This paper offers a detailed reconstruction of Frege’s theory of side-thoughts and its relation to other parts of his pragmatics, most notably to the notion of colouring, to the notion of presupposition, and to his implicit notion of multi-propositionality. I also highlight some important differences between the subsemantic categories employed by Frege and those used in contemporary pragmatics.

ABSTRACT:Although the literature on multi-stakeholder initiatives for sustainability has grown in recent years, it is scattered across several academic fields, making it hard to ascertain how individual disciplines, such as business ethics, can further contribute to the debate. Based on an extensive review of the literature on certification and principle-based MSIs for sustainability, we show that the scholarly debate rests on three broad themes : theinputinto creating and governing MSIs; theinstitutionalizationof MSIs; and theimpactthat relevant initiatives create. While our discussion (...) reveals the theoretical underpinnings of the 3Is, it also shows that a number of research challenges related to business ethics remain unaddressed. We unpack these challenges and suggest how scholars can utilize theoretical insights in business ethics to push the boundaries of the field. Finally, we also discuss what business ethics research can gain from theory development in the MSI field. (shrink)

The possibility of multi-location—of one entity having more than one exact location—is required by several metaphysical theories such as the immanentist theory of universals and three-dimensionalism about persistence. One of the most pressing challenges for multi-location theorists is that of making sense of exact location—in that extant definitions of exact location entail a principle called ‘functionality’, according to which nothing can have more than one exact location. Recently in a number of promising papers, Antony Eagle has proposed and (...) defended a definition of exact location in terms of weak location that does not entail functionality. This paper provides the first thorough assessment of Eagle’s proposal. In particular, we argue that it cannot account for the location of immanent universals, the multi-location of mereologically changing three-dimensional objects, the multi-location of mereologically complex objects, and that it makes extended simples impossible. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Global multi-stakeholder initiatives are important instruments that have the potential to improve the social and environmental sustainability of global supply chains. However, they often fail to comprehensively address the needs and interests of various supply-chain participants. While voluntary in nature, MSIs have most often been implemented through coercive approaches, resulting in friction among their participants and in systemic problems with decoupling. Additionally, in those cases in which deliberation was constrained between and amongst participants, collaborative approaches have often failed to (...) materialize. Our framework focuses on two key aspects of these breakdowns: assumptions about the orientation of MSI participants, and the deliberation processes that participants use to engage with each other to create these initiatives and sustain them over time. Drawing from stakeholder and deliberation theories, we revisit the concept of MSIs and show how their deliberative capacity may be enhanced in order to encourage participants to collaborate voluntarily. (shrink)

Responsible research practices are critical to maintaining integrity in research and the provision of institutional trainings is an important means of promoting research integrity. However, studies show contrasting results on the efficacy of institutional training and that these approaches may not be fully effective in promoting research integrity among individuals and improving the overall climate in research integrity. Therefore, a more comprehensive multi-dimensional learning strategy seems to be needed. This includes continuous and tailored training at different institutional levels, the (...) incorporation of training sessions focusing on the development of the moral character of researchers, and the use of different mentoring practices. With this comprehensive approach, research institutions can foster a culture of integrity in research, improve the overall research integrity climate and promote responsible research practices by individuals. (shrink)

Multi-modal integration, which combines multiple neurophysiological signals, is gaining more attention for its potential to supplement single modality’s drawbacks and yield reliable results by extracting complementary features. In particular, integration of electroencephalography and functional near-infrared spectroscopy is cost-effective and portable, and therefore is a fascinating approach to brain-computer interface. However, outcomes from the integration of these two modalities have yielded only modest improvement in BCI performance because of the lack of approaches to integrate the two different features. In addition, (...) mismatch of recording locations may hinder further improvement. In this literature review, we surveyed studies of the integration of EEG/fNIRS in BCI thoroughly and discussed its current limitations. We also suggested future directions for efficient and successful multi-modal integration of EEG/fNIRS in BCI systems. (shrink)

Attempts to understand farmer conservation behavior based on quantitative socio-demographic, attitude, and awareness variables have been largely inconclusive. In order to understand fully how farmers are making conservation decisions, 32 in-depth interviews were conducted in the Eagle Creek watershed in central Indiana. Coding for environmental attitudes and practice adoption revealed several dominant themes, representing multi-dimensional aspects of environmental attitudes. Farmers who were motivated by off-farm environmental benefits and those who identified responsibilities to others (stewardship) were most likely to adopt (...) conservation practices. Those farmers who focused on the farm as business and were most concerned about profitability were less likely to adopt practices. The notion of environmental stewardship in particular was found to be much more complex than the way it is traditionally measured in quantitative studies. The interplay between on-farm and off-farm benefits to practice adoption is an issue that quantitative studies largely do not address. This study seeks to increase understanding of farmers’ environmental attitudes and the connections to conservation behavior. (shrink)

Mohandas Karamchand “Mahatma” Gandhi discussed corporate responsibility and business ethics over several decades of the twentieth century. His views are still influential in modern India. In this paper, we highlight Gandhi’s cross-level CR framework, which operates at institutional, organizational, and individual levels. We also outline how the Tata Group, one of India’s largest conglomerates, has historically applied and continues to utilize Gandhi’s concept of trusteeship. We then compare Gandhi’s framework to modern notions of stakeholder and stewardship management. We conclude that (...) trusteeship has strong potential to help firms and their stakeholders achieve shared value by considering the interactions between individual, organizational, and institutional factors, and paying attention to a range of multi-level stakeholder obligations. (shrink)

Where does agency lie in musical performance? How is it expressed? Recent music scholarship has highlighted an increasingly prominent tendency to conceive of agency as not confined to any one individual or type of individual, instead being distributed across diverse individuals that can be found occupying performance situations. . This article uses two ‘percussion’ works from the 1970s by the composer John Cage, Child of Tree (1975) and its multi-performer elaboration Branches (1976), as a foil for engaging with these (...) practical and theoretical musical concerns, and for suggesting some heretofore underappreciated distinctions within the ongoing work on multi-agential performance. (shrink)

Do multi-level selection explanations of the evolution of social traits deepen the understanding provided by single-level explanations? Central to the former is a mathematical theorem, the multi-level Price decomposition. I build a framework through which to understand the explanatory role of such non-empirical decompositions in scientific practice. Applying this general framework to the present case places two tasks on the agenda. The first task is to distinguish the various ways of suppressing within-collective variation in fitness, and moreover to (...) evaluate their biological interest. I distinguish four such ways: increasing retaliatory capacity, homogenising assortment, and collapsing either fitness structure or character distribution to a mean value. The second task is to discover whether the third term of the Price decomposition measures the effect of any of these hypothetical interventions. On this basis I argue that the multi-level Price decomposition has explanatory value primarily when the sharing-out of collective resources is `subtractable'. Thus its value is more circumscribed than its champions Sober and Wilson (1998) suppose. (shrink)

In the recent literature, it has been shown that the wave function in the de Broglie–Bohm theory can be regarded as a new kind of field, i.e., a "multi-field", in three-dimensional space. In this paper, I argue that the natural framework for the multi-field is the original second-order Bohm’s theory. In this context, it is possible: i) to construe the multi-field as a real-valued scalar field; ii) to explain the physical interaction between the multi-field and the (...) Bohmian particles; and iii) to clarify the status of the energy-momentum conservation and the dynamics of the theory. (shrink)

It is a familiar point that many ordinary dispositions are multi-track, that is, not fully and adequately characterisable by a single conditional. In this paper, I argue that both the extent and the implications of this point have been severely underestimated. First, I provide new arguments to show that every disposition whose stimulus condition is a determinable quantity must be infinitely multi-track. Secondly, I argue that this result should incline us to move away from the standard assumption that (...) dispositions are in some way importantly linked to conditionals, as presupposed by the debate about various versions of the ‘conditional analysis’ of dispositions. I introduce an alternative conception of dispositionality, which is motivated by linguistic observations about dispositional adjectives and links dispositions to possibility instead of conditionals. I argue that, because of the multi-track nature of dispositions, the possibility-based conception of dispositions is to be preferred. (shrink)

Humans communicate with different modalities. We offer an account of multi-modal meaning coordination, taking speech-gesture meaning coordination as a prototypical case. We argue that temporal synchrony (plus prosody) does not determine how to coordinate speech meaning and gesture meaning. Challenging cases are asynchrony and broadcasting cases, which are illustrated with empirical data. We propose that a process algebra account satisfies the desiderata. It models gesture and speech as independent but concurrent processes that can communicate flexibly with each other and (...) exchange the same information more than once. The account utilizes the ψ-calculus, allowing for agents, input-output-channels, concurrent processes, and data transport of typed λ-terms. A multi-modal meaning is produced integrating speech meaning and gesture meaning into one semantic package. Two cases of meaning coordination are handled in some detail: the asynchrony between gesture and speech, and the broadcasting of gesture meaning across several dialogue contributions. This account can be generalized to other cases of multi-modal meaning. (shrink)

In this introductory article to the special issue on Multi-level semiosis we attempt to stage the background for qualifying the notion of “multi-levelness” when considering communication processes and semiosis in all life forms, i.e. from the cellular to the organismic level. While structures are organized hierarchically, communication processes require a kind of processual organization that may be better described as being heterarchical. Theoretically, the challenge arises in the temporal domain, that is, in the developmental and evolutionary dimension of (...) dynamic semiotic processes. We discuss the importance of this fundamental difference in order to explain how levels, domains and orders of magnitude, on the one hand, and synchronic and diachronic processes, on the other, contribute to the overall organization of every living being. To account for such multi-level organization, semiotic freedom is assumed to be a scalar property that endows living systems at different levels and domains with the capacity to ponder selectively the overall structural coherence and functional compatibility of their heterarchical processing, which is increasingly less conditioned by the underlying molecular determinism. (shrink)

In this paper we argue that awareness comes in degrees, and we propose a novel multi-factor account that spans both subjective experiences and perceptual representations. At the subjective level, we argue that conscious experiences can be degraded by being fragmented, less salient, too generic, or flash-like. At the representational level, we identify corresponding features of perceptual representations—their availability for working memory, intensity, precision, and stability—and argue that the mechanisms that affect these features are what ultimately modulate the degree of (...) awareness. We conclude the paper by demonstrating why the original interpretations of certain empirical findings that apparently pose problems for our account are, in fact, flawed. (shrink)

My essay, “Multi-modal argumentation” was published in the journal, _Philosophy of the Social Sciences,_ in 1994. This information appeared again in my book, _Coalescent argumentation_ in 1997. In the ensuing twenty years, there have been many changes in argumentation theory, and I would like to take this opportunity to examine my now middle-aged theory in light of the developments in our discipline. I will begin by relating how a once keen intended lawyer and then formal logician ended up in (...) argumentation theory. (If you do not care to read this bit of autobiography, skip to Section 2). (shrink)

The legitimacy of multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) as institutions for social and environmental governance in the global economy has received much scholarly attention over the past years. To date, however, research has yet to focus on assessing the legitimacy of MSIs in their interactions with other actors within larger systems of deliberation. Drawing on the deliberative systems perspective developed within deliberative democracy theory, we theorise a normative framework to evaluate the roles of MSIs within the broader systems of governance they (...) co-construct through their interactions with other initiatives, governments, non-governmental organisations, and other external actors. As we demonstrate in our evaluation of the illustrative case of the Bangladesh Accord on Fire and Building Safety as a MSI in the context of the Bangladeshi garment industry, this framework can help researchers assess whether a MSI ultimately serves to enhance or undermine the deliberative legitimacy of the overall system of which it forms a part. (shrink)

In the present article, we introduce a multi-type display calculus for dynamic epistemic logic, which we refer to as Dynamic Calculus. The display approach is suitable to modularly chart the space of dynamic epistemic logics on weaker-than-classical propositional base. The presence of types endows the language of the Dynamic Calculus with additional expressivity, allows for a smooth proof-theoretic treatment, and paves the way towards a general methodology for the design of proof systems for the generality of dynamic logics, and (...) certainly beyond dynamic epistemic logic. We prove that the Dynamic Calculus adequately captures Baltag–Moss–Solecki's dynamic epistemic logic, and enjoys Belnap-style cut elimination. (shrink)

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders has elicited numerous criticisms throughout its history. Its particularly controversial status has not been resolved by the recent release of the DSM-5 ; rather, the new edition has amplified debates in psychiatry as well as philosophy and the wider public. To a certain extent, such controversies are to be expected because of the influential role the DSM plays in science and health care. Researchers have often been required to use the DSM classification (...) to get funded and published, clinicians need to use it for diagnosis, and patients need a DSM code to get reimbursed for treatment.1 Classification in psychiatry shapes the course of research... (shrink)

The problem of multi-peer disagreement concerns the reasonable response to a situation in which you believe P1 … Pn and disagree with a group of ‘epistemic peers’ of yours, who believe ∼P1 … ∼Pn, respectively. However, the problem of multi-peer disagreement is a variant on the preface paradox; because of this the problem poses no challenge to the so-called ‘steadfast view’ in the epistemology of disagreement, on which it is sometimes reasonable to believe P in the face of (...) peer disagreement about P. After some terminology is defined (§1), Peter van Inwagen's challenge to the steadfast view will be presented (§2). The preface paradox will then be presented and diagnosed (§3), and it will be argued that van Inwagen's challenge relies on the same principle that generates the preface paradox (§4). The reasonable response to multi-peer disagreement will be discussed (§5), and an objection addressed (§6). (shrink)

Over the last twenty years, in all of these neighbouring fields, modal systems have been developed that we call multi-dimensional. (Our definition of multi ...

This article explores the meaning and relevance of the ‘Idea of Europe’ in the context of a multicultural and multi-ethnic continent that increasingly draws on the presence and practices of people from non-European backgrounds. The Idea of Europe, even in its contemporary use, remains an ideal based on a Christian-Enlightenment-Romantic heritage, mobilized by supporters of European integration as the bridge between diverse European national cultures. In a Europe of extraordinary cultural interchange and immigration from all corners of the world, (...) the classical Idea of Europe is strikingly exclusionary and backward looking – a poor motif for the future. The article tries to develop an alternative Idea of Europe, one based on a particular politics of the public domain and a particular ethos of belonging in Europe seen as a migrant space, rather than one based on the enduring cultural values of a body of people called Europeans. It outlines a commons, protected by appropriate EU-level rights, that can both support and bind cultural pluralism and difference, and it proposes democratic vitalism as Europe’s core political project, an idea of becoming European, read as the process of never-settled cultural invention resulting from the vibrant clashes of an equal and empowered multiple public. No myth of origin, no myth of destination, only the commitment to a plural demos. (shrink)

We develop and test a trickle-down model of how authentic leadership at the department level flows down the organizational hierarchy to encourage team leader authentic leadership and consequently, promotes team and individual-level supervisor-directed helping behavior. Analyses of multi-level and multi-source data collected from a total of 487 employees comprising 122 teams, 47 departments, and 4 different working areas of a major public sector organization in Taiwan show that team leaders’ authentic leadership mediates the relationship between departmental authentic leadership (...) and individual-level leader–member exchange. We also found that intra-team trust completely mediates the influence of team authentic leadership on both team helping behavior and individual-level supervisor-directed helping behavior. Finally, the results reveal that self-concordance mediates the influence of team authentic leadership on individual-level supervisor helping behavior as well as the influence of individual-level LMX on individual-level supervisor-directed helping behavior. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed. (shrink)

In his PhD proposal, now published as Seeing Sociological, Garfinkel [2006] formulated action in terms of a mutually constitutive structure—the Noesis-Noema Structures. This structure can be traced to Aaron Gurwitsch’s gestalt psychology and Law of Good Gestalt which theorises how participants prioritise functional Gestalts over other possible meanings of what is perceivable in their surroundings. While Gurwitsch illustrated his theory using images, in this paper we revisit Gurwitsch’s theory in light of the advances in recording real-time interaction to consider Gestalt (...) in spatio-temporality of real-time interaction. We consider the Law of Good Gestalt in terms of the dimensions of time and space, and postulate two analytical principles—the Principle of Good Momentary Gestalt and the Principle of Good Temporal Gestalt—for analysing a multi-angle video segment of a monologue taken from a training event. The analysis examines how the monologue was embedded in a multi-layer projection structure, so that during the time of the monologue, the trainer and trainees can be seen as achieving a transition between one activity to another while sustaining the frame of the training event. Through this, the analysis highlights the multi-layered structure of participants’ field of perception that constitutes their experience of the social activity, and explores a “method” to reconstruct such a structured field of perception through re-coupling meanings to the assemblages of multimodal resources recoverable on video. (shrink)

In this paper I revive two important formal approaches to the interpretation of natural language, that of Montague and that of Karttunen and Peters. Armed with insights from dynamic semantics (Heim, Krifka) the two turn out to stand up against age-old criticisms in an orthodox fashion. The plan is mainly methodological, as I only want to illustrate the technical feasibility of the revived proposals. Even so, there are illuminating and welcome empirical consequences on the subject of scope islands (as discussed (...) by Abusch and Kratzer, among many others), as well as unintended theoretical implications in the contextualist debate (Grice, Recanati, Simons, Stanley, and many others again). (shrink)

The ‘adjustment strategy’ currently seems to be the most common approach to incorporating objective elements into one's theory of well‐being. These theories face a certain problem, however, which can be avoided by a different approach – namely, that employed by ‘partially objective multi‐component theories.’ Several such theories have recently been proposed, but the question of how to understand their mathematical structure has not been adequately addressed. I argue that the most mathematically simple of these multi‐component theories fails, so (...) I proceed to investigate more sophisticated ways to formulate such a theory. I conclude that one of these – the Discount/Inflation Theory – is particularly promising. (shrink)

Worldwide we see the rise of new non-state, ?multi-stakeholder? organizations setting standards for socially and environmentally responsible practices. A multi-stakeholder organization builds on the idea of assembling actors from diverse societal spheres into one rule-setting process, thereby combining their resources, competences, and experiences. These processes also allow competing interests to negotiate and deliberate about their different concerns in global political and ethical matters. This paper analyzes multi-stakeholder dynamics within three global standard setters: the Forest Stewardship Council, the (...) Marine Stewardship Council, and the work of the International Organization for Standardization on social responsibility (ISO 26000). Although the multi-stakeholder organizational form facilitates the establishment of transnational non-state authority, this very structure could also result in fragility. The key aim of this paper is to elaborate on this fragility with specific focus on how participatory aspects within a multi-stakeholder context both contribute to and destabilize the authority of the multi-stakeholder organization. The paper contributes theoretically to current discussions about transnational governance in the making, and more specifically it adds nuance to the discussion about the fragility of non-state authority as well as a critical perspective to the literature on multi-stakeholder arrangements. (shrink)

In modern zoos, enrichment programs have become a standard part of animal care routines. Although 'higher' primates usually receive complex enrichment programs, encompassing many types of enrichment, these are less common for prosimians. These animals often largely receive food-based enrichment, as was previously the case at Auckland Zoo, where the ring-tailed lemur enrichment schedule contained only three different items, all food-related. Lemurs tend to be considered less curious and quick to learn than other primates, as well as being less manually (...) dextrous, and for these reasons can be overlooked for complex enrichment. However, they have strong sensory abilities, in particular an acute sense of smell (Sauther et al 1999). This paper describes an enrichment program designed for the lemurs at Auckland Zoo with the aim of stimulating all senses. (shrink)

Background Encounters of moral distress have long-term consequences on healthcare workers’ physical and mental health, leading to job dissatisfaction, reduced patient care, and high levels of burnout, exhaustion, and intentions to quit. Yet, research on approaches to ameliorate moral distress across the health workforce is limited. Research Objective The aim of our study was to qualitatively explore multi-professional perspectives of healthcare social workers, chaplains, and patient liaisons on ways to reduce moral distress and heighten well-being at a southern U.S. (...) academic medical center. Participants & Research Context Purposive sampling and chain-referral methods assisted with recruitment through hospital listservs, staff meetings, and newsletters. Interested participants contacted the principal investigator and all interviews were conducted in-person. Consent was attained prior to interviews. All interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. Research Design Directed content analysis was used to deductively organize codes and to develop themes in conjunction with the National Academy of Medicine’s National Plan for Health Workforce Well-Being. Rigor was attained through peer-debriefing, data triangulation methods, and frequent research team meetings. Ethical Considerations Ethics approval was obtained from the university and medical center institutional review boards. Findings Themes demonstrate that rather than offering interventions in the aftermath of moral distress, multilevel daily practices ought to be considered that pre-emptively identify and reduce morally distressing encounters through (1) the care team, (2) management and leadership, and (3) the health care industry. Strategies include interdisciplinary decision-making, trusting managerial relationships, and organizational policies and practices that explicitly invest in mental health promotion and diverse leadership opportunities. Conclusion Moral distress interventions ought to target short-term stress reactions while also addressing the long-term impacts of moral residue. Health systems must financially commit to an ethical workplace culture that explicitly values mental health and well-being. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI) has garnered tremendous attention in health care, and many hope that AI can enhance our health system’s ability to care for people with chronic and degenerative conditions, including Parkinson’s Disease (PD). This paper reports the themes and lessons derived from a qualitative study with people living with PD, family caregivers, and health care providers regarding the ethical dimensions of using AI to monitor, assess, and predict PD symptoms and progression. Thematic analysis identified ethical concerns at four intersecting (...) levels: personal, interpersonal, professional/institutional, and societal levels. Reflecting on potential benefits of predictive algorithms that can continuously collect and process longitudinal data, participants expressed a desire for more timely, ongoing, and accurate information that could enhance management of day-to-day fluctuations and facilitate clinical and personal care as their disease progresses. Nonetheless, they voiced concerns about intersecting ethical questions around evolving illness identities, familial and professional care relationships, privacy, and data ownership/governance. The multi-layer analysis provides a helpful way to understand the ethics of using AI in monitoring and managing PD and other chronic/degenerative conditions. (shrink)

The gap between the decision to engage in physical activity and subsequent behavioral enactment is considerable for many. Action control theories focus on this discordance in an attempt to improve the translation of intention into behavior. The purpose of this mini-review was to overview one of these approaches, the multi-process action control framework, which has evolved from a collection of previous works. The main concepts and operational structure of M-PAC was overviewed followed by applications of the framework in physical (...) activity, and concluded with unanswered questions, limitations, and possibilities for future research. In M-PAC, it is suggested that three layered processes build upon each other from the formation of an intention to a sustained profile of physical activity action control. Intention-behavior discordance is because of strategic challenges in goal pursuit and automatic tendencies. Regulatory processes are employed to hold the relationship between reflective processes and behavior concordant by countering these strategic challenges and automatic tendencies until the development of reflexive processes begin to co-determine action control. Results from 29 observational and preliminary experimental studies generally support the proposed M-PAC framework. Future research is needed to explore the temporal dynamic between reflexive and regulatory constructs, and implement M-PAC interventions in different forms, and at different levels of scale. (shrink)

This article attempts to study cost minimizing multi-objective fractional solid transportation problem with fuzzy cost coefficients c ˜ i j k r {\tilde{c}}_{ijk}^{r}, fuzzy supply quantities a ˜ i {\tilde{a}}_{i}, fuzzy demands b ˜ j {\tilde{b}}_{j}, and/or fuzzy conveyances e ˜ k {\tilde{e}}_{k}. The fuzzy efficient concept is introduced in which the crisp efficient solution is extended. A necessary and sufficient condition for the solution is established. Fuzzy geometric programming approach is applied to solve the crisp problem by defining (...) membership function so as to obtain the optimal compromise solution of a multi-objective two-stage problem. A linear membership function for the objective function is defined. The stability set of the first kind is defined and determined. A numerical example is given for illustration and to check the validity of the proposed approach. (shrink)

In this paper, we define correlation coefficient measure between any two rough neutrosophic sets. We also prove some of its basic properties.. We develop a new multiple attribute group decision making method based on the proposed correlation coefficient measure. An illustrative example of medical diagnosis is solved to demonstrate the applicability and effecriveness of the proposed method.

This paper aims to review the empirical and theoretical research on engineering ethics education, by focusing on the challenges reported in the literature. The analysis is conducted at four levels of the engineering education system. First, the individual level is dedicated to findings about teaching practices reported by instructors. Second, the institutional level brings together findings about the implementation and presence of ethics within engineering programmes. Third, the level of policy situates findings about engineering ethics education in the context of (...) accreditation. Finally, there is the level of the culture of engineering education. The multi-level analysis allows us to address some of the limitations of higher education research which tends to focus on individual actors such as instructors or remains focused on the levels of policy and practice without examining the deeper levels of paradigm and purpose guiding them. Our approach links some of the challenges of engineering ethics education with wider debates about its guiding paradigms. The main contribution of the paper is to situate the analysis of the theoretical and empirical findings reported in the literature on engineering ethics education in the context of broader discussions about the purpose of engineering education and the aims of reform programmes. We conclude by putting forward a series of recommendations for a socio-technical oriented reform of engineering education for ethics. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article studies multi-stakeholder initiatives as spaces for both deliberation and contestation between constituencies with competing discourses and disputed values, beliefs, and preferences. We review different theoretical perspectives on MSIs, which see them mainly as spaces to find solutions to market problems, as spaces of conflict and bargaining, or as spaces of consensus. In contrast, we build on a contestatory deliberative perspective, which gives equal value to both contestation and consensus. We identify four types of internal contestation which can (...) be present in MSIs—procedural, inclusiveness, epistemic, and ultimate-goal—and argue that embracing contestation and engaging in ongoing revision of provisional agreements, criteria, and goals can enhance the democratic quality of MSIs. Finally, we explore the implications of this perspective for theorizing about the democratic quality in MSIs and about the role of corporations in transnational governance. (shrink)

The paper draws its inspiration from the provocation which Merton offered sociology both to engage with empirical data and to perform analyses adequate to guide intervention beyond the particular case. Whilst contemporary STS is very different both in its models of theory and its forms of methodology, this paper suggests Merton's concerns with engagement and adequacy provide a useful way to interrogate current approaches. Specifically, the paper explores some recent anthropological conceptions of ethnographic fieldwork that have provided potent models for (...) the study of scientific and technological cultures. These multi-sited approaches have also provided the opportunity to develop new notions of intervention and explore alternative ways of making contributions to development of theory and practice. In the process of pursuing the goals of engagement and adequacy notions of ethnography have however become stretched. This sense of detachment from methodological canons accentuates the need for methodological debate and skill-sharing in STS. (shrink)

Non-deterministic matrices are multiple-valued structures in which the value assigned by a valuation to a complex formula can be chosen non-deterministically out of a certain nonempty set of options. We consider two different types of semantics which are based on Nmatrices: the dynamic one and the static one . We use the Rasiowa-Sikorski decomposition methodology to get sound and complete proof systems employing finite sets of mv-signed formulas for all propositional logics based on such structures with either of the above (...) types of semantics. Later we demonstrate how these systems can be converted into cut-free ordinary Gentzen calculi which are also sound and complete for the corresponding non-deterministic semantics. As a by-product, we get new semantic characterizations for some well-known logics. (shrink)

To address the prevalence and complexities of sustainable development challenges around the world, organizations in the business, government, and non-profit sectors are increasingly collaborating via multi-stakeholder partnerships. Because complex problems can be neither understood nor addressed by a single organization, it is necessary to bring together the knowledge and resources of many stakeholders. Yet, how these partnerships coordinate their collaborative activities to achieve mutual and organization-specific goals is not well understood. This study takes an organization design perspective of collaborative (...) decision-making processes to explore how they impact the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder partnerships. We compare the decision-making processes of 94 sustainability-focused multi-stakeholder partnerships and find that collaborative decision-making has an indirect and positive impact on partnership capacity through systems that keep partners informed, coordinate partner interactions, and facilitate ongoing learning. The implications of this study for multi-stakeholder partnership research and practice are that partnership capacity is contingent on the design of decision-making processes, as well as internal mechanisms that coordinate and monitor collaborative activities. (shrink)

Despite the burgeoning literature on the governance and impact of cross-sector partnerships in the past two decades, the debate on how and when these collaborative arrangements address globally relevant problems and contribute to systemic change remains open. Building upon the notion of wicked problems and the literature on governing such wicked problems, this paper defines harnessing problems in multi-stakeholder partnerships as the approach of taking into account the nature of the problem and of organizing governance processes accordingly. The paper (...) develops an innovative analytical framework that conceptualizes MSPs in terms of three governance processes harnessing three key dimensions of wicked problems. The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil provides an illustrative case study on how this analytical framework describes and explains organizational change in partnerships from a problem-based perspective. The framework can be used to better understand and predict the complex relationships between MSP governance processes, systemic change and societal problems, but also as a guiding tool in organizing governance processes to continuously re-assess the problems over time and address them accordingly. (shrink)

Multi-stakeholder initiatives claim to make production of commodities more socially and environmentally sustainable by regulating their members and through systems of certification. These claims, however, are highly contested. In this article, I examine how actors use MSI regulation with regard to land conflicts with a focus on the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. MSIs are a resource that actors in land conflicts can use to generate evidence that gives them leverage in their negotiations. To do so, actors employ the (...) interrelations between two kinds of land conflict: localized land conflicts between local land users, and disputes between more distant actors over aggregated land-use related to the sustainability of palm oil production. To demonstrate this, I use the notion of assemblage in two case studies from Sumatra, Indonesia. Thinking in terms of assemblage allows the contradictory but interrelated practices that shape MSIs to be understood. In distinct locally embedded processes, actors enact MSIs in contexts of unequal power relations, from which MSI governance emerges. The way in which access to an MSI is distributed among contending actors shapes MSI enactments and thus its governance. The unequal distribution of access to the RSPO results in a governance that favors companies over communities. (shrink)

This is an excerpt from a report that highlights and explores five questions which arose from the workshop on perceptual learning and perceptual recognition at the University of Toronto, Mississauga on May 10th and 11th, 2012. This excerpt explores the question: Does our representation of time provide and amodal framework for multi-sensory integration?

In recent years, much discussion has taken place regarding the social role of firms and their responsibilities to society. In this context, the role of universities is crucial, as it may shape management students’ attitudes and provide them with the necessary knowledge, skills and critical analysis to make decisions as consumers and future professionals. We emphasise that universities are multi-level learning environments, so there is a need to look beyond formal curricular content and pay more attention to implicit dimensions (...) of the learning process in order to create significant learning. With this in mind, we propose an integrative and holistic approach to guide the integration of ethics, corporate social responsibility and sustainability in management education that aims to improve students’ knowledge and attitudes. In this model, we consider three interdependent levels of analysis–the institutional level, the curricular level and the instrumental level–which together produce a leverage effect on student learning. For each level, we identify the main issues and aspects that need to be considered, based on an extensive literature review in this field. (shrink)

Sustainable entrepreneurship is a vital and growing area of entrepreneurship studies. Although charged with multiple potentially conflicting discourses, sustainable entrepreneurship is usually viewed from a binary logic of business versus sustainability. This article uses an aesthetic process approach to sustainable entrepreneurship to move beyond this binary logic and unearth the tensions between multiple discourses. The authors introduce the construct of embodied multi-discursivity that addresses this issue methodologically as well as conceptually. By combining discourse analysis with aesthetic inquiry, the article (...) pushes the boundaries of “traditional” qualitative methods. The aim is to encourage sustainable entrepreneurship scholars to expand their methodological horizon to capture the emotionally charged, value-laden processes they study. Embodied multi-discursivity shows how multi-discursive processes of entrepreneurship come into being, how they are disrupted, and how they can break into a duality that ignores the variety of discourses. The authors conclude by drawing some implications for sustainable entrepreneurship. (shrink)

In this paper, the sine, cosine and cotangent similarity measures of interval rough neutrosophic sets is proposed. Some properties of the proposed measures are discussed. We have proposed multi attribute decision making approaches based on proposed similarity measures. To demonstrate the applicability, a numerical example is solved.

Projections of future climate change cannot rely on a single model. It has become common to rely on multiple simulations generated by Multi-Model Ensembles (MMEs), especially to quantify the uncertainty about what would constitute an adequate model structure. But, as Parker points out (2018), one of the remaining philosophically interesting questions is: “How can ensemble studies be designed so that they probe uncertainty in desired ways?” This paper offers two interpretations of what General Circulation Models (GCMs) are and how (...) MMEs made of GCMs should be designed. In the first interpretation, models are combinations of modules and parameterisations; an MME is obtained by “plugging and playing” with interchangeable modules and parameterisations. In the second interpretation, models are aggregations of expert judgements that result from a history of epistemic decisions made by scientists about the choice of representations; an MME is a sampling of expert judgements from modelling teams. We argue that, while the two interpretations involve distinct domains from philosophy of science and social epistemology, they both could be used in a complementary manner in order to explore ways of designing better MMEs. (shrink)

Drug development regularly has to deal with complex circumstances on two levels: the local level of pharmacological intervention on specific target proteins, and the systems level of the effects of pharmacological intervention on the organism. Different development strategies in the recent history of early drug development can be understood as competing attempts at coming to grips with these multi-level complexities. Both rational drug design and high-throughput screening concentrate on the local level, while traditional empirical search strategies as well as (...) recent systems biology approaches focus on the systems level. The analysis of these strategies reveals serious obstacles to integrating the study of interventive and systems complexity in a systematic, methodical way. Due to some fairly general properties of biological networks and the available options for pharmaceutical intervention, drug development is captured in an obstinate methodological dilemma. It is argued that at least in typical cases, drug development therefore remains dependent on coincidence, serendipity or plain luck to bridge the gap between development methodology and actual therapeutic success. (shrink)

Massively multiplayer online games are not merely electronic communication systems based on computational databases, but also include artificial intelligence that possesses complex, dynamic structure. Each visible action taken by a component of the multi-agent system appears simple, but is supported by vastly more sophisticated invisible processes. A rough outline of the typical hierarchy has four levels: interaction between two individuals, each either human or artificial, conflict between teams of agents who cooperate with fellow team members, enduring social-cultural groups that (...) seek to accomplish shared goals, and large-scale cultural traditions, often separated into virtual geographic regions. In many MMOs, both magic and religion are represented, in ways that harmonize with a social-scientific theory that defines them in terms of specific versus general psychological compensators. This article draws empirical examples from five diverse MMOs: Dark Age of Camelot, Dungeons and Dragons Online, World of Warcraft, A Tale in the Desert and Gods and Heroes. (shrink)