Both jianxing 践形 (taking on proper appearance) and jianxing 践行 (putting into practice) were concepts coined by Confucians before the Qin Dynasty. They largely referred to similar things. But because the Daxue 大学 ( Great Learning ) was listed as one of the Sishu 四书 (The Four Books) during the Song Dynasty, different explanations and trends in terms of the Great Learning resulted in taking on proper appearance and putting into practice becoming two different systems of efforts. The (...) former formed a vertical kind of representation and a complete system of practice by developing the sincerity of intentions inside and taking on proper appearance and looks outside in shendu æ Žç‹¬ (self-discipline when alone) and chengyi 诚意 (developing the sincerity of intentions), and the latter developed into a horizontal system of practice through the interdependency of zhi 知 (knowing or knowledge) and xing 行 (doing or practice). The interdependence between knowledge and practice promoted by the Cheng brothers and Zhu Xi represented the vertical practice of moral understanding, while the integration of knowing and doing advocated by Wang Yangming represented using the way in developing the sincerity of intentions to adjust and transform the representation of the relationship between knowledge and practice. The ideas that were frequently stressed, such as the same effort and naturally being so, were all from developing the sincerity of intentions and taking on proper appearance, and they were all the representation of really making intentions sincere. In fact, the confusion over the integration of knowing and doing reflected the tension between two different systems and inconsistency in their thoughts. (shrink)

The phenomenon of corruption as a type of crime is immanently inherent in social and political reality. Sociality as a trans-societal universal form of human community is the environment in which corruption ties are born and function. The socio-political structure is organized as a collective effort, on the one hand, it overcomes disintegration, and on the other, it generates corrupt behaviour patterns. Corruption models of behaviour have an extremely wide scale of distribution and are characterized by active institutional expansion into (...) various spheres and institutions of modern society, they feed business relations and administrative activities, covering huge masses of the population. In this sense, their study is extremely important and relevant. (shrink)

Well-developed educational system leads to a strong country. The Chinese government has emphasized and clarified the priority of developing the Chinese educational system, and it has accelerated efforts to modernize it to position China as one of the world leaders in education. This essay discusses the priority of developing the Chinese educational system, and it outlines the main factors for the construction of a modern theoretical system of education with Chinese characteristics. It argues that this construction should be based (...) on the actual practice of education in China in the new era, it should be deeply rooted in the methods and wisdom of traditional Chinese education, it should incorporate the educational ideology and concepts nurtured by the modern Chinese revolutionary culture, it should draw on the latest scientific advancements and achievements throughout the world and keep pace with the development of the times, and, finally, it should be informed by the study of the nature and development of human beings with special attention to the theoretical issues embedded in educational activities themselves, which relate to the deepest levels of a philosophical worldview. (shrink)

This article offers a thorough and critical reading of Husserl’s Thing and Space. This reading is principally motivated by the effort to methodologically design a phenomenological–topological approach to the research of lived sonic environments. In this book, Husserl lays foundations of phenomenological topology by understanding perceptions as places and defining, consequently, the space as a system of places. The critical reading starts with pointing out the ambiguity of location in Thing and Space, which consists mainly in the insufficient implementation of (...) the distinction between the location and the localization. Further investigations then reveal the roots of this ambiguity in both the preference of visual perception and the omission of subjective aspects of kinesthesia. The article critically examines Husserl’s notion of the appended localization that expresses the marginalization of acoustic experience. In conclusion, the article utilizes the critical findings to formulate the project of a place-based, medium-centered, and multi-sensory approach to sonic environments. (shrink)

ANNOTATION Sardak S.E. Global Regulatory System of Human Resources Development. – Manuscript. Thesis for the Doctor of Economic Science academic degree with major in 08.00.02 – World Economy and international economic relations. – SHEE «Kyiv National Economic University named after Vadym Hetman», Kyiv, 2014. The preconditions and factors of the global economic system with the identified relevant subjects areas and mechanisms of regulation instruments have been investigated. The crucial role of humans in the global economic system as a key factor (...) of production, the main resource, the producer and the consumer of economic and social benefits that are exposed to global threats, problems, challenges, trends and subjects has been confirmed. There have been revealed the causes and consequences of the public institutions transformation under the influence of globalization, which formed a qualitatively new conditions for social and economic development that determine the need for further changes in the areas of conceptual guideline for the management of human resources development, optimization of tasks, state and international institutions activity forms, integration of efforts as for monitoring, planning and forecasting. The modern major instruments and spheres of international cooperation to ensure human development have been determined. The integrated characteristic of human resources and their role in social development both from the standpoint of their use in labour processes and as a medium of civilization and social utility with the help of the categorical classification system organizing and expanding which enables to design and apply the appropriate approaches at all managerial levels have been defined. The necessity and the concept of human resources development in the context of the content of managerial influence identifying (self-development, self-management and external control of development) at different administrative levels that ensures the growth of human capital to the limits of its potential have been analysed. The survey of human activity system aspects in the global world, taking into account the parametrization of the global environment, its structure, management and development have been realized. The formed methodology principles of managerial influence on the development of human resources with scientific schools, hardness degrees, available models, research and providing theoretical and practical implementation peculiarities for groups of countries and territories of the world taken into consideration have been examined. There have been noted civilization and national differences in the forms of managerial influence on the development of human resources, which lead to the formation of human resources development national control systems conditioned by different value public strategic guidelines, especially in relation to social security, education, national management and state migration policy. The current and future requirements for global human resources development which are proposed to be achieved by the development and formalization of global civilizational paradigm of social development due to social coordination interaction have been given. The influence of the institute of state on the human resources development has been evaluated and it has been proved that in the beginning of the XXI century in the global environment the institute of state is the ultimate guarantor of its citizens’ labour ability and vital activity renewal, that makes it the main instrument of managerial influence on human development. The methodology of countries and territories matrix positioning by human development qualitative criteria and population size quantitative parameters which allows to design unified managerial measures as for human resources for similar national economies in the context of global regulatory trends has been proposed. The strategic trends of improvement of human resources development in the national economy, taking into account the differences in the development of human resources in different countries and areas which vary and differ in their focus, content and ways of implementation for such groups. The varying criteria for evaluating the effectiveness of the global impact on human resources development, taking into account the natural, biological, technological, economic, social and management dimensions and the results of human resources development management in social and economic systems at various levels have been revealed. The periodization and the forecast of the global dynamics of human resources development by analyzing and modeling the values of the absolute and relative terms correlation character have been carried out, which enables to make their retrospective and prospective comparison and to find chronological boundaries of qualitatively different periods. The configuration of the human resource development global coordinate system as a set of interrelated principles, components, fields, tools, frameworks, management levels and forms of managerial influence that allows with the help of institutional means to adapt the state of human resources development to a globally varying environment. (shrink)

Humans are obligate cooperative breeders, relying heavily on support from kin to raise children. To date, most studies of cooperative breeding have focused on help that supplements rather than replaces parental care. Here we propose that fosterage can act as a form of dispersed cooperative breeding, one that enhances women’s fitness by allowing them to disinvest in some children and reallocate effort to others. We test this hypothesis through a series of predictions about the costs and benefits of fosterage for (...) mothers, foster parents, and foster children using data from the Himba, a group of Namibian agro-pastoralists. We show that fostering out children enhances mothers’ fitness, and we provide evidence for a causal link from fosterage to enhanced fitness by showing that fosterage of early-born children is associated with greater maternal reproductive success. Foster parents minimize the costs of fosterage by skewing their care toward their postreproductive years, and by mainly fostering close kin. However, the system is associated with some detrimental effects on foster children, who are more likely to be stunted and underweight than their non-fostered counterparts. (shrink)

Logical works of this period, beginning with Generales Inquisitiones and ending wi th the two dated pieces of 1 Aug. 1690 and 2 Aug. 1690 , are read as a sustained effort, finally successful, to develop a set of axioms and an appropriate schema for the expression of categorical propositions faithful to traditional syllogistic. This same set of axioms is shown to be comprehensive of the propositional calculus of Principia Mathematica, providing that ‘Some A is A’ is not a thesis (...) in an unrestricted sense. There is no indication in the works of this period that Leibniz understood just how significant is this logicalsystem he developed. But it is undeniable that he held tenaciously to this particular set of axioms throughout the period, a set of axioms of great power. (shrink)

The “default system” of the brain has been described as a set of regions which are ‘activated’ during rest and ‘deactivated’ during cognitively effortful tasks. To investigate the reliability of task-related deactivations, we performed a meta-analysis across 12 fMRI studies. Our results replicate previous findings by implicating medial frontal and parietal brain regions as part of the “default system”.However, the cognitive correlates of these deactivations remain unclear. In light of the importance of social cognitive abilities for human beings and their (...) propensity to engage in such activities, we relate our results to findings from neuroimaging studies of social cognition. This demonstrates a remarkable overlap between the brain regions typically involved in social cognitive processes and the “default system”.We, henceforth, suggest that the physiological ‘baseline’ of the brain is intimately linked to a psychological ‘baseline’: human beings have a predisposition for social cognition as the default mode of cognizing which is implemented in the robust pattern of intrinsic brain activity known as the “default system”. (shrink)

Healthcare workers who are on the front line of coronavirus disease 2019 and are also undergoing shift schedules face long work hours with few pauses, experience desynchronization of their circadian rhythm, and an imbalance between work hours effort and reward in saving lives, resulting in an impact on work capacity, aggravated by the lack of personal protective equipment, few resources and precarious infrastructure, and fear of contracting the virus and contaminating family members. Some consequences are sleep deprivation, chronic insomnia, stress-related (...) sleep disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder. These sleep alterations critically affect mental health, precipitating or perpetuating anxiety, stress, and depression, resulting in the inability to regulate positive and negative emotions. Pre-existing sleep disorders are an important risk factor for the development and maintenance of PSTD when individuals are exposed to an important stressor such as a COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, how an individual regulates the emotion associated with worries during daytime functioning impacts nighttime sleep, precipitating and perpetuating difficulties in sleeping. All of these changes in sleep and emotional regulation also alter the immune system. Sleep deprivation is commonly associated with chronic inflammatory diseases, due to the desynchronizations in circadian rhythms, causing possible psychophysiological disorders and impaired neuroimmune-endocrine homeostasis. From this perspective, we clarify in this article how sleep disorders affect the immune system and emotional regulation, explaining their phenomenological and neurobiological mechanisms, and discussing elements of cognitive and behavioral coping for health professionals to adopt and manage a healthier sleep pattern in the COVID-19 outbreak. (shrink)

A key goal in the Olympic value system of Olympism is the all-round cultivation of the individual. According to its so-called ?fundamental principles?, Olympism is a ?philosophy of life? with ideals of ?exalting and combining in a balanced whole the qualities of body, will, and mind? and creating ?a way of life based on the joy of effort?. These goals are to be reached by blending sport with culture and education. Olympism is often criticised for idealism and lack of impact (...) in real life. At the same time Olympic ideals are intuitively appealing and have rhetorical force. The Olympic athlete stands at the very centre of the ideology. This paper examines the possibility of critical examination of Olympic ideals in terms of three different understandings of the athlete. A dualist understanding sees the athlete as divided between body and mind and with the body as a means towards the cultivation of the mind. Within this understanding Olympic ideals make little sense. A phenomenological approach attempts to overcome a dualist scheme with an understanding of the athlete as ?embodied intentionality?. This seems fertile in an examination of Olympic ideals but can be criticised for lack of contextual sensitivity. A third perspective points towards the athlete as a social construction who can be fully understood only by examining the more extensive socio-cultural context of which the athlete is a part. The contextual understanding adds critical force to Olympic analyses but seems to lack conceptual tools to examine the vision of athletes as responsible moral agents. In conclusion the complementary functions of the three perspectives are emphasised for a proper study of Olympic ideals. (shrink)

Purpose. The purpose of this paper is the study of gender aspects of management and relationship between management characteristic and style of leadership from gender typing in order to improve management efficiency. Theoretical basis. To understand the influence of gender mechanisms on the organization’s governance system, it turns out that there is a difference in the approach of women and men to management and leadership. The main characteristics of male and female leadership style, features in making management decisions regarding work (...) and career are given. Originality of a paper is the further development in the theory of gender processes with application of interdisciplinary approaches in studying the phenomenon of gender, not from the point of view of the interactions between two large social groups, but as a social resource of an organization where men and women represent labor potential, rational use of which is the key to successful management in the organization. The social potential of Ukrainian women can become a valuable resource in a country, a region, and any social organization. Conclusions. In modern society, the unique experience of women’s rule is ignored, indicating that they have significant and little used management potential. An analysis of gender interactions in management processes revealed the active desire of women for career growth and success in individual image. However, the transformation of the gender sphere in an organization reflects the preference of patriarchal relations, which is an obstacle to the advancement of women in the managerial structure and, accordingly, requires them to make significant efforts to achieve equal management opportunities with men. To ensure the effectiveness of the organization, it is necessary to take into account the gender factor and comply with gender balance in management positions. (shrink)

Civil society organizations attempt to induce corporations to behave in more socially responsible ways, with a view to raising labour standards. A broader way of conceptualizing their efforts to influence the policies and practices of employers is desirable, one centred upon the concept of civil governance. This recognizes that CSOs not only attempt to shape the behaviour of employers through the forging of direct, collaborative relationships, but also try to do so indirectly, with interactions of various kinds with the (...) state being integral. Drawing on evidence derived from UK-based CSOs involved in work and employment relations, four types of civil governance are identified and characterized. By elaborating the concept of civil governance, and demonstrating how different types of civil governance operate, the research extends our knowledge and understanding of how CSOs, as increasingly prominent actors in the field of work and employment relations, operate within, and contribute to, systems of labour governance. (shrink)

J.G. Fichte’s 1798 System of Ethics is seldom read, despite the fact that it remains, after more than two centuries, one of the most original and insightful efforts at a systematic normative ethical theory on Kantian foundations. Part of the reason for its obscurity lies in the perceived implausibility of Fichte’s account of practical deliberation and of the authority of individual conscience. The view typically attributed to Fichte is a conjunction of four claims: that moral deliberation consists entirely in (...) consultation of one’s conscience; that conscience is a faculty that gives immediate epistemic access to substantive moral truths; that conformity with the verdict of conscience is the sole criterion of the moral worth of actions; and that an individual’s conscientious decision is therefore morally incorrigible. This set of views is indeed implausible; but Fichte in fact held none of them. Hegel was the first to attribute them to him and, incredibly, Hegel’s has remained for 200 years the dominant interpretation, even among scholars of Fichte. In this paper I explain how Fichte actually thought about practical deliberation and the role of conscience, and diagnose the sources of appeal of the Hegelian interpretation. (shrink)

The theoretical system of Ottoman music was developed through the works of Safi al-Din al-Urmawī (d. 693/1294) and ʿAbd al-Qādir Marāgī (d. 838/1435). Considering the first period, although the 24-tone sound system was not developed in theory, it is clear that it was used in practice. However, in a theoretical sense, the 17 sound system initiated by al-Urmawī continued to be used until the 20th century. In this century, the Turkish theoretical musical system evolved into a different point with the (...) efforts of Raūf Yektā (d. 1935). Here we have an unequal 24-track sound system. The first written traces of the 24-tone sound system can be seen in the work of La Borde (d. 1208/1794). Later, Muhammad al-‘Attār (d. 1243/1828) and his student Mīkhāʾīl Mishāqah (d. 1305/1888) found fame with their 24-tone sound system. Mishāqah's work named Riṣālah al-Shihābiyyah fī al-ṣināʻah al-mūsīqiyyah, which also includes this system, has become an important cornerstone in the shaping of modern Arabic music. Raūf Yektā, who noticed this system through a newspaper article, determined that this note system, which is divided into 24 equal parts, provides great convenience in Turkish music, especially in naming intermediate sounds. This determination of Yekta is largely similar to the note names in Mishāqah's system, despite some differences. The main difference between this system that Yektā introduced to Turkish music and Mishāqah's system is that Yektā prefers unequal sounds. In this study, information about who first introduced the 24-tone sound system is included. However, no clear data on this subject has been found. From the perspective of Turkish music, this systematic breakthrough succeeded by Yektā - although not put forward by Yektā - enabled him to lay the foundations of today's theory with the Arel-Ezgi-Uzdilek trio. In this research, it has been determined that some of the concepts included in Mishāqah's work are the same in terms of content with the concepts in Turkish music. The focus of this study is the work named Riṣālah al-Shihābiyyah fī al-ṣināʻah al-mūsīqiyyah, written by Mīkhāʾīl Mishāqah, which Murat Bardakcı clearly stated in an article and which we think Raūf Yektā used in creating the sound system of Turkish music. The aim of the article is to reach the first traces of the 24-tone sound system and to reveal its connection with Turkish music. In the literature study, it is founded that no detailed study has been conducted on both Mīkhāʾīl Mishāqah and where the traces of the 24-track sound system can be traced. In this respect, seeking answers to these questions constitutes the originality of the article. Qualitative research method is used and, the information obtained through literatüre review was discussed with data analysis. (shrink)

(2001). Discovering Elements of Complex Adaptive Systems: A Case Study of University Hospital's Re‐engineering Efforts. World Futures: Vol. 57, Future Trends in Communications Strategies, pp. 615-643.

Institutional Review Boards and their federal overseers protect human subjects, but this vital work is often dysfunctional despite their conscientious efforts. A cardinal, but unrecognized, explanation is that IRBs are performing a specific function – the management of risk – using a flawed theoretical and practical approach. At the time of the IRB system’s creation, risk management theory emphasized the suppression of risk. Since then, scholars of governance, studying the experience of business and government, have learned that we must (...) distinguish pure from opportunity risks. Pure risks should be suppressed. Some opportunity risks, in contrast, must be accepted if the institution is to meet its goals. Contemporary theory shows how institutions may make these decisions wisely. It also shows how a sound organizational understanding of risk, a proper locus of responsibility, and appropriate institutional oversight all contribute to effective risk management. We can apply this general theory, developed in other contexts, to the problems of the IRB system. Doing so provides a unifying explanation for IRBs’ disparate dysfunctions by spotlighting five related deficiencies in IRB theory and structure. These deficiencies are inability to focus on greater risks, loss of balanced theory, inaccessibility to guidance from senior leadership, unbalanced federal oversight, and inflexibility. These flaws are deeply rooted in the system, and superficial reform cannot resolve them. Congress should overhaul the system to meet contemporary standards of risk management; this would benefit subjects, scientists, and the public that needs the fruits of research. (shrink)

Despite wide acceptance that the attributes of living creatures have appeared through a cumulative evolutionary process guided chiefly by natural selection, many human activities have seemed analytically inaccessible through such an approach. Prominent evolutionary biologists, for example, have described morality as contrary to the direction of biological evolution, and moral philosophers rarely regard evolution as relevant to their discussions. -/- The Biology of Moral Systems adopts the position that moral questions arise out of conflicts of interest, and that moral (...) systems are ways of using confluences of interest at lower levels of social organiation to deal with conflicts of interest at higher levels. Moral systems are described as systems of indirect reciprocity: humans gain and lose socially and reproductively not only by direct transactions, but also by the reputations they gain from the everyday flow of social interactions. -/- The author develops a general theory of human interests, using senescence and effort theory from biology, to help analye the patterning of human lifetimes. He argues that the ultimate interests of humans are reproductive, and that the concept of morality has arisen within groups because of its contribution to unity in the context, ultimately, of success in intergroup competition. He contends that morality is not easily relatable to universals, and he carries this argument into a discussion of what he calls the greatest of all moral problems, the nuclear arms race. (shrink)

The author examines the philosophical doctrines of Kant and Hegel, and puts forward a thesis concerning the inner ambivalence of these doctrines. The thesis is supported with concrete examples demonstrating the internal contradictions in the philosophical systems of Kant and Hegel. The more a philosophical doctrine is meaningful and innovative, the more it is contradictory, ambivalent, and aporiastic, in spite of the efforts of its founder and followers to reconcile all of its major claims. This ambivalence, however, turns (...) out to be a positive quality, because it allows philosophers to transcend their philosophical system, and if not directly, then indirectly raises the questions: Should philosophers continue building systems? And do not all self-contained systems fetter philosophical discourse? (shrink)

In this paper we design a new logical system to explicitly model the different deductive reasoning steps of a boundedly rational agent. We present an adequate system in line with experimental findings about an agent’s reasoning limitations and the cognitive effort that is involved. Inspired by Dynamic Epistemic Logic, we work with dynamic operators denoting explicit applications of inference rules in our logical language. Our models are supplemented by (a) impossible worlds (not closed under logical consequence), suitably structured according to (...) the effect of inference rules, and (b) quantitative components capturing the agent’s cognitive capacity and the cognitive costs of rules with respect to certain resources (e.g. memory, time). These ingredients allow us to avoid problematic logical closure principles, while at the same time deductive reasoning is reflected in our dynamic truth clauses. We further show that our models can be reduced to awareness-like plausibility structures that validate the same formulas and we give a sound and complete axiomatization with respect to them. This approach to the agent’s internal deductive reasoning is finally combined with actions of external information. (shrink)

Se realiza un estudio de los principios básicos o tradicionales de la bioética y su influencia en la práctica de la limitación del esfuerzo terapéutico en las Unidades de Cuidados Intensivos, como condicionante que favorece su aplicación en los pacientes en estado terminal. Se aborda la necesidad de una bioética no importada de otros países, que se corresponda a las características de la realidad latinoamericana y a cada contexto sociocultural. El trabajo tiene como objetivo fundamental resaltar la importancia de estos (...) principios básicos en la discusión ético-clínica para la toma de decisiones, a partir de una bioética que se corresponda a la realidad de los sistemas imperantes. A study of basic or traditional principles of bioethics and its influence in the practice of the limits of the therapeutic effort in the intensive care units, as a requirement that favors its application in terminal ill patients was carried out. The need of having bioethics principles that match Latin-American reality and each sociocultural context, not imported ones from other countries, was stated. This paper main objective is to highlight the importance of these basic principles in ethic-clinic discussion for decision-making, taking as the starting point a bioethics that corresponds to the reality of the dominant system. (shrink)

Why does performing certain tasks cause the aversive experience of mental effort and concomitant deterioration in task performance? One explanation posits a physical resource that is depleted over time. We propose an alternative explanation that centers on mental representations of the costs and benefits associated with task performance. Specifically, certain computational mechanisms, especially those associated with executive function, can be deployed for only a limited number of simultaneous tasks at any given moment. Consequently, the deployment of these computational mechanisms carries (...) an opportunity cost – that is, the next-best use to which these systems might be put. We argue that the phenomenology of effort can be understood as the felt output of these cost/benefit computations. In turn, the subjective experience of effort motivates reduced deployment of these computational mechanisms in the service of the present task. These opportunity cost representations, then, together with other cost/benefit calculations, determine effort expended and, everything else equal, result in performance reductions. In making our case for this position, we review alternative explanations for both the phenomenology of effort associated with these tasks and for performance reductions over time. Likewise, we review the broad range of relevant empirical results from across sub-disciplines, especially psychology and neuroscience. We hope that our proposal will help to build links among the diverse fields that have been addressing similar questions from different perspectives, and we emphasize ways in which alternative models might be empirically distinguished. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 12.4 (2002) 389-390 [Access article in PDF] IOM Report on the System for Protecting Human Research Participants Tom L. Beauchamp* In response to society's concerns about the use of human subjects in research, the Department of Health and Human Services commissioned the Institute of Medicine to perform a comprehensive assessment of current systems of research participant protection in the U.S., including recommendations for (...) reform (Committee 2002). Although the committee declared its frustration over the lack of data, it found ample evidence to indicate that there are pivotal weaknesses in the current system. First, it discovered dissatisfaction with the current system from virtually every quarter and at virtually every level. Second, it found evidence that IRBs are under severe strain and performing inadequately. Third, it found that the existing regulatory framework—the IRB system and the Common Rule—has not and probably now cannot react adequately to the constantly evolving research environment. Some of these problems might be handled through federal agencies, but the committee holds that the problems are more extensive and will require additional institutional support and professional attention.The committee found that federal protection requirements should be extended to every research project—private, public, or otherwise. Subjects should be, in this respect, equally protected in privately sponsored research.The committee found that the IRB system is in important respects a failure, especially when it alone is relied upon for ethics reviews in institutions. One set of problems concerns the proper education of IRB members. The committee recommends that all members henceforth be given a specialized knowledge of human research ethics. It finds that IRB deliberations commonly have been dominated by scientists, who often marginalize the perspectives of nonscientist members. It therefore recommends that unaffiliated members, nonscientists, local community representatives, and those representing the participant-perspective comprise at least 25 percent of the membership. It also recommends that no protocol be approved without three-quarters of the voting members concurring. [End Page 389]The committee recommends that institutions distinguish review aimed at (1) scientific merit, (2) conflict of interest, and (3) general Ethics Review. The distinction should more evenly distribute the work of institutional ethics review. The IRB should not conduct the initial scientific review nor should it be spending the bulk of its time purely in examining either scientific merit—as many IRBs now do—or conflict of interest. Instead, the conclusions of the scientific review should be submitted to the IRB for ethics-focused deliberations. Problems of both financial and nonfinancial conflicts of interest should be handled similarly, preferably by a committee properly distanced from the institution's interests.The committee underscores that consent must be understood on the model of an interactive dialogue between research staff and participants and not merely as a signed form or single-disclosure event. Conversations between the participant and the research staff should begin even prior to the point of enrollment and should be reinforced during each stage of the research. The committee finds that informed consent conversations and documents too often are being conceived as risk management tasks gauged to protect the institution from liability.The committee also believes that the system of protections established by a research program should be open to the public in order to foster and maintain the community's trust. Open communication should occur among all relevant stakeholders. The committee notes that currently no centralized system exists for the dissemination of information about clinical trials and other research activities.It urges reconsideration of present policies regarding compensation, finding that many research organizations provide at least short-term medical care for those who are injured, but that few organizations cover all potential risks and that many organizations have no effective policy of compensation. The report holds that providing reasonable compensation for bona fide instances of research harm is the only just system and is necessary to avoid diminished public trust.The committee holds that establishing the appropriate culture in research institutions will require sustained efforts to educate researchers, research administrators, IRB members, and... (shrink)

Collaborative research and development (R&D) activities between public universities and industry are of importance for the sustainable development of the innovation ecosystem. However, policymakers especially in developing countries show little knowledge on the issues. In this paper, we analyse the level of university–industry collaboration in Malaysia. We further examine the fundamental conditions that hinder university–industry collaboration despite the government’s initiatives to improve such linkages. We show that the low collaboration is a result of an R&D gap between the entities. While (...) the universities engage in basic and fundamental R&D, the private sectors involved in incremental innovation that requires less R&D investments. The different nature of the industries’ R&D requires closer cooperation between firms namely buyers, suppliers and technical service providers and not the universities. Among others, the lack of an intermediary role, absorptive capacity and collaborative initiative by the industry also contribute to the problem. The study suggests that the collaborative activities can benefit both if deliberate and effective efforts on reducing the R&D mismatch are made between the universities and industry. Likewise, proper institutional arrangements in coordinating these activities are required. This result seems to reflect the nature of many developing countries’ national innovation systems, and therefore, lessons from Malaysia may serve as a good case study. (shrink)

Learning programming is thought to be troublesome. One doable reason why students don’t do well in programming is expounded to the very fact that traditional way of learning within the lecture hall adds more stress on students in understanding the Material rather than applying the Material to a true application. For a few students, this teaching model might not catch their interest. As a result, they'll not offer their best effort to grasp the Material given. Seeing however the information is (...) applied to real issues will increase student interest in learning. As a consequence, this may increase their effort to be taught. In the current paper, we try to help students learn C# programming language using Intelligent Tutoring System. This ITS was developed using ITSB authoring tool to be able to help the student learn programming efficiently and make the learning procedure very pleasing. A knowledge base using ITSB authoring tool style was used to represent the student's work and to give customized feedback and support to students. (shrink)

Recent years have seen widespread calls to transform food systems to address complex demands such as feeding a growing global population while reducing environmental impacts. But what is a food system and how can we most effectively work to change it? “Food System” can be found describing more limited dietary regimens as well as sector-specific supply chains going back to the 1930s, but its use to describe very large, dynamic, coupled socio-ecological systems gained traction in academic and civil (...) society publications in the 1990s and this use of the term has increased dramatically in recent years. When the influential food system actors from non-governmental organizations, foundations, consultancies, and the UN that this research focuses on talk about food systems, they seem to be talking about the same thing. Yet the interpretive flexibility of the concept obfuscates that people may have very different framings that may be deeply incompatible. Drawing from interviews, participant observation, and document analysis, this paper examines what food systems thinking does in terms of setting the stage for how we enact the food system and efforts to intervene in it. It reveals that rather than leading to more expansive understanding, the unexamined use of the concept food system might actually serve to sharpen divides. (shrink)

In the last two decades we have witnessed considerable efforts directed towards making electronic healthcare records comparable and interoperable through advances in record architectures and (bio)medical terminologies and coding systems. Deep semantic issues in general, and ontology in particular, have received some interest from the research communities. However, with the exception of work on so-called ‘controlled vocabularies’, ontology has thus far played little role in work on standardization. The prime focus has been rather the rapid population of terminologies (...) at the level of fine detail. In this paper, we argue that more efforts are needed on the side of both research and standardization to ensure that the coding systems used in electronic healthcare records enjoy a semantics that is coherent with the semantics of the record. We propose realist ontology as a method to bring about this coherence by means of a robust system of top-level ontological categories. (shrink)

Why does performing certain tasks cause the aversive experience of mental effort and concomitant deterioration in task performance? One explanation posits a physical resource that is depleted over time. We propose an alternative explanation that centers on mental representations of the costs and benefits associated with task performance. Specifically, certain computational mechanisms, especially those associated with executive function, can be deployed for only a limited number of simultaneous tasks at any given moment. Consequently, the deployment of these computational mechanisms carries (...) an opportunity cost – that is, the next-best use to which these systems might be put. We argue that the phenomenology of effort can be understood as the felt output of these cost/benefit computations. In turn, the subjective experience of effort motivates reduced deployment of these computational mechanisms in the service of the present task. These opportunity cost representations, then, together with other cost/benefit calculations, determine effort expended and, everything else equal, result in performance reductions. In making our case for this position, we review alternative explanations for both the phenomenology of effort associated with these tasks and for performance reductions over time. Likewise, we review the broad range of relevant empirical results from across sub-disciplines, especially psychology and neuroscience. We hope that our proposal will help to build links among the diverse fields that have been addressing similar questions from different perspectives, and we emphasize ways in which alternative models might be empirically distinguished. (shrink)

Contemporary debates about scientific institutions and practice feature many proposed reforms. Most of these require increased efforts from scientists. But how do scientists’ incentives for effort interact? How can scientific institutions encourage scientists to invest effort in research? We explore these questions using a game-theoretic model of publication markets. We employ a base game between authors and reviewers, before assessing some of its tendencies by means of analysis and simulations. We compare how the effort expenditures of these groups interact (...) in our model under a variety of settings, such as double-blind and open review systems. We make a number of findings, including that open review can increase the effort of authors in a range of circumstances and that these effects can manifest in a policy-relevant period of time. However, we find that open review’s impact on authors’ efforts is sensitive to the strength of several other influences. (shrink)

This work is part of a proposed four volume series. A much-respected teacher once told Palmquist, “No single philosopher has done more damage to the Christian religion than Immanuel Kant.” Palmquist eventually came to disagree strongly: he regards the present volume as an attempt to remove his teacher’s appraisal “from the collective consciousness of contemporary philosophy of religion”. The result is a compendious effort, full of excellent textual analysis that may, nevertheless, lead the critical reader to conclude that Palmquist’s teacher (...) was right after all. How can this be? Palmquist successfully defends Kant, on Kant’s own terms, against various allegations, including prominently the following: that his philosophy is antimetaphysical; that he reduces religion to morality; that he is a deist, not a theist; and that he denies even the possibility of mystical experience. (shrink)

The crisis resilience of vital social systems is currently the target of constant development efforts in Finland, as their drifting into crisis would weaken societies’ functional abilities, safety, and security. This is also the case regarding the Finnish health care system. In an attempt to move beyond existing frameworks of crisis imagination, this article takes an unconventional stance by elucidating endogenous crisis dynamics present in the Finnish health care system. Delphi process was conducted for top experts in Finnish (...) health care and crisis management. With a dissensus-seeking orientation, our aim was to fertilize disagreements among panelists to reveal key vulnerabilities in the health system. Despite our efforts to evoke dissensus, the panelists ended up generating a consensus that aims to protect the underlying assumptions of the health system’s knowledge structure. Through inductive analysis of expert discourses, the data was analyzed through our research question “what constitutes a crisis-proof health system and a crisis-prone health system”. What is framed as a strength of the system by our panelists, namely the ability to maintain legitimacy, improve efficiency, and guarantee continuity, can still have questionable implications that are left ungrasped. A system’s theory approach illustrates how such effects can develop and escalate beyond the reach of social interventions, and thus be predisposed to cause objectionable yet concealed social crises. The discussion illustrates how these endogenous crisis dynamics could be seen to materialize in real-life cases. (shrink)

The topic of offender DNA databases and the retention of offender's DNA samples are issues that continue to generate debate between privacy advocates and forensic DNA scientists. Considered previously by both the Federal DNA Advisory Board and the National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence, recommendations were made that the existing statutory frameworks were sufficient to protect the confidentiality and use of the DNA samples solely for forensic identification purposes and that the issue be revisited. Now, approximately five years (...) since these debates, privacy advocates and forensic scientists retain divergent views on this issue. This brief essay is not intended to fuel the debate, but rather, to describe the protections and safeguards currently in place for the protection of the offender DNA samples.Surrounding the discussion of the sample retention issue are the underlying principles for the establishment of the Combined DNA Index System Program and the National DNA Index System. (shrink)

Theories of individuation predict systematic differences in argumentative behavior between adolescent girls and their mothers. In order to reveal the nature and functions of this kind of discourse, two studies were carried out on 110 mother-daughter pairs. The second study (n=80) replicated and extended the first study (n=30) on an independent sample. The mother-daughter pairs were asked to discuss a subject that had recently been at issue between them. To assess the argumentative behavior, a category system was developed that reflects (...) the functional character of utterances in discourse. The aim of the research was to test the reliability and validity of the category system. Daughters are assumed to verbalize their own needs and preferences to increase the differences to the mother, and to weaken or reject the mother's arguments in an effort to resist control. Mothers, on the other hand, are supposed to exert control over the behavior of their daughters but do so within bounds of mutuality. This should lead to verbal initiatives and attempts to explain, support and modify their positions and arguments. The data showed high reliability of the categorization of arguments. The categories also differentiated between mothers and daughters. Daughters were more likely to try to weaken and reject (and accept) the mother's arguments and to state preferences while mothers tried to support and explain their positions and to retain control by initiating questions and arguments to which the daughters responded. (shrink)

This article has a dual purpose. First, it looks at the transfer of the methodology of systems analysis from the RAND Corporation to the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in the wake of an East–West bridge-building effort during the Cold War. Second, it draws out a more general argument about how the institutional structures of these research organizations condition their methodological orientations. Acknowledging the complexity of factors influencing methodological choices at RAND and IIASA, the article concentrates on (...) the centrality of institutional purpose, institutional environments and internal organizational structure, and demonstrates how, when taken together, these factors led to a methodological diversification at IIASA that is best summarized as the internationalization of systems analysis. (shrink)

Most writers now recognize that mental health policy and the mental health system are extremely resistant to real changes that reflect genuine biopsychosocial paradigms of mental disorder. Writers bemoaning the intransigence of the mental health system tend to focus on a small analytical level, only to find themselves mired in the rationalities of the existing system. Problems are acknowledged to be system-wide, yet few writers have used a method of analysis appropriate for systemic problems. Drawing upon the General System Theory (...) (GST) analytical perspective, this article advances a systematic approach to understand the mental health system and to facilitate the development of reform strategies that recognize the system's complexity and changing nature. The article first discusses the failure of major reform efforts in the mental health system and the limitations of mainstream analysis of mental health politics and policies with respect to the objectives of analysis and reform. This article describes how systems thinking has thus far influenced the study of the mental health policy and politics system, and argues that a systemic perspective is profitable for reconceiving the mental health system, enabling a fresh basis for the development of reform strategies. The mental health system should be seen as a social system influenced by larger political and economic dimensions, not just as a 'delivery system' scientifically constructed by neutral experts. Furthermore, the policy planning process should be viewed as part and parcel of a mental health system modeled as complex and dynamic. The systemic perspective outlined here should help both to clarify the value-based objectives that we hold for the system and, consequently, to plan for the strategic reforms that have so far eluded us. (shrink)

The International workshop 'Frontiers of Combining Systems' is the only forum that is exclusively devoted to research efforts in this interdisciplinary area. This volume contains selected, edited papers from the second installment of the workshop. The contributions range from theorem proving, rewriting and logic to systems and constraints. While there is a clear emphasis on automated tools and logics, the contributions to this volume show that there exists a rapidly expanding body of solutions of particular instances of (...) the combination problem, and at the same time, that the issue of developing general frameworks for intergrating formalisms and systems is taking on an increasingly important position on the international research agenda. The idea of combining formal systems and algorithms has been attracting interest in areas as diverse as constraint logic programming, automated deduction, verification, information retrieval, computational linguistics, artificial intelligence, and logic. As any interesting real world system is a complex composite entity, decomposing its descriptive requirements (for design, verification, or maintenance purposes) into simpler, more restricted tasks is appealing as it is often the only plausible way of tackling complex modelling problems. A core body of notions, questions and results is beginning to emerge in the area, and we are beginning to understand the computational and logical impact of combining methods and algorithms. (shrink)

The paper reconstructs the concept of culture that emerges from Heinrich Rickert?s neo-Kantianism, uncovering its major historical-problematic, methodological, and philosophical implications. The central theme of the first section is the idea that modern culture is uniquely characterized by?fragmentation?. It also unpacks the programme of Rickert?s philosophy of culture, which pursues the task of reconstructing the lost unity of culture. The second section explains the methodological implications of the problematic relationship between value and reality established in cultural goods and evaluations. Finally, (...) the third section reconstructs the Rickertian system of values, with its peculiar effort to reconcile historicity and value absoluteness. The last part develops a critical discussion of the Rickertian project. (shrink)

Understanding factors that motivate farmers to perform conservation behaviors is seen as key to enhancing efforts to address agri-environmental challenges. This study uses survey data collected from 277 farmers in the La Moine River watershed in western Illinois to develop new measures of farmers’ environmental attitudes and examine their influence on current usage of agricultural best management practices. The results suggest that a Dual Interest Theory approach reflecting two separate, competing psychological frames representing a stewardship view of the environment (...) and a farm as a business view of the environment are present within the decision making domain. Using a cluster analysis technique to examine the interaction between these attitude frames reveals four groups of farmers who hold distinct views of the environment. Further exploration of these distinct belief systems reveals little evidence of differences in participation or willingness to participate in agricultural BMPs; however, we observe significant differences between these groups with regard to their willingness to support rural conservation planning priorities that address agri-environmental challenges. Further discussion focuses on the implications of these interactive dual interest typologies and the implications of these findings on efforts to engage farmers in conservation efforts. (shrink)

This article represents a concerted Laszlo effort. What you will find here is a collection of autobiographical reflections written by Ervin Laszlo that speaks to his involvement with the field of systems thinking and his impact on it, interspersed with comments and illustrative examples on points of special interest. As such, this essay should be read as a reflection piece?one in which a new generation of Laszlos muse on the power and inspiration of the vision that has served as (...) a platform not only for them but for many others in the systems community as well. To understand Ervin Laszlo and his contributions to the systems view of the world, one must place him in context?both ontologically and epistemologically. This narrative will do both, first presenting a chronological overview of his personal history up to the present and subsequently exploring the world of ideas and ideals that he traversed (and continues to traverse with unrelenting momentum). However, this narrative will inevitably be nonlinear, and bits and pieces of his adventure in thought are woven into his chronological development and vice-versa. (shrink)

The present research is an attempt to determine the contribution of the management system and the institutional framework to the efficiency of values-based management. The interest in the question of efficiency stems from the fact that to grasp this founding principle of management is essential for any effort of evaluation and valuation accompanying the adoption of any type of management. Our choice of an organizational variable as well as an environmental one to explain the phenomenon of efficiency, intends to cover (...) sources of influence, both internal and external to the organization. As such, this study addresses the following question: What is the effect of the management system and the institutional framework on the efficiency of values-based management? The main theoretical and empirical results reveal that these two variables contribute jointly to the efficiency of VBM. More precisely, the empirical results obtained, in particular through the canonical correlation analysis, specify that both variables influence the efficiency of VBM in different degrees, with the effect of the management system being superior. The latter explains the efficiency of the management by the values at a rate of 52.59 %, whereas the institutional framework explains it only up to 25.15 %. (shrink)

Since its introduction in the 1980s, use of the innovation systems conceptual approach has been growing, particularly on the part of national governments including, recently, the Hong Kong Government. In 2004, the Hong Kong Government set forth a ‘‘new strategy’’ for innovation and technology policy making. Because it marked a significant break from the past, it was necessary to convince a wider audience to accept this new strategy, a strategy that included the IS conceptual approach. Adopting a science and (...) technology studies perspective, I show how the IS conceptual approach is being used as a rhetorical resource by the Hong Kong Government in its innovation and technology policy making in an effort to persuade its perceived audience of the efficacy of its new strategy for its policies—policies that are in fact unrelated to the basic precepts of the IS conceptual approach. The case provides a cautionary tale in the ways in which policy makers transform scholarly work and scientific discovery into rhetorical instruments in support of a political agenda. (shrink)

In this paper I provide a brief history of the emerging science of conceptual systems, explain some methodologies, their sources of data, and the understandings that they have generated. I also provide suggestions for extending the science-based research in a variety of directions. Essentially, I am opening a conversation that asks how this line of research might be extended to gain new insights—and eventually develop more useful and generally accepted methods for creating and evaluating theory. This effort will support (...) our ability to generate theory that is more effective in practical application as well as accelerating the development of theory to support advances in other sciences. (shrink)

Abstract.Growing interest in the origin of life, the physical foundations of biological theory, and the evolution of animal social systems has led to increasing efforts to understand the processes by which elements or living systems at one level of organizational complexity combine to form stable systems of higher order. J. Bronowski saw the need to extend or reformulate evolutionary theory to deal with the hierarchy problem and to account for the evolution of systems of “stratified (...) stability.” The hierarchy problem has become a matter of great interest also in nonequilibrium thermodynamic theory.An effort is made here to develop an abstract, phenomenological model, based on the laws of thermodynamics, to account for the origin and hierarchical evolution of living systems. It is argued that the principle of minimum entropy production, developed by I. Prigogine, applies generally to all thermodynamic systems and processes and is implicit in an extended and more complete formulation of the second law of thermodynamics. From this are derived a thermodynamic criterion and a principle of thermodynamic selection governing the formation of stable systems of “elements” of various levels of organization. Thermodynamic selection gives rise to the creation of “elements” having increasingly “open” characteristic structures which may combine spontaneously to form “social” or crystalline systems capable of growing and reproducing themselves through processes of fissioning or budding. Such simple, self‐reproducing systems are capable of evolving by natural selection, which is seen to be a special case of the more general process of thermodynamic selection. The principle of natural selection, thus formulated, has the character of a fundamental physical law. Self‐reproducing systems with suitably open hereditary programs may combine to form stable social systems, which may grow and reproduce as a unit. In this way self‐reproducing systems of increasing hierarchical order, size, and organizational complexity may evolve through processes of thermodynamic (natural) selection. Some implications of this open‐ended model and opportunities for testing its empirical and theoretical utility are explored. (shrink)

This paper argues against the moral Turing test as a framework for evaluating the moral performance of autonomous systems. Though the term has been carefully introduced, considered, and cautioned about in previous discussions :251–261, 2000; Allen and Wallach 2009), it has lingered on as a touchstone for developing computational approaches to moral reasoning :98–109, 2015). While these efforts have not led to the detailed development of an MTT, they nonetheless retain the idea to discuss what kinds of action (...) and reasoning should be demanded of autonomous systems. We explore the flawed basis of an MTT in imitation, even one based on scenarios of morally accountable actions. MTT-based evaluations are vulnerable to deception, inadequate reasoning, and inferior moral performance vis a vis a system’s capabilities. We propose verification—which demands the design of transparent, accountable processes of reasoning that reliably prefigure the performance of autonomous systems—serves as a superior framework for both designer and system alike. As autonomous social robots in particular take on an increasing range of critical roles within society, we conclude that verification offers an essential, albeit challenging, moral measure of their design and performance. (shrink)

The paper provides a conceptual distinction between evidence assessment criteria and standards of proof. Evidence must be assessed in order to check whether it satisfies a relevant standard of proof, and the assessment is operated with some criterion; so both criteria and standards are necessary for fact-finding. In addition to this conceptual point, the article addresses three main questions: Why do some scholars and decision-makers take assessment criteria as standards of proof and vice versa? Why do systems differ as (...) to criteria and standards? How can a system work if it neglects one of these things? The answers to the first and second question come from the historical and procedural differences between the systems. The answer to the third focuses on the functional connection between criteria and standards. (shrink)

Daniel Kahneman was not the first to suggest that attention and effort are closely associated, but his 1973 book Attention and Effort, which claimed that attention can be identified with effort, cemented the association as a research paradigm in the cognitive sciences. Since then, the paradigm has rarely been questioned and appears to have set the research agenda so that it is self-reinforcing. In this article, we retrace Kahneman's argument to understand its strengths and weaknesses. The central notion of effort (...) is not clearly defined in the book, so we proceed by constructing the most secure inferences we can from Kahneman's argument regarding effort: it is cognitive, objective, metabolic expenditure, and it is attention. Continuing, we find from Kahneman's argument that effort-attention must be a special case of sympathetic dominance of the autonomic nervous system that is also an increase in metabolic activity in the brain that has crossed a threshold of magnitude. We then weigh this conception of effort against evidence in Kahneman's book and against more recent evidence, finding that it does not warrant the conclusion that effort can be equated with attention. In support of an alternative perspective, we briefly review diverse studies of behavior, physiology and neuroscience on attention and effort, including meditation and studies of the LC-NE system, where we find evidence for the following: 1) Attention seems to be associated not with the utilization of metabolic resources per se but with the readying of metabolic resources in the form of adaptive gain modulation. This occurs under sympathetic dominance and can be experienced as effortful. 2) Attention can also occur under parasympathetic dominance, in which case it is likely experienced as effortless. (shrink)