The “happiness agenda” is a worldwide movement that claims that happiness is the highest good, happiness can be measured, and public policy should promote happiness. Against Happiness is a thorough and powerful critique of this program, revealing the flaws of its concept of happiness and advocating a renewed focus on equality and justice. Written by an interdisciplinary team of authors, this book provides both theoretical and empirical analysis of the limitations of the happiness agenda. The authors emphasize that this movement (...) draws on a parochial, Western-centric philosophical basis and demographic sample. They show that happiness defined as subjective satisfaction or a surplus of positive emotions bears little resemblance to the richer and more nuanced concepts of the good life found in many world traditions. Cross-cultural philosophy, comparative theology, and social and cultural psychology all teach that cultures and subcultures vary in how much value they place on life satisfaction or feeling happy. Furthermore, the ideas promoted by the happiness agenda can compete with rights, justice, sustainability, and equality—and even conceal racial and gender injustice. Against Happiness argues that a better way forward requires integration of cross-cultural philosophical, ethical, and political thought with critical social science. Ultimately, the authors contend, happiness should be a secondary goal—worth pursuing only if it is contingent on the demands of justice. (shrink)

8 March, now known as International Women’s Day, is a day for feminist claims where demonstrations are organized in over 150 countries, with the participation of millions of women all around the world. These demonstrations can be viewed as collective rituals and thus focus attention on the processes that facilitate different psychosocial effects. This work aims to explore the mechanisms involved in participation in the demonstrations of 8 March 2020, collective and ritualized feminist actions, and their correlates associated with personal (...) well-being and collective well-being, collective efficacy and collective growth, and behavioral intention to support the fight for women’s rights. To this end, a cross-cultural study was conducted with the participation of 2,854 people from countries in Latin America and Europe, with a retrospective correlational cross-sectional design and a convenience sample. Participants were divided between demonstration participants and non-demonstrators or followers who monitored participants through the media and social networks. Compared with non-demonstrators and with males, female and non-binary gender respondents had greater scores in mechanisms and criterion variables. Further random-effects model meta-analyses revealed that the perceived emotional synchrony was consistently associated with more proximal mechanisms, as well as with criterion variables. Finally, sequential moderation analyses showed that proposed mechanisms successfully mediated the effects of participation on every criterion variable. These results indicate that participation in 8M marches and demonstrations can be analyzed through the literature on collective rituals. As such, collective participation implies positive outcomes both individually and collectively, which are further reinforced through key psychological mechanisms, in line with a Durkheimian approach to collective rituals. (shrink)

Bringing allegory into the light from the neglect into which it fell means focusing on the wondrous heights of the human spirit in its significance for culture. Contemporary philosophies and literary theories, which give pre-eminence to primary linguistics forms (symbol and metaphor), seem to favor just that which makes intelligible communication possible. But they fall short in accounting for the deepest subliminal founts that prompt the mind to exalt in beauty, virtue, transcending aspiration. The present, rich collection shows how allegory, (...) incorporating the soaring of the spirit, offers highlights for culture, with its fluctuations and transformation. This collective effort, rich in ideas and intuitions and covering a vast range of cultural manifestations, is a pioneering work, retrieving the vision of the exalted human spirit, bringing together literature, theatre, music and painting in a variety of revealing perspectives. The authors include: M. Kronegger, Ch. Raffini, J. Smith, J.B. Williamson, H. Ross, M.F. Wagner, F. Divorne, L. Oppenheim, D.K. Heckerl, N. Campi de Castro, P. Saurez Pascual, M. Alfaro Amieiro, H. Fletcher Thompson, R.J. Wilson III, and A. Stensaas. For specialists, students and workers in philosophy, comparative literature, aesthetic phenomenologists and historians of art. (shrink)

Surging from the ontopoietic vital timing of life, human self-consciousness prompts the innermost desire to rise above its brute facts. Imaginatio creatrix inspires us to fabulate these facts into events and plots with personal significance attempting to delineate a life-course in life-stories within the ever-flowing stream – existence. Seeking their deep motivations, causes and concatenations, we fabulate relatively stabilized networks of interconnecting meaning – history. But to understand the meaning and sense of these networks’ reconfigurations call for the purpose and (...) telos of our endless undertaking; they remain always incomplete, carried onwards with the current of life, while fluctuating with personal experience in the play of memory. Facts and life stories, subjective desires and propensities, the circumambient world in its historical moves, creative logos and mythos, personal freedom and inward stirrings thrown in an enigmatic interplay, prompt our imperative thirst for the meaning of this course, its purpose and its fulfillment – the sense of it all. To disentangle all this animates the passions of the literary genius. The focus of this collection is to isolate the main arteries running through the intermingled forces prompting our quest to endow life with meaning. Papers by: Jadwiga Smith, Lawrence Kimmel, Alira Ashvo-Munoz, William D. Melaney, Imafedia Okhamafe, Michel Dion, Franck Dalmas, Ludmila Molodkina, Victor Gerald Rivas, Rebecca M. Painter, Matti Itkonen, Raymond J. Wilson III, Christopher S. Schreiner, Bruce Ross, Bernadette Prochaska, Tsung-I Dow, Jerre Collins, Cezary Jozef Olbromski, Victor Kocay, Roberto Verolini. (shrink)

Edward Osborne Wilson sformułował hipotezę biofilii, według której biofilia jest tendencją do skupiania się na życiu i procesach podobnych do życia. Status tej hipotezy jest kontrowersyjny zarówno w naukach przyrodniczych, społecznych i środowiskowych, jak i w etyce ekologicznej. Na płaszczyźnie metodologicznej stawiany jest m.in. zarzut niefalsyfikowalności; etycy ekologiczni krytykują hipotezę za jej antropocentryczne implikacje. W artykule proponujemy filozoficzną interpretację biofilii jako formy biomorfizmu, według którego pojęcie bytu substancjalnego, wartości i normy moralności jest oparte na paradygmacie bytu żywego.

This essay responds to the helpful criticisms of Valuing Health: Well-Being, Freedom, and Suffering, which have been offered by Elselijn Kingma, Adam Oliver, Anna Alexandrova, Alex Voorhoeve, Erik Nord and James Wilson. I am extremely grateful to Jonathan Wolf and especially James Wilson for arranging a one-day conference on my book, Valuing Health: Well-Being, Freedom, and Suffering [Hausman, D.. Valuing Health: Well-Being, Freedom, and Suffering. Oxford: Oxford University Press.], and for publishing this symposium. I am also grateful (...) to the wonderful six scholars who took the time to study my work and to offer perceptive and helpful criticisms. Without unduly trying the patience of readers, I cannot respond to all their remarks, but I hope that in what follows I have replied to the most important of their comments on the arguments and conclusions of Valuing Health. Before I begin these replies, a brief synopsis of Valuing Health may be helpful to the reader. (shrink)

The extended mind view and the embodied-grounded view of cognition and language are typically considered as rather independent perspectives. In this paper we propose a possible integration of the two views and support it proposing the idea of “Words As social Tools” (WAT). In this respect, we will propose that words, also due to their social and public character, can be conceived as quasi-external devices that extend our cognition. Moreover, words function like tools in that they enlarge the bodily space (...) of action thus modifying our sense of body. To support our proposal, we review the relevant literature on tool-use and on words as tools and report recent evidence indicating that word use leads to an extension of space close to the body. In addition, we outline a model of the neural processes that may underpin bodily space extension via word use and may reflect possible effects on cognition of the use of words as external means. We also discuss how reconciling the two perspectives can help to overcome the limitations they encounter if considered independently. (shrink)

Following SOX, financial restatements increased dramatically. Prior research suggests that how investors respond to restatements, particularly those involving fraud, may mitigate or exacerbate damage suffered. We extend both accounting and management research by examining the joint effects of pre-restatement managerial reputation and the announcement of managerial corrective actions in response to a restatement on nonprofessional investors’ judgments. We find that pre-restatement managerial reputation and the announcement of managerial corrective actions jointly influence investors’ managerial fraud prevention assessments, which mediate their trust (...) in management. These trust perceptions in turn affect investors’ investment and CEO retention judgments. Our results have implications for firms that are concerned with lessening the negative consequences associated with issuing a restatement. (shrink)

The article analyzes the little-known field of philosophical studies of M. Schlick, who was traditionally considered as a scientist dealing with the problems of epistemology and philosophy of science. In the spotlight of the research is the work On meaning of Life, where the philosopher not only lays the foundation for his future work on ethics but also offers an original approach to the problem of the meaning of life, linking it with the concept of "youth". He notes that most (...) people see the meaning of life in achieving certain goals. As a result, life is filled with activities aimed at preserving existence. The only way to find meaning in life is through an activity that has a purpose and value in itself, so the meaning of life cannot be found in work since it is not an activity for its own sake. The alternative is the game inherent in youth. It fills you with joy and gives value to life. The meaning of life symbolizes youth. You can be young at any time if you consider youth as a time of play, activity and creativity. It implies the requirement to change the conventional system of upbringing and conservative ethics. In particular, he insists that it is necessary to abandon the ethics of duty and replace it with new ethics, where the virtue is serene, does not suffer from the pressure of duty and freely unfolds of its own will. It is concluded that Schlick's ethics of youth is symptomatic of the first third of the twentieth century since those times were oriented to the new man, whose universal traits were health, cheerfulness, fortitude and social activism. (shrink)

Brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) exemplify a dual-use neurotechnology with significant potential in both civilian and military contexts. While BCIs hold promise for treating neurological conditions such as spinal cord injuries and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis in the future, military decisionmakers in countries such as the United States and China also see their potential to enhance combat capabilities. Some predict that U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) will be early adopters of BCI enhancements. This article argues for a shift in focus: the U.S. Special (...) Operations Command (SOCOM) should pursue translational research of medical BCIs for treating severely injured or ill SOF personnel. After two decades of continuous military engagement and on-going high-risk operations, SOF personnel face unique injury patterns, both physical and psychological, which BCI technology could help address. The article identifies six key medical applications of BCIs that could benefit wounded SOF members and discusses the ethical implications of involving SOF personnel in translational research related to these applications. Ultimately, the article challenges the traditional civilian-military divide in neurotechnology, arguing that by collaborating more closely with military stakeholders, scientists can not only help individuals with medical needs, including servicemembers, but also play a role in shaping the future military applications of BCI technology. (shrink)

The writer Anna M. Stoddart published biographies of Isabella Bird and the classical scholar John Stuart Blackie before this 1908 life of the educationalist Hannah E. Pipe. Pipe was sent in 1847 to Chorlton high school, run by William Ballantyne Hodgson, who mapped out for her a teaching career. This biography was written for, and at the urging of, Pipe's ex-pupils, concerned to record her life 'before it crumbles into oblivion'. She opened her first school in Manchester, but moved (...) to London in 1856: Stoddart herself was one of her staff; music was taught by Sterndale Bennett, and science by William Huggins. The school was enormously successful, and Pipe also became involved in other philanthropic causes, being a friend of Octavia Hill and F. D. Maurice. This is a fascinating account of an inspiring teacher and educational pioneer. (shrink)

This paper examines the role of management's earnings preannouncements on judgments about its trustworthiness by nonprofessional investors. We predict that management's preannouncement decision and the resulting direction of the earnings surprise influence investors' ethical judgments about management's trustworthiness; these judgments, in turn, are associated with investors' other investment related judgments. We test our predictions in an experiment in which MBA students make investment-related judgments under four different preannouncement strategies. Consistent with our predictions, the results of our study show that managers' (...) preannouncement decisions are significantly associated with investors' evaluations of management's trustworthiness. Specifically, holding the size of the earnings surprise constant, we find that judgments of management's trustworthiness are damaged more following a negative as opposed to a positive earnings surprise, and the release of a preannouncement compared to when management does not issue a preannouncement. Also consistent with our predictions, we find that evaluations of management's trustworthiness are significantly and positively associated with judgments of the attractiveness of the firm's equity as an investment. Based on our findings, we encourage further research to explore whether managers understand the trust implications associated with their preannouncement decisions and the extent to which this understanding influences their disclosure decisions. (shrink)

Recent theories on abstract concepts and words (ACs), such as Words As social Tools (WAT) (Borghi et al., 2019b) and Language is an Embodied Neuroenhancement and Scaffold (LENS) (Dove, 2019) have underlined the crucial role of both sensorimotor experience and language for ACs representation and use [see Dove et al. (2020), for a comparison]. Here we focus on the WAT view. WAT highlights the role of language, sociality, and inner grounding (interoception, metacognition) for ACs. Furthermore, WAT seeks to integrate a (...) developmental perspective with approaches focusing on conceptual use and brain representation. We briefly illustrate evidence coming from both clinical and non-clinical populations and identify areas where additional evidence that ACs evoke linguistic, social, and interoceptive experience is still needed. (shrink)

Transient receptor potential vanilloid 4 (TRPV4), a member of the TRP superfamily, is a broadly expressed, cell surface‐localized cation channel that is activated by a variety of environmental stimuli. Importantly, TRPV4 has been increasingly implicated in the regulation of cellular morphology. Here we propose that TRPV4 and the cytoskeletal remodeling small GTPase RhoA together constitute an environmentally sensitive signaling complex that contributes to pathological cell cytoskeletal alterations during neurological injury and disease. Supporting this hypothesis is our recent work demonstrating direct (...) physical and bidirectional functional interactions of TRPV4 with RhoA, which can lead to activation of RhoA and reorganization of the actin cytoskeleton. Furthermore, a confluence of evidence implicates TRPV4 and/or RhoA in pathological responses triggered by a range of acute neurological insults ranging from stroke to traumatic injury. While initiated by a variety of insults, TRPV4–RhoA signaling may represent a common pathway that disrupts axonal regeneration and blood–brain barrier integrity. These insights also suggest that TRPV4 inhibition may represent a safe, feasible, and precise therapeutic strategy for limiting pathological TRPV4–RhoA activation in a range of neurological diseases. (shrink)

This paper employs theory of normal organizational wrongdoing and investigates the joint effects of management tone and the slippery slope on financial reporting misbehavior. In Study 1, we investigate assumptions about the effects of sliding down the slippery slope and tone at the top on financial executives’ decisions to misreport earnings. Results of Study 1 indicate that executives are willing to engage in misreporting behavior when there is a positive tone set by the Chief Financial Officer, regardless of the presence (...) or absence of a slippery slope. A negative tone set by the CFO does not facilitate the transition from minor indiscretions to financial misreporting. In Study 2, we find that auditors evaluating executives’ decisions under the same conditions as those in Study 1 do not react to the slippery slope condition, but auditors assess higher risks of fraud when the CFO sets a negative tone. Overall, our results indicate that many assumptions about the slippery slope and tone at the top should be questioned. We provide evidence that pro-organizational behaviors and incrementalism yield new insights into the causes of ethical failures, financial misreporting behavior, and failures of corporate governance mechanisms. (shrink)

More than 1.5 billion students experienced disruption to education as a result of COVID-19, representing the most substantial interruption to global education in modern history. Many educational institutions transitioned to emergency remote teaching (ERT) overnight, which has presented an array of distinct challenges for educators. Using virtual interviews and an experiential approach to thematic analysis, the study examined Scottish primary teachers’ (n = 10) lived experiences of adapting to ERT practice. Findings demonstrated three main themes; ‘Meeting Learners’ Needs,’ ‘Influencing Engagement’, (...) and ‘The Impact of ERT on Teachers’. Key findings suggested that differentiating learning, engaging, and communicating with learners is more difficult during ERT than face-to-face teaching. Parental engagement is vital, however, is influenced by several mitigating factors. Finally, ERT is likely to have substantial effects on the wellbeing of those involved. Implications of these findings are considered and discussed. (shrink)

This essay examines the impact of linguistic choices on the perception and regulation of assisted dying, particularly in Canada. It argues that euphemistic terms like “medical assistance in dying” and its acronym, “MAID,” serve to normalize the practice, potentially obscuring its moral gravity. This contrasts with what is seen in Belgium and the Netherlands, where terms like “euthanasia” are used, as well as in France and the United Kingdom, where terminology remains divisive and contested. By tracing the evolution of these (...) terms and what they reveal about different cultural and legal approaches, this essay sheds light on the politics of language in end-of-life discourses. It suggests that the shift toward euphemistic language reflects a broader discomfort with death that can shape public attitudes and legal frameworks. It calls for a more transparent, philosophically grounded approach to terminology and suggests that continued debate about semantics is necessary to capture the complexities and ethical significance of assisted dying. (shrink)

A critical and aware return to pragmatism entails a preliminary focus upon the possibility of productive communication and a possible exchange among fields of research often far apart in terms of methods and spheres of application. This difficulty is felt all the more strongly if we refer to the contested intellectual legacy of George H. Mead, one often divided between opposing and conflicting fields of investigation. In this paper, I propose a reinterpretation of his thought that I believe could operate (...) transversally. To do so, I interpret Mead’s idea of human creativity in a more radical way compared with some previous interpretations. This way, it is possible to see the constructive role of the relation between inter-subjective and intra-subjective communication as constitutive moments in an ethical self-construction of human beings. Finally, the peculiarity of human creativity, in all its complexity, shows itself as the starting point for responsible, normatively oriented conduct. Moreover, a new anthropological paradigm, also emerging from Mead’s suggestions, could become a source of inspiration for a renewed pattern of civic life and democratic citizenship. (shrink)

This content analysis examines the ways that genocide is included in the high school world history content standards of eleven states with legislative mandates requiring genocide education, as well as if the content standards in those states differ from those of states without mandated genocide education. The null curriculum theorizes that the content that is not taught may be as important as what is taught; this lens allows for a nuanced analysis of the ways that genocide is included and excluded (...) in state standards. The findings suggest that states with legislative mandates requiring genocide education do not necessarily have high school world history content standards that require genocide education. The content standards in states with legislative mandates often omit acts of genocide, refrain from using the term “genocide,” and frame genocides as less important than the Holocaust, perpetuating the null curriculum of genocides. (shrink)

Thinking about what the senses cannot grasp is one of the hallmarks of human cognition. We argue that “intangible abstracta” are represented differently from other products of abstraction, that goal-derived categorization supports their learning, and that they are grounded also in internalized linguistic and social interaction. We conclude by suggesting different ways in which abstractness contributes to cement group cohesion.

The article presents results of a study aimed at exploring social concepts associated with bodily ‘normativity’ and ‘passability’: the notion of normative body weight and attitude towards over- and underweight individuals. We were particularly interested in the common concepts and notions associated with normative body weight as well as possible reasons for rejection of people whose bodies do not fall within the socially shared knowledge of what the ‘right’ body is. The article presents results of a qualita­tive, interview-based research study (...) conducted with the use of visual materials. (shrink)

There is a general perception that synchronous, online chat about politics is fragmented, incoherent, and rife with ad hominem attacks because of its channel characteristics. This study aims to better understand the relative impact of channel of communication versus topic of communication by comparing chat about four different topics. Discourse analysis and coding for topic drift were applied to two hours of chat devoted to the topics of politics, auto racing, entertainment, and cancer support. Findings demonstrate that topic may have (...) an effect on the coherence of chat, with discussion in the politics chat room surprisingly being more coherent than in the other rooms. This research suggests that users can sustain relatively coherent interaction on political talk, suggesting chat technology may not be an inherently problematic medium for political discourse. (shrink)

That Catullus’ sixty-fourth poem influenced Virgil's work has long been accepted. We approach a little nearer a resolution of the enigma of the Fourth Eclogue when we recognize epithalamian elements within it that echo not only the song of the Parcae, but also the themes of the Golden Age, of the Voyage of the Argo, and of the relations between gods and men from Catullus’ poem. Similarly, Ariadne's part in the creation of Aeneid 4, both in the ‘marriage’ scene and (...) in Dido's reproaches to Aeneas, has been noted. (shrink)

Книгата е посветена на проблема за обосноваността от класическата интерналистка гледна точка на епистемологията. Тя преразглежда традиционните проблеми в интерналистката рамка в по-широкия контекст на развитието в тази област през последните петдесет години.Централните проблеми в изследването се отнасят до условията на обосноваността като резултат от епистемичната оценка на вярванията с помощта на свидетелства и основания. Сред тях са проблемът за характера на свидетелствата и мястото им в процедурата на епистемична оценка, проблемите за добрите и достатъчни основания и проблемът за регреса (...) на основанията. (shrink)

Increasingly, feminist scholars examine how the stability of racial hierarchies is maintained through discourse. This article explores the importance of race discourse in the construction of white women's accounts explaining their race politics. Specifically, the author examines the connections between race discourse and politics as they emerged in interviews with white women involved in a local women's movement between 1972 and 1999. The interviews revealed five discursive strategies women used to talk about race and the movement's antiracist practices. In addition, (...) one of the most important contributions of this study is the evidence it provides of the relationship between the discursive construction of an “invisible white self” and the broader structure of power relations. (shrink)

Affordances, i.e. the opportunity of actions offered by the environment, are one of the central research topics for the theoretical perspectives that view cognition as emerging from the interaction between the environment and the body. Being at the bridge between perception and action, affordances help to question a dichotomous view of perception and action. While Gibson’s view of affordances is mainly externalist, many contemporary approaches define affordances as the product of long-term visuomotor associations in the brain. These studies have emphasized (...) the fact that affordances are activated automatically, independently from the context and the previous intention to act: for example, affordances related to objects’ size would emerge even if the task does not require focusing on size. This emphasis on the automaticity of affordances has led to overlook their flexibility and contextual-dependency. In this contribution I will outline and discuss recent perspectives and evidence that reveal the flexibility and context-dependency of affordances, clarifying how they are modulated by the physical, cultural and social context. I will focus specifically on social affordances, i.e. on how perception of affordances might be influenced by the presence of multiple actors having different goals. (shrink)