If states are permitted to create and maintain a military force, by what means are they permitted to do so? This paper argues that a theory of just recruitment should incorporate a concern for moral risk. Since the military is a morally risky profession for its members, recruitment policies should be evaluated in terms of how they distribute moral risk within a community. We show how common military recruitment practices exacerbate and concentrate moral risk exposure, using the UK as a (...) case study. We argue that the British state wrongs its citizens by subjecting them to excessively morally risky recruitment practices. Since, we argue, this risk exposure cannot be justified by appealing to the benefits of a military career for recruits, our argument calls for reform of existing practices. Our method of evaluation is generalizable and thus can be used to assess other states’ practices. (shrink)

Between the fall of the Soviet Union and the fall of Lehman Brothers, if the Anglophone academy could be said to have arrived at any consensus about the value of Marxist theory, it would be that Marxism was a quaint historical curio at best and a world-historically hubristic folly at worst. Today, however, well on our way through the first quarter of the twenty-first century, we live in a moment of greatly renewed interest in Marxist ideas. This curiosity is stoked (...) by, among other factors, the worldwide economic shocks of 2008 and, in more recent times, by impending climate catastrophe, incipient fascisticization, and the still-ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. Any of these on its own would stand out as a rebuke to the neoliberal triumphalism of the 1990s, famously crystallized in Francis Fukayama's assertion that humanity had arrived at "the end of history," there to find permanently expanding capitalist prosperity. Taken together, they present at least strong prima facie evidence for what Karl Marx identified as the inherently and ineluctably crisis-ridden nature of capital and, therefore, good reason to encounter his writings anew. (shrink)

The processing of metaphors and idioms has been the subject of neuroscientific research for several decades. However, results are often contradictory, which can be traced back to inconsistent terminology and stimulus control. In this systematic review of research methods, we analyse linguistic aspects of 116 research papers which used EEG, fMRI, PET, MEG, or NIRS to investigate the neural processing of the two figurative subtypes metaphor and idiom. We critically examine the theoretical foundations as well as stimulus control by performing (...) a systematic literature synthesis according to the PRISMA guidelines. We explicitly do not analyse the findings of the studies but instead focus on four primary aspects: definitions of figurative language and its subtypes, linguistic theory behind the studies, control for factors influencing figurative language processing, and the relationship between theoretical and operational definitions. We found both a lack and a broad variety in existing definitions and operationalisation, especially in regard to familiarity and conventionality. We identify severe obstacles in the comparability and validation potential of the results of the papers in our review corpus. We propose the development of a consensus in fundamental terminology and more transparency in the reporting of stimulus design in the research on figurative language processing. (shrink)

We demonstrate how different normalization techniques in GC‐MS analysis impart unique properties to the data, influencing any biological inference. Using simulations, and empirical data, we compare the most commonly used techniques (Total Sum Normalization ‘TSN’; Median Normalization ‘MN’; Probabilistic Quotient Normalization ‘PQN’; Internal Standard Normalization ‘ISN’; External Standard Normalization ‘ESN’; and a compositional data approach ‘CODA’). When differences between biological classes are pronounced, ESN and ISN provides good results, but are less reliable for more subtly differentiated groups. MN, TSN, and (...) CODA approaches produced variable results dependent on the structure of the data, and are prone to false positive biomarker identification. In contrast, PQN exhibits the lowest false positive rate, though with occasionally poor model performance. Because ESN requires extensive pre‐planning, and offers only mixed reliability, and ISN, TSN, MN, and CODA approaches are prone to introducing artefactual differences, we recommend the use of PQN in GC–MS research. (shrink)

Human rights defenders (HRDs) fight for various human rights and address concerns related to corruption, employment, the environment, and other issues. They also challenge powerful state and private stakeholders and seek justice for human rights abuses. Therefore, HRDs are increasingly becoming targets of violent attacks and abuse with the aim of silencing them. This article begins by providing a brief definition of HRDs and then proceeds to outline the risks associated with their work in defending human rights. It also identifies (...) the perpetrators responsible for these violations. The article categorises the types of abuses against HRDs into two main categories, with a particular focus on the widespread tactic of using the legal system to target and silence defenders in Europe, which is also emerging globally. It introduces a taxonomy of various types of violations through the legal system. By categorising the types of violations against HRDs and establishing a taxonomy to aid in identifying these tactics, the article seeks to deepen understanding and awareness of the varied abuses experienced by HRDs, as well as their deviation from human rights standards, providing a valuable resource for academics, practitioners, and defenders. (shrink)

Seed rematriation is a rising movement within greater efforts to improve seed and food sovereignty for Native American communities in the United States. As a feminized reframing of repatriation, rematriation seeks to heal Indigenous relationships with food, seeds, and landscapes. Since first contact, Native agricultural practices have been systematically targeted by colonization, resulting in the diminished biodiversity of cultural gardening systems. Of this vast wealth, many varieties exist today solely under the stewardship of non-Native institutions. Seed rematriation is therefore the (...) process and movement by which Native nations reclaim their cultural seed heritages. Once seeds are returned to the hands and soils of their home communities, Indigenous Nations can reestablish healthy, diverse, and sustainable seed and foodways for generations to come. This article explores the history of the term rematriation within Indigenous sovereignty scholarship as well as its evolving interpretations and applications. Considering how the seed rematriation movement has been shaped by several seed keepers in the Midwest reveals the cultural understandings and significances that underpin this work across many aspects of Indigenous lifeways. The resulting discussion from ethnographic material demonstrates why seed reclamation and seed sovereignty movements in the Midwest uphold Native nationhood through both resurgence and refusal. The Indigenous processes of recognizing and reclaiming seeds work beyond recovering agricultural knowledge to also mend severed kin relationships, rejuvenate cultural knowledge, and reestablish authority over Indigenous food systems. (shrink)

On July 18, 1988, workers at the Metropolitan YWCA Women's Services, a Chicago-area center designed to assist women and children who are survivors of violence and sexual assault, agreed to record in a journal their thoughts at a chosen hour during that day. Each section was written by a different worker. The purpose was to bring together separate voices, all connected through their common work with survivors to begin to understand the impact of this work on their own lives.

Food is becoming an increasingly important issue in the urban context. Urban food policies are a new phenomenon in Czechia, where urban food alternatives to the current food regime are promoted by food movements or take the form of traditional self-provisioning. This paper examines how urban food governance in Prague and Brno is constituted based on the municipalities’ relations with actors engaged in urban food alternatives. We argue that prioritizing aspects of local food system transformation compliant with the status quo (...) is non-systemic and implies a fragmentation of urban food alternatives based on different levels of social capital and radicality. We conceptualize urban food alternatives as values-based modes of production and consumption and focus on values that guide urban food governance in its participatory and territorial interplay with the actors of urban food alternatives. Our analysis reveals that the values underpinning the two cities’ progressive food policies do not match reality on the ground. We propose four types of relations between the two examined cities and aspects of the local food system transformation. Aspects compliant with the status quo, such as food waste reduction and community gardening are embraced, whereas those requiring more public intervention, such as public procurement, short supply chains, or the protection of cultivable land are disregarded, degraded, or, at most, subject to experimentation as part of biodiversity protection. Chances for a successful transformation of the local food system under such governance are low but can be increased by strengthening social capital and coalition work among urban food alternatives. (shrink)

The fast-developing field of neuroscience has given philosophy, as well as other disciplines and the public broadly, many new tools and perspectives for investigating one of our most pressing challenges: addressing the health and well-being of our mental lives. In some cases, neuroscientific innovation has led to clearer understanding of the mechanisms of mental illness and precise new modes of treatment. In other cases, features of neuroscience itself, such as the enticing nature of the data it produces compared to previous (...) behavioral methods, together with its costliness and “coldness” have complicated understanding of mental illness and decision making about mental illness. Taking neuroscientific information into account can leave practitioners in psychiatry and law with difficult questions, stemming not only from the complexity of these fields, but also from our rapidly evolving understanding of and facility with neuroscience. In this chapter, we will review several examples of the insights and dilemmas that have unfolded as mental illness has been examined through the lens of neuroscience, covering diagnoses such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), schizophrenia, addiction, and severe mood disorders. (shrink)

Through imaginative engagement readers of fiction become, to an extraordinary extent, the narrator’s ‘children’: they often submit themselves to the narrator’s authority without reserve. But precisely because of that, readers are deeply at a loss when their trust is betrayed. This underscores a core function of fiction, namely to evoke emotional response in the reader. In this paper, we hypothesize how a reader’s imaginative engagement can be subjected to narrative frustration due to processing or moral complexity. The types of narrative (...) frustration we consider differ in terms of their sources, and their emotional and behavioral impacts on the reader. Here, we break down these frustrations into their component parts, in an effort to better characterize the different classes of frustrations. We propose that frustrations arise from different combinations of local uncertainty, moral clash and global uncertainty. These sources of frustration in turn explain the reader’s emotional response and their consequent reading behavior as they imaginatively engage with fiction. (shrink)

The first annual Alchemy Lecture brings four deep and agile writers from different geographies and disciplines into vibrant conversation on a topic of urgent relevance: humans and borders. Borders, Human Itineraries, and All Our Relation captures and expands those conversations in insightful, passionate ways. Architect, artist, and urban theorist Dele Adeyemo (UK/Nigeria) calls attention to the complexity of Black infrastructures, questioning how "the environments that surround us condition the possibility of our being." Poet Natalie Diaz (US/Mojave/Akimel O'otham) writes: "Like story, (...) migration is the sensual movement of knowledge," and asks, "What is the language we need to live right now?" Philosopher Nadia Yala Kisukidi (France) suggests there is no diasporic life "without the dynamics of fabulation, where we pass down, from generation to generation, the stories of our ancestors who walked barefoot for many months." And cultural theorist Rinaldo Walcott (Canada) asks us to consider inheritances beyond white supremacist logics: "What might it mean to live a life, if we can't risk desiring and working towards utopia?" As each Alchemist considers the legacies of anticolonial struggle, the future of the planet, and the textures of Black and Indigenous life, their essays speak to each other in multiple ways, creating something startling and revelatory: a vision of the world as it is, and as it could be. (shrink)

We examine and test alternative models for explaining the relationships between resource stress, beliefs that gods and spirits influence weather, and customary beyond-household sharing behavior. Our model, the resource stress model, suggests that resource stress affects both sharing as well as conceptions of gods’ involvement with weather, but these supernatural beliefs play no role in explaining sharing. An alternative model, the moralizing high god model, suggests that the relationship between resource stress and sharing is at least partially mediated by religious (...) beliefs in moralizing high gods. We compared the models using a worldwide sample of 96 cultures from the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample, newly coded data on supernatural involvement with weather, and previously coded data on food and labor sharing. We conducted three types of analysis: multilevel and society-level regressions, and mediational path modeling using Monte Carlo simulations. Resource stress shows a robust effect on beliefs that high gods are associated with weather, that superior gods help the food supply through weather, and that minor spirits hurt the food supply through weather. Resource stress also predicts greater belief in moralizing high gods. However, no form of high god belief that we test significantly predicts more sharing. Mediational models suggest the religious beliefs do not significantly explain why resource stress is associated with food and labor sharing. Our findings generally accord with the view that resource stress changes religious belief and has a direct effect on sharing behavior, unmediated by high god beliefs. (shrink)

Steady-state visual evoked potentials are commonly used for functional objective diagnostics. In general, the main response at the stimulation frequency is used. However, some studies reported the main response at the second harmonic of the stimulation frequency. The aim of our study was to analyze the influence of the stimulus design on the harmonic components of ssVEPs. We studied 22 subjects using a circular layout. At a given eccentricity, the stimulus was presented according to a 7.5 Hz square wave with (...) 50% duty cycle. To analyze the influence of the stimulus eccentricity, a background luminance of 30 cd/m2 was added to suppress foveal stray light effects; to analyze the influence of simultaneous foveal and peripheral stimulations, stimulations are performed without stray light suppression. For statistical analysis, medians M of the amplitude ratios for amplitudes at the second harmonic to the first harmonic and the probability of the occurrence of the main response at the second harmonic P are calculated. For stimulations with foveal stray light suppression, the medians were M0–1.6° = 0.45, M1.6–3.5° = 0.45, M3.5–6.4° = 0.76, M6.4–10.9° = 0.72, and M10.9–18° = 0.48, and the probabilities were P0–1.6° = 0.05, P1.6–3.5° = 0.05, P3.5–6.4° = 0.32, P6.4–10.9° = 0.29, and P10.9–18° = 0.30. For stimulations without foveal stray light suppression, the medians M were M0–1.6° = 0.29, M1.6–3.5° = 0.37, M3.5–6.4° = 0.98, M6.4–10.9° = 1.08, and M10.9–18° = 1.24, and the probabilities were P0–1.6° = 0.09, P1.6–3.5° = 0.05, P3.5–6.4° = 0.50, P6.4–10.9° = 0.55, and P10.9–18° = 0.55. In conclusion, the stimulus design has an influence on the harmonic components of ssVEPs. An increase in stimulation eccentricity during extrafoveal stimulation leads to a transition of the main response to the second harmonic. The effect is enhanced by a simultaneous foveal stimulation. (shrink)

Microaggressions are a new moral category that refers to the subtle yet harmful forms of discriminatory behavior experienced by members of oppressed groups. Such behavior often results from implicit bias, leaving individual perpetrators unaware of the harm they have caused. Moreover, microaggressions are often dismissed on the grounds that they do not constitute a real or morally significant harm. My goal is therefore to explain why microaggressions are morally significant and argue that we are responsible for their harms. I offer (...) a conceptual framework for microaggressions, exploring the central mechanisms used for identification and the empirical research concerning their harm. The cumulative harm of microaggressions presents a unique case for understanding disaggregation models for contributed harms, blame allocation, and individual responsibility within structural oppression. Our standard moral model for addressing cumulative harm is to hold all individual contributors blameworthy for their particular contributions. However, if we aim to hold people responsible for their unconscious microaggressions and address cumulative harm holistically, this model is inadequate. Drawing on Iris Marion Young's social connection model, I argue that we, as individual perpetrators of microaggressions, have a responsibility to respond to the cumulative harm to which we have individually contributed. (shrink)

This paper considers three arguments by David Shugarman and Maureen Ramsay for why dirty hands cannot be democratic. The first argues that it is contradictory, in principle, to use undemocratic means to pursue democratic ends. There is a conceptual connection between means and ends such that getting one’s hands dirty is incompatible with acting in accordance with democratic ends. The second claims that using dirty-handed means, in practice, will undermine democracy more than it promotes it and therefore cannot be justified. (...) The final criticism states that politicians with dirty hands are a sign that politics is no longer meeting the criteria necessary to be called democratic. The paper shows that such rejections of democratic dirty hands are based on misunderstandings of the nature of dirty hands and democratic politics. (shrink)

In this paper, I present and explore some ideas about how factive emotional states and factive perceptual states each relate to knowledge and reasons. This discussion will shed light on the so-called ‘perceptual model’ of the emotions.

How do people decide which claims should be considered mere beliefs and which count as knowledge? Although little is known about how people attribute knowledge to others, philosophical debate about the nature of knowledge may provide a starting point. Traditionally, a belief that is both true and justified was thought to constitute knowledge. However, philosophers now agree that this account is inadequate, due largely to a class of counterexamples (termed ‘‘Gettier cases’’) in which a person’s justified belief is true, but (...) only due to luck. We report four experiments examining the effect of truth, justification, and ‘‘Gettiering’’ on people’s knowledge attributions. These experiments show that: (1) people attribute knowledge to others only when their beliefs are both true and justified; (2) in contrast to contemporary philosophers, people also attribute knowledge to others in Gettier situations; and (3) knowledge is not attributed in one class of Gettier cases, but only because the agent’s belief is based on ‘‘apparent’’ evidence. These findings suggest that the lay concept of knowledge is roughly consistent with the traditional account of knowledge as justified true belief, and also point to a major difference between the epistemic intuitions of laypeople and those of philosophers. (shrink)

Establishing and maintaining mutual understanding in everyday conversations is crucial. To do so, people employ a variety of conversational devices, such as backchannels, repair, and linguistic entrainment. Here, we explore whether the use of conversational devices might be influenced by cross‐linguistic differences in the speakers’ native language, comparing two matched languages—Danish and Norwegian—differing primarily in their sound structure, with Danish being more opaque, that is, less acoustically distinguished. Across systematically manipulated conversational contexts, we find that processes supporting mutual understanding in (...) conversations vary with external constraints: across different contexts and, crucially, across languages. In accord with our predictions, linguistic entrainment was overall higher in Danish than in Norwegian, while backchannels and repairs presented a more nuanced pattern. These findings are compatible with the hypothesis that native speakers of Danish may compensate for its opaque sound structure by adopting a top‐down strategy of building more conversational redundancy through entrainment, which also might reduce the need for repairs. These results suggest that linguistic differences might be met by systematic changes in language processing and use. This paves the way for further cross‐linguistic investigations and critical assessment of the interplay between cultural and linguistic factors on the one hand and conversational dynamics on the other. (shrink)

Aesthetics is a central topic in the works of Jean-Luc Marion and Michel Henry. While Henry focuses on abstract art (especially Kandinsky), Marion’s writings range over the history of art, including analyses of Courbet, Rothko, and Klee. This article examines their strikingly similar aesthetic theories and shows how they are grounded in a phenomenological claim about the relation between invisible and visible, hence about phenomenality itself. The artist becomes a paradigm for phenomenological receptivity in both thinkers, and art is assigned (...) a quasi-salvific function. This raises several important questions about their theories of art. (shrink)

First Published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This paper is part of an ongoing study that looks at the development of one component of a community network in a city in upstate New York. ‘Community networks’ refers to the use of computer networking technologies for the benefit of strengthening community goals and needs. The component studied is a youth database. In particular, this article looks at the early phases of this project: how the idea of the database emerged, how the technology was presented to the community, and (...) the community's response to this project. Theories guiding this paper include the social construction of technology theory and social worlds theory. (shrink)

This book is a comprehensive study of the writings of Jean-Paul Sartre. As well as examining the drama and the fiction, the book analyses the evolution of his philosophy, explores his concern with ethics, psychoanalysis, literary theory, biography and autobiography and includes a lengthy section on the still much-neglected study of Flaubert, L'Idiot de la famille. One important aim of the book is to rebut the charges made by many theorists and philosophers by revealing that Sartre is in fact a (...) major source for concepts such as the decentred subject and detotalised truth and for the revolt against individualistic humanism. Dr Howells also takes into account much posthumously published material, in particular the Chaiers pour une morale, but also the Lettres au Castor and the Cranets de la drole de guerre. The work is a substantial contribution to Sartre studies, but has been written with the non-specialist in mind; to that end all quotations are translated into English and gathered in an appendix. (shrink)

Although birth marks the entrance of a human being into the world and establishes the very possibility of experience the philosophical implications of this event have been largely ignored in the history of thought. This is particularly troubling in phenomenology in general and in the work of Martin Heidegger in particular. While Heidegger raises the issue of birth he drops it very quickly on the path to defining Dasein''s existence as constituted from the standpoint of death, as being-towards-death. In this (...) paper I argue, contra Heidegger, that intentional existence can only be understood from the standpoint of birth. I begin by showing that intentionality inheres in a double difference that is fundamentally dependent on birth insofar as birth is an original differentiating from prenatal existence. I conclude with the argument that only a philosophy that regards Dasein from the standpoint of birth, as being-from-birth, can give an adequate account of humans as beings who live with others and who can initiate sense constitution and action. (shrink)

Positive emotions are highly valued and frequently sought. Beyond just being pleasant, however, positive emotions may also lead to long-term benefits in important domains, including work, physical health, and interpersonal relationships. Research thus far has focused on the broader functions of positive emotions. According to the broaden-and-build theory, positive emotions expand people’s thought–action repertoires and allow them to build psychological, intellectual, and social resources. New evidence suggests that positive emotions—particularly gratitude—may also play a role in motivating individuals to engage in (...) positive behaviors leading to self-improvement. We propose and offer supportive evidence that expressing gratitude leads people to muster effort to improve themselves via increases in connectedness, elevation, humility, and specific negative states including indebtedness. (shrink)

Research in the cognitive sciences indicates that metaphors significantly shape perceptions and approaches to problem solving. With this in mind, this essay argues that it is problematic for ethicists that mainstream economics and other social scientific literature relies on naturalistic metaphors to describe markets. These imply an inaccurate picture of economic phenomena and rhetorically frame many solutions to problems such as inequality as interventionist. This essay proposes that religious ethicists may find resources for avoiding this conceptual hazard in emerging fields (...) of heterodox economics that are attentive to the role of culture and human agency in shaping markets. It introduces feminist, behavioral, institutional, and Austrian economics in particular and highlights some of the specific approaches to inequality adopted in these fields. It then suggests that engaging heterodox perspectives more generally may help ethicists keep in view the full complexity and social nature of the economic problems they analyze. (shrink)

This book provides an introduction to the emerging field of continental philosophy of religion by treating the thought of its most important representatives, including its appropriations by several thinkers in the United States. Part I provides context by examining religious aspects of the thought of Martin Heidegger, Emmanuel Levinas, and Jacques Derrida. Christina Gschwandtner contends that, although the work of these thinkers is not apologetic in nature, it prepares the ground for the more religiously motivated work of more recent (...) thinkers by giving religious language and ideas some legitimacy in philosophical discussions. Part II devotes a chapter to each of the contemporary French thinkers who articulate a phenomenology of religious experience: Paul Ricoeur, Jean-Luc Marion, Michel Henry, Jean-Louis Chrétien, Jean-Yves Lacoste, and Emmanuel Falque. In it, the author argues that their respective philosophies can be read as an apologetics of sorts--namely, as arguments for the coherence of thought about God and the viability of religious experience--though each thinker does so in a different fashion and to a different degree. Part III considers the three major thinkers who have popularized and extended this phenomenology in the U.S. context: John D. Caputo, Merold Westphal, and Richard Kearney. The book thus both provides an introduction to important contemporary thinkers, many of whom have not yet received much treatment in English, and also argues that their philosophies can be read as providing an argument for Christian faith. (shrink)

Reviewers of this book have praised Christina Hoff Sommer's well-reasoned argument against many feminists' reliance on misleading, politically motivated 'facts' about how women are victimised.

This study draws on achievement goal theory and self-determination theory to examine the associations among two motivational climates (i.e. mastery and performance) and two indicators of energy at work (i.e. vigour and emotional exhaustion), as well as the mediating role of basic psychological need satisfaction (i.e. autonomy, relatedness, and competence). A two-wave longitudinal study was conducted collecting data from 1081 engineers and technologists. We applied previously validated instruments to assess the variables of interest. Structural equation modeling analyses were conducted to (...) test the hypotheses. Our findings show that mastery climate is positively and significantly related to each of the three basic needs, while a performance climate is negatively and significantly related to each of the three basic needs. Further, the results indicate that the basic needs are significantly associated with both measures of energy, negatively with emotional exhaustion and positively with vigour. This pattern of results suggests that basic psychological need satisfaction mediates the relationship between motivational climates and energy at work. (shrink)

This article uses Egyptian burials of the Roman period as an entry point for considering aesthetics in relation to archaeology, ancient art, and human remains. Although some archaeologists and Egyptologists reject or ignore the concept of aesthetics, this article argues that it complements questions of ontology, materiality, and social practice that concern much contemporary archaeological thought. Moreover, engaging with aesthetics in the study of the ancient world requires archaeologists to reflect critically on the relationship between disciplinary histories and knowledge production, (...) and to recognize the influence that earlier aesthetic models, such as racial science, continue to exert in current aesthetic encounters with ancient Egypt and its dead. (shrink)

Script analysis is often used in research that focuses on gender and technology design. It is applied as a method to describe problematic inscriptions of gender in technology and as a tool for advancing more acceptable inscriptions of gender in technology. These analyses are based on the assumption that we can design technologies that do justice to gender. One critique on script analysis is that it does not engage with the emergent effects of design. The authors explore this critique with (...) the help of two vignettes taken from their design research. In this article they ask: How to design for gender if gender and design are emergent? The authors present two design strategies, degendering design and undesigning design and propose a new approach to doing justice to gender in design. This perspective foregrounds ethics in the design process, in particular the accountability of technology designers. (shrink)