The controversy over the old ideal of “value-free science” has cooled significantly over the past decade. Many philosophers of science now agree that even ethical and political values may play a substantial role in all aspects of scientific inquiry. Consequently, in the last few years, work in science and values has become more specific: Which values may influence science, and in which ways? Or, how do we distinguish illegitimate from illegitimate kinds of influence? In this paper, I argue that this (...) problem requires philosophers of science to take a new direction. I present two case studies in the influence of values on scientific inquiry: feminist values in archaeology and commercial values in pharmaceutical research. I offer a preliminary assessment of these cases, that the influence of values was legitimate in the feminist case, but not in the pharmaceutical case. I then turn to three major approaches to distinguish legitimate from illegitimate influences of values, including the distinction between epistemic and non-epistemic values and Heather Douglas’ distinction between direct and indirect roles for values. I argue that none of these three approaches gives an adequate analysis of the two cases. In the concluding section, I briefly sketch my own approach, which draws more heavily on ethics than the others, and is more promising as a solution to the current problem. This is the new direction in which I think science and values should move. (shrink)

Sinking organic particles transfer ∼10 gigatonnes of carbon into the deep ocean each year, keeping the atmospheric CO2 concentration significantly lower than would otherwise be the case. The exact size of this effect is strongly influenced by biological activity in the ocean's twilight zone (∼50–1,000 m beneath the surface). Recent work suggests that the resident zooplankton fragment, rather than ingest, the majority of encountered organic particles, thereby stimulating bacterial proliferation and the deep‐ocean microbial food web. Here we speculate that this (...) apparently counterintuitive behaviour is an example of ‘microbial gardening’, a strategy that exploits the enzymatic and biosynthetic capabilities of microorganisms to facilitate the ‘gardener's’ access to a suite of otherwise unavailable compounds that are essential for metazoan life. We demonstrate the potential gains that zooplankton stand to make from microbial gardening using a simple steady state model, and we suggest avenues for future research. (shrink)

Standard approaches to defining and evaluating environmental risk tend to reflect technocratic rather than democratic values. One consequence is that institutional mechanisms for achieving citizen participation in risk decisions rarely are studied or evaluated. This article presents a survey of five institutional mechanisms for allowing the lay public to influence environmental risk decisions: public hearings, initiatives, public surveys, negotiated rule making, and citizens review panels. It also defines democratic process criteria for assessing these and other participatory mechanisms.

Joseph HenryWoodger (1894–1981) was one of the foremost theoretical biologists of the twentieth century. Starting out his career as an experimental embryologist and cytologist, Woodger became increasingly interested in the conceptual foundations of biology. Eventually, he abandoned all empirical research so that he could devote himself fully to studying the structure of biological theories. Perhaps his major accomplishment was the 500-page treatise 'Biological Principles: A Critical Study' (1929), which systematically investigated the epistemological basis of biological knowledge through an analysis of (...) its central concepts. Today, he is mostly remembered for his audacious monograph 'The Axiomatic Method in Biology' (1937), which remains the most ambitious attempt to reformulate the propositions of biology (especially genetics, embryology, and taxonomy) using the tools of symbolic logic and pure mathematics. Woodger is also known for establishing the Theoretical Biology Club, and for introducing the ‘Bauplan’ concept into Anglophone biology. The insect Terpandrus Woodgeri (Woodger’s Gumleaf Katydid) is named in his honour. (shrink)

The writings of the later Mohists are generally taken to contain several updates to the consequentialist ethical view held by the Mohist school. In this paper, I defend one interpretation of those updates and how they may have served, within the Mohists’ argumentative context, to make their views more defensible. I argue that we should reject A.C. Graham’s prominent interpretation, on which the later Mohists’ argumentative strategy is to develop a conception of the a priori and to ground their ethical (...) view in a form of a priori rationalism. I contend, instead, that the strength of the later Mohists’ ethical view comes largely from their adoption of a subjective criterion for identifying what counts as a benefit within their consequentialist view. I show how the adoption of this subjective criterion fits within a larger trend in later Mohist thought of coming to terms with the diversity of people’s evaluative standpoints, and further show how it equips the later Mohists with worthwhile responses to their philosophical rivals. (shrink)

A number of formal models, including a highly influential model from Hong and Page, purport to show that functionally diverse groups often beat groups of individually high-performing agents in solving problems. Thompson argues that in Hong and Page’s model, that the diverse groups are created by a random process explains their success, not the diversity. Here, I defend the diversity interpretation of the Hong and Page result. The failure of Thompson’s argument shows that to understand the value of functional diversity, (...) we should be clearer about how we conceive of and measure that diversity. (shrink)

Ocean biology helps regulate global climate by fixing atmospheric CO2 and exporting it to deep waters as sinking detrital particles. New observations demonstrate that particle fragmentation is the principal factor controlling the depth to which these particles penetrate the ocean's interior, and hence how long the constituent carbon is sequestered from the atmosphere. The underlying cause is, however, poorly understood. We speculate that small, particle‐associated copepods, which intercept and inadvertently break up sinking particles as they search for attached protistan prey, (...) are the principle agents of fragmentation in the ocean. We explore this idea using a new marine ecosystem model. Results indicate that explicitly representing particle fragmentation by copepods in biogeochemical models offers a step change in our ability to understand the future evolution of biologically‐mediated ocean carbon storage. Our findings highlight the need for improved understanding of the distribution, abundance, ecology and physiology of particle‐associated copepods. (shrink)

Since at least the mid-2000s, political commentators, environmental advocates, and scientists have raised concerns about an “anti-science” approach to environmental policymaking in conservative governments in the US and Canada. This paper explores and resolves a paradox surrounding at least some uses of the “anti-science” epithet. I examine two cases of such “anti-science” environmental policy, both of which involve appeals to epistemic values that are widely endorsed by both scientists and philosophers of science. It seems paradoxical to call an appeal to (...) epistemic values “anti-science.” I develop an analysis that, I argue, can resolve this paradox. This analysis is a version of the “aims approach” to science and values, drawing on ideas from axiology and virtue ethics. I characterize the paradox in terms of conflicts or tensions between epistemic and pragmatic aims, and argue that there is a key asymmetry between them: epistemic aims are valuable, in part, because they are useful for pursuing pragmatic aims. Thus, when epistemic and pragmatic aims conflict, epistemic aims need to be reconceptualized in order to reconcile them to pragmatic aims. When this is done, in the “anti-science” cases, the epistemic values are scientific vices rather than virtues. Thus the “anti-science” epithet is apt. (shrink)

According to inferential role semantics, for any given expression to possess a particular meaning one must be disposed to make or, alternatively, acknowledge as correct certain inferential transitions involving it. As Williamson points out, pejoratives such as ‘Boche’ seem to provide a counter-example to IRS. Many speakers are neither disposed to use such expressions nor consider it proper to do so. But it does not follow, as IRS appears to entail, that such speakers do not understand pejoratives or that they (...) lack meaning. In this paper, I examine recent responses to this problem by Boghossian and Brandom and argue that their proposed construal of the kind of inferential rules governing a pejorative such as ‘Boche’ is to be ruled out on the grounds that it is non-conservative. I defend the appeal to conservatism in this instance against criticism and, in doing so, propose an alternative approach to pejoratives on behalf of IRS that resolves the problem Williamson poses. (shrink)

This article investigates the use of favors by managers of BRIC firms to accomplish business goals, the ethicality of which should be determined by the moral reasoning in these countries rather than from a developed country perspective. We define a favor as an exchange of outcomes between individuals, typically utilizing one's connections, that is based on a commonly understood cultural tradition, with reciprocity by the receiver typically not being immediate, and its value being less than what would constitute bribery within (...) that cultural context. This exchange normally takes place between and among members of networks, and may involve a network outsider contacted by a network insider on behalf of another insider. We see the giver and receiver of the favor, as well as network insiders and outsiders, as stakeholders. Additionally, society could also be considered to be a stakeholder since the practice of using favors generally inhibits the development of legitimate, strong formal institutions, since the use of favors in emerging economies is rooted in cultural traditions that we view as informal institutions. Furthermore, we assert that the practice of using favors can lead to bribery which harms society as a stakeholder both morally and economically. We posit that BRIC-country managers' behaviors stem from informal, culturally based practices—jeito in Brazil, blat/sviazi in Russia, jaan-pehchaan in India, and guanxi in China. We utilize institutional theory to explain why favors are relied upon, and ISCT to support the argument that the use of favors in environments like the BRICs is generally considered ethical. (shrink)

Philosophers are approaching a consensus that biological individuality, including evolutionary individuality, comes in degrees. Graded evolutionary individuality presents a puzzle when juxtaposed with another widely embraced view: that evolutionary individuality follows from being a selectable member of a Darwinian population. Population membership is, on the orthodox view, a bivalent condition, so how can members of Darwinian populations vary in their degree of individuality? This article offers a solution to the puzzle, by locating difference in degree of evolutionary individuality at the (...) level of population lineages, some of which are more Darwinian than others. In doing so, it sheds light on graded individuality in overlapping and nested population lineages, such as those that arise in multilevel selection and symbiotic collectives. (shrink)

We read with interest the recent article on criteria for patient selection of cardiac xenotransplantation by Kögel et al.1 The authors recognise the benefits and concerns of first developing xenotransplantation trials in children (or at least concurrent development). They conclude that, based on (1) the vulnerable nature of children and (2) the observation that ‘the benefits of cardiac xenotransplantation have never been systematically proven in humans,’ that the ‘very first clinical trials should be conducted with adult patients.’ This is a (...) long-standing contention in xenotransplantation that, to our knowledge, finds its origins in the Nuffield Council on Bioethics’ 1996 report on xenotransplantation, which states: ‘It would be difficult to justify the involvement of children in major and risky xenotransplantation trials before some of the uncertainties have been eliminated in trials involving adults.’2 However, given the cardiac allotransplant waitlist mortality borne by some paediatric patients, as well as other factors that raise unique candidacy considerations in children compared with adults—and arguably make some children better candidates than adults—we do not believe …. (shrink)

This collection of essays explores the metaphysical thesis that the living world is not made up of substantial particles or things, as has often been assumed, but is rather constituted by processes. The biological domain is organised as an interdependent hierarchy of processes, which are stabilised and actively maintained at different timescales. Even entities that intuitively appear to be paradigms of things, such as organisms, are actually better understood as processes. Unlike previous attempts to articulate processual views of biology, which (...) have tended to use Alfred North Whitehead’s panpsychist metaphysics as a foundation, this book takes a naturalistic approach to metaphysics. It submits that the main motivations for replacing an ontology of substances with one of processes are to be found in the empirical findings of science. Biology provides compelling reasons for thinking that the living realm is fundamentally dynamic, and that the existence of things is always conditional on the existence of processes. The phenomenon of life cries out for theories that prioritise processes over things, and it suggests that the central explanandum of biology is not change but rather stability, or more precisely, stability attained through constant change. This edited volume brings together philosophers of science and metaphysicians interested in exploring the consequences of a processual philosophy of biology. The contributors draw on an extremely wide range of biological case studies, and employ a process perspective to cast new light on a number of traditional philosophical problems, such as identity, persistence, and individuality. (shrink)

Abstractabstract:Being a parent is hard, particularly parenting adolescents, who need to be given choices and allowed the space to learn how to make choices for themselves, even when those choices result in negative consequences. This essay explores how Steven Sondheim and James Lapine's 1987 musical Into the Woods provides relatable stories of the challenges of being a parent, the challenges of parenting adolescents, and just how messy parents and families can be despite everyone trying their best. The stories of Little (...) Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, Jack, and Cinderella show us various stages, trajectories, and occasional tragedies of adolescents' emerging autonomy, while the Baker's and the Witch's struggles becoming and being parents encapsulate how disorderly and untidy parenting often is. Pediatricians and clinical bioethicists, who are often in a position to scrutinize the choices of parents and teens, should remember that parents and adolescents are almost always motivated by good intentions and doing the best that they can. Perhaps the best we can do is accompany them on their journey "into the woods.". (shrink)

G. W. Leibniz has been praised as an exemplar of tolerance on both theological and political grounds. His irenic efforts within Christendom as well as his positive attitude towards pagans like the Chinese is well documented. He thought that “the great majority of mankind” were already “civilized”. This paper highlights Leibniz’s political treatment of the “uncivilized” peoples, whom he termed “barbarians” and “savages”. Given Leibniz’s worldly outlook and prodigious reading, including writings detailing the horrors inflicted on the natives of the (...) Americas, he blithely ignored a reality that was quite at odds with his own vision for such peoples. The dissonance between his ideas on how to treat “barbarian” peoples (whom he considered to be fully human and deserving of mutual respect) and his awareness of their actual treatment in many nascent European colonies is striking. The only conclusion that can be reached (though Leibniz never says so explicitly) is that their conversion to Christianity and the consequent enlightenment of their posterity trumped their present suffering. (shrink)

I studied Royce a bit as an undergraduate, and in graduate school, I took a course that included readings from Race Questions. Memory was, and is, an abiding interest of mine, and so I focused on that element of Royce’s thought—specifically, the community of memory and of hope in his Problem of Christianity. I suppose I had a naïve sense of Royce’s racism at the time—something along these lines: “Of course, a nineteenth-century white man was racist, but he was not (...) a bad racist.” However, I was a Peirce scholar at heart, and so set Royce aside for years, except for pairing Philosophy of Loyalty with Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince in an ethical leadership course that I taught twice.In the interim, I moved to a... (shrink)

Origen of Alexandria uses the language of ἔρως to explain God’s desire to be with humanity. However, Plato’s classic definition of ἔρως as a mix of poverty and plenty seems to be at odds with Origen’s commitment to classical theism. This article explains why Origen does not consider this attribution to contradict his theological commitments. It starts with a discussion of Origen’s theory of divine attributes, the ἐπίνοιαι Χριστοῦ. Next, Origen’s doctrine of passio caritatis, which states that God can actively (...) will to be passive, is explained. Then, Origen’s familiarity with Plato’s Symposium is demonstrated. The article then considers Origen’s attribution of ἔρως to God, and its context, in the Commentarium in Canticum Canticorum; it emerges that the Incarnation is, for Origen, God’s most erotic act. The final section shows that Origen maintains his understanding of God’s erotic, incarnational movement towards fallen humanity in works other than the Commentarium in Canticum Canticorum. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Christian Naturalism: Christian Thinking for Living in This World Only by Karl E. PetersDaniel J. OttChristian Naturalism: Christian Thinking for Living in This World Only. Karl E. Peters. Boston: Wipf & Stock, 2022. xvi + 152 pp. $25.00 paperback; $22.00 eBook; $40.00 hardcover.The number of scholars who would call themselves Christian naturalists and the number of books that think through what it means to be both Christian and (...) naturalist are quite small. Karl E. Peters has been an outstanding figure in this small group for many years. He is a leader in the science and religion dialogue in the United States and has been thinking theologically for a long time about what it means to be a Christian in an age of science. For these reasons, I was eager to read Peters’s Christian Naturalism as it promised to be a concise and systematic summary of his thinking about Christian Naturalist theology. What I found was a book that may have its uses but is not always successful in both its approach and its argumentation.Peters states in the Introduction that the book is “intentionally written for a general audience” (xi), and he maintains an accessible style and vocabulary throughout. Often, the book has an autobiographical quality as Peters weaves in reflection on his own educational journey in both science and theology. Chapters 1 and 3 helpfully lay out a brief comparison of ancient cosmologies and a contemporary scientific cosmology. Chapter 3 is a good example of some of the interesting heuristics that Peters uses throughout as he tells the story of the beginnings of the universe and the emergence of life on Earth in a first-person narrative. The rest of the book proceeds in brief and accessible treatments of categories one would typically find in theology primers: God, Jesus, evil and sin, salvation, ethics, and after death. The remainder of this review will take up two of these categories: 1) evil, sin, and ethics and 2) after death. The former will serve as an example of the book’s relative weaknesses and the latter as an example of the book’s promise and usefulness.“Human Evil,” chapter 4, begins promisingly. Peters builds on an earlier introduction to the idea that we can associate “God” with the creative processes at work in the universe or with creativity itself. Here, Peters argues that being faithful to creativity becomes the norm for Christian faith and morality. “So, being moral means sustaining the well-being of already created dynamic systems and at the same time being open to creativity (God) and the emergence of new systems” (42). Perhaps these arguments would be better positioned at the [End Page 97] beginning of a chapter on morality and ethics rather than the chapter on evil and sin, though, especially since the corollary definition of sin doesn’t come for another twenty-four pages. There, Peters explains that “sin (the Christian term for human evil) is the attempt to limit the work of creativity (God) and to limit what is included in the family of life that arises from the work of creativity (God)” (66). These two definitions taken together offer one of the most theologically pregnant ideas in the book. Unfortunately, they are not pursued and applied in a systematic way throughout the remainder of this chapter and into chapters 7 and 8 on ethics and Christian practice. What we get, instead, is a collection of reflections on various ethical topics including: racism, xenophobia, sexism, and climate change.Perhaps if these sections were retitled “Karl’s Reflections on Wrestling with White, Male Privilege,” the reader would have the right expectation and their usefulness would reemerge. But as they stand they often lose the thread of their connections to his theological definitions and sometimes slip into problematic assumptions. The latter is exhibited when Peters employs the first-person again, this time in reference to certain social histories, as when “you and I” migrated from north Africa to the Caucasus Mountains (47), or when “you and I arrived in America from England in 1630” (58). The assumed “you” seems to be white, male people of anglo origin and therefore cuts... (shrink)

Joshua Daniel offers a reconstruction of the influence of Josiah Royce and George Herbert Mead on H. Richard Niebuhr to counter predominate strains in Christian ethics that overemphasize the role of socialization in moral formation at the expense of acknowledging the agency of individuals and their importance in preventing communities from turning in on themselves or becoming static. Daniel characterizes the driving worry of postliberal Christian ethics as “the accommodation of Christian communities to prevailing social forces and norms, (...) which is understood to radically undermine the churches’ existence and mission”. The primary accusation against these prevailing social norms is individualism. The modern... (shrink)

Social media offers an attractive site for Big Data research. Access to big social media data, however, is controlled by companies that privilege corporate, governmental, and private research firms. Additionally, Institutional Review Boards’ regulative practices and slow adaptation to emerging ethical dilemmas in online contexts creates challenges for Big Data researchers. We examine these challenges in the context of a feminist qualitative Big Data analysis of the hashtag event #WhyIStayed. We argue power, context, and subjugated knowledges must each be central (...) considerations in conducting Big Data social media research. In doing so, this paper offers a feminist practice of holistic reflexivity in order to help social media researchers navigate and negotiate this terrain. (shrink)