Cognitive systems face a tension between stability and plasticity. The maintenance of long‐term representations that reflect the global regularities of the environment is often at odds with pressure to flexibly adjust to short‐term input regularities that may deviate from the norm. This tension is abundantly clear in speech communication when talkers with accents or dialects produce input that deviates from a listener's language community norms. Prior research demonstrates that when bottom‐up acoustic information or top‐down word knowledge is available to disambiguate (...) speech input, there is short‐term adaptive plasticity such that subsequent speech perception is shifted even in the absence of the disambiguating information. Although such effects are well‐documented, it is not yet known whether bottom‐up and top‐down resolution of ambiguity may operate through common processes, or how these information sources may interact in guiding the adaptive plasticity of speech perception. The present study investigates the joint contributions of bottom‐up information from the acoustic signal and top‐down information from lexical knowledge in the adaptive plasticity of speech categorization according to short‐term input regularities. The results implicate speech category activation, whether from top‐down or bottom‐up sources, in driving rapid adjustment of listeners' reliance on acoustic dimensions in speech categorization. Broadly, this pattern of perception is consistent with dynamic mapping of input to category representations that is flexibly tuned according to interactive processing accommodating both lexical knowledge and idiosyncrasies of the acoustic input. (shrink)

This paper reports laboratory data for games that are played only once. These games span the standard categories: static and dynamic games with complete and incomplete information. For each game, the treasure is a treatment in which behavior conforms nicely to predictions of the Nash equilibrium or relevant refinement. In each case, however, a change in the payoff structure produces a large inconsistency between theoretical predictions and observed behavior. These contradictions are generally consistent with simple intuition based on the interaction (...) of payoff asymmetries and noisy introspection about others’ decisions. (shrink)

Two fundamental business ethics issues that repeatedly surface in the academic literature relate to business's role in the development of public policy [Suarez, S. L.: 2000, Does Business Learn? (The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI); Roberts, R. W. and D. D. Bobek: 2004, Accounting, Organizations and Society 29(5-6), 565-590] and its role in responsibly managing the natural environment [Newton, L.: 2005, Business Ethics and the Natural Environment (Blackwell Publishing, Oxford)]. When studied together, researchers often examine if, and how, (...) corporations influence environmental policy decisions. Drawing from literatures on corporate political activity, corporate social and environmental performance, and corporate environmental disclosure, we develop and empirically examine two research questions concerning the relations between corporate political expenditures, environmental performance, and environmental disclosure. The questions are: (1) Do corporations that are poorer environmental performers spend more on political activities than their better-performing counterparts? (2) Is there an association between corporations' spending on political activities and the extent of their financial report environmental disclosures? We investigated these questions through analyses of data we gathered on a sample consisting of 119 U.S. environmentally sensitive firms for the 2001-2002 election cycle. After controlling for firm size and specific industry effects, our tests reveal a significant, inverse relationship between firm environmental performance and political spending. This is consistent with the notion that U.S. firms with relatively poorer environmental performance records engage more intensely in corporate political activities as part of their overall strategic management of their relationship with the state. In addition, a significant and positive association between the amount of political spending and the extent of environmental disclosure suggests that environmental disclosure and political spending are both proactive, complementary tactics to strategically manage public policy pressure. If corporations' strategies are intentionally designed to unreasonably limit their environmental responsibilities or to misrepresent firm environmental performance, then we argue that these activities reflect a significant lapse in ethical conduct. (shrink)

In “Divine Foreknowledge and Facts” Paul Helm defends a traditional argument to the incompatibility of foreknowledge and free will “against the attempts of Kenny and some other recent writers to provide a reconciliation.” I shall here set out a reconciliationist position similar to those he attacks, but innocent of the charges he makes against them.The argument, discussed by St. Thomas in the Summa Theologiae, employs the doctrine of the necessity of the past to show that literally prior knowledge of a (...) free action is impossible. Since prior knowledge of an action is past relative to the ·action, the fact of that knowledge is necessary. It is a past fact, and so cannot be undone. From this it follows that the action itself must be necessary; for necessity is transitive, and knowledge of p implies p. But only contingent actions can be free, and so no free action can be foreknown. (shrink)

The use of high hypothetical payoffs has been justified by the realism and relevance of large monetary consequences and by the impracticality of making high cash payments. We argue that subjects may not be able to imagine how they would behave in high payoff situations.

N- and O-linked glycan structures of cell surface and secreted glycoproteins serve a variety of functions related to cell–cell communication in systems affecting development and disease. The more sophisticated N-glycan biosynthesis pathway of metazoans diverges from that of yeast with the appearance of the medial-Golgi β-N-acetylglucosaminyltransferases (GlcNAc-Ts). Tissue-specific regulation of medial- and trans-Golgi glycosyltransferases contribute structural diversity to glycoproteins in metazoans, and this can affect their molecular properties including localization, half-life, and biological activity. Null mutations in glycosyltransferase genes positioned later (...) in the biosynthetic pathway disrupt expression of smaller subsets of glycan structures and are progressively milder in phenotype. In this review, we examine data on targeted mutations affecting glycosylation in mice and congenital mutations in man, with a view to understanding the molecular functions of glycan structures as modulators of glycoprotein activity. Finally, pathology associated with the expression of GlcNAc-Ts in cancer and diabetes-induced cardiac hypertrophy suggest that inhibitors of these enzymes may have therapeutic value. BioEssays 21:412–421, 1999. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

A course on the Western philosophical tradition, with multiple lecturers, available in audio and video formats through the Great Courses.

This paper investigates potential motivations for late adopting U.S. companies to begin disclosing environmental liability amounts in their financial statements. Based on a review of 10-K reports filed from 1998 through 2012, inclusive, we identified 55 firms initiating environmental liability disclosure over the period, with all but three doing so by 2006. Focusing on the disclosers up through 2006, we argue that the companies may have used the disclosure as a tool of impression management to avoid potential stakeholder mis-estimation of (...) previously undisclosed liability exposures. We first compute tests to identify firms that may have begun the disclosure due to (1) materiality and (2) concerns of having proprietary costs imposed upon them due to changes in their environmental media coverage and environmental performance, and we find very few cases where these explanations might hold. For the remaining companies, we compared their newly disclosed liability amount, on average, with the mean level of environmental liability being disclosed by other firms in the year prior to the sample companies’ initiation, and find that it is significantly smaller, thus supporting our impression management argument. Finally, we find that overall level of environmental liability amounts was consistently decreasing over the time frame examined, suggesting that earlier adoption would have made more sense. However, it may also explain why almost no new firms began disclosing after the mid-2000s. (shrink)

In 2001, France became one of the few countries to require corporate social responsibility reporting through its Nouvelles Régulations Économiques #2001-420. However, initial compliance with the statute was low, a factor implying the law lacked normativity. In this exploratory study, we attempt to determine whether there is movement toward normativity by examining the change in CSR disclosure from 2004 in comparison to 2010 for a sample of 81 publicly traded French firms. We measure both the space and the quality of (...) CSR disclosures, including in the latter a measure based on informational quality attributes as discussed by the International Accounting Standards Board, the Financial Accounting Standards Board, and the Global Reporting Initiative. We find significant increases in the space allocated to CSR disclosure, as well as some evidence of increased quality; although the informational quality of the disclosures remains quite low and fewer firms are including negative performance information in their reports. Finally, we document that differences in disclosure space and quality in 2004 appeared to be associated with legitimacy-based variables and that those relations remain largely unchanged in 2010. As such, it appears that the NRE’s goals of increased transparency remain unmet. (shrink)

In this study, we developed and validated an instrument that researchers can use to measure the collective effort of principals and teachers who excise their own unique leadership to genera...

This book is a personal history and apology, written by one of this century's most distinguished small mammal ecologists, for a life in science spent working on problems for which no final dramatic conclusion was reached. Included along the way are some important anecdotes and history about Charles Elton and the pioneering work at the Bureau of Animal Population at Oxford University, from which most of modern population ecology has grown, and insigts on the philosophy and practice of science.

In Descartes’s reformulation of natural philosophy, two aspects of what came to be known as the mechanical philosophy were intimately joined: mechanism as an ontology of nature, according to which all natural things had only ‘mechanical’ properties; and mechanism as a method of explanation. One could, and many philosophers did, adopt mechanism as a method of explanation without adopting a mechanistic ontology. I examine two successors of Descartes who did just that, and one who did not. Giovanni Alfonso Borelli in (...) his De motu animalium and Charles Perrault in his Mécanique de animaux propose and argue for a variety of mechanical accounts of the operations of animals, in particular of their muscles. They reject, however, the Cartesian reduction of animal souls to mechanical forces; the principle of animal motion for them remains a non-mechanical soul. Pierre Sylvain Régis in his Cours entier de philosophie follows Descartes in taking the ‘physical cause’ of motion in animals to be the fermentation of blood in the heart, and thus denies animal souls any role in his physiology. That he can do so while taking over, sometimes word for word, Perrault’s accounts of animal motion shows that mechanistic explanation and mechanistic ontology could easily part company. (shrink)

Art works provide a unique and influential way to teach human virtues because they can place individuals (or particular artistic expressions) within the ambiguities, complexities, and forces of the human experience. I use four art works to teach about the virtue of kindness: Giotto di Bondonie's Scene 2: St. Francis Giving His Mantle to a Poor Man; Bishop Charles Francois in Victor Hugo's Les Misérables; Adam in William Shakespeare's As You Like It; and Sonya in Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime and (...) Punishment. In these four examples, we see necessary characteristics of being a kind person: supererogatory behavior, altruistic behavior, a display of the way the world ought to be, and the presence of a kind soul. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to raise the question of ethical life independently of the framework of metaphysical assumptions, above all, independently of the language and idiom of conceptual reason. In order to carry out this project, which is akin to what Heidegger described as the project of formulating an “original ethics,” I take up several works by Charles Scott that I find offering especially productive openings for that project.

Aristotle is often credited with views about practical reasoning, desire, and action collectively referred to as the theory of the practical syllogism.Some commentators are skeptical about the existence of any such general theory, but most would agree that a theory of some sort is outlined in the De Motu Animalium and that it influences Aristotle’s account of akrasia in the icomachean Ethics.This paper will begin by describing the most important ideas in the De Motu Animalium discussion of the practical syllogism. (...) The ideas are simple but I think that their implications and philosophical importance have not been appreciated. I will suggest that the practical syllogism is Aristotle’s model for the rational explanation of action. Other commentators have made this claim, but I think that it can be given a very precise sense. Aristotle thinks that an action can be rationally explained if the agent acts in response to the strength of the reasons that he sees for acting. The practical syllogism is an argument that expresses the reasons in favor of the action, so if the agent acts for those reasons the action is explained by the practical syllogism. The second part of the paper considers the work that the practical syllogism does in Aristotle’s account of akrasia. I will argue that in akrasia—at least in the most extreme kind of akrasia—the agent acts intentionally to satisfy a desire but the action cannot be explained by a practical syllogism. Aristotle distinguishes between explanation by the motivational strength of desires and explanation by a practical syllogism. The last part of this paper comments on David Charles’s interpretation of Aristotle’s views about desire, practical reason, and akrasia. Charles discusses the traditionally disputed questions in a provocative way, and more importantly his suggestions fit together into a complex and philosophically sophisticated reading of Aristotle. I disagree with his most important claims, but I can best explain and defend my own interpretation by contrasting it with his. (shrink)

Dennis Schmidt is developing a way of thinking that has at its core his understanding of "idiom," especially in what he calls "original ethics" and "idiomatic truth." This paper engages that understanding, distinguishes linguistic idioms and "event idioms," shows the transformative effects in both his thought and his life that his focus on idioms has had and is having in the present direction of his constructive philosophy, and further shows that this direction has the potential to change considerably major (...) aspects of contemporary continental philosophy. (shrink)

Identifying what the differences are or ought to be between Catholic health care organizations and their non-Catholic counterparts is the subject of great debate. The author responds to the essays in this volume by Dennis Brodeur, Clarke E. Cochran and Christopher J. Kauffman, each of which represents a different perspective in the discussion of what is unique about Catholic health care.

This volume commemorates the 6th centennial of the birth of Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464), a Renaissance polymath whose interests included law, politics, metaphysics, epistemology, theology, mysticism and relations between Christians and non-Christian peoples. The contributors to this volume reflect Cusanus' multiple interests; and, by doing so they commemorate three deceased luminaries of the American Cusanus Society: F. Edward Cranz, Thomas P. McTighe and Charles Trinkaus. Contributors include: Christopher M. Bellitto, H. Lawrence Bond, Elizabeth Brient, Louis Dupré, Wilhelm Dupré, Walter (...) Andreas Euler, Lawrence Hundersmarck, Thomas M. Izbicki, Dennis D. Martin, Yelena Matusevich, Bernard McGinn, Clyde Lee Miller, Thomas E. Morrissey, Brian A. Pavlac, and Morimichi Watanabe. Publications by Charles Trinkaus: - Edited by C. Trinkaus and H.A. Oberman, The pursuit of holiness in late medieval and renaissance religion, ISBN: 978 90 04 03791 5 (Out of print). (shrink)

Today many adult children find themselves in the position of caring for elderly parents and attending to the other demands of life. Because of the unique balance of power in the adult child/elderly parent relationship as well as other negative influences, many adult children find caring for parents a frustrating task. This article argues a solution to this dilemma can be found in a renewed appreciation of filial piety as it specifically relates to caring for elderly parents. Using the moral (...) insights of Aristotle and Aquinas, this paper develops a contemporary theoretical framework for geriatric filial piety that incorporates the traditional virtues of gratitude, respect, honor and obedience. It also illustrates their practical application so that adult children can find caring for their elderly parents a meaningful activity. (shrink)

A fascinating recent turn in epistemology focuses on inquiring attitudes like wondering and being curious. Many have argued that these attitudes are governed by norms similar to those that govern our doxastic attitudes. Yet, to date, this work has only considered norms that might prohibit having certain inquiring attitudes (“norms of restriction”), while ignoring those that might require having them (“norms of expansion”). We aim to address that omission by offering a framework that generates norms of expansion for inquiring attitudes. (...) The framework draws on inferential erotetic logic, which we explain and augment with some theorems. We explore several of the norms that it yields—some sympathetically, others unsympathetically. (shrink)

Excerpt from The Appeal to Immediate Experience: Philosophic Method in Bradley Whitehead and Dewey The insight and guidance of Professor John Herman Randall, Jr. have made this book possible. Rather than merely acknowledge my debt to him I would like to express my gratitude here for his unfailing kindness, his penetrating criticism of my efforts, and the help he has given me in clarifying the complex problems of this subject-matter. I wish also to acknowledge the kindness of the following publishers (...) in permitting me to quote from their publications: F. H. Bradley, Appearance and Reality, by Allen and Unwin Ltd.; J. H. Randall, Jr. and J. Buchler, Philosophy: An Introduction, by Barnes Noble, Inc.; F. H. Bradley, Appearance and Reality and Essays on Truth and Reality, by Clarendon Press, Oxford; F. J. E. Woodbridge, Nature and Mind, by Columbia University Press; R. W. Church, Bradley's Dialectic, by Cornell University Press; John Dewey, The Man and His Philosophy, by Harvard University Press; J. Dewey, Logic and Influence of Darwin on Philosophy, by Henry Holt Company; R. Kagey, F. H. Bradley's Logic, by R. Kagey; J. Dewey, Nature in Experience and Whitehead's Philosophy, by Longmans, Green & Co.; A. N. Whitehead, Symbolism, Modes of Thought, Adventures of Ideas, Process and Reality, T. M. Forsyth, English Philosophy, and J. H. Muirhead, Bradley's Place in Philosophy, by the Macmillan Company; A. N. Whitehead, The Concept of Nature-and An Equiry Concerning the Principles of Natural Knowledge, by the Macmillan Company and the Cambridge University Press; H. B. Haldane, Human Experience, by John Murray Ltd.; J. Goheen, Whitehead's Theory of Value, by Northwestern University Press; J. Dewey, Experience and Nature, by Open Court Publishing Co.; G. Santayana, Realm of Essence and Scepticism and Animal Faith, by Charles Scribner's Sons; and J. Dewey, "How is Mind to be Known?" The Objectivism-Subjectivism of Modern Philosophy," M. Gross, The Philosophy of A. N. Whitehead," and M. C. Otto, The Journal of Philosophy. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

The story of the greatest of all philosophical friendships—and how it influenced modern thought David Hume is widely regarded as the most important philosopher ever to write in English, but during his lifetime he was attacked as “the Great Infidel” for his skeptical religious views and deemed unfit to teach the young. In contrast, Adam Smith was a revered professor of moral philosophy, and is now often hailed as the founding father of capitalism. Remarkably, the two were best friends for (...) most of their adult lives, sharing what Dennis Rasmussen calls the greatest of all philosophical friendships. The Infidel and the Professor is the first book to tell the fascinating story of the friendship of these towering Enlightenment thinkers—and how it influenced their world-changing ideas. The book follows Hume and Smith’s relationship from their first meeting in 1749 until Hume’s death in 1776. It describes how they commented on each other’s writings, supported each other’s careers and literary ambitions, and advised each other on personal matters, most notably after Hume’s quarrel with Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Members of a vibrant intellectual scene in Enlightenment Scotland, Hume and Smith made many of the same friends, joined the same clubs, and were interested in many of the same subjects well beyond philosophy and economics—from psychology and history to politics and Britain’s conflict with the American colonies. The book reveals that Smith’s private religious views were considerably closer to Hume’s public ones than is usually believed. It also shows that Hume contributed more to economics—and Smith contributed more to philosophy—than is generally recognized. Vividly written, The Infidel and the Professor is a compelling account of a great friendship that had great consequences for modern thought. (shrink)

Attempts to illuminate the nature of “blame” have shaped recent philosophical discussion of free will and moral responsibility. In this paper I show how, in at least one context, this search for a theory of blame has led us astray. Specifically, I focus on the contemporary debate about the “standing” to blame and argue, first, that theorizing about blame-in-general in this context has assumed an impoverished moral psychology that fails to reflect the range of blaming emotions and that conflates these (...) emotions’ distinctive logics; and, second, that such theorizing has encouraged the propagation of misleading theories of blame’s “norms.” Rather than searching for the nature of blame, I employ and defend an alternative methodological approach that focuses on the psychology and ethics of specific reactive emotions. I then show how an agent’s own bad behavior can alter the appropriateness of these various attitudes in distinctive ways. Marking these distinctions leads to some surprising conclusions. For example, it allows us to move beyond the assumption that the wrongness of standingless blame is fundamentally a matter of hypocrisy. (shrink)

Seventeen obituaries of recently deceased Fellows of the British Academy: Shackleton Bailey; James Barr; William Beasley; Lord Blake; Julian Budden; Lord Bullock; Robert Carson, Laurence Cohen; Charles Feinstein; Henry Gifford; Peter Holt; Emrys Jones; Robert Megarry; Edward Oates; Maurice Wiles; Brian Woledge; Austin Woolrych.

When a person commits a testimonial injustice, the unjust thing they do consists in their reaction to an assertion (theorists diverge on the details; paradigmatically the relevant unjust thing consists in prejudicially refraining from believing the assertion). Whatever reactions to questions are analogous to these reactions to assertions, those things are "interrogative injustices". I explore some models of those things and apply them to some non-ideal cases. One of the models appeals to mental states like curiosity and wonder, telling us (...) that interrogative injustice occurs when hearers prejudicially refrain from adopting those mental states. Other models appeal to common conversational goals – these goals including the answering of questions. On these models, interrogative injustice occurs when a person asks a question, and another person prejudicially blocks the answering of that question from joining the common goals. Or, if they don’t block said answering, perhaps they believe that it should be thus blocked. Or perhaps they merely resist the question, not fully blocking its answering from joining the common goals but instead pushing back against it in some other way. Or perhaps they merely believe that they should resist the question. I endorse a pluralism on which each of these things can be an interrogative injustice. (shrink)