First published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The literature on faith has largely focused on the relationship between faith and belief, specifically the question: does faith entail belief? At the same time, it’s also widely held that faith involves a desire or pro-attitude, but more attention has been paid to the specifics of faith’s doxastic component than to faith’s affective component. This paper focuses on the relationship between faith and desire. I’ll argue that faith is weakly positive: while faith may not always involve a flat-out desire, faith (...) necessarily involves a positive desire-like attitude. (shrink)

This essay is a critical engagement with recent assessments of comparative religious ethics by John Kelsay and Jung Lee. Contra Kelsay's proposal to return to a neo-Weberian sociology of religious norm elaboration and justification, the authors argue that comparative religious ethics is and should be practiced as a field of study in active conversation with other fields that consider human flourishing, employing a variety of methods that have their roots in multiple disciplines. Cross-pollination from a variety of disciplines is a (...) strength of comparative ethics, which has enlivened recent and ongoing research on ethics, not a problem to be resolved by convergence on a single, distinctively comparative project. The authors also argue in response to Lee and Kelsay that while individual comparative studies of virtue and personal formation can be flawed in various ways, this line of research has been productive and at times very compelling. Moreover, attention to comparative virtue ethics shows how scholarship on some ethical topics necessitates drawing on a variety of perspectives and disciplinary backgrounds, a conclusion relevant to all work in religious ethics today. (shrink)

In this chapter, I argue that theistic belief is permissive belief. This is not a universal claim about persons or normative domains, but the claim that, for many common bodies of evidence, epistemic rationality is permissive about whether God exists. Marks of a permissive belief are rational disagreement over time, rational disagreement over persons, and powerful evidence on both sides. I argue that theistic belief fits all these criteria. I also show how considerations from divine hiddenness support permissivism about theism. (...) Then, I show how these considerations support intrapersonal permissivism about theistic belief, using Peter Van Inwagen’s (1994) Quam Dialecta as a case study. Finally, I reply to objections. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to mount a challenge to gesture-first hypotheses about the evolution of language by identifying constraints on the emergence of symbol use. Current debates focus on a range of pre-conditions for the emergence of language, including co-operation and related mentalising capacities, imitation and tool use, episodic memory, and vocal physiology, but little specifically on the ability to learn and understand symbols. It is argued here that such a focus raises new questions about the plausibility of (...) gesture-first hypotheses, and so about the evolution of language in general. After a brief review of the methodology used in the article, it is argued that existing uses of gesture in hominid communities may have prohibited the emergence of symbol use, rather than ‘bootstrapped’ symbolic capacities as is usually assumed, and that the vocal channel offers other advantages in both learning and using language. In this case, the vocal channel offers a more promising platform for the evolution of language than is often assumed. (shrink)

A growing number of theorists have launched an epistemic challenge against retributive punishment. This challenge involves the core claim that it is wrong (intentionally) to inflict serious harm on someone unless the moral argument for doing so has been established to a high standard of credibility. Proponents of this challenge typically argue that retributivism fails to meet the required epistemic standard, because retributivism relies on a contentious conception of free will, about whose existence we cannot be sufficiently certain. However, the (...) scope of the epistemic challenge should not be limited to doubts about free will or retributivism. In this article, I argue that the epistemic challenge should be expanded beyond the original focus on justifications of punishment. By “expanding the epistemic challenge” I mean demanding that other purported justifications for serious (intentional) harm be held to a high standard of credibility. To provide a focus for the argument, I will concentrate on the “Public Health Quarantine Model” defended by Gregg Caruso, but my arguments have wider implications beyond this model. A growing number of “abolitionist” theorists believe that punishment is wrong in principle. If retributive punishment, or punishment in general, were abandoned, we would need to ask, “how else should we respond to crime?”. My arguments suggest that all such abolitionists will have to face the same epistemic standard as penal theorists if they wish to replace punishment with the intentional imposition of non-punitive severe coercive measures. (shrink)

The theory that practical reasoning is wholly instrumental says that the only practical function of reason is to tell agents the means to their ends, while their ends are fixed by something other than reason itself. In this essay I argue that Hume has an instrumentalist theory of practical reasoning. This thesis may sound as unexciting as the contention that Kant is a rationalist about morality. For who would have thought otherwise? After all, isn't the ‘instrumentalist’ line in contemporary discussions (...) of this topic descended directly from Hume himself? Contrast the following recent comment from Robert Audi's book on practical reasoning, holding the standard line, with the comment from Christine Korsgaard following it:Hume's conception of practical reasoning, so far as we can formulate it, can be located within … the foundationalist account of motivation in which reason plays the instrumentalist role … by virtue of arousing and directing our desires. (shrink)

Uncountable superperfect forcing is tree forcing on regular uncountable cardinals κ with κ<κ=κ, using trees in which the heights of nodes that split along any branch in the tree form a club set, and such that any node in the tree with more than one immediate extension has measure-one-many extensions, where the measure is relative to some κ-complete, nonprincipal normal filter F. This forcing adds a generic of minimal degree if and only if F is κ-saturated.

Process models are valuable conceptual tools to help in understanding the approaches to value creation in social enterprises. This teaching case illustrates the application of a process model about creating, building, and sustaining a social enterprise with a mission to provide clean water to communities in need. The social enterprise generates revenue in support of community water projects and works with community stakeholders in different locations throughout the world to provide sustainable clean water solutions. The case study uses primary data (...) from semi-structured interviews, direct observations of a community project, and archival sources to demonstrate application of the process model. The study shows how the social enterprise developed as a promising idea; was implemented through an operating model with resources to support social impact; and continues to build and evolve while guided by the social mission. The paper concludes with a discussion and teaching note on ways to use the case for educational purposes to enhance learning about the social value creation process. (shrink)

This article presents a model of employee dishonesty and formation of stakeholders' images of organizations, which applies theories of moral judgment and attribution. It describes the person-situation interaction effects of characteristics of employee behavior and of persons making moral judgments on stakeholders' moral judgments, amounts of blame, loci of blame, and images of organizations. Using a situationally based definition of dishonesty, the article examines the effects of the act, the actor, the result, the person affected, and the intent of an (...) employee's behavior on stakeholders' images of the organization, as well as the effects of the characteristics of the person making the moral judgment. The situationally based definition of dishonesty provides a theoretical basis for understanding how differences in situations lead to differences in moral judgments by the same individuals. The person making the moral judgment is presented as a part of the model to explain how differences in viewpoints result in different moral evaluations of the same situations by different judges. Research directions are identified and discussed. (shrink)

This paper examines trust as a fundamental aspect of fiduciary relationships in education. The specific relationship under examination is that of academic employee and university employer. Both have the value of trust assigned to them as an implicit part of their social and professional contract. The setting is Australia, but the principles apply to any democratic jurisdiction and educational level or location, where fiduciary principles are a pre-condition for healthy and trustworthy working relationships. The paper firstly discusses the meaning and (...) application of ‘trust’ and ‘fiduciary’, and considers the codes that regulate fiduciary relationships in education. It then asks what happens if and when the fiduciary duties and obligations are not upheld, advancing that question through an employment law case against an Australian university, for alleged breach of the Fair Work Act. The analysis shows what may be the outcome when fiduciary trust between employee and employer is breached, how it may happen, and the consequences of this. The aim of the paper is to throw light on the value of trust for robust working relationships in academic life. Ultimately, the paper shows that trust is axiomatic to a working system of justice in a healthy educational workplace. (shrink)

De Smet et al. (2018) propose that when functionally similar constructions come to overlap, analogical attraction may occur. So may differentiation, but this process involves attraction to other subnetworks and is both “accidental” and “exceptional”. I argue that differentiation plays a considerably more significant role than De Smet et al. allow. My case study is the development of the dative and benefactive alternations. The rise of the dative alternation (e.g., “gave the Saxons land” ∼ “gave land to the Saxons”) has (...) been shown to occur in later Middle English between 1400 and 1500 (Zehentner 2018). Building on Zehentner and Traugott (2020), the rise of the benefactive alternation (e.g., “build her a house” ∼ “build a house for her”) in Early Modern English c1650 is analyzed from a historical constructionalist perspective and compared with the rise of the dative alternation. The histories of the alternations exemplify the rise of functionally similar constructions that overlap, and show that differentiation from each other plays as large a role as attraction. Both attraction and differentiation occur at several levels of abstraction: verb-specific constructions, schemas and larger systemic changes. (shrink)

Harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie’s western basin are caused in large part by nutrient loss from agricultural production. While use of nutrient management practices is encouraged to reduce agricultural nutrient loss and its consequent environmental impacts, such practices are not universally adopted. This study aims to better understand the factors that influence western Lake Erie basin farmers’ risk perceptions associated with agricultural nutrient loss, and thus further our knowledge of how adoption of nutrient management practices may be increased. We (...) propose a conceptual model to explain the relationships that we hypothesize to influence farmers’ risk perceptions associated with agricultural nutrient loss. Specifically, we consider the roles that farmer conservation identity, farmers’ perceived sufficiency of their nutrient management practices, and land vulnerability to nutrient loss play in influencing risk perceptions. We find that many of the hypothesized relationships are not statistically significant, and that risk perception associated with nutrient loss is primarily driven by farmers’ conservation identities. While farmers’ perceived sufficiency of their nutrient management practices plays some role in governing risk perceptions, we do not observe the hypothesized relationship between land vulnerability to nutrient loss and perceived sufficiency of nutrient management practices. (shrink)

Robust ex vivo expansion of umbilical cord blood (UCB) derived hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs) should enable the widespread use of UCB as a source of cells to treat hematologic and immune diseases. Novel approaches for HSPC expansion have recently been developed, setting the stage for the production of blood stem cell derived products that fulfill our current best known criteria of clinical relevance. Translating these technologies into clinical use requires bioengineering strategies to overcome challenges of scale‐up, reproducibility, and (...) product quality assurance. Clinical‐scale implementation should also define criteria and targets for cost‐effective cell manufacturing. As production strategies become more effective, new opportunities in the therapeutic use of ex vivo expanded hematopoietic cell products will emerge. Herein we examine key technological milestones that need to be met in order to move ex vivo expanded HSPC therapies from the bench‐top to the bedside in a robust and reliable manner. (shrink)

One of Darwin’s purposes in writing The Origin of Species was to rebut the doctrine of separate creations. Moreover, the argument he was chiefly concerned with—which was both his target and the model of his own argument—was the familiar argument from design.

In Philosophy 51, October 1976, 471–472, Professor Tom Regan takes ud to task for our attack on Kant's theory concerning the moral status of animals. The ground of Regan's criticism is that ‘… it is clear that Kant does not suppose, as… Broadie and Pybus erroneously assume that he does, that the concept of maltreating an animal, on the one hand, and, on the other, the concept of using an animal as a means, are the same or logically equivalent concepts’ (...) . Regan argues that Kant does not say that we should avoid treating animals as a means. Rather, he claims, Kant's view is that we have an indirect duty not to maltreat animals, since in maltreating them we treat, or run the risk of treating, as a mere means rationality in ourselves or in others. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Editors’ IntroductionElizabeth S. Radcliffe and Mark G. SpencerThis issue opens with the winning essay in the Second Annual Hume Studies Essay Prize competition: “Hume’s Passion-Based Account of Moral Responsibility,” by Taro Okamura. Dr. Okamura’s essay was chosen as the 2022 winner from among papers submitted by emerging scholars from August 2021 through July 2022. Dr. Okamura received his Ph.D. from the University of Alberta in 2022. He is currently (...) a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Research Fellow at the Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology at the University of Tokyo.The competition for the Third Prize closed on August 1, 2023, and the winner will be announced in our next issue. Please see the Call for Papers for the fourth competition in the back of this issue. The competition is open to authors ten or fewer years from the Ph.D.A special aspect of our current issue is its spotlight on Hume’s Essays, Moral, Political, and Literary. Renowned Dutch Enlightenment scholar, Frederic L. van Holthoon, presents his analysis of some of Hume’s essays, which he argues constitute Hume’s project of writing on political, or public, issues—a goal he did not get to complete with the Treatise. Also, established Hume scholar Lorne Falkenstein offers an extended review of the newly published Clarendon edition of Hume’s essays, in two volumes (edited by Tom L. Beauchamp and Mark A. Box, with Michael Silverthorne, J. A. W. Gunn, and F. David Harvey).Finally, we want to bring to the attention of our readers that, in fewer than two years, Hume Studies will be marking the 50th anniversary of its first publication. For this event, we are planning a special jubilee issue, 50:1 (April 2025). We hope to include among the unique features of that issue paragraphs or statements from our readers in answer to this query: “Of all of the articles that have been published in Hume Studies over the past 50 years, which one is most noteworthy to you? Why so?” Please see the “Call for Entries” in the back of this issue and on the Hume Studies website. We invite your responses! [End Page 193]Copyright © 2023 Hume Studies... (shrink)