La comunicación está referida a la categoría de la acción, pero no dirigida inmediatamente al mundo, sino a promover algún tipo de respuesta en otro sujeto. Y es este campo limitado -dominio de la interacción humana- el objeto propio de la ética. Communication refers to the category of action, but it is not directed to the world immediately. Instead, it is oriented to elicit a certain type of answer from somebody else. This constrained field -domain of the human interaction- is (...) the particular subject of Ethics. (shrink)

In this paper I propose a way of characterizing human agency in terms of the concept of a two‐way power. I outline this conception of agency, defend it against some objections, and briefly indicate how it relates to free agency and to moral praise‐ and blameworthiness.

In this essay, I recount and examine my response to a genetic diagnosis of my disabled daughter. My daughter was forty‐nine before the diagnosis came. All her disabilities were traceable to a de novo single gene variant on the PURA gene that was discovered only in 2014. I speak of the jolt and the recalibration that this discovery engendered, concluding that, while it seemed that everything had changed, nothing had changed. But my family did discover a community in which Sesha (...) joins other PURA‐perfect sons and daughters and where we as a family acquire a “horizontal identity” marked by a genetic variant. (shrink)

The glaring lack of formal and informal caregivers in Germany has not only become apparent in hospitals and nursing homes but also in home care arrangements. One tension is particularly pertinent in such arrangements: a ‘family-oriented’ logic of the long-term care insurance and the individual wishes of those in need of care meet the actual possibilities of family carers. This care gap has been compensated for by 24-hour care workers, so-called ‘live-ins’, from Eastern Europe for some years. This contribution maps (...) the ‘live-ins’ situation comprehensively from an ethical perspective. Based on different constellations regarding the ‘live-ins’ status as a professional nurse or non-professional caregiver, which ethical principles and moral norms are affected by whom and potentially conflict with each other in such home care arrangements at a micro and meso level of care are outlined. Special attention is paid to the tension between self-care and care for others, and to questions of the shared responsibility in and social responsibility of those external services that are involved in home care in addition to the ‘live-in’. In order to uncover, understand and influence the current ethical problems, an ethical framework that considers both the divergent interests of all individuals involved in the home care arrangement and their mutual dependency and vulnerability is needed. (shrink)

Los acelerados cambios científicos tecnológicos y sociales exigen de los centros de Educación Superior la búsqueda de nuevas vías y el perfeccionamiento de las ya existentes para lograr egresados más competentes. La tutoría se identifica como un proceso educativo que debe favorecer el pleno desarrollo personal e integral del estudiante, en el que éste se conciba como sujeto activo y responsable de su propio proceso de formación. En este sentido cobra una especial importancia el proceso de interacción en el desarrollo (...) de la tutoría. El artículo tiene como objetivo fundamentar la importancia de dicha interacción, mediante un breve análisis teórico y la exposición de algunos resultados de su diagnóstico en el contexto de tres carreras universitarias. The accelerated social, scientific and technological changes demand of Higher Education centers, the search for new ways to create more competent graduates, as well as to improve the existing ones. Tutorship is identified as a teaching process that must favour the complete personal and comprehensive development of the student, in which he must be seen as an active individual responsible for his own formative process. This way, the interactive process of developing tutorship takes on special significance. This article aims at supporting the importance of such interaction, by means of a brief theoretical analysis and by setting out some results of its diagnostic in the context of three university degree courses. (shrink)

Contemporary industrialized societies have been confronted with the fact and consequences of women's increased participation in paid employment. Whether this increase has resulted from women's desire for equality or from changing economic circumstances, women and men have been faced with a crisis in the organization of work that concerns dependents, that is, those unable to care for themselves. This is labor that has been largely unpaid, often unrecognized, and yet is indispensable to human society.

side or other from his conception of reality ; for though some kind of reality is generally allowed to exist on the other side, ... Thus to the ordinary man philosophy seems to offer no choice, but either to destroy absolutely one half of his sense of ...

Canadian video game developer BioWare’s critically acclaimed Mass Effect video game series has been called the most important science fiction universe of a generation. Whether or not one is inclined to agree, it cannot be denied that Mass Effect matters. It matters not only because of its brilliant narrative and the difficult questions it asks, but also because, as bioethicist Kyle Munkittrick writes, it reflects society as a whole. Mass Effect is a sci-fi epic in the truest sense, spanning over (...) years and across hundreds of planets tucked away in the darkest corners of the galaxy, populated with dozens of species with their own histories, beliefs, cultures, and technologies. Academics and dedicated fans have explored the numerous facets of the game, from its philosophy to time and temporality, fandom ethnographies, and ethics. This article proposes to explore the boundaries of alien sex and the desire for alien others as represented in sci-fi role playing games, and their reinterpretation by fans. Science fiction role playing games in particular enable the production of sexual modalities outside of the constraints of heterosexual norms. Alien sex, animal sex, or monstrous sex are common tropes in fantasy and sci-fi media—the vampire, the werewolf, and monstrous non/in-humans are eroticized and construed conduits of a mainly female sexual desire. However, the example I would like to approach is slightly more radical, both in terms of execution and in terms of media audience response: examples of “alien sex” as illustrated in the Mass Effect video game series, whose canonical representation of alien-human romances invite some interesting questions about either the potential exacerbation, or the rendering-unintelligible of sexual difference, as well as about cross-species desire and about the ontology of the natural and the artificial. (shrink)

Modern science is so much specialised that it seems utopic to try to follow it all at once. This new book is aimed at crossing the gap between specialists and a common understanding of 'modern science'. It would seem desirable that all educated people would know something from the humanities, literature, art but also the newest developments of natural sciences. One aim of this book is to point out the main messages of certain scientific fields, and what is really new (...) and beyond the average educational level, in order to broaden our horizons. Therefore, at the end of the chapters each scientific field possible future contributions and and ethical concerns, if any, are elaborated. (shrink)

Empathy as “Feelingly Grasping” Perhaps the central question concerning empathy is if and if so how it combines aspects of thinking and feeling. Indeed, the intellectual tradition of the past centuries has been marked by a dualism. Roughly speaking, there have been two pathways when it comes to understanding each other: 1) thinking or mind reading and 2) feeling or empathy. Nonetheless, one of the ongoing debates in psychology and philosophy concerns the question whether these two abilities, namely, understanding what (...) the other is thinking and “understanding” what the other is feeling, are separate or not. Most of the authors in this volume consider the cognitive and affective dimensions at work within empathy. Each author does this within and beyond their own field. Coming from the humanities, we propose the following definition for empathy: Empathy is a social feeling that consists in feelingly grasping or retracing the present, future, or past emotional state of the other; thus empathy is also called a vicarious emotion. We would like to highlight two aspects of this definition in particular: 1.) the peculiar position of “grasping” which involves a cognitive dimension and 2.) the social dimensions of relating to the emotions of another human being. (shrink)

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) describes the evolution of treatment‐resistant pathogens, with potentially catastrophic consequences for human medicine. AMR is driven by the over‐prescription of antibiotics, and could be reduced through consideration of the ethical dimensions of the dilemma faced by doctors. This dilemma involves balancing apparently opposed interests of current and future patients, and unique contextual factors in different countries, which may modify the core dilemma. We describe three example countries with different economic backgrounds and cultures—South Africa, Sri Lanka and the (...) United Kingdom. Then we discuss how country‐specific factors impact on the prominence of various ethical dimensions of the dilemma (visibility and moral equality of future generations; Rule of Rescue; prescribing autonomy and conflicts of interest; consensus on collective action). We conclude that a nuanced understanding of national prescribing dilemmas is critical to inform the design of effective stewardship approaches. (shrink)

Contingent valuation surveys generally elicit stated preferences by asking how much a respondent would be willing to pay for an environmental improvement. By drawing on linguistic theory, we propose that the modal phrasing of this question establishes a particular type of commitment towards a hypothetical payment, namely a subjective want or desire. Based on the idea that beyond subjective desires, considerations about what is morally adequate may guide expressed values and that elicitation of these can be linguistically facilitated, we employ (...) an experimental framework to investigate the effects of different modals ( willing, should and appropriate) in the elicitation question on stated preferences. We find that elicited amounts with appropriate are higher than those elicited with willing and should for environmental improvements more associated with use values, while differences are non-significant for environmental improvements more associated with non-use values. We discuss the implications of our findings for stated preference studies, as well as the potential broader theoretical implications that our study entails regarding linguistic representations of the moral entrenchment of environmental values. (shrink)

Kierkegaard verwendet den Salto mortale als Metapher für den Glauben. Aber was für eine Bewegung ist der Salto mortale genau? Diese Frage wird im ersten Teil anhand der Beschreibungen, die Arcangelo Tuccaro – selbst ein Akrobat, aber auch erster Akrobattheoretiker Europas – von dieser Bewegung gibt, beantwortet. Im zweiten und dritten Teil wird aufgezeigt, inwiefern die Metapher des Salto mortale und die konkurrierende Metapher des Augenblicks in den Texten Kierkegaards Sprachbilder für den Glauben sind, also: Welche Auffassung des Glaubens kann (...) diesen Bildern entnommen werden? Und wie verhalten sich die beiden Metaphern zueinander? Im vierten Teil wird der jacobischen Provenienz der Metapher des Salto mortale nachgegangen: Bereits Jacobi verwendet in einer sehr ähnlichen Weise wie Kierkegaard diese akrobatische Bewegung als Bild für den Glauben. Trotz dieser Nähe verspottet Kierkegaard Jacobi in seiner Nachschrift, indem er die jacobische Vorlage wiederverwendet und ironisch verzerrt. Der letzte Teil ist der Auseinandersetzung mit der Sekundärliteratur gewidmet und bettet diese Arbeit in die philosophische und theologische Kierkegaard-Forschung ein. (shrink)

A comprehensive exploration of theories of citizenship and inclusiveness in an age of globalization. The authors analyze democracy and the political community in a transnational context, using new critical, conceptual and normative perspectives on the borders, territories and political agents of the state.

This volume explores the relationship between human rights and democracy within both the theoretical and empirical field. It is an innovative study that offers tools for democratizing existing global political institutions.

This brings us not only to the conclusion of my list of eight features proposed as being common to all or most value experience, but also to a reminder of its purpose. First, I hope that, in the spirit of Husserl's dictum, “to the things themselves,” this proposal will initiate a discussion of a “basic research” type of question, namely: What are the main features of value experience? Second, I hope that the fruits of such a discussion might eventually contribute (...) to the working out of a metatheory for value inquiry: a theory about criteria of adequacy for any general theory of value.In a paper of this scope it is obvious that one cannot even begin to discuss all the points and subpoints made in the manner in which they deserve. Much less can one defend all, or even any, of its claims with the kind of logical rigor and linguistic fastidiousness which have come to be the norm in most Anglo-American philosophy today. As a counterbalance to a tendency in some professional circles to making adherence to this norm the end of, rather than merely a means for, philosophic understanding, I have offered this paper after the spirit of Socrates and Plato, who certainly appreciated appropriate logical rigor and linguistic tidiness. Philosophy was nevertheless always for them first and foremost a mutual adventure of exploration into value through significant dialogue. Thus, rather than submitting one more piece of logic or language to the microscope, it has been my purpose to go exploring this time with a telescope. I cordially invite other seekers to join me and to challenge my findings. (shrink)

Este trabajo esboza una forma de justificar el principio estructurador central de una teoría veritista de la evaluación epistémica, en respuesta a críticas planteadas por Eleonora Cresto a mi defensa del veritismo frente a una serie de objeciones en el sentido de que no es capaz de explicar la naturaleza y el valor del entendimiento. La primera sección presenta el esbozo de justificación del núcleo de una teoría veritista; la segunda responde a críticas más específicas de Cresto. This paper sketches (...) a way to justify the central tenet of a veritistic theory of epistemic evaluation, in response to problems raised by Eleonora Cresto concerning my defense of veritism, against a series of objetions to the effect that veritistic epistemology is uncapable of explaining the nature and value of understanding. The first section presents the sketch of justification of the nucleus of a veritistic theory, the second responds to some of Cresto's more specific criticisms. (shrink)