This introductory article to the thematic section on “Spiritual Intelligence” sets out the ways in which spiritual intelligence is currently conceptualized. Most prominently, spiritual intelligence is understood as an adaptive intelligence which enables people to develop their values, vision, and capacity for meaning. Questions arise as to whether spiritual intelligence is a distinct form of intelligence, and how to frame it if it is. It is questionable whether psychometric approaches justify concluding there is a distinct spiritual intelligence, and the authors (...) reject any notion of a God spot in the brain specifically dedicated to spiritual intelligence, which is a much more broadly embodied phenomenon. The authors suggest that spiritual intelligence most likely makes use of existing cognitive architecture, though applied in a distinctive way. This article finishes with a brief introduction to the four main articles in this thematic section, which present spiritual intelligence as a kind of participation in transcendent being. The four articles approach the cognitive, embodied, meditative, and ritual aspects of spiritual intelligence as participation. (shrink)

This interdisciplinary volume of essays explores how the notion of time varies across disciplines by examining variance as a defining feature of temporalities in cultural, creative, and scholarly contexts. Featuring a President's Address by philosopher David Wood, it begins with critical reassessments of J.T. Fraser's hierarchical theory of time through the lens of Anthropocene studies, philosophy, ecological theory, and ecological literature; proceeds to variant narratives in fiction, video games, film, and graphic novels; and concludes by measuring time's variance with (...) tools as different as incense clocks and computers, and by marking variance in music, film, and performance art. (shrink)

Originally published between 1924 and 1929 discuss the future of psychology and the break-throughs it could provide for modern medicine. Authors included are E N Bennett, H F Carlill,D F Fraser Harris, M Jaeger and C J Patten.

Volume 11 Apollonius, or the Future of Psychical Research E N Bennett Originally published in 1927 "Admirably conceived, skilfully executed." Liverpool Post "His exposition of the case for psychic research is lucid and interesting." The Scotsman This volume summarizes the results secured by the scientific treatment of psychical phenomena, and to forecast the future developments of such research. 88pp ************** Socrates Or the Emancipation of Mankind H F Carlill Originally published in 1927 "One of the most brilliant and important of (...) a remarkable series." Westminster Gazette This volume examines the differences between humans and animals and discusses the freedom that a proper understanding of psychology will bring to the human race. The author argues that the whole psycho-physical organism will be regarded as what it is – a mechanism full of inherited tendencies and untapped energies which needs to be consciously adjusted and controlled. 90pp Morpheus or the Future of Sleep D F Fraser-Harris Originally published in 1928. "His arguments, clearly and ably presented, hold our interest." Clarion "Shows that the doctors do not as yet know much about the subject." Queen This volume discusses sleep and the part it plays in maintaining health. It contains suggestions for sufferers from insomnia, discusses dreams and their causes and suggests the probable line of investigation of sleep problems. 94pp Sisyphus or the Limits of Psychology M Jaeger Originally published in 1929. "Much acumen and knowledge. All students of psychology should read it." Manchester Guardian This volume argues that Psychology has just as an important role to play as Physics and Chemistry, because it affects the ordinary person and is not merely limited to the scientific community. The opportunities is provides, as well as its limits, are discussed. 88pp The Passing of The Phantoms A Study of Evolutionary Psychology and Morals C J Patten Originally published in 1924 "This bright and bracing little book." Literary Guide "Interesting and original." Medical Times This volume examines the evolution of the mental and moral faculties of animals. This knowledge, in the author’s opinion is critical for understanding the evolution of human mortality. 90pp. (shrink)

Harry C. Boyte. Craig Calhoun. Geoff Eley. Nancy Fraser. Nicholas Garnham. JürgenHabermas. Peter Hohendahl. Lloyd Kramer. Benjamin Lee. Thomas McCarthy. Moishe Postone. Mary P.Ryan. Michael Schudson. Michael Warner. David Zaret.

Quassim Cassam has argued that psychological and epistemological analyses of conspiracy theories threaten to overlook the political nature of such theories. According to Cassam, conspiracy theories are a form of political propaganda. I develop a limited critique of Cassam's analysis.This paper advances two core theses. First, acceptance of conspiracy theories requires a rejection of epistemic authority that renders conspiracy theorists susceptible to co-option by certain political programs while insulating such programs from criticism. I argue that the contrarian nature of conspiracy (...) theories partially accounts for the prominence of such theories in populist movements.Second, the contrarian nature of conspiracy theories partially accounts for their attractiveness, especially among those to whom populism already appeals. I argue that for those who resent what appears from their perspective as the shaping of the epistemic landscape by alien perspectives, conspiracy theorizing may facilitate the reassertion of epistemic autonomy. (shrink)

Georg Wilhelm Hegel’s dialectic plays a crucial role in some of the thought of the most prominent Black thinkers. The role it plays has received little attention. In this dissertation, I begin to fill this lacuna in Africana Philosophy by examining the arguments of William Edward Burghardt Du Bois in “The Conservation of Races,” Frantz Fanon in Black Skin, White Masks and The Wretched of the Earth, and Cyril Lionel Robert James in The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L’Ouverture and the San (...) Domingo Revolution and Notes on Dialectics: Hegel, Marx, Lenin. I argue that forms of praxis are the result of their engagement with Hegel’s dialectic: reflexive practice, absolute praxis, and organic praxis respectively. I show that in each of these cases Hegel’s dialectical approach to history (dialectical thinking) was essential to their own attempts to understand the possibility of a positive transformation of the pervasively racist world they inhabited. (shrink)

This paper defends two main theses related to emerging deepfake technology. First, fears that deepfakes will bring about epistemic catastrophe are overblown. Such concerns underappreciate that the evidential power of video derives not solely from its content, but also from its source. An audience may find even the most realistic video evidence unconvincing when it is delivered by a dubious source. At the same time, an audience may find even weak video evidence compelling so long as it is delivered by (...) a trusted source. The growing prominence of deepfake content is unlikely to change this fundamental dynamic. Thus, through appropriate patterns of trust, whatever epistemic threat deepfakes pose can be substantially mitigated. The second main thesis is that focusing on deepfakes that are intended to deceive, as epistemological discussions of the technology tend to do, threatens to overlook a further effect of this technology. Even where deepfake content is not regarded by its audience as veridical, it may cause its viewers to develop psychological associations based on that content. These associations, even without rising to the level of belief, may be harmful to the individuals depicted and more generally. Moreover, these associations may develop in cases in which the video content is realistic, but the audience is dubious of the content in virtue of skepticism toward its source. Thus, even if—as I suggest—epistemological concerns about deepfakes are overblown, deepfakes may nonetheless be psychologically impactful and may do great harm. (shrink)

Philosophers who study conspiracy theories have increasingly addressed the questions of where conspiracy theories come from, what such theories do, and what to do about them. This essay serves as a commentary on the answers to these questions offered by contributors to this special issue.

Ethicists, policy-makers, and the general public have questioned whether artificial entities such as robots warrant rights or other forms of moral consideration. There is little synthesis of the research on this topic so far. We identify 294 relevant research or discussion items in our literature review of this topic. There is widespread agreement among scholars that some artificial entities could warrant moral consideration in the future, if not also the present. The reasoning varies, such as concern for the effects on (...) artificial entities and concern for the effects on human society. Beyond the conventional consequentialist, deontological, and virtue ethicist ethical frameworks, some scholars encourage “information ethics” and “social-relational” approaches, though there are opportunities for more in-depth ethical research on the nuances of moral consideration of artificial entities. There is limited relevant empirical data collection, primarily in a few psychological studies on current moral and social attitudes of humans towards robots and other artificial entities. This suggests an important gap for psychological, sociological, economic, and organizational research on how artificial entities will be integrated into society and the factors that will determine how the interests of artificial entities are considered. (shrink)

A retired manager and university teacher reflects on global ethics, on the purpose of life, and on the challenges facing global ethics in a contemporary world where there is no certainty about shared belief or shared values. The future lies, he concludes, with process and with a deeper understanding of one another.

Sam Harris dismantles the most common justification for religious faith--that a moral system cannot be based on science.

We introduce a St. Petersburg-like game, which we call the ‘Pasadena game’, in which we toss a coin until it lands heads for the first time. Your pay-offs grow without bound, and alternate in sign (rewards alternate with penalties). The expectation of the game is a conditionally convergent series. As such, its terms can be rearranged to yield any sum whatsoever, including positive infinity and negative infinity. Thus, we can apparently make the game seem as desirable or undesirable as we (...) want, simply by reordering the pay-off table, yet the game remains unchanged throughout. Formally speaking, the expectation does not exist; but we contend that this presents a serious problem for decision theory, since it goes silent when we want it to speak. We argue that the Pasadena game is more paradoxical than the St. Petersburg game in several respects. We give a brief review of the relevant mathematics of infinite series. We then consider and rebut a number of replies to our paradox: that there is a privileged ordering to the expectation series; that decision theory should be restricted to finite state spaces; and that it should be restricted to bounded utility functions. We conclude that the paradox remains live. (shrink)

Who deserves credit for epistemic successes, and who is to blame for epistemic failures? Extreme views, which would place responsibility either solely on the individual or solely on the individual’s surrounding environment, are not plausible. Recently, progress has been made toward articulating virtue epistemology as a suitable middle ground. A socio-environmentally oriented virtue epistemology can recognize that an individual’s traits play an important role in shaping what that individual believes, while also recognizing that some of the most efficacious individual traits (...) have to do with how individuals structure their epistemic environments and how they respond to information received within these environments. I contribute to the development of such an epistemology by introducing and elucidating the virtue of epistemic exactingness, which is characterized by a motivation to regulate the epistemically significant conduct of others. (shrink)

Biomedical research is so important that there is a positive moral obligation to pursue it and to participate in itScience is under attack. In Europe, America, and Australasia in particular, scientists are objects of suspicion and are on the defensive.i“Frankenstein science”5–8 is a phrase never far from the lips of those who take exception to some aspect of science or indeed some supposed abuse by scientists. We should not, however, forget the powerful obligation there is to undertake, support, and participate (...) in scientific research, particularly biomedical research, and the powerful moral imperative that underpins these obligations. Now it is more imperative than ever to articulate and explain these obligations and to do so is the subject and the object of this paper.Let me present the question in its starkest form: is there a moral obligation to undertake, support and even to participate in serious scientific research? If there is, does that obligation require not only that beneficial research be undertaken but also that “we”, as individuals and “we” as societies be willing to support and even participate in research where necessary?Thus far the overwhelming answer given to this question has been “no”, and research has almost universally been treated with suspicion and even hostility by the vast majority of all those concerned with the ethics and regulation of research. The so called “precautionary approach”9 sums up this attitude, requiring dangers to be considered more likely and more serious than benefits, and assuming that no sane person would or should participate in research unless they had a pressing personal reason for so doing, or unless they were motivated by a totally impersonal altruism. International agreements and protocols—for example, the Declaration of Helsinki10 and the CIOMS Guidelines11—have been directed principally at …. (shrink)

Vaccines, when available, will prove to be crucial in the fight against Covid-19. All societies will face acute dilemmas in allocating scarce lifesaving resources in the form of vaccines for Covid-19. The author proposes The Value of Lives Principle as a just and workable plan for equitable and efficient access. After describing what the principle entails, the author contrasts the advantage of this approach with other current proposals such as the Fair Priority Model.

Understanding Animal Welfare, 2nd Edition is revised and expanded to incorporate new research and developments in animal welfare. Updated with greater accessibility in mind, the reader is guided through animal welfare in its cultural and historical context, methods of study, and applications in practice and policy. Drawing examples from farm, companion, laboratory and zoo animals, the text provides an up-to-date overview of research and its applications, while also tracing how concepts and methods have evolved over time. Originally intended for scientists (...) and professionals, Understanding Animal Welfare has also found a home in undergraduate classrooms. It is now the essential text for students, practitioners, veterinarians, and researchers in animal welfare and related fields. (shrink)

Are the properties of communicative acts grounded in the intentions with which they are performed, or in the conventions that govern them? The latest round in this debate has been sparked by Ernie Lepore and Matthew Stone (2015), who argue that much more of communication is conventional than we thought, and that the rest isn’t really communication after all, but merely the initiation of open-ended imaginative thought. I argue that although Lepore and Stone may be right about many of the (...) specific cases they discuss, their big-picture, conventionalist conclusions don’t follow. My argument focuses on four phenomena that present challenges to conventionalist accounts of communication: ambiguity, indirect communication, communication by wholly unconventional means, and convention acquisition. (shrink)

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) have gained a degree of prominence across recent moral enhancement literature as a possible intervention for dealing with antisocial and aggressive impulses. This is due to serotonin's purported capacity to modulate persons’ averseness to harm. The aim of this article is to argue that the use of SSRIs is not something worth getting particularly excited about as a practicable intervention for moral enhancement purposes, and that the generally uncritical enthusiasm over serotonin's potential as a moral (...) enhancer is a consequence of the paucity of viable options for envisaging practicable moral enhancement interventions. While there are many conceptual issues raised by the idea of moral enhancement generally, and by the idea of serotonin as a morally affective agent, the aim here is to look at practical concerns. It is argued that SSRIs do not, nor cannot in the reasonably foreseeable future, be made to work as a reliably safe or reliably effective means for moral enhancement, even within the very limited remit of treating “reactive” aggression. SSRIs might be effective as a limited and partial mental health intervention (even this is questionable), but not as a generally effective moral enhancement technology. (shrink)

The chapter will argue that the way current enthusiasm for moral enhancement is articulated in the extant literature is itself morally problematic. The moral evaluation of the discourse will proceed through three stages. First, we shall look at the chequered history of various societies’ attempts to cast evil, character, and generally undesirable behaviour, as biological problems. As will be argued, this is the larger context in which moral enhancement discourse should be understood, and abuses in the recent past and present (...) should therefore be highlighted. Second, it will be argued that, given moral functioning's profoundly contextual and responsive qualities, any notion of a fine-grained, powerfully efficacious moral enhancement is both unrealistic and, actually, incoherent. Since enthusiasts’ hopes are unrealistic and incoherent, such enhancement would not even be capable of providing the transformative ends that supposedly justify the sometimes extreme prescriptions set forward. Finally, the chapter concludes with the claim that moral enhancement enthusiasm actually serves to trivialise the evils of this world, and not only to trivialise the hard-won efforts required to diminish and overcome such evils, but to misdirect attention away from the real hard work that needs to be done in facing such evils. (shrink)

In the Western philosophic tradition, virtue theory has rarely been extended to the political realm. There is a long tradition that advocates the role of virtue in ethical theory, but the implications of this tradition for political theory have largely been neglected. However, in the Chinese tradition, we very early on see the use of virtue-based theories not only in ethics but in political thought as well. Indeed, one of the most sophisticated early Confucian philosophers, Xúnzǐ 荀子 (fl. 298–238 BCE), (...) believes that a virtue-based political theory is a natural extension of his virtue-based ethical theory. At the same time, a prominent anti-Confucian political philosopher, Hán Fēizǐ 韓非子, was diametrically opposed to allowing virtue, or, indeed, any other moral quality, serve as the basis for political theory, arguing instead that a clear set of laws should serve as the fundamental basis. Therefore, this tradition offers us a very clear debate on the problems and promise of a virtue politics. This debate is not only of historical interest, however. To the extent that contemporary philosophers interested in the possibility of extending virtue theory to the political realm take themselves to be prescribing for everyone, as opposed to simply for those within their own cultural background, they must be willing to take into account other traditions that have wrestled with similar issues. In early China we not only see a version of virtue politics, we also see a sophisticated debate about its viability. And, while Xúnzǐ himself may not be capable of answering all of Hán Fēizǐ’s objections, analyzing this debate affords us the opportunity to see how and where a particular conception of virtue politics succeeds and fails, providing contemporary philosophers not only with a set of problems that must be overcome but also with a promising way forward. (shrink)

This paper supports the scientific position that panpsychism is a valid category of possible resolutions to the hard problem of consciousness, and it focuses on a solution to the 'combination problem' in panpsychism. I argue for a new way of thinking about consciousness in which consciousness is not viewed in reference to subjects, and that the concept of a 'subject' is borne of the illusion of self. Therefore, we don't face a combination problem if the notion of a subject is (...) superfluous and consciousness itself is pervasive in the form of a field. The paper is also a more general discussion about the importance of pursuing this scientific question in the twenty-first century: is consciousness a more fundamental aspect of the universe than we have previously assumed? (shrink)

There is a wide array of contemporary arenas toward which the ideas of Han Fei may be directed. One of these is the arenas where Han Fei may potentially be of use is that of corporate and business ethics. Even if we disagree with Han Fei’s pessimistic assumptions about human dispositions and the plausibility of moral cultivation, we may find such a framework useful for analyzing how businesses, corporations, indeed any sort of bureaucracy can and should function. Milton Friedman was (...) of course famous for his claim that “there is one and only one social responsibility of business―to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game.” On this account, businesses not only do, but should act in a fashion which bears stark similarities to how Han Fei believes that human dispositions lead them to act at the individual level. He then draws a range of conclusions from this, and it is worth exploring the extent to which these conclusions are useful as we determine how to analyze, evaluate, organize, and limit corporate behavior. (shrink)

Harris, Barnier, Sutton and Savage examine the communication styles that boost the mnemonic consequences associated with conversations for long‐term married couples and the circumstances under which the couples form a TMS. Harris and colleagues demonstrated that specific communication styles (e.g., cueing each other) promote group memory success whereas others (e.g., correcting each other) did not enhance group recall performance. These results showed that even in well‐established and enduring distributed cognitive systems such as long‐term intimate couples (Harris, Barnier, (...) Sutton & Keil, 2014), memory benefits depend on effective communication and the specificities of the task performed (e.g., remembering lists of words vs. remembering shared, autobiographical experiences). (shrink)

I defend the view that linguistic meaning is a relation borne by an expression to a type of speech act, and that this relation holds in virtue of our overlapping communicative dispositions, and not in virtue of linguistic conventions. I argue that this theory gives the right account of the semantics–pragmatics interface and the best-available semantics for non-declarative clauses, and show that it allows for the construction of a rigorous compositional semantic theory with greater explanatory power than both truth-conditional and (...) dynamic semantics. (shrink)

"This book re-examines the old debate about the relationship between rationality and literacy. Does writing 'restructure consciousness'? Do preliterate societies have a different 'mind-set' from literate societies? Is reason 'built in' to the way we think? How is literacy related to numeracy? Is the 'logical form' that Western philosophers recognize anything more than an extrapolation from the structure of the written sentence? Is logic, as developed formally in Western education, intrinsically beyond the reach of the preliterate mind? What light, if (...) any, do the findings of contemporary neuroscience throw on such issues? Roy Harris challenges the received mainstream opinion that reason is an intrinsic property of the human mind, and argues that the whole Western conception of rational thought, from Classical Greece down to modern symbolic logic, is a by-product of the way literacy developed in European cultures." --publisher's website. (shrink)

Experts are sharply divided concerning the prevalence and influence of misinformation. Some have emphasized the severe epistemic and political threats posed by misinformation and have argued that some such threats have been realized in the real world. Others have argued that such concerns overstate the prevalence of misinformation and the gullibility of ordinary persons. Rather than taking a stand on this issue, I consider what would follow from the supposition that this latter perspective is correct. I argue that, if the (...) prevalence and influence of misinformation are indeed overstated, then many reports as to the prevalence and influence of misinformation constitute a kind of higher-order misinformation. I argue that higher-order misinformation presents its own challenges. In particular, higher-order misinformation, ironically, would lend credibility to the very misinformation whose influence it exaggerates. Additionally, higher-order misinformation would lead to underestimations of the reasons favoring opposing views. In short, higher-order misinformation constitutes misleading higher-order evidence concerning the quality of the evidence on which individuals form their beliefs. (shrink)

Social media misinformation is widely thought to pose a host of threats to the acquisition of knowledge. One response to these threats is to remove misleading information from social media and to de-platform those who spread it. While content moderation of this sort has been criticized on various grounds—including potential incompatibility with free expression—the epistemic case for the removal of misinformation from social media has received little scrutiny. Here, I provide an overview of some costs and benefits of the removal (...) of misinformation from social media. On the one hand, removing misinformation from social media can promote knowledge acquisition by removing misleading evidence from online social epistemic environments. On the other hand, such removals require the exercise of power over evidence by content moderators. As I argue, such exercises of power can encourage suspicions on the part of social media users and can compromise the force of the evidence possessed by such users. For these reasons, the removal of misinformation from social media poses its own threats to knowledge. (shrink)

Drawing primarily on the Mòzǐ and Xúnzǐ, the article proposes an account of how knowledge and error are understood in classical Chinese epistemology and applies it to explain the absence of a skeptical argument from illusion in early Chinese thought. Arguments from illusion are associated with a representational conception of mind and knowledge, which allows the possibility of a comprehensive or persistent gap between appearance and reality. By contrast, early Chinese thinkers understand mind and knowledge primarily in terms of competence (...) or ability, not representation. Cognitive error amounts to a form of incompetence. Error is not explained as a failure to accurately represent the mind-independent reality due to misleading or illusory appearances. Instead, it can be explained metaphorically by appeal to part-whole relations: cognitive error typically occurs when agents incompetently respond to only part of their situation, rather than the whole. (shrink)

The story of Anna is a brief description of a faithful prophetess which is consciously paired with the previous and more developed narrative of Simeon. Hannah’s story is significant to the Lukan Gospel and yet her voice, which men and women visiting the temple heard repeatedly, is not articulated by Luke. She has been the topic of much research, in as much as three verses in their context can provide, while no one has sought to let Hannah speak for herself. (...) This article aims to do this by exploring her story within the Lukan narrative, considering prophetesses in the Old Testament, and echoing the dynamics of the Jewish story of Judith with which she is intertextually paired. (shrink)

Among the many striking features of the philosophy of the Zhuāngzǐ is that it advocates a life unperturbed by emotions, including even pleasurable, positive emotions such as joy or delight. Many of us see emotions as an ineluctable part of life, and some would argue they are a crucial component of a well-developed moral sensitivity and a good life. The Zhuangist approach to emotion challenges such commonsense views so radically that it amounts to a test case for the fundamental plausibility (...) of the Daoist ethical orientation: If the Zhuangist stance on emotion is untenable, then other aspects of Daoist ethics may founder as well. In this essay, I explore what I call a Zhuangist ‘Virtuoso View’ of emotion and its connections with human agency, attempting to show that at least one version of a Zhuangist approach to emotion passes the ‘basic plausibility’ test. I begin by describing the Virtuoso View and sketching its theoretical foundation, which involves claims about human agency, the self, psychophysical hygiene, the good life, epistemology, and metaphysics. Next, I defend the Virtuoso View against three objections, namely that it abandons intentionality, that it interferes with a good life, and that it yields a schizophrenic conception of agency. I argue for three major theses. First, the Virtuoso View is easily intelligible and largely defensible. Second, it reflects a crucial insight into a fundamental dichotomy at the core of human agency: the unavoidable conflict within a self-aware human agent between an internal, engaged perspective and an external, detached one. Third, I suggest that certain problems or conflicts arising from the Virtuoso View actually reflect inherent features of the human predicament and thus are not mere conceptual defects. Hence even if we do not find the Virtuoso View wholly convincing, we can nevertheless gain much insight from it. (shrink)

Whether a predicate is a referential expression depends upon what reference is conceived to be. Even if it is granted that reference is a relation between words and worldly items, the referents of expressions being the items to which they are so related, this still leaves considerable scope for disagreement about whether predicates refer. One of Frege's great contributions to the philosophy of language was to introduce an especially liberal conception of reference relative to which it is unproblematic to suppose (...) that predicates are referring expressions. According to this liberal conception, each significant expression in a language has its own distinctive semantic role or power, a power to effect the truth-value of the sentences in which it occurs. (shrink)

According to Armstrong (amongst others) ‘any truth, should depend for its truth for something “outside” it’ where this one-way dependency is explained in terms of the asymmetric relationship that obtains between a truth and its truth-maker. But there’s no need to appeal to truth-makers to make sense of this dependency. The truth of a proposition is essentially determined by the interlocking semantic mechanism of reference and satisfaction which already ensures that the truth-value of a proposition depends on how things stand (...) outside it. By contrast, how things stand outside of a proposition is determined by other worldly mechanisms that have nothing to do with truth. (shrink)

This article explores the overlap between systems biology and predictive neuroscience, placing them in their larger context, the contemporary trend of bioinformatic convergence across the sciences. These two domains overlap with respect to their interest in data accumulation and data integration; their reliance on computational statistical correlation; and their translational goals, that is, producing practical fruits and applications from the interscientific cross-pollination that contemporary data-integrative approaches make possible. The interventions that such translational conversations generate are medical and social in nature, (...) and are aimed at both prevention and treatment. It will be argued that such approaches, socially and medically applied, contain potential for conveying both agency-enhancing and agency-diminishing social messages. The article concludes with a call to balance the overwhelmingly quantitative focus characteristic of predictive neuroscience with more qualitative empirical methodologies. This would represent a double helical approach. (shrink)

When children are too young to make their ownautonomous decisions, decisions have to be madefor them. In certain contexts we allow parentsand others to make these decisions, and do notinterfere unless the decision clearly violatesthe best interest of the child. In othercontexts we put a priori limits on whatkind of decisions parents can make, and/or whatkinds of considerations they have to take intoaccount. Consent to medical research currentlyfalls into the second group mentioned here. Wewant to consider and ultimately reject one (...) ofthe arguments put forward for putting medicalresearch into the second category. We willargue that some objections to children'sparticipation in research are either based onan implausibly restrictive conception of whatis in fact in the child's best interests orthat there is an implicit and false premisehidden in this argument; i.e., the premise thatour children have so deeply fallen into moralturpitude that we must assume that they wouldnot want to fulfill their moral obligations,or, that they will grow up to be morallydeficient and will then wish not to have actedwell while a child. (shrink)