This research poses the question of whether it is possible to optimize modern legislative drafting by integrating LLM-based systems into the lawmaking process to address the pervasive challenge of misinformation and disinformation in the age of AI. While misinformation is not a novel phenomenon, with the proliferation of social media and AI, disseminating false or misleading information has become a pressing societal concern, undermining democratic processes, public trust, and social cohesion. AI can be used to proliferate disinformation and misinformation through (...) fake news and deepfakes; can AI also be used for beneficial purposes to develop the antidote legislation combatting these challenges? Leveraging the capabilities of LLMS, such as ChatGPT and others, can present a promising direction for optimizing legislative drafting. By proposing the methodological approach of an AI bun, this article explores an important approach in which LLMS can support lawmakers and policy experts in crafting legislation. The article contributes to the discourse through a nuanced understanding of the opportunities and challenges in harnessing LLM-powered tools for legislative innovation. Ultimately, it underscores the transformative potential of LLMs as a potential resource for lawmakers seeking to navigate decision-making while developing legislation on an example of navigating the intricate landscape of misinformation and disinformation regulation in the age of AI. (shrink)

This paper presents an ethical approach to the use of lobbying within the context of the relationships among U.S. organizations, their lobbyists, and government officials. After providing a brief history of modern-day lobbying activities, lobbying is defined and described focusing on its role as a strategic marketing tool. Then ethical frameworks for understanding the impact of these practices on various external constituencies are delineated with an emphasis on the communitarian movement advanced by Etzioni. Consistent with the call for "informed advocacy" (...) by Laczniak (1993), the paper closes with an examination of the ethics of specific lobbying activities. (shrink)

Many journals in the physical sciences require authors to submit assurances of compliance with human subjects and other research ethics standards. These requirements do not cover all disciplines equally, however. In this paper we report on the findings of a survey of perceptions of ethical and managerial problems from journal editors in political science and related disciplines. Our results show that few journals in political science require assurance statements common to journals for other scientific disciplines. We offer some reasons for (...) this as well as some recommendations for implementing ethical assurance safeguards for political science. (shrink)

This book examines the divine nature in terms of maximal greatness. It investigates each attribute associated with maximal greatness - omnipotence, omniscience, perfect goodness, eternity, and beauty, arguing that maximal greatness is necessary and sufficient for divinity.

We propose an Analogy Principle in the context of Unary Inductive Logic and characterize the probability functions which satisfy it. In particular in the case of a language with just two predicates the probability functions satisfying this principle correspond to solutions of Skyrmsʼ ‘Wheel of Fortune’.

An important assumption underlying meaningful comparisons of scores in rater-mediated assessments is that measurement is commensurate across raters. When raters differentially apply the standards established by an instrument, scores from different raters are on fundamentally different scales and no longer preserve a common meaning and basis for comparison. In this study, we developed a method to accommodate measurement noninvariance across raters when measurements are cross-classified within two distinct hierarchical units. We conceptualized random item effects cross-classified graded response models and used (...) random discrimination and threshold effects to test, calibrate, and account for measurement noninvariance among raters. By leveraging empirical estimates of rater-specific deviations in the discrimination and threshold parameters, the proposed method allows us to identify noninvariant items and empirically estimate and directly adjust for this noninvariance within a cross-classified framework. Within the context of teaching evaluations, the results of a case study suggested substantial noninvariance across raters and that establishing an approximately invariant scale through random item effects improves model fit and predictive validity. (shrink)

Part biography and part constructive ethical inquiry, this book is an original interpretation of the Scottish philosopher Adam Ferguson’s ethical method and view of ethical integrity, with an emphasis on his Analysis, Institutes, and Principles.

Developing and implementing a meaningful code of conduct by managers or consultants may require a change in orientation that modifies the way these precepts are determined. The position advocated herein is for a different approach to understanding and organizing the guiding parameters of the firm that requires individual reflection and empowerment of the entire organization to advance their shared values. The processes involved are discussed using four discrete stages that move from the personal to the work team and to the (...) unit to the full company, followed by the board of directors’ evaluation. The hoped-for end product is dynamic, employee-driven, codes of conduct that recognize the systemic and far-reaching impact of organizational activities across internal and external stakeholders. Operational details for and some issues associated with its implementation are also provided. (shrink)

In order to defend her claim that the concept object is biologically determined, Carey must answer Quine's gavagai argument, which purports to show that mastery of any concept with determinate reference presupposes a substantial repertoire of logical concepts. I maintain that the gavagai argument withstands the experimental data that Carey provides, but that it yields to an a priori argument.

In ‘A Defence of the Ramsey Test’, Richard Bradley makes a case for not concluding from the famous impossibility results regarding the Ramsey Test — the thesis that a rational agent believes a conditional if he would believe the consequent upon learning the antecedent — that the thesis is false. He lays the blame instead on one of the other premisses in these results, namely the Preservation condition. In this paper, we explore how this condition can be weakened by strengthening (...) the notion of consistency which appears in it. After considering the effects of such weakenings for Bradley's argument, we propose a refinement of the Preservation condition which does not fall prey to Bradley's argument nor to Gärdenfors's impossibility theorem. We briefly compare it to Bradley's suggested restriction of Preservation. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine critically Kimberley Brownlee’s descriptive criteria for identifying when a person has a conscientious moral conviction. Then, I contrast her conception of conscience with other ideas of conscience, including a religious conception, a relativist conception, and those of Butler and Kant. The concepts examined here are central in her argument that, if civil disobedience is grounded in citizens’ conscience-based conscientious convictions, then it deserves legal and moral protection.

This article explores Adam Smith's (1723-90) cosmopolitanism by examining his conception of the ideal global regime and his attitudes to classical cosmopolitanism, British imperialism, American independence, war, mercantilism, benevolence, global integration, specialization, patriotism and his own alleged nationalism. It is argued that Smith shares with the Stoics the ideal of a world community but his cosmopolitanism is based, not on the sympathetic workings of universal benevolence, but on mutual enablement and the desire for and satisfaction of exponential material enrichment. Such (...) a state precludes conflict and territorial rivalry. Patriotism will not disappear but will be moderated by a pacific desire for prosperity via free trade. Eventually fierce nationalistic sentiments and intense alliances between security allies will be subdued by a development-induced aversion to conflict and the habits of amicable strangership underlying commercial cosmopolitanism. The article outlines the efficient mechanisms by which this is to be achieved and, in so doing, shows why, for Smith, economic cosmopolitanism is at once desirable, necessary and natural. (shrink)

Readers looking for an articulate, well‐informed exposition of Hayek's multifaceted intellectual achievement will be pleased with Bruce Cald‐well's new book, Hayek's Challenge: An Intellectual Biography of F. A. Hayek. Readers interested in a more critical consideration of Hayek's ideas, or in their ability to withstand cross‐examination from the positions Hayek himself criticized, are less likely to be satisfied. But even for the latter group, Caldwell has performed a useful service, compressing the varied elements of Hayek's complex thought into a lucid (...) synopsis that should facilitate engagement with those outside the Austrian camp. (shrink)

Media analyses of the aesthetic presentation of news frequently and persuasively demonstrate the skewed ethics of news production, where those in need who are distant and dissimilar are often presented in ways that do not fully humanize their condition. However, it is argued here, they also locate too fully the locus of moral responsibility in the production and presentation of the media text. This article explores the moral demands inherent in two kinds of media presentation: the explicit focus on shock (...) and awe over intimacy; and minimal presentations that substitute bare information (such as statistics or maps) for affective stories. It is argued that in both cases a moral encounter with the other can be motivated despite the news presentation and it is concluded that an excessive emphasis on the role of the news in generating moral responsibility justifies a spectatorish inertia that should be resisted. (shrink)

Kantian responses to three related questions are considered: Given the limits of our altruistic sentiments, is it possible for us to act beneficently as duty seems to require? What are we morally required to do for others besides respecting their rights? Why is this a reasonable requirement? Although the importance of empirical facts in deliberation is undeniable, the distinction between a practical deliberative point of view and the perspective of empirical inquiry proves to be crucial. Kant's grounds for an imperfect (...) duty of beneficence are examined. From a deliberative perspective, we must assume that we can act beneficently, even when lacking altruistic sentiments, provided we understand the good reasons for doing so. (shrink)

Abstract In the ideal market of general equilibrium theory, choices are made in full knowledge of one another, and all expectations are fulfilled. This pre?harmonization of individual plans does not occur in real?world markets where decisions must be taken in ignorance of one another. The Austrian school grants this, but claims that real?world price systems are nonetheless effective in coordinating saving and investment decisions, which are motivated by disparate considerations. In contrast, Keynes held that without the pre?reconciliation of individual plans, (...) investment and employment would be less than optimal, and the resulting distribution of income arbitrary and inequitable. (shrink)

In this paper I develop a theological account of intrinsic value drawn from some passages in Robert Merrihew Adams’ book Finite and Infinite Goods. First I explain why Adams’ work on this topic is interesting, situate his theory within the broader literature on intrinsic value, and draw attention to some of its revisionist features. Next I state the theory, raise some problems for it, and refine it in light of those problems. Then I illustrate how the refined theory works by (...) showing that it has the resources to deal with some seemingly formidable objections. (shrink)

Abstract:In this paper, I apply John Cage’s wide musical embrace of sound to the field of music education and explore its curricular and practical implications. In particular, I ask music teachers to consider themselves teachers of sound, or “sound teachers.” I argue that privileging sound as our chief concern leads us to reconsider the ways we speak about music, the offerings we include in our music curricula, and the ways we teach (about) sound. In particular, I suggest that application of (...) Cage’s ideas compels us to permit still more genres and styles in the classroom and curriculum, to emphasize activities that allow students to manipulate a diverse palette of sound types (for example, electronic composition), and to teach in ways that expand and diversify rather than narrow and limit students’ relationships with sound. I close by considering how Cage’s ideas of “purposeless play” and “purposeful purposelessness” orient our goals toward making students more attentive to and invested in the world of sound and the sound of the world. (shrink)

This essay presents my research stream on impoverished citizens as it relates to transdisciplinary work at the intersection of consumer behavior, applied ethics, public policy, and marketing practice. The original studies that inform this discussion were conducted using ethnographic methods with subpopulations that included the homeless, rural poor, children living in poverty, and aborigines isolated in the Australian outback. The opening section frames my work within the context of the larger marketing domain. The next section describes dysfunctional business activities that (...) reduce the consumer quality of life of disadvantaged citizens. Their reactions to this maltreatment then are presented, with an emphasis on the various groups noted. The essay closes with a brief discourse on restricted consumer behavior in business ethics research. (shrink)

A handy guide to the major figures and issues in Christian philosophy from Augustine to the present.This volume covers a broad historical sweep and takes into account those non-Christian philosophers that have had a great impact on the Christian tradition. However, it concentrates on the issues that perplex Christian philosophers as they seek to think through their faith in a philosophical way and their philosophical beliefs in the light of their faith. Examples of the topics discussed are the question of (...) whether and how God knows the future, whether we actually know that God exists, and what Athens has to do with Jerusalem. The leaders of the recent revival of Christian analytic philosophy, especially Alvin Plantinga, Nicholas Wolterstorff, William Alston, and Robert Adams are also included. (shrink)

Adam Ferguson was a leading light of the Scottish Enlightenment who developed a systematic theory of historical progress in the context of a broader theory of spontaneous order. His exposition of social order outlines a vision of human affairs as harmonious, orderly, progressive and perfectibilist. History is conceived lineally and is presented in the form of a tri-stadial thesis in which progress is both natural and likely. It is also a Providentially inspired process and yet the second major theme of (...) Ferguson's history is that of decline. Ferguson apparently harboured grave fears about the third stage in our cultural and economic evolution, the ‘polished’ or commercial age, and he suggested that this stage contained the seeds of its own destruction.Ferguson fails to make explicit the precise relationship between the parallel themes of progress and decline within his corpus; indeed, his articulation of them within the superstructure of a Providential teleology casts them in direct conflict. The result is a strong sense of ambivalence which throws the whole idea of spontaneous order into doubt. How can Ferguson simultaneously subscribe to notions about progressive, spontaneous history and to others about the onset of decay in the presumably ‘natural stage’ of commercial or ‘polished’ society? This paper explores and seeks to resolve this conundrum textually via a discussion of Ferguson's response to the problem of theodicy and by using his commitment to spontaneous order as the key unifying construct. (shrink)

There has been a recent surge of interest among economists in developing models of doxastic states that can account for some aspects of human cognitive limitations that are ignored by standard formal models, such as awareness. Epistemologists purport to have a principled reason for ignoring the question of awareness: under the equilibrium conception of doxastic states they favour, a doxastic state comprises the doxastic commitments an agent would recognise were he fully aware, so the question of awareness plays no role. (...) The objective of this paper is to scrutinize this argument. A thesis underlying the argument, which we call the independence of doxastic commitments with respect to awareness, is identified, and examples are given where it appears to be violated. By considering these examples, one can get an idea of the price of accepting this thesis. On the one hand, one can escape the conclusion that the thesis is violated, but only at the expense of another principle espoused by all major formal models of belief, which we call constant doxastic rest; and abandoning this principle necessitates extensive revision of current models of belief. On the other hand, there are epistemologically valid reasons for thinking that the thesis fails to hold in the examples, which have to be rebutted if the thesis, and the equilibrium justification for ignoring the issue of awareness, are to be retained. (shrink)

Little is known of Edmund Husserl's direct encounter with Georg Cantor's ideas on Platonic idealism and the abstraction of number concepts during the late 19th century, when Husserl's philosophical orientation changed considerably and definitely. Closely analyzing and comparing the two men's writings during that important time in their intellectual careers, I describe the crucial shift in Husserl's views on psychologism and metaphysical idealism as it relates to Cantor's philosophy of arithmetic. I thus establish connections between their ideas which have been (...) until now been virtually unsuspected and contribute to a better understanding of the development of Husserl's thought and of the philosophical and metaphysical ideas within which Cantor chose to frame his theories. (shrink)

This book examines the complexities of the hipster through the lens of art history and cultural theory, from Charles Baudelaire's flan̂eur to the contemporary 'creative' borne from creative industries policies. It claims that the recent ubiquity of hipster culture has led many artists to confront their own significance, responding to the mass artification of contemporary life by de-emphasising the formal and textual deconstructions so central to the legacies of modern and postmodern art. In the era of creative digital technologies, long (...) held characteristics of art such as individual expression, innovation, and alternative lifestyle are now features of a flooded and fast-paced global marketplace. Against the idea that artists, like hipsters, are the 'foot soldiers of capitalism', the institutionalized networks that make up the contemporary art world are working to portray a view of art that is less a discerning exercise in innovative form-making than a social platform--a forum for populist aesthetic pleasures or socio-political causes. It is in this sense that the concept of the hipster is caught up in age-old debates about the relation between ethics and aesthetics, examined here in terms of the dynamics of global contemporary art."--Publisher's website. (shrink)

"Aristotelian Dialectic" is a dialogue between two persons, T and Q, concerning Aristotle's views on the nature of dialectic and rhetoric and also on the role of dialectic and rhetoric in modern education. T advances two theses: that Aristotle views dialectic and rhetoric as intellectual martial arts. to be used to combat the sophists; and that these arts form the basis of Homeric education. T defends this view by examining what Aristotle has to say in the Topics, The Sophistical Refutations, (...) The Posterior Analytics, and The Rhetoric. T also indicates a strong belief that these arts are as important for education today as they were in Aristotle's time. To drive home this point, T uses many of the techniques he ascribes to Aristotle on Q in the course of their discussion. (shrink)