The United Kingdom’s approach to encouraging environmentally positive behaviour has been three-pronged, through voluntarism, incentives and regulation, and the balance between the approaches has fluctuated over time. Whilst financial incentives and regulatory approaches have been effective in achieving some environmental management behavioural change amongst farmers, ultimately these can be viewed as transient drivers without long-term sustainability. Increasingly, there is interest in ‘nudging’ managers towards voluntary environmentally friendly actions. This approach requires a good understanding of farmers’ willingness and ability to take (...) up environmental activities and the influences on farmer behavioural change. The paper aims to provide insights from 60 qualitative farmer interviews undertaken for a research project into farmers’ willingness and ability to undertake environmental management, particularly focusing on social psychological insights. Furthermore, it explores farmers’ level of engagement with advice and support networks that foster a genuine interest, responsibility and a sense of personal and social norm to sustain high quality environmental outcomes. Two conceptual frameworks are presented for usefully exploring the complex set of inter-relationships that can influence farmers’ willingness to undertake environmental management practices. The research findings show how an in-depth understanding of farmer’s willingness and ability to adopt environmental management practices and their existing level of engagement with advice and support are necessary to develop appropriate engagement approaches to achieve sustained and durable environmental management. (shrink)

This edited collection sets forth a new understanding of aesthetic-moral judgment organised around three key concepts: pleasure, reflection, and accountability. The overarching theme is that art is not merely a representation or expression like any other, but that it promotes shared moral understanding and helps us engage in meaning-making. This volume offers an alternative to brain-centric and realist approaches to aesthetics. It features original essays from a number of leading philosophers of art, aesthetics, ethics, and perception, including Elizabeth Burns Coleman, (...) Garrett Cullity, Cynthia A. Freeland, Ivan Gaskell, Paul Guyer, Jane Kneller, Keith Lehrer, Mohan Matthen, Jennifer A. McMahon, Bence Nanay, Nancy Sherman, and Robert Sinnerbrink. Part I of the book analyses the elements of aesthetic experience— pleasure, preference, and imagination—with the individual conceived as part of a particular cultural context and network of other minds. The chapters in Part II explain how it is possible for cultural learning to impact these elements through consensus building, an impulse to objectivity, emotional expression, and reflection. Finally, the chapters in Part III converge on the role of dissonance, difference, and diversity in promoting cultural understanding and advancement. Social Aesthetics and Moral Judgment will appeal to philosophers of art and aesthetics, as well as to scholars in other disciplines interested in issues related to art and cultural exchange. (shrink)

This book encourages readers to acknowledge humanity's contribution to the environmental crisis, proposing a way forward by exploring the power of ordinary people to bring about large-scale cultural change. Is it possible for humankind to change its ways and shed the belief that the planet is ours to do with as we like? Internationally acclaimed philosopher of education Jane Roland Martin argues that "humancentrism" is a learned affair, and what is learned can be unlearned. Turning to the past to (...) see how large-scale cultural change has occurred, she discovers a pattern in the achievements of such historical luminaries as Martin Luther, Mahatma Gandhi, Rosa Parks and Greta Thunberg that we too can follow. Drawing on history, philosophy, and literature as well as the natural and social sciences and hoping to mobilize readers to effective action, Martin employs an accessible and powerful rhetoric, with each chapter beginning with a scene from history written in dialogue form. This book calls on young and old to avert a looming tragedy of Aristotelian proportions--the demise of the "Mother Nature" that made it possible for our species to flourish. Thoroughly interdisciplinary in its approach, it will appeal to students and teachers as well as general readers interested in environmental studies, philosophy, and education. (shrink)

It is a commonplace that the modern world cannot be experienced as enchanted--that the very concept of enchantment belongs to past ages of superstition. Jane Bennett challenges that view. She seeks to rehabilitate enchantment, showing not only how it is still possible to experience genuine wonder, but how such experience is crucial to motivating ethical behavior. A creative blend of political theory, philosophy, and literary studies, this book is a powerful and innovative contribution to an emerging interdisciplinary conversation about (...) the deep connections between ethics, aesthetics, and politics. As Bennett describes it, enchantment is a sense of openness to the unusual, the captivating, and the disturbing in everyday life. She guides us through a wide and often surprising range of sources of enchantment, showing that we can still find enchantment in nature, for example, but also in such unexpected places as modern technology, advertising, and even bureaucracy. She then explains how everyday moments of enchantment can be cultivated to build an ethics of generosity, stimulating the emotional energy and honing the perceptual refinement necessary to follow moral codes. Throughout, Bennett draws on thinkers and writers as diverse as Kant, Schiller, Thoreau, Kafka, Marx, Weber, Adorno, and Deleuze. With its range and daring, The Enchantment of Modern Life is a provocative challenge to the centuries-old ''narrative of disenchantment,'' one that presents a new ''alter-tale'' that discloses our profound attachment to the human and nonhuman world. (shrink)

Recent philosophy of mind has had a mistaken conception of the nature of psychological concepts. It has assumed too much similarity between psychological judgments and those of natural science and has thus overlooked the fact that other people are not just objects whose thoughts we may try to predict and control but fellow creatures with whom we talk and co-operate. In this collection of essays, Jane Heal argues that central to our ability to arrive at views about others' thoughts (...) is not knowledge of some theory of the mind but rather an ability to imagine alternative worlds and how things appear from another person's point of view. She then applies this view to questions of how we represent others' thoughts, the shape of psychological concepts, the nature of rationality and the possibility of first person authority. This book should appeal to students and professionals in philosophy of mind and language. (shrink)

In the April, 1985 issue of Bio Essays, F. Vella presented an evaluation of the recent GPEP report, concerning medical school education in the United States. Here, Hilliard Jason and Jane Westberg present an additional discussion of the issues.

Eager to change the world? Learn how you can have a greater social impact through your everyday purchases. The money we routinely spend on food, clothes, gifts, and even indulgences is an untapped superpower. What would happen if we slowed down to make more thoughtful decisions about what we buy? For "mom and pop" stores across the country, and artisan and agricultural communities around the world, every purchase matters. Consumers--whether individuals, small businesses, or corporations--are paying more attention than ever to (...) how their goods are made; and retailers--large and small--are responding by investing in ethical and eco-friendly production. Yet figuring out which brands to support can feel overwhelming. Jane Mosbacher Morris has devoted her career to creating economic opportunities for vulnerable communities around the world, and in this valuable book, she shares her passion and insights on how we, as consumers, can create positive change too. Covering topics that range from why not all factories are evil, to how our morning coffee can be the easiest way for us to use our purchasing power for good, Buy the Change You Want to See makes us better informed consumers. Morris tells inspiring stories about how victims of human trafficking and natural disasters have been empowered by economic opportunity, and she offers practical ideas about how we can support these communities through our purchases--whether it comes to jewelry made from recycled materials in Haiti, sustainably grown and ethically sourced coffee and chocolate from farmers in some of the poorest regions of the world, or mass-produced jeans and shoes made in factories where workers are guaranteed decent working conditions and a fair wage. (shrink)

In Recovering Hegel from the Critique of Leo Strauss, Sara MacDonald and Barry Craig provide a study unique in its focus on Leo Strauss’s reading of Hegel. While MacDonald and Craig find value in Strauss’s thought, they argue that his pessimism concerning modernity lies in a misunderstanding of both modernity’s greatest philosophical advocate, G.W.F. Hegel, and modernity’s virtues.

Contemporary theories of Virtue Ethics are often presented as being in opposition to Kantian Ethics and Consequentialism. It is argued that Virtue Ethics takes as fundamental the question, “What sort of character would a virtuous person have?” and that Kantian Ethics and Consequentialism take as fundamental the question, “What makes an action right?” I argue that this opposition is misconceived. The opposition is rather between Virtue Ethics and Kantian Ethics on the one hand and Consequentialism on the other. The former (...) two are concerned with, respectively, the development of a virtuous character and a good will, whereas Consequentialism is essentially a doctrine that just provides a justification of the right option without specifying how this is to be achieved. Furthermore, I show that Consequentialism, interpreted as a justificatory doctrine, is both an impoverished doctrine and one that cannot be enriched by taking a “pick and mix” approach to other ethical theories in the way that Consequentialists advocate. I argue that there is at least one reason to prefer Kantian Ethics: Kantian Ethics necessarily avoids the objection of selfcenteredness, whereas the avoidance of this objection is only contingent in the case of Virtue Ethics. (shrink)

(People do not understand how what is borne in different directions comes to be in agreement with itself; [for] a framework like that of the bow and the lyre turns back [on itself].).

Using Giddens’s structuration theory and empirical data from a study with social enterprise stakeholders, the article explores how social entrepreneurs and the structure co-create one another. We show that the development of the contemporary significance of social entrepreneurialism lies in a combination of complex context-specific structural forces and the activities of agents who initiate, demand, and impose change. Social entrepreneurs intentionally tackle social challenges, but their actions bring unintentional results, such as the transfer of state responsibilities onto communities. Direct outputs (...) of their activities introduce indirect outcomes, bringing wider changes in culture and policy. The evolving nature of entrepreneurship and a number of factors that interplay in time and space, and enable and constrain social entrepreneurs, confirm the applicability of Giddens’s theory in the field of social entrepreneurship. The originality of this article derives from revealing mechanisms that enable social entrepreneurs to emerge and reasons for structural change. We also build a “co-creation model of structure and agency” that can be used to “engineer” the process of social entrepreneurship. (shrink)

From climate change forecasts and pandemic maps to Lego sets and Ancestry algorithms, models encompass our world and our lives. In her thought-provoking new book, Annabel Wharton begins with a definition drawn from the quantitative sciences and the philosophy of science but holds that history and critical cultural theory are essential to a fuller understanding of modeling. Considering changes in the medical body model and the architectural model, from the Middle Ages to the twenty-first century, Wharton demonstrates the ways in (...) which all models are historical and political.0Examining how cadavers have been described, exhibited, and visually rendered, she highlights the historical dimension of the modified body and its depictions. Analyzing the varied reworkings of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem-including by monumental commanderies of the Knights Templar, Alberti's Rucellai Tomb in Florence, Franciscans' olive wood replicas, and video game renderings-she foregrounds the political force of architectural representations. And considering black boxes-instruments whose inputs we control and whose outputs we interpret, but whose inner workings are beyond our comprehension-she surveys the threats posed by such opaque computational models, warning of the dangers that models pose when humans lose control of the means by which they are generated and understood. Engaging and wide-ranging, 'Models and World Making' conjures new ways of seeing and critically evaluating how we make and remake the world in which we live. (shrink)

Ethics consultation is a service provided to patients, families, and clinicians to support decisions during ethical dilemmas. This study is a secondary qualitative analysis of 48 interviews from clinicians involved in an ethics consultation at a large academic health center. An inductive secondary analysis of this data set led to the emergence of one key theme, the apparent perspective the clinicians adopted as they recalled a specific ethics case. This article presents a qualitative analysis of the propensity of clinicians involved (...) in an ethics consultation to adopt the subjective viewpoints of their team, their patient, or both simultaneously. Clinicians demonstrated an ability to take the patient perspective (42%), the clinician perspective (31%), or the clinician-patient perspective (25%). Our analysis suggests the potential for narrative medicine to build the empathy and moral imagination necessary to bridge the gap in perspectives between key stakeholders. (shrink)

Summary This paper notes and explores the attraction of Dugald Stewart's moral philosophy for women readers and a few women writers. Student lecture notes reveal the chronological development of his ideas, as he drew upon the works of Thomas Reid, Adam Smith, and Adam Ferguson, and responded to political events. Particular attention is paid to Stewart's comments relating to women and gender, through discussions of education, the institution of marriage, and population questions. After 1800, he shifted away from a speculative (...) conjectural history towards a philosophy of moral progress rooted in common sense philosophy and a belief in perfectibility. He taught a system of practical morality relevant to the education of children and strongly emphasised the importance of the association of ideas in childhood. For women readers, the message was contradictory in that he united an apparently conservative reinforcement of the relations of the sexes with a belief in the improvement of the condition of women through education in a modern, progressive, and commercial society. (shrink)

Three professors reflect on the experience of creating a learning community of 22 students by linking courses in Literature and Ethics. The project demonstrates practical strategies for incorporating feminist scholarship and pedagogy into the core curriculum and for integrating core courses from diverse disciplines.

From Bauhaus to Dada, from Virginia Woolf to John Dos Passos, the Modernist movement revolutionized the way we perceive, portray, and participate in the world. This landmark anthology is a comprehensive documentary resource for the study of Modernism, bringing together more than 150 key essays, articles, manifestos, and other writings of the political and aesthetic avant-garde between 1840 and 1950. By favoring short extracts over lengthier originals, the editors cover a remarkable range and variety of modernist thinking. Included are not (...) just the familiar high modernist landmarks such as Gustave Flaubert, Ezra Pound, and James Joyce, but also a diverse representation from the sciences, politics, philosophy, and the arts, including Charles Darwin, Thorstein Veblen, W. E. B. Du Bois, Isadora Duncan, John Reed, Adolf Hitler, and Sergei Eisenstein. Another welcome feature is a substantial selection of hard-to-find manifestos from the many modernist movements, among them futurism, cubism, Dada, surrealism, and anarchism. (shrink)

John Henry Newman had a fascination with the angels, as evidenced by three of his published poems, a passage devoted to angels in his Apologia pro Vita Sua, as well as sermons on the angels. Surprisingly, Newman’s interest in angels has not attracted much scholarly attention. After examining some of Newman’s writings that touch upon angels, this essay suggests that Newman’s Romantic and Evangelical background prepared him for his reading of the Fathers in 1828, which in turn influenced his consideration (...) of the significance of angels in the spiritual life. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Journal of Aesthetic Education 37.1 (2003) 32-39 [Access article in PDF] Aesthetics, Epistemics, and Feminist Theory Jane Duran Recent feminist analysts of aesthetics and analytic aesthetics in particular seem to have come to the conclusion that the redemption of formulated aesthetic theory from the feminist point of view is a difficult and recondite task. 1 If analytic aesthetics now looks problematic, qua fruitful philosophical enterprise, its future (...) appears bleaker still when the intersection of the androcentric nature of analytic philosophy and the larger feminist project, frequently articulated in other than analytic terms, is examined.In this essay I will assume that there is some future for analytic aesthetics, and I will not dispute the basic assumption that any portion of analytic theory is somewhat immiscible with feminist points of view. My concern, rather, will be to try to show what it is specifically in the nature of analytic theory, both aesthetic and otherwise, which renders it of dubious value to the feminist critique (at least on first blush). Although in the past feminist theorists have tried to characterize the androcentric nature of analytic philosophy on the whole in rather striking terms,it is not clear that these terms have been precise enough. 2 Further, it is not clear that analytic modes are obviously unusable for feminist theory or for the development of a still nascent feminist aesthetics, although what one wants to say here is that this task is a terribly danger-fraught one. 3My goal here is twofold: first, to articulate what precisely it is aboutanalytic aesthetics (or any portion of analytic theory, for that matter) thatmakes it a hindrance — at least preliminarily — to the development of feminist views. In order to do this I will need to examine a relatively uncharted area in the literature, that is the parallel between much of analytic aesthetic theory and analytic epistemology. The second portion of my task will runsomewhat contrary to conventional wisdom: having delineated the mostmasculinist parts of analytic endeavors, I inquire if there is, indeed, anypart of rigorously articulated analytic theory that could lend itself to the development of a feminist aesthetic. [End Page 32] Analytic Philosophy and Aesthetics Analytic aesthetics, like analytic philosophy taken as a whole, has often proceeded as if the development of conceptual clarification and theoretical rigor could do much to "solve" or dissolve aesthetic problems. George Dickie's introductory work, for example, presents the student with a number of difficult areas in aesthetics, and then proceeds to address these areas in much the same manner that other contemporary texts employ for the discussion of issues in ethics, epistemology, or metaphysics.In discussing symbolism, Dickie first attempts to clarify the use of theterm, and then notes that there are problematic areas with regard to whether or not a work of art can both contain a symbol and serve itself as a symbol simultaneously. A symbol "stands for" in some establishable way that which it symbolizes. A symbol serves to transfer someone's thought to something other than itself, and the transfer is not a random association. The transfer depends upon certain features of the symbol which give it a place in a certain meaning system. 4I cite this material as exemplary because the flavor of analytic aesthetics is remarkably similar to the flavor of analytic philosophy as a whole. We sometimes need to remind ourselves that the techniques of analysis developed in the earlier part of this century relied on breakthroughs in logic and formal representation which allowed for a certain precision in matching symbol to thing signified. The original hope of philosophers working at the time of Bertrand Russell and G.E. Moore had been to develop something close to a logically perfect language with a one-to-one relationship between signifier and signified. However without merit this somewhat arcane task, its goals infused much of the philosophizing that followed it, and even the ordinary language school was, of course, indirectly an offshoot of this work. Nicholas Wolterstorff, for example, notes that "analytic philosophy was to be 'scientific philosophy'....The goal of the analytic philosopher... (shrink)