Mental maps and historical consciousness, which describe the spatial and temporal dimensions of worldviews, are not, as commonly stated, twentieth century concepts. Historical consciousness was coined simultaneously by several German scholars in the mid-1800s. Mental maps, used in English since the 1820s, had a prominent role in US geography education from the 1880s. Since then, the concepts have traveled between practical-technical, educational, and academic vocabularies, cross fertilizing fields and contributing to the formation of new research questions. However, when these initial (...) periods of reflection gave way to empirical investigation, strict intra-disciplinary definitions of the concepts have strengthened disciplinary borders by excluding the interpretations of the same concepts in other fields. (shrink)

This study examines social desirability bias in the context of ethical decision-making by accountants. It hypothesizes a negative relation between social desirability bias and ethical evaluation. It also predicts an interaction effect between religiousness and gender on social desirability bias. An experiment using five general business vignettes was carried out on 121 accountants (63 males and 58 females). The results show that social desirability bias is higher (lower) when the situation encountered is more (less) unethical. The bias has religiousness and (...) gender main effects as well as an interaction effect between these two independent variables. Women who were more religious recorded the highest bias scores relative to less religious women and men regardless of their religiousness. (shrink)

The 2018 eligibility regulation for female competitors with differences of sexual development (DSD) issued by World Athletics requires competitors with DSD with blood testosterone levels at or above 5 nmol/L and sufficient androgen sensitivity to be excluded from competition in certain events unless they reduce the level of testosterone in their blood. This paper formalises and then critically assesses the fairness-based argument offered in support of this regulation by the federation. It argues that it is unclear how the biological advantage (...) singled out by the regulation as an appropriate target for diminishment, is relevantly different from other biological advantages that athletes may enjoy, and specifically that Sigmund Loland’s recent attempt to drive a wedge between heightened levels of blood testosterone and other biological advantages fails. The paper also suggests that even if heightened blood testosterone levels do differ relevantly from other types of biological advantage, the regulation is further challenged by studies indicating that athletes with blood testosterone at the high end of the normal range have a competitive advantage over athletes with blood testosterone levels at the low end of it. Finally, the paper contends that the premises of the fairness-based argument do not unequivocally support the conclusion that DSD athletes with heightened levels of testosterone should diminish those levels, since, just as powerfully, they support allowing athletes with normal levels of testosterone to use performance-enhancing drugs in the name of fairness. (shrink)

It is widely believed that informed consent must be obtained from a patient for it to be morally permissible to administer to him/her a medical intervention. The same has been argued for the use of neurointerventions administered to criminal offenders. Arguments in favour of a consent requirement for neurointerventions can take two forms. First, according to absolutist views, neurointerventions shouldneverbe administered without an offender’s informed consent. However, I argue that these views are ultimately unpersuasive. The second, and more plausible, form (...) defences of the consent requirement may take are more moderate in that they accept the use of neurointerventions in some cases, but not in others. Based on common rationales for consent in medical interventions, I discuss whether four moderate approaches in defence of the informed consent requirement for medical interventions succeed in establishing that informed consent must be obtained from offenders prior to administering neurointerventions to them. I offer novel critical perspectives on approaches that have already received some attention in the literature, and I critically discuss other approaches to defending informed consent in a medical context that have not yet received due attention. Ultimately, I argue that it is not obvious that any of these considerations support a requirement of offenders’ informed consent to neurointerventions. Lastly, however, I suggest that there is at least one overlooked fact as regards how courts currently employ mandatory neurointerventions, which may support such a requirement. (shrink)

Friendly persuasion, in contrast to deterrent measures like tax audits and penalties on underreported taxes, is a positive and possibly a cost effective method of increasing taxpayer compliance. However, prior studies have failed to show that friendly persuasion has a significant impact on compliance (Blumenthal et al., 2001; McGraw and Scholz, 1991). In our study, in contrast to prior studies, we examine the impact of generating and reading reasons supporting compliance as friendly persuasion on individuals' income reporting behavior as well (...) as control for gender effects. Specifically, we predict an interaction effect between friendly persuasion and gender on compliance behavior. We carried out a 2 (friendly persuasion and control) × 2 (men and women) full factorial experiment, where participants earned $30 by completing two questionnaires. Participants in the friendly persuasion group were required first to generate and second to read a list of reasons why they should comply fully. Afterwards, participants in both groups were asked to report the income they earned and pay tax on the reported income. The results show a significant main effect for gender as well as a significant interaction effect between gender and friendly persuasion on income reported. Women in the friendly persuasion group reported significantly higher income compared to men in that group. Other comparisons were not significant. Policy implications for increasing taxpayers' ethics and compliance are highlighted. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss whether it is ever morally permissible to diminish the cognitive abilities or capacities of some cognitively gifted offenders whose ability to commit their crimes successfully relies on them possessing these abilities or capacities. I suggest that, given such cognitive diminishments may prevent such offenders from re-offending and causing others considerable harm, this provides us with at least one good moral reason in favour of employing them. After setting out more clearly what cognitive diminishment may consist (...) of, I then critically discuss variations of four plausible arguments against a proposal of using them on cognitive gifted offenders related to autonomy, harm, narrative identity, and a right to mental self-determination. I argue that none of these concerns should have us reject the use of cognitive diminishments. (shrink)

Most contemporary action theorists deny the possible existence of intentionally evil actions or diabolic agency. The reason for this is a normative interpretation of agency that appears to be motivated by action theoretic concerns, where agents are conceived as necessarily acting sub specie bonie or under ‘the guise of the good’. I argue that there is nothing in human agency to motivate this view and that diabolic evil is not at odds with inherent features of our nature.

Nudging refers to the subtle design of the context of choice in a way that mobilises the unconscious mind and alters human behaviour predictably. Nudging has been criticised for entailing numerous practical and ethical problems, including manipulation, elitism and cultural insensitivity. To respond to the problems, participatory and deliberative procedures have been proposed that would enable the questioning of the power relations embedded in behavioural governance. Yet participation and deliberation are themselves characterised by unconscious behavioural influences. I argue that awareness (...) of the prevalence of unconscious behavioural influences in environmental governance is a prerequisite for tackling the complex practical and ethical issues of nudging. I show that unconscious behavioural influences permeate environmental governance and outline analytical approaches for revealing them. (shrink)

It has recently been suggested that personalized advertising is often _more _an affront to a person's autonomy and thus more morally worrisome than its generic counterpart precisely because it involves or takes advantage of such personalization. This paper argues that central reasons that have been forwarded to support this claim are unpersuasive and that generic and personalized advertising should therefore be treated as morally on par in terms of their potential to undermine consumer autonomy. The paper then suggests that, if (...) this is true, it presses scholars who wish to maintain there to be a moral asymmetry between personalized and generic advertising in terms of their effect on consumer autonomy to choose between three argumentative avenues, but that none of these is likely to be particularly attractive for a defender of the asymmetry. (shrink)

In this article, I focus on possibly impaired self-determination in addiction. After some methodological reflections, I introduce a phenomenological description of the experience of being self-determined. I argue that being self-determined implies effectivity of agency regarding three different behavioural domains. Such self-referential agency shall be called ‘self-effectivity’ in this article. In a second step, I will use this phenomenological description to understand the impairments of self-determination in addiction. While addiction does not necessarily imply a basic lack of control over one’s (...) life, this can well be the case during certain periods of time or in special situations. Addiction is herein described as an embodied custom—highly effective with respect to changing one’s lived experience—which is learned and developed while becoming addicted. Such a repeatedly performed custom, called a ‘psychotropic technique’, implies deep changes in one’s personal identity and alters an agent’s ‘self-effectivity’. In the closing section, I discuss the possible implications of a phenomenological approach to personal responsibility. (shrink)

This book aims to contribute to our understanding of one of the most pressing issues of modern international law: the relationship between the international legal order on the one hand and the domestic legal orders of over 190 sovereign states on the other handThe traditional and dominant understanding of this relationship is that there exists a strict separation between the international legal order and domestic legal orders. Processes of legal globalisation and internationalisation have made this relationship much more complex. Legal (...) authority has shifted away from the state in both vertical and horizontal directions. Forced by the pressures of interdependence, states have allowed international bodies to oversee and sometimes even implement and enforce domestic legislation. At the same time, private persons are more and more drawn into an internationalized order. Increasing cross-border flows of services, goods and capital, mobility, and communication have further undermined any stable notion of what is national and what is international.This book offers several partly complementary and partly competing perspectives that allow us understand and make sense of the complex interaction between the international and domestic sphere. (shrink)

In welfare encounters, clients may from time to time report about other peoples’ doings in ways that are heard as more or less downgrading. This article examines how these reports are brought off in Norwegian vocational rehabilitation encounters, and especially, how the professional party aligns. Do such practices represent what Levinson calls ‘allowable contributions’ in the vocational rehabilitation meeting or are they treated as matter out of place? The analysis of five data extracts suggests that it is very important for (...) the reception that the report is well contextualized and attuned to the institutional agenda. The counsellors displayed a neutral but cooperative alignment to reports integrated neatly in the business-at-hand in a top-down fashion. Here, the reports served as a tool to inform the recipient about the client’s own character and/or her experience of the rehabilitation process. However, in the two latter cases, where the client had a more initiating role, the reports appeared to have a more humorous or entertaining function. In response, the counsellors did not display alignment but searched for institutional relevance before re-contextualizing the report into a proper context. This suggests that out-of-frame reports about other people delivered on a humorous footing do not straightforwardly fall into the category of ‘allowable contributions’ in this setting. (shrink)

An educated healthcare professional or student is sensitive and able to make good judgements, understanding existential challenging issues. It is argued that the ideas within phenomenology and hermeneutics can function as a basis for comprehension. This article focuses on how choice of perspective and knowledge is of importance to what we do in practice. However, education does not consist of mere accumulation of knowledge and ways of explanation. We do not become competent practitioners by being able to reproduce philosophical ideas. (...) These are merely perspectives by means of which we can seek to go beyond what we take for granted, or what we assume to know, thus enabling us to take a new direction understanding problems and issues that until now may have been hidden to us. In other words, understanding is of an existential character, whereas an observing healthcare professional must be aware and open to the mental aspects of life. It is therefore important to attune ourselves to being sensitive to and aware of experiences from our lifeworld, understanding what they imply. It is argued that literature provides insight into human nature through the written depiction of real or imagined experiences. To develop such narrative imagination, it is suggested that literature should be part of the curriculum of various educations. This is relevant to healthcare professionals who thereby can get an important insight into human nature and begin to develop the self‐awareness and sensitivity to others that is so central to care. (shrink)

In this paper phenomenological descriptions of the experiential structures of suicidality and of self-determined behaviour are given; an understanding of the possible scopes and forms of lived self-determination in suicidal mental life is offered. Two possible limits of lived self-determination are described: suicide is always experienced as minimally self-determined, because it is the last active and effective behaviour, even in blackest despair; suicide can never be experienced as fully self-determined, even if valued as the authentic thing to do, because no (...) retrospective re-evaluation from some future vantage is possible. The phenomenological descriptions of the possible scope of lived self-determination in suicidality, presented in this paper, should prove to be extremely helpful in three different fields of interest: (a) ethical debates regarding the pros and cons of autonomous or heteronomous suicide; (b) clinical day-to-day practice with respect to treating suicidal people; (c) people who suffered a suicidal crisis, attempted suicide or lost loved ones through suicides. (155 words). (shrink)

In this paper, I develop a phenomenological description of lived autonomy and describe possible alterations of lived autonomy associated with chronic depression as they relate to specific psychopathological symptoms. I will distinguish between two types of lived autonomy, a pre-reflective type and a reflective type, which differ with respect to the explicitness of the action that is willed into existence; and I will relate these types to the classical distinction between freedom of intentional action and freedom of the will. I (...) will then describe how a chronically depressed person habitually discloses her experiential workspace with an impaired scope of perceivable action-properties, and pre-reflectively values many of these perceived action-properties as demanding or devalues these properties as well as her own abilities and drive to perform the respective actions. These alterations, typically experienced in a passive manner, imply an impairment of both types of lived autonomy. Drawing on first-hand accounts, I will then argue that small islands of lived autonomy, even of the reflective type, are possible if the afflicted identifies with at least some of her ‘depressive disabilities’. Lastly, I will compare this manner of life-conduct with the constellation of includence, as described by Tellenbach, and discuss the limitations of this study. (shrink)

The challenges of the Anthropocene are growing ever more complex and uncertain, underpinned by the emergence of systemic risks. At the same time, the landscape of risk governance has become compartmentalised and siloed, characterized by non-overlapping activities, competing scientific discourses, and distinct responsibilities distributed across diverse public and private bodies. Operating across scales and disciplines, actors tend to work in silos which constitute critical gaps within the interface of science, policy, and practice. Yet, increasingly complex and ‘wicked’ problems require holistic (...) solutions, multi-scalar communication, coordination, collaboration, data interoperability, funding, and stakeholder engagement. To address these problems in a real-world context, we present the Risk-Tandem framework for bridging theory and practice; to guide and structure the integration of disaster risk management (DRM), climate change adaptation (CCA) and systemic risk management through a process of transdisciplinary knowledge co-production. Advancing the frontiers of knowledge in this regard, The Risk-Tandem framework combines risk management approaches and tools with iterative co-production processes as a cornerstone of its implementation, in efforts to promote the co-design of fit-for-purpose solutions, methods and approaches contributing toward strengthened risk governance alongside stakeholders. The paper outlines how the framework is developed, applied, and further refined within selected case study regions, including Denmark, Germany, Italy and the Danube Region. (shrink)

Although there is a growing acknowledgement of the potential of a more nuanced healthcare paradigm and practice, the discourses of health promotion—and with that nursing and other healthcare professionals’ practice—still tend to focus on the medical diagnosis, disease and the rationale of biomedicine. There is a need for shifting to a human practice that draws on a broader perspective related to illness. This requires a transformation of practices which can be constructed within a narrative understanding. A narrative approach appreciates the (...) importance of emotion and intersubjective relation in the telling and listening that occur in the clinical encounter. The essence of nursing lies in the creative imagination, the sensitive spirit and the intelligent understanding of the individuals’ possibilities of becoming empowered in his or her own life. This entails that the focus of the use of patients’ narratives is, ultimately, not the story itself, but the nurses’ and other healthcare professionals’ ability to support the patients in finding useful meaning in their stories. Herein, it is of particular importance to let the patients narrate about what is sparkling moments or events in the lived life. Stories with such focus can open up for patients’ hopes and dreams, which gives inspiration for finding meaningful ways to cope in life empowering personal recovery. It is, therefore, crucial to transform clinical settings into places that acknowledge the need for imagination and creativity, aiming at creating the opportunity for sensibility and vision essential to encouraging a narrative approach and thereby the ability to reflect upon and promote a healing process. (shrink)

This paper critically discusses the argument from objectification – as recently presented by Elizabeth Shaw – against mandatory direct brain interventions targeting criminal offenders’ values as part of rehabilitative or reformative schemes. Shaw contends that such DBIs would objectify offenders because a DBI “excludes offenders by portraying them as a group to whom we need not listen” and “implies that offenders are radically defective with regard to one of the most fundamental aspects of their agency”. To ensure that offenders are (...) not objectified, Shaw first maintains that we should restrict rehabilitative/reformative schemes to attempts at rational dialogue because such an approach respects the offender’s personhood. Second, Shaw claims that we should not portray offenders as radically defective because such treatment would only negatively impact offenders’ already tenuous relationship with society. Third, Shaw contends that we should not confer the state the power to change an offender’s values because the state lacks insight into what constitutes the right values. I contend that none of these arguments should prevent the use of value-targeting DBIs. First, I show that the dialogue requirement for rehabilitative schemes is insufficient ground from which to oppose the use of these DBIs. Second, I show that it is doubtful that the use of DBIs as proposed would damage the relationship between offenders and society. Finally, although the state may often lack insight into what constitutes the correct values, this lack of insight should not by itself prevent value-targeting DBIs from being employed on certain groups of offenders. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Diacritics 30.3 (2000) 53-71 [Access article in PDF] Ghostly Politics Jann Matlock [Figures]The failure of the Second Republic, as we know well, thanks to Marx, was a matter of ghostly politics.1 Successful revolutions succeeded—claimed Marx—in "waking the dead" in order to glorify the new struggles. Unsuccessful revolutions parodied, as in 1848, the old ones. The Second Republic failed to find again "the spirit of revolution" ("den Geist der Revolution"); (...) instead, it made its "ghost walk about again" ["Der 18te Brumaire" 116].2The "conjurations of the dead" ("Totenbeschwörungen") [115] of the failed Second Republic—and of the Second Empire, which crowned its disastrous experiment—were nowhere more apparent than in the obsession that swept France in 1853 within months after Louis-Napoléon declared himself Emperor in the spectral shadow of his great-uncle, as contemporary Louis Figuier described:Suddenly—it was near the last days of April 1853—Paris woke up prey to the [Table-]turning epidemic, and the newspapers, which finally had to break the silence, informed us that [the epidemic] had simultaneously burst forth in Strasbourg, in Marseille, in Bordeaux, in Toulouse, and in all our other great population centers. For the public, it was, at first, only a simple amusement to which people everywhere surrendered themselves amidst great bursts of laughter. Pedestal tables [guéridons], [other kinds of] tables, hats, plates and washbasins—everything that was within reach—were called into service. Some people succeeded. Others—and these were the greater number—failed at the experiment; they accused the successful of deception [supercherie], and the successful, in their turn, accused the unsuccessful of failing to believe. "They turn; they donít turn": that summed up all the debates on this subject, and these were the only two terms through which, among the vulgar, the question of the tables was thrashed about. In our country, always quite frivolous about serious matters, though sometimes extreme in its credulousness and sometimes absurd in its skepticism, the tables were for the larger share of people only an amusement, only a way to kill time in society. Quarrels were frequent [End Page 53] on this subject. People denied. People confirmed. People laughed—when they were not losing their tempers.Nevertheless, the phenomenon soon appeared to make progress, and this was quite another story. Not only did the tables turn, but they spoke and wrote; they rose up and held themselves in the air without any strings—or at least without any visible ones. The tables gave consultations, discovered secrets buried in the most profound mystery, put the world of the living in communication with the world of the dead, and finally, behaved in such a way to let people believe they were haunted by spirits [hantées par des esprits]. [294-95] The Baron Du Potet, editor of the Journal du magnétisme, remarked in the summer of 1853 that "The tables are making one hell of a noise! —Enter into the porter's lodge, you'll see him make his table turn; go to the home of a judge, of a lawyer, of an archbishop even, and their tables are turning—after dinner, of course. It seems that they are even interrogating tables in palaces" [643]. Alexandre Erdan, author of an 1855 book on "the religious excentricities" of contemporary France, denounced the table turning as "a universal monomania" and declared it the "the characteristic event" of the year 1853, "that memorable period of universal mental estrangement" [71]. Daumier honored the trend in May and June 1853 with a series of a dozen caricatures called La Fluidomanie.3 Caricaturist Cham continued to ridicule its believers well into the year 1853 [Fig. 1].4 Louis Huart, author of a series of satirical articles in the opposition newspaper Le Charivari recounted a debate between two scholars on the subject: "Sir, are you for tables turning or for tables not turning," asked the first. The second replied, "It's all the same to me so long as the table is well served and it doesn't turn while I'm eating." Huart's conclusion, not dissimilar to that of most... (shrink)

In _The Eudaimonist Ethics of al-Fārābī and Avicenna_, Janne Mattila provides the first comprehensive account of the ethical thought of al-Fārābī and Avicenna.

Understanding the mental life of persons with psychosis/schizophrenia has been the crucial challenge of psychiatry since its origins, both for scientific models as well as for every therapeutic encounter between persons with and without psychosis/schizophrenia. Nonetheless, a preliminary understanding is always the first step of phenomenological as well as other qualitative research methods addressing persons with psychotic experiences in their life-world. In contrast to Rashed's assertions, in order to achieve such understanding, phenomenological psychopathologists need not necessarily adopt the transcendental-phenomenological attitude, (...) which, however, is often required if performing phenomenological philosophy. Additionally, in the course of these scientific endeavors, differences between persons with psychosis/schizophrenia and so-called normal people seem to have a methodological function and value driving the scientist in her enterprise. Yet, these differences do not extend to ethical dimensions, and therefore, do not by any means touch ethical equality. (shrink)

The view that acting morally is ultimately a question of treating others with respect has had a profound influence on moral and legal philosophy. Not surprisingly, then, some scholars forcefully argue that the modes of punishment that the states mete out to offenders should not be disrespectful, and, furthermore, it has been argued that obliging offenders to receive neurological treatment is incompatible with showing them their due respect. In this paper, I examine three contemporary accounts of what showing respect for (...) offenders in our sentencing practices would amount to: that it involves not interfering with offenders’ capacities for rationality and autonomy, that it should not undermine offenders’ prospect of reform, and that it amounts to treating offenders as if opaque. I then critically discuss whether any of these accounts plausibly imply that mandating neurointerventions to some offenders is necessarily morally wrong. I argue that they do not. (shrink)

In one of his meetings with members of the Vienna Circle, Wittgenstein discusses Hermann Weyl’s brief conversion to intuitionism and criticizes his arguments against applying the law of the excluded middle to generalizations over the natural numbers. Like Weyl, however, Wittgenstein rejects the classical model theoretic conception of generality when it comes to infinite domains. Nonetheless, he disagrees with him about the reasons for doing so. This paper provides an account of Wittgenstein’s criticism of Weyl that is based on his (...) differing understanding of what a general statement over infinite domains consists in. This difference in their conception of generality is argued to be central to the middle Wittgenstein’s overall stance on intuitionism as well. While Weyl (and other intuitionists) reject the law of the excluded middle on grounds of constructivity, Wittgenstein argues that general statements over infinite domains do not express propositions in the first place. The origin of this position as well as its consequences for contemporary debates on generality are further assessed. (shrink)

Phenomenological descriptions of depressed mental life offer a profound understanding of depression from the first-person perspective. In this paper, such descriptions are developed by drawing on the work by Ludwig Binswanger and on the autobiographical report of depression by Piet C. Kuiper . I will argue that Binswanger’s central claim in his phenomenological description of the depressed state of mind fails due to crucial misunderstandings of Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology. Nonetheless, by drawing on Kuiper’s first-hand account, I will develop a phenomenological (...) description of depressed mental life, highlighting the altered manner of pre-reflective valuing in depression and introducing the concept of a ‘depressive habituality.’ This term refers to the acquisition of a new set of habitualisations, especially on the foundational levels of automatic mental life. It offers explanations for the fact that it is not easy to recover from depression and that people may more easily become depressed again. (shrink)

It is widely hoped that quantum gravity will shed light on the question of the origin of time in physics. The currently dominant approaches to a candidate quantum theory of gravity have naturally evolved from general relativity, on the one hand, and from particle physics, on the other hand. A third important branch of twentieth century ‘fundamental’ physics, condensed-matter physics, also offers an interesting perspective on quantum gravity, and thereby on the problem of time. The bottomline might sound disappointing: to (...) understand the origin of time, much more experimental input is needed than what is available today. Moreover it is far from obvious that we will ever find out the true origin of physical time, even if we become able to directly probe physics at the Planck scale. But we might learn some interesting lessons about time and the structure of our universe in the process. A first lesson is that there are probably several characteristic scales associated with “quantum gravity” effects, rather than the single Planck scale usually considered. These can differ by several orders of magnitude, and thereby conspire to hide certain effects expected from quantum gravity, rendering them undetectable even with Planck-scale experiments. A more tentative conclusion is that the hierarchy between general relativity, special relativity and Newtonian physics, usually taken for granted, might have to be interpreted with caution. (shrink)

Paslers stated aim-to flesh out the contingencies and rich complexity of theparticular moments in which music was conceived, created, performed, and heard, is ...

This paper explores the prospects of a combinatorial account of modality. We argue against David M. Armstrong’s version of combinatorialism, which seeks to do without modal primitives, on the grounds, among other things, that Armstrong’s basic ontological categories are themselves subject to non-contingent constraints on recombination. We outline an alternative version, which acknowledges the necessity of modal primitives, at the level of ontology, and not just of our concepts.

This study examines whether truth-telling in the form of honest reporting is associated with cognitive moral development. Conventional agency theory assumes that people are self-interested and willing to tell a lie to increase their personal payoffs, while recent empirical evidence shows that some people give up monetary rewards to tell the truth. The social psychology literature suggests that cognitive moral development influences individuals’ ethical decisions. We carried out an experiment whereby participants submitted managerial reports in which truth-telling decreased their monetary (...) payoff. Despite the fact that their decisions were not subject to monitoring, auditing, or reputation effects, some participants reported honestly or partially honestly. We find the relationship between honest reporting and cognitive moral development to be both positive and linear. Compared with those at lower stages of cognitive moral development, participants at higher stages of cognitive moral development were more likely to submit an honest report and give up potential monetary gains from lying. We further examine the economic impact of honest reporting on the firm’s profit. With the assumption of self-interest and profit maximization, Antle and Eppen suggest that a contract with a hurdle-rate feature reduces managers’ information rent. We find that in comparison with the expected outcome of a hurdle contract, the firm can yield higher profits with a trust contract by hiring managers with a P-score higher than 16.67. (shrink)

One way to seek to reduce the risk of potential offenders engaging in certain types of crime in a public or semi-public area is to make it much more difficult, or even impossible, for them to gain access to the area in question and subject them to a sanction if they do enter the area. This paper considers whether preventive exclusion of this kind should be considered a pro tanto morally impermissible means of crime prevention because it violates the agency (...) of those excluded. Several variants of this agency objection to preventive exclusion are identified and critically assessed. It is argued that none persuasively show preventive exclusion to be pro tanto morally wrong. (shrink)

This article explores the concept of trust put forth by Niklas Luhmann and Talcott Parsons. It shows the outline of Luhmann's theory of trust and its connections to his autopoietic systems theory. It also deliberates upon the role of trust in the Luhmannian research of future society as well as examines the role of trust in risk society and shows why norms, values and familiarity play only a peripheral role in today's society. Trust is a way to control everyday interaction (...) of the future. But what are the challenges and limits of Luhmann's concept of trust? (shrink)

This article explores the status of a UN mandate for military intervention, especially in the aftermath of the non-mandated interventions in Kosovo and Iraq. It examines the realist and positivist approaches to this issue, and proposes a third approach, called the ?human rights model? in which public legitimacy plays a key role. It shows that not only political assessments but also legal ones differ on this question according the premises they are based on. The article further analyses how normative and (...) military power interacts in today's global public debate, and concludes that legitimacy for an intervention is established on a case-by-case basis. The existence of a UN mandate no longer gives automatic legitimacy. (shrink)

Kant's first antinomy uses a notion of infinity that is tied to the concept of (finitary) successive synthesis. It is commonly objected that (i) this notion is inadequate by modern mathematical standards, and that (ii) it is unable to establish the stark ontological assumption required for the thesis that an infinite series cannot exist. In this paper, I argue that Kant's notion of infinity is adequate for the set-up and the purpose of the antinomy. Regarding (i), I show that contrary (...) to appearance, the Critique can even accommodate a modern notion of infinity without consequences for the antinomy; and regarding (ii), that the ‘ontological’ consequence indeed follows once its covertly epistemic character is adequately understood. (shrink)

An important concern sometimes voiced in the neuroethical literature is that swift and radical changes to the parts of a person’s mental life essential for sustaining his/her numerical identity can result in the person ceasing to exist—in other words, that these changes may disrupt psychological continuity. Taking neurointerventions used for rehabilitative purposes as a point of departure, this short paper argues that the same radical alterations of criminal offenders’ psychological features which under certain conditions would result in a disruption of (...) numerical identity can be achieved without these having any effect on numerical identity. Thus, someone interested in making radical alterations to offenders’ psychology can avoid the charge that this would kill the offenders, while still achieving a radical transformation of them. The paper suggests that this possibility makes the question of what kinds of qualitive alterations to offenders’ identity are morally permissible pressing, but then briefly highlights some challenges for arguments against making radical qualitative identity alterations to offenders. No data are available. (shrink)

Families have a right to privacy, but we know little about how the public–private boundary is negotiated at the micro level in educational settings. Adopting ethnomethodology, the paper examines how talk about the home situation was occasioned and managed in ten parent–teacher conferences in early childhood education and care (ECEC), with a special focus on the ECEC teacher’s strategies for eliciting family information. The paper demonstrates a continuum of interactional practices which, in various degrees, make parents accountable for providing family (...) information. The analysis shows that parents both volunteer and provide the pursued information, thus actively orienting to the norm of visibility in child rearing. However, although both parties orient to questioning and fishing as business as usual, the parents’ accounts sometimes had an excusing quality or they adopted a reserved communication style, suggesting a certain ambivalence as well. The paper outlines different ways of understanding the present partnership ideal in parent–teacher teacher cooperation with implications for the negotiation of privacy. The paper also addresses training, which can contribute to staff and student reflections on the management of the public–private boundary. (shrink)

The important question of the legality of the state obliging trial incompetent defendants to receive competency-restoring treatment against their wishes, is one that has received much attention by legal scholars. Surprisingly, however, little attention has been paid to the, in many ways more fundamental, moral question of whether the state ought to administer such treatments. The aim of this paper is to start filling this gap in the literature. I begin by offering some reasons for thinking it morally acceptable to, (...) at least sometimes, oblige trial-incompetent defendants to receive competency-restoring treatments. The paper then discusses whether three prominent arguments (and their variations) offered by legal scholars against using non-consensual treatment to restore trial competence provide grounds for thinking there to be a general moral prohibition against these treatments. I argue that they do not. (shrink)

In the Insanity Defence Woody Allen claims that when we say humans are mortal we are obviously not complimenting them. It is difficult to contradict great comedy, of course, but if what I argue holds, Allen is wrong on this account. Mortality is a compliment – or at least something for which we should be grateful – since life without it threatens with disaster. To live without death also means living in the universe in its more hostile stages under conditions (...) where there can be no meaningful life. In this way, immortality is worse than death. In addition, I argue that no matter how carefully we qualify the conditions that make up immortality the old problem of death resurface. I therefore conclude, with a nod towards Voltaire, that if death did not exist, it would have been necessary to invent it. (shrink)