The Hoffmann reflex (H-wave) is produced by alpha-motoneuron activation in the spinal cord. A feature of this electromyography response is that it exhibits fluctuations in amplitude even during repetitive stimulation with the same intensity of current. We herein explore the hypothesis that physical training induces plastic changes in the motor system. Such changes are evaluated with the fractal dimension (FD) analysis of the H-wave amplitude-fluctuations (H-wave FD) and the cross-covariance (CCV) between the bilateral H-wave amplitudes. The aim of this study (...) was to compare the H-wave FD as well as the CCV before and after track training in sedentary individuals and athletes. The training modality in all subjects consisted of running three times per week (for 13 weeks) in a concrete road of 5 km. Given the different physical condition of sedentary vs. athletes, the running time between sedentary and athletes was different. After training, the FD was significantly increased in sedentary individuals but significantly reduced in athletes, although there were no changes in spinal excitability in either group of subjects. Moreover, the CCV between bilateral H-waves exhibited a significant increase in athletes but not in sedentary individuals. These differential changes in the FD and CCV indicate that the plastic changes in the complexity of the H-wave amplitude fluctuations as well as the synaptic inputs to the Ia-motoneuron systems of both legs were correlated to the previous fitness history of the subjects. Furthermore, these findings demonstrate that the FD and CCV can be employed as indexes to study plastic changes in the human motor system. (shrink)

The second volume in Joel Feinberg's series The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, Offense to Others focuses on the "offense principle," which maintains that preventing shock, disgust, or revulsion is always a morally relevant reason for legal prohibitions. Feinberg clarifies the concept of an "offended mental state" and further contrasts the concept of offense with harm. He also considers the law of nuisance as a model for statutes creating "morals offenses," showing its inadequacy as a model for understanding (...) "profound offenses," and discusses such issues as obscene words and social policy, pornography and the Constitution, and the differences between minor and profound offenses. (shrink)

It has become customary to locate the origins of modern measurement theory in the works of Helmholtz and Hölder. If by ‘modern measurement theory’ is meant the representational theory, then this may not be an accurate assessment. Both Helmholtz and Hölder present theories of measurement which are closely related to the classical conception of measurement. Indeed, Hölder can be interpreted as bringing this conception to fulfilment in a synthesis of Euclid, Newton, and Dedekind. The first explicitly representational theory appears to (...) have been Russell's. He rejected the traditional concept of quantity and its connection to number, making the use of number in quantitative science problematical. He solved the problem via representationalism. (shrink)

According to the realist interpretation, measurement commits us not just to the logically independent existence of things in space and time, but also to the existence of quantitatively structured properties and relations, and to the existence of real numbers, understood as relations of ratio between specific levels of such attributes. Measurement is defined as the estimation of numerical relations (or ratios) between magnitudes of a quantitative attribute and a unit. The history of scientific measurement, from antiquity to the present may (...) be interpreted as revealing a progressive deepening in the understanding of this position. First, the concept of ratio was broadened to include ratios between incommensurable magnitudes; second, the concept of a quantitative attribute was broadened to include non-extensive quantities; third, quantitative structure and its relations to ratios and real numbers were elaborated; and finally, the issue of empirically distinguishing between quantitative and non-quantitative structures was addressed. This interpretation of measurement understands it in a way that is continuous with scientific investigation in general, i.e., as an attempt to discover independently existing facts. (shrink)

This paper argues that the political adage “Be ye prudent as serpents and guileless as doves” involves three different types of relation between prudence and morality, namely: unification (Vereinigung), subordination (Unterordnung), and association (Beigesellung). I maintain that these relations are set up according to the same principle that determines the relationship between mechanical and teleological causality in the third Critique. Thus, I argue that morality and prudence are much more systematically related within the system of critical philosophy than is normally (...) assumed in the literature and that this is made possible by way of an intimate relationship between prudence and teleological judgment. (shrink)

The thesis that numbers are ratios of quantities has recently been advanced by a number of philosophers. While adequate as a definition of the natural numbers, it is not clear that this view suffices for our understanding of the reals. These require continuous quantity and relative to any such quantity an infinite number of additive relations exist. Hence, for any two magnitudes of a continuous quantity there exists no unique ratio. This problem is overcome by defining ratios, and hence real (...) numbers, as binary relations between infinite standard sequences. This definition leads smoothly into a new definition of measurement consonant with the traditional view of measurement as the discovery or estimation of numerical relations. The traditional view is further strengthened by allowing that the additive relations internal to a quantity are distinct from relations observed in the behaviour of objects manifesting quantities. In this way the traditional theory can accommodate the theory of conjoint measurement. This is worth doing because the traditional theory has one great strength lacked by its rivals: measurement statements and quantitative laws are able to be understood literally. 1 This paper was completed in 1990-1. while the author was a visiting scholar at the Irvine Research Unit in Mathematical Behavioral Sciences. University of California. Irvine. The author wishes to thank the Director. Professor R. D. Luce, for the generous provision of space and facilities within the Unit and for his critical comments upon some of the ideas expressed herein: Professor L. Narens. for his trenchant criticisms: and the University of Sydney, for granting Special Study Leave and financial assistance to make the visit possible. (shrink)

The second volume in Joel Feinberg's series The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, Offense to Others focuses on the "offense principle," which maintains that preventing shock, disgust, or revulsion is always a morally relevant reason for legal prohibitions. Feinberg clarifies the concept of an "offended mental state" and further contrasts the concept of offense with harm. He also considers the law of nuisance as a model for statutes creating "morals offenses," showing its inadequacy as a model for understanding (...) "profound offenses," and discusses such issues as obscene words and social policy, pornography and the Constitution, and the differences between minor and profound offenses. (shrink)

A major reason that Confucius should matter to Western ethical philosophers is that some of his concerns are markedly different from those most common in the West. A Western emphasis has been on major choices that are treated in a decontextualized way. Confucius’ emphasis is on paths of life, so that context matters. Further, the nuances of personal relations get more attention than is common (with the exception of feminist ethics) in Western philosophy. What Confucius provides is a valuable aid (...) in arriving at a more balanced sense of what ethics is concerned with. It also allows us to realize the importance of sensitivity to particulars. Finally, it highlights the importance of style (as well as the content of what is chosen) in behavior, and the ways in which relations with family and friends can connect with choices in a wider “public” sphere. (shrink)

... the turn of the fourth/tenth century, in the province of Sijistan, Muhammad b. Tahir b. Bahram was born, known in the fullness of time as Abu Sulayman ...

As an aspiring science in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, psychology pursued quantification. A problem was that degrees of psychological attributes were experienced only as greater than, less than, or equal to one another. They were categorised as intensive magnitudes. The meaning of this concept was shifting, from that of an attribute possessing underlying quantitative structure to that of a merely ordinal attribute . This fluidity allowed psychologists to claim that their attributes were intensive magnitudes and measurable . This (...) claim was supported by an argument that order entails quantity. As adapted by psychometricians, the argument was that if an attribute is ordered, then the differences between its degrees are quantitative and, therefore, measurable. However, in a paper ignored in psychology for six decades, the issue was resolved mathematically and the resolution implies that the psychometricians’ argument was fallacious. (shrink)

The clinical research enterprise is changing in fundamental ways. The bright line that separates research and clinical care is beginning to fade, as both “research” and “nonresearch” converge into and are embodied by the concept of the learning health care system. Here, data about care and operations are translated into practice improvement. VA has been a leader in this area, and based on its use of electronic health records and other inputs, has formed large databases and a data‐driven health care (...) system. These changes raise questions about the traditional approach to “research subject” protection. (shrink)

This volume is a comprehensive collection of critical essays on The Taming of the Shrew, and includes extensive discussions of the play's various printed versions and its theatrical productions. Aspinall has included only those essays that offer the most influential and controversial arguments surrounding the play. The issues discussed include gender, authority, female autonomy and unruliness, courtship and marriage, language and speech, and performance and theatricality.

In his review of Charles Spearman’s The Nature of ‘Intelligence’ (1923), R. G. Collingwood launched an attack upon psychometrics that was expanded in his Essay on Metaphysics (1940). Although underrated by friend and foe alike, Collingwood’s critique identified a number of defects in the thinking of psychometricians that subsequently became entrenched. However, his main complaint was that psychology generally (and, by implication, psychometrics) was a ‘fashionable scientific fraud’. This charge was inspired by his more general views on logic and metaphysics, (...) which, however, as I argue, are logically unsustainable. Ironically, other elements of his philosophy – his ‘fallacy of calculation’ and concept of ‘scale of forms’ – are relevant to psychometrics and tip the scales in favour of his otherwise unwarranted charge. (shrink)

Ethics and Qualities of Life looks at what enters into ethical judgment and choice. Interpretation of a case and of what the options are is always a factor, as is a sense of the possible values at stake. Intuitions also enter in, but often are unreliable. For a long time it seemed only fair that oldest sons inherited, and struck few people as unfair that women were not allowed to attend universities. A moral judgment is putatively part of a moral (...) order in a society that any reasonable person would accept. But what counts as "reasonable" is generally contestable. The unreliability of intuitions leads naturally to ethical theory. Kantian, contractualist, and consequentialist theories all have some important truth in them, but not the whole truth. Contractualism lacks the resources required for a fully determinate account of what counts as "reasonable". Broad general rules are important to Kant and are at the center of everyday morality. But can Kantian ethics explain why they have to have this central role? Our evolving social contract now contains elements that once would have seemed counter-intuitive to most people. But could consequentialists have predicted with entire confidence the consequences of social changes that we now think were desirable? The last part of this book contains a double argument. One is that ethical theory is employed by humans in a state of semi-ignorance of relevant factors, grasping at likely truths and evolved intuitions. The other is that consequentialist considerations have a major role at the fundamental level, but much more in justification or criticism than in ethical discovery. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: Public Duties: The Moral Obligations of Government Officials. Edited by Joel L. Fleishman, Lance Liebman, and Mark H. Moore.

In this paper I defend three different points: first, that the concept of highest good is derived from an a priori but subjective argument, namely a maxim of pure practical reason; secondly, that the theory regarding the highest good has the validity of a practical regulative knowledge; and thirdly, that the practical regulative knowledge can be understood as the same “holding something to be true” as Kant attributes to hope and believe.

Emotions normally include elements of feeling, motivation, and also intentionality; but the argument of this essay is that there can be emotion without feeling, emotion without corresponding motivation, and emotion without an intentional relation to an object such that the emotion is (among other things) a belief about or construal of it. Many recent writers have claimed that some form of intentionality is essential to emotion, and then have created lines of defence for this thesis. Thus, what look like troublesome (...) cases of emotions can be regarded as having a global intentionality or as being “mood-like”. Alternatively surges of non-intentional joy or ecstasy can be regarded as merely feelings rather than as emotions, and what people experience in response to absolute music can be treated similarly. A clear view of how we normally talk about moods, emotions, and feelings however undermines these defences; and in particular we can understand the role of emotions in relation to absolute music once we become clear about the way in which musical content stands in for intentional objects. (shrink)

The essay has two purposes. One is to point out connections and parallels between, On one hand, The debates of metaphysical realists and anti-Realists, And on the other hand, The debates surrounding moral realism. The second is to provide the outlines of a case for a kind of position that would generally be classified as moral realism. One feature of this position is that it emerges as parallel to, And compatible with, A metaphysical position that would generally be classified as (...) anti-Realism. (shrink)

Might there be knowledge of non-instrumental values? Arguments are give for two principal claims. One is that if there is such knowledge, it typically will have features that do not entirely match those of other kinds of knowledge. It will have a closer relation to the kind of person one is or becomes, and in the way it combines features of knowing-how with knowing-that. There also are problems of indeterminacy of non-instrumental value which are not commonly found in other things (...) that we can know about. The second claim is that there is a strong prima-facie case for holding that there is such knowledge, and that the usual arguments against this are all faulty. (shrink)

Este trabalho apresenta uma interpretação abrangente e sistemática do significado e da legitimidade dos conceitos de precisão, interesse, esperança e crença no interior da filosofia kantiana. A análise desses conceitos está diretamente vinculada à discussão acerca da natureza da razão prática pura, da legitimidade do conceito de sumo bem e da unidade arquitetônica da razão. Defende-se que tanto os conceitos de precisão e interesse, assim como os conceitos de crença e esperança possuem legitimidade transcendental e concordam com as bases da (...) filosofia crítica. (shrink)

For the “respectable” part of society there can be a presumption of virtuousness, rather like the presumption of innocence in the law. In both cases, the presumption can be defeated, as we learn more and get into specifics. We still might insist that to be genuinely virtuous is to be able to pass the more familiar sorts of tests of virtue, and to be reliably virtuous also in the ordinary business of life, especially in things that really matter. Something like (...) this is a necessary condition for virtue. Factors of motivation, especially those related to what a person's basic concerns are, can vary enormously. Imagine an extreme case. Someone might be inherently indifferent to what happens to other people, and have no sense of the inherent dignity or worthiness of moral principles, but also be totally convinced that God is watching his or her every move, and that the prospects of heaven or hell depend heavily on one's following accepted morality at every step. (shrink)

Neste artigo apresenta-se o significado do conceito de sociabilidade insociável e de sua importância para a filosofia histórico-política de Kant. Defendem-se aqui duas teses importantes: primeira, que esse conceito se insere essencialmente num paradigma biológicoteleológico em vez de físico-mecânico; segunda, que a insociabilidade deve ser compreendida como se referindo a inclinações e não a paixões, o que, por sua vez, permite pensá-la em concordância com um progresso moral também dos indivíduo.

ABSTRACT In this paper, I argue that the idea of a universal history is systematically legitimized in Kant’s transcendental system of philosophy by way of the concept of a need [Bedürfnis] for pure practical reason. In this sense, the idea of a universal history is a fundamental part of the moral image of the world that emerges from Kant’s whole philosophy, and it is crucial for understanding both the possibility of the system of pure reason, as well the full development (...) of Kant’s moral philosophy, especially for political philosophy. RESUMO Nesse artigo eu argumento que a ideia de uma história universal é sistematicamente legitimada no sistema da filosofia transcendental de Kant por meio do conceito de precisão [Bedürfnis] da razão pura prática. Nesse sentido, a ideia de uma história universal é uma parte fundamental da imagem moral do mundo que emerge da totalidade da filosofia de Kant e é crucial para o entendimento tanto da possibilidade de um sistema da razão pura, quanto para um desenvolvimento completo da filosofia moral, particularmente para a filosofia política. (shrink)

We use genomic information to tell us stories of evolutionary origins. But what does it mean when different genomes report wildly different accounts of lineage history? This genomic “discordance” can be a consequence of a fascinating suite of natural history and evolutionary phenomena, from the different inheritance mechanisms of nuclear versus cytoplasmic (mitochondrial and plastid) genomes to hybridization and introgression to horizontal transfer. Here, we explore how we can use these distinct genomic stories to provide new insights into the maintenance (...) of sexual reproduction, one of the most important unanswered questions in biology. We focus on the strikingly distinct nuclear versus mitochondrial versions of the story surrounding the origin and maintenance of asexual lineages in Potamopyrgus antipodarum, a New Zealand freshwater snail. While key questions remain unresolved, these data inspire multiple testable hypotheses that can be powerfully applied across a broad range of taxa toward a deeper understanding of the causes and consequences of mitonuclear discordance, the maintenance of sex, and the origin of new asexual lineages. (shrink)

Doctors in Denial examines the relationship between the Canadian medical profession and the pharmaceutical industry, and explains how doctors have become dependents of the drug companies instead of champions of patients' health. Big Pharma plays a role in every aspect of doctors' work. These giant, wealthy multinationals influence how medical students are trained and receive information, how research is done in hospitals and universities, what is published in leading medical journals, what drugs are approved, and what patients expect when they (...) go into their doctors' offices. But almost all doctors deny the influence and control the drug companies exert. In this book Dr. Lexchin urges the medical profession to make the changes needed to give priority to protecting and promoting patients' health and benefitting society, rather than enabling Big Pharma to dominate health care while raking in billions in profits from citizens and governments. (shrink)

Este artigo apresenta os aspectos liberais e republicanos da filosofia política de Rousseau e defende que eles devem ser interpretados como complementares. Entretanto, essa complementaridade pode ser caracterizada num sentido específico, qual seja, como sendo um liberalismo republicano.

Although the policing of gendered embodiment is central to ethnographic accounts of sexual minority bullying, data limitations have prevented population-level analyses of how gender expression shapes bullying victimization. Using novel data on gender expression, I document the dynamics of gender policing in contemporary American high schools. Analyzing population-representative surveys from eight states and 10 school districts, I examine how students’ assigned sex, sexual identity, and gender expression intersectionally shape their risk for bullying. Consistent with patterns of cultural sexism that stigmatize (...) male “femininity” more harshly than female “masculinity,” I find that gender expression powerfully stratifies bullying among boys but is seemingly unrelated to bullying for girls. Boys who report feeling seen as “very feminine” are 3.5 times more likely to be bullied than their “very masculine” peers. By contrast, girls’ bullying rates are roughly constant across the gender expression spectrum. Stratifying by sexuality, I find that highly conforming gender expression offers some protection against bullying for sexual minority boys but no protection for sexual minority girls. This study illustrates the value of gradational measures of gendered embodiment and makes newly visible the powerful sanctions pressuring boys into narrow, heteronormative enactments of masculinity. (shrink)

Here are two widespread responses to Kant's categorical imperative. On one hand, one might note the absence of detailed rational derivation. On the other hand, even someone who maintains some skepticism is likely to have a sense that (nevertheless) there is something to Kant's central ideas. The recommended solution is analysis of elements of the categorical imperative. Their appeal turns out to have different sources. One aspect of the first formulation rests on the logic of normative utterances. But others can (...) be justified only in terms of their contributions to desirable functionings of a moral order. (shrink)

This volume focuses on the American philosopher and psychologist William James and his engagements with European thought, together with the multidisciplinary reception of his work on both sides of the Atlantic since his death. James participated in transatlantic conversations in science, philosophy, psychology, religion, ethics, and literature.