The present research seeks to better understand research conditions in laboratory research, with special attention paid to the informed consent process and experimenter characteristics. The first study tested the impact of language perspective and experimenter demeanor upon participant retention of the informed consent information, attitudes toward the research project, and performance on experimental tasks. The second study examined the impact of experimenter attire. Across the two studies, our results suggest that there was no impact of language perspective, whereas the number (...) of other participants in the laboratory, experimenter attire, and experimenter demeanor influence participant behaviors in the laboratory. (shrink)

Different sectors have expressed the need to address the different notions of pluralism that characterize modern society, as well as their difficulties. The article provides a critical reading of three significantly different approaches to the issue: Chantal Mouffe's On the Political, John Rawls' Political Liberalism, and William E. Connolly's Pluralism. It discusses their strengths and weaknesses, as well as the possibilities they provide to understand pluralism and take their theoretical contributions to the field of practice.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Light that Binds: A Study in Thomas Aquinas's Metaphysics of the Natural Law by Stephen BrockAngel Perez-LopezThe Light that Binds: A Study in Thomas Aquinas's Metaphysics of the Natural Law by Stephen Brock (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2020), xv + 277 pp.How does the natural law fit the definition of law? Opinions clash among different interpreters of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Stephen Brock's book provides both a magisterial (...) and a definitive answer to this question.Like fine wine, this book has been fermenting and maturing for almost thirty years. Originally a doctoral dissertation, this recently published work has been rewritten, and to a certain extent, reworked by the author with respect to some of its content.Without disregard for nuances, the first chapter introduces the reader to four different groups of Aquinas's interpreters. The first two groups question the full legal character of the natural law in its dependence to the eternal law. The third one questions its naturalness. The fourth group, instead, upholds both the divine origin of the natural law's full legality in its dependence on the eternal law, as well as its natural character.Brock places Dom Odo Lottin, Wolfgang Kluxen, Germain Grisez, and John Finnis in the first group. They maintain that the natural law is a law only in a qualified sense and that it does not entirely fulfill the definition of law. The natural law would provide an intrinsic morality. It should be treated independently from the eternal law. The second group is composed by authors such as Frederick Copleston, Alan Donagan, or Gregory Stevens. Similar to the first group, they argue that the natural law is an autonomous self-standing law, legislated by human reason. Thus, it should be treated independently from the eternal law, except to point out its ultimate origin.The author who exemplifies the third position is Ernest Fortin. Reacting against Finnis, Fortin's position jeopardizes the natural character of the natural law. In his view, the legal force of the first principles of practical reason is not fully actualized until one recognizes the divine institution sanctioning them. [End Page 981]All the authors of the fourth group uphold that the natural law is fully a law on account of its divine origin and that it is also entirely natural insofar as it is naturally known by human reason. Herein Brock places commentators of Saint Thomas such as Francisco Suarez, Dominic Farrell, Lawrence Dewan, and himself. He also includes in this last group other philosophers such as G. E. M. Anscombe and Peter Geach. In the course of his whole study, Brock shows how Aquinas's true position differs from the other members of this group. Special attention is given to the differences between Aquinas's true mind and the interpretations offered by Suarez, Farrell, and, to a certain degree, even by Dewan. In order to better appreciate the depth of this process, I have found it very helpful to read Farrell's The Natural Law According to Aquinas and Suarez in conjunction with Brock's work.The second chapter targets the natural law's legal character in its dependence to the eternal law. It proves that Thomas provides a strict definition of the natural law when he says that it is nothing but a participation of the eternal law in the rational creature. This chapter opens with a historical study concerning the influence of the Summa Fratri Alexandri in the Summa theologiae (ST). Aquinas's understanding of the dependence of the natural law on the eternal law turns out to be more systematic and refined. It is based on a fuller comprehension and development of what law is (the ratio legis).The remainder of the second chapter consists in a superb commentary regarding ST, I-II, q. 91, a. 2, on whether something existing in man is fit to be called a natural law. Promulgation is the element of the definition of law that specifies the different kinds of laws. Hence, the natural law is differentiated from the others by its natural promulgation, namely, by the act through which the order of the eternal law (already instituted by God... (shrink)

Y-a-t-il une inconsistance entre la thèse d’un Dieu chrétien et l’existence du mal ? Notre argumentation se basera sur l´excellente thèse développée par Alvin Plantinga, qui soutient, contre John L. Mackie, la consistance du théisme face au problème du mal. Cependant, nous refuserons de suivre la métaphysique modale adoptée par Alvin Plantinga et proposerons une position actualiste, et plus précisément l’essentialisme sérieux prôné par E. J. Lowe. Nous montrerons qu’il est alors possible de suivre l’argumentation logique de Plantinga tout (...) en soutenant un essentialisme sérieux. (shrink)

En este trabajo sostenemos que las consecuencias de los profundos cambios derivados del desarrollo de la ciencia y la tecnología han puesto en cuestión algunas de las concepciones más arraigadas sobre la naturaleza humana. Tras examinar algunos aportes recientes al debate sobre este tema central –provenientes del campo de la filosofía iberoamericana y de la filosofía feminista-, proponemos incorporar a la discusión ideas muy vigentes del legado de John Dewey. Nuestro autor, al cuestionar ciertos supuestos metafísicos tradicionales, invita a (...) pensar la condición humana desde una perspectiva evolutiva e histórica, que se sustenta en su innovadora noción de experiencia como interacción mutuamente transformadora entre los seres humanos y su entorno. De aquí que, frente a toda concepción esencialista, sostenga que la condición humana es susceptible de ser modificada por la acción humana misma. (shrink)

In these previously uncollected essays, Smith argues that American philosophers like Peirce, James, Royce, and Dewey have forged a unique philosophical tradition—one that is rich and complex enough to represent a genuine alternative to the analytic, phenomenological, and hermeneutical traditions which have originated in Britain or Europe. "In my judgment, John Smith has no equal today in combining two scholarly qualities: the analysis of philosophical texts with penetration and rigor, and the discernment of what it is in these texts (...) that matters. These qualities are in evidence throughout the essays in _America's Philosophical Vision._ Whether he is evaluating Rorty's view of Dewey; the pragmatic theory of experience and truth; theories of freedom, creativity, and the self; Royce's conception of community; or synoptic philosophic visions, Smith always succeeds in uniting a comprehensive understanding of philosophic writings with a sure grasp of their import for human culture and aspiration. It is a great benefit to students of American thought that these papers have now been collected into one volume."—James Gouinlock, Emory University. (shrink)

OBJECTIVES: To analyse the attitudes of medical personnel towards terminally ill patients and their right to be fully informed. DESIGN: Self-administered questionnaire composed of 56 closed questions. SETTING: Three general hospitals and eleven health centres in Granada (Spain). The sample comprised 168 doctors and 207 nurses. RESULTS: A high percentage of medical personnel (24.1%) do not think that informing the terminally ill would help them face their illness with greater serenity. Eighty-four per cent think the patient's own home is the (...) best place to die: 8.9% of the subjects questioned state that the would not like to be informed of an incurable illness. CONCLUSION: In our opinion any information given should depend on the patient's personality, the stage of the illness and family circumstances. Our study confirms that a hospital is not the ideal environment for attending to the needs of the terminally ill and their families. (shrink)

Divine Command defends the thesis that what makes something morally obligatory is that God commands it, and what makes something morally forbidden is that God forbids it. John E. Hare successfully defends a version of divine command theory, but also shows that there is considerable overlap with some versions of natural law theory. Hare engages with a number of Christian theologians, most especially Karl Barth, and extends into a discussion of divine command within Judaism and Islam. The work concludes (...) by examining recent work in evolutionary psychology, and argues that thinking of our moral obligations as produced by divine command offers us some help in seeing how a moral conscience could develop in a way that is evolutionarily stable. (shrink)

Author John E. Rexine expounds on the theologies of the great Roman thinkers Plato and Cicero in this essay.

Examines Arthur Schopenhauer's (1788-1860) conception of human agency and responsibility, his unique ethics of the morally virtuous character, and his assessment of life as fundamentally suffering. This title focuses on his contention that the human will and the human body cannot have a cause and effect relationship with each other.

The influence of age and formal education on the development of moral reasoning in a Spanish sample of students was assessed by using a Spanish translation of Rest's Defining Issues Test. Our results support the hypothesis that moral development is highly related to both variables in our cultural context, although more so with formal education than with age.

This review of Martin Jay’s recent published collection of essays examines his ongoing rethinking, supplementation, and revision of central themes—the negative and positive dialectics of historical totalization, the varieties and uses of conceptions of experience, the nature of visual cultures and scopic regimes, and the ambiguities of truth-construction in the public realm—that have been the focus of his major works since the 1970s. It argues that his more recent work indicates a gradual shift toward an affirmation of the kinds of (...) paratactic and deconstructive thinking of Adorno and Derrida as models for producing appropriate forms of historical consciousness and historical critique in the present, and it raises the question of how the issues of historical truth-telling, consensual collective identity, ethical action, and the cultural role of the critical intellectual are reformulated in this process. (shrink)

Previous research has demonstrated electroencephalogram (EEG) changes in response to low-odor concentrations, resulting in near-chance detection. Such findings have been taken as evidence for olfaction without awareness. We replicated and extended previous work by examining EEG responses to water-water control, 0.0001, 0.001, 0.01, and 1 ppm isoamyl acetate (IAA) in water paired with water only. Detection was above chance (>50%) for .001 and above, and alpha decreased only to those concentrations, suggesting that EEG changes corresponded to IAA awareness. However, when (...) correct trial EEGs were compared to incorrect trial EEGs during .001 ppm, right posterior/central alpha decreased during incorrect trials and alpha decreased more globally (including frontal sites) during correct trials. These data may not reflect awareness or unawareness per se. Instead, results are discussed regarding activation of perceptual systems in the posterior region during incorrect trials and the activation of frontal action systems during a subset of correct trials. (shrink)

This article explores the rhetoric, and mass mediation, of the national Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration ceremony, as broadcast on British television. I argue that the televised national ceremonies should be approached as an example of multi-genre epideictic rhetoric, working up meanings through a hybrid combination of genres, author/animators and modes. Epideictic rhetoric has often been depreciated as simply ceremonial ‘praise or blame’ speeches. However, given that the topics of praise/blame assume the existence of social norms, epideictic also acts to presuppose (...) and evoke common values, in general, and a collective recognition of shared social responsibilities, in particular. My methodology draws on the Discourse-Historical Approach to Critical Discourse Analysis, given, first, its central prominence in analysing argumentative strategies in discourse and, second, the ways it facilitates a reflexive ‘shuttling’ between text-discursive features, intertextual relations and wider contexts of society and history. Here, I examine how a catastrophic past is invoked in speech and evoked through image and music, in response to the demands that uncertainty of the future ‘places upon one’s conscience’. (shrink)

_A new theory of how and why we cooperate, drawing from economics, political theory, and philosophy to challenge the conventional wisdom of game theory_ Game theory explains competitive behavior by working from the premise that people are self-interested. People don’t just compete, however; they also cooperate. John Roemer argues that attempts by orthodox game theorists to account for cooperation leave much to be desired. Unlike competing players, cooperating players take those actions that they would like others to take—which Roemer (...) calls “Kantian optimization.” Through rigorous reasoning and modeling, Roemer demonstrates a simpler theory of cooperative behavior than the standard model provides. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe purpose of the study was to investigate differences in writers’ abilities to perceive global text organisation in self-, peer- and teacher/researcher-authored essays. Eight student part...

John E Olford; The Concept of Creativity, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 5, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 77–95, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9752.1.

The experiences of students taking the same courses in the humanities by distance learning were compared when tutorial support was provided conventionally or online . The Course Experience Questionnaire and the Revised Approaches to Studying Inventory were administered in a postal survey to 1264 students taking two different courses with the UK Open University. There were no significant differences between the students who received face-to-face tuition and those who received online tuition either in their perceptions of the academic quality of (...) their courses or in the approaches to studying that they adopted on those courses. Provided that tutors and students receive appropriate training and support, course designers in the humanities can be confident about introducing online forms of tutorial support in campus-based or distance education. (shrink)

Most psychometricians believe that the significance test is counterproductive. I have read Chow's book to see whether it addresses or rebuts any of the key facts brought out by the psychometricians. The book is empty on this score; it is entirely irrelevant to the current debate. It presents nothing new and is riddled with errors.

The authors present a materialist analysis of the effects of neoliberalism in education. Specifically, they contend that neoliberalism is a form of cultural invasion that begets necrophilia. Neoliberalism is necrophilous in promoting a cultural desire to fix fluid systems and processes. Such desire manufactures both individuals known and culturally felt experiences of alienation which are, it is argued, symptomatic of an imperialist nostalgia that permeates educational policy and practice. The authors point to ‘unschooling in schools’ as a mechanism for resisting (...) the necrophilous tendencies of contemporary formations of education. (shrink)

Peirce promised but never delivered a theoretical system called "speculative rhetoric," therefore explication is synthesized from throughout his writings. bypassing nearly everything akin to standard rhetorical theory, he thinks of it as the "power of appealing to a mind" defined strictly in terms of logical processes. these "formal conditions of symbolic force" fall into two operations: "methodeutic" is an alternating inductive/deductive process beginning with imagined ideational relationships and ending with a specific claim or idea; "assertiveness" is a conjoining of images (...) ("icons") which, when directed upon the attention ("indexed"), provides compulsiveness to the idea. (shrink)

In this remarkable survey of "the communicative repertory of humans," John Gedo demonstrates the central importance to theory and therapeutics of the communication of information. He begins by surveying those modes of communication encountered in psychoanalysis that go beyond the lexical meaning of verbal dialogue, including "the music of speech," various protolinguistic phenomena, and the language of the body. Then, turning to the analytic dialogue, Gedo explores the implications of these alternative modes of communication for psychoanalytic technique. Individual chapters (...) focus, in turn, on the creation of a "shared language" between analyst and analysand, the consequences of the analytic setting, the form in which the analyst casts particular interventions, the curative limits of empathy, the analyst's affectivity and its communication to the patient, and the semiotic significance of countertransference and projective identification. Gedo does not proffer semiotics as a substitute for metapsychology. He is explicit that communicative skill is always dependdent on somatic events within the central nervous system. Indeed, it is because Gedo's hierarchical approach to communication builds on our current understanding of a hierarchically organized central nervous system that his clincal observations become insights into basic psychobiological functioning. Grounded in Gedo's four decades of clinical experience, _The Languages of Psychoanalysis_ points to a new venue of clinical research and conceptualization, one in which attentiveness to issues of communication will not only foster linkages with contemporary neuroscience, but also clarify and enlarge the therapeutic possibilities of psychoanalytic treatment. (shrink)

An examination of the question of influence in Senghor's work, with particular attention to the concept of assimilation - which I argue allows Senghor to responsibly adopt notions from French vitalist and life-philosophy traditions, despite their close ties to colonial and imperial histories.