Research in neurocriminology has explored the link between neural functions and structures and the psychopathic disposition. This online experiment aimed to assess the effect of communicating the neuroscience of psychopathy on the degree to which lay people exhibited attitudes characteristic of psychopathy in particular in terms of moral behaviour. If psychopathy is blamed on the brain, people may feel less morally responsible for their own psychopathic tendencies. In the study, participants read false feedback about their own psychopathic traits supposedly inferred (...) from their Facebook likes, described either in neurobiological or cognitive terms. Participants were randomly allocated to read that they either had above-average or below-average psychopathic traits. We found no support for the hypothesis that the neuroscientific explanation of psychopathy influences moral behaviour. This casts doubt on the fear that communicating the neuroscience of psychopathy will promote psychopathic attitudes. (shrink)

According to Richard Swinburne, the principle of simplicity is of great importance to theory choice scenarios and theoretical changes in the sciences. In particular, he holds that the theory choice criterion of fit with background evidence can be reduced to the criteria of simplicity and of yielding the data. We will, however, rebut this reduction thesis and show that three central aspects of theoretical change (confirming power of empirical data, reliability of experimental methods, and truth of new theoretical proposals) cannot (...) be adequately reconstructed if simplicity is regarded as a key criterion of theory choice. (shrink)

To the renowned psychoanalyst, philosopher, and linguist Julia Kristeva, Melanie Klein (1882--1960) was the most original innovator, male or female, in the psychoanalytic arena. Klein pioneered psychoanalytic practice with children and made major contributions to our understanding of both psychosis and autism. Along the way, she successfully introduced a new approach to the theory of the unconscious without abandoning the principles set forth by Freud. In her first biography of a fellow psychoanalyst, the prolific Kristeva considers Klein's life and (...) intellectual development, weaving a narrative that covers the history of psychoanalysis and illuminates Kristeva's own life and work. Kristeva tells the remarkable story of Klein's life: an unhappy wife and mother who underwent analysis, and -- without a medical or other advanced degree -- became an analyst herself at the age of 40. In examining her work, Kristeva proposes that Klein's "break" with Freud was really an attempt to complete his theory of the unconscious. Kristeva addresses Klein's numerous critics, and, in doing so, bridges the wide gulf between the clinical and theoretical worlds of psychoanalysis. Klein is celebrated here as the first person to see the mother as the source of not only creativity, but of thought itself, and the first to consider the place of matricide in psychic development. As such, Klein is a seminal figure in the evolution of the provocative ideas about motherhood and the psyche for which Kristeva is most famous. Klein is thus, in a sense, a mother to Kristeva, making this book an account of the development of Kristeva's own thought as well as Klein's. (shrink)

We give Scott sentences for certain computable groups, and we use index set calculations as a way of checking that our Scott sentences are as simple as possible. We consider finitely generated groups and torsion-free abelian groups of finite rank. For both kinds of groups, the computable ones all have computable \ Scott sentences. Sometimes we can do better. In fact, the computable finitely generated groups that we have studied all have Scott sentences that are “computable d-\” sentence and a (...) computable \ sentence). In [9], this was shown for the finitely generated free groups. Here we show it for all finitely generated abelian groups, and for the infinite dihedral group. Among the computable torsion-free abelian groups of finite rank, we focus on those of rank 1. These are exactly the additive subgroups of \. We show that for some of these groups, the computable \ Scott sentence is best possible, while for others, there is a computable d-\ Scott sentence. (shrink)

it is one of the central commitments of Leibniz’s mature metaphysics that all substances or monads possess perfect spontaneity, that is, that all states of a given monad originate within it.1 Created monads do not truly interact with each other, for Leibniz. Instead, each one produces all of its states single-handedly, requiring only God’s ordinary concurrence. Several commentators have pointed out that implicit in Leibniz’s view is a distinction between different types of spontaneity: a general type of spontaneity that all (...) monads have perfectly and at all times, and a narrower type of spontaneity that monads possess in only some of their actions. Some commentators make a similar case for two types of teleology:.. (shrink)

In the Stoics we find a combination of two perspectives which are commonly thought to conflict: the embedded perspective from within one's social context, and the universal perspective of the member of the moral community of rational beings. I argue that the Stoics do have a unified theory, one which avoids problems that trouble some modern theories which try to unite these perspectives.

Our sense of obligation is evident outside of joint collaborative activities. Most notably, children and adults recognize that parents are obligated to care for and love their children. This is presumably not because we think parents view their children as worthy cooperative partners, but because special obligations and duties are inherent in certain relational dynamics, namely the parent-child relationship.

Leibniz’s famous Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles (PII) states that no two things are exactly alike. The PII is commonly thought to be metaphysically necessary for Leibniz: the coexistence of two indiscernibles is metaphysically impossible. This paper argues, against the standard interpretation, that Leibniz’s PII is metaphysically contingent. In other words, while the coexistence of indiscernibles would not imply a contradiction, the PII is true in the actual world because the Principle of Sufficient Reason rules out violations of the (...) PII. God could have created indiscernibles but he did not because he is wise and does nothing without a sufficient reason. Because it is plausible that all Leibnizian possible worlds are unified by a wise plan, this means that the PII is true in all possible worlds. God could create indiscernibles, but the resulting creation would not be a world. To argue for this conclusion, the paper carefully examines Leibniz’s mature account of metaphysical contingency. It shows that for Leibniz, only states of affairs that imply logical contradictions are metaphysically impossible. Next, it argues that the coexistence of indiscernibles would not imply a logical contradiction; it would merely imply what Leibniz calls a “moral absurdity,” that is, a violation of the Principle of Sufficient Reason. This means that the PII is true contingently and—since God can do whatever is metaphysically possible—that God can create two things that are exactly alike. (shrink)

A core area of pragmatics is conversational implicatures, where speakers imply a meaning that is not part of what is literally said. Not all people have the ability to easily understand such common (implicit) forms of communication. For these people, Easy Language has been developed, i.e. a form of barrier-free communication with substantially simplified syntax and lexis. Moreover, Easy Language is based on the principle of maximum explicitness. However, the heterogeneous target groups and the different types of implicature have not (...) been systematically taken into account. Therefore, this article is the first to take an in-depth look at conversational implicatures in Easy Language. It shows that a universal principle of maximum explicitness for Easy Language is too short-sighted. Instead, the principle of explicitness must be considered in relation to the different target groups and the types of implicature. The article provides an impulse for further (empirical) research in this emerging field. (shrink)

This is a response to Donald Rutherford's review of Jorati, Leibniz on Causation and Agency. The review is published in Leibniz Review 27 (2017), 183-197.

Ce dictionnaire rassemble, sous une forme accessible à tous, l'essentiel de ce qui a marqué le cours de la recherche et de la réflexion philosophiques depuis l'Antiquité -les grands philosophes, les œuvres les plus importantes, les notions et les doctrines- et accorde également une large place à l'évolution de la pensée contemporaine et à ses principaux représentants : R. ARON, G. DELEUZE, M. FOUCAULT, M. SERRES...

Issues surrounding ethics in journalism are presented from a variety of viewpoints.

ZusammenfassungDer Text schlägt vor, die Entwicklung kollaborativer audiovisueller Wissenspraktiken in der Anthropologie als situiertes und diffraktives Wissen zu verstehen (Haraway, Barad, Smith). Im Durchgang durch einige historische Stationen der Geschichte kollaborativer und partizipativer Projekte wird vorgeschlagen, dass kollaboratives Filmemachen nicht nur eine Dezentrierung einseitiger Autor:innenschaft und einseitiger Repräsentationsmodi ist, sondern auch eine medienspezifische Wissensform, die an soziale Kontexte gebunden und in diese eingebettet ist. Vor dem Hintergrund des Kolonialfilms werden Stationen der Abgrenzung und Versuche der Dekolonisierung des Films beschrieben. Aktuelle (...) Filmexperimente mit marginalisierten Gruppen haben ihren Ursprung in den „shared anthropologies“ (Rouch) und haben diesen Ansatz durch konsequentere Formen des power sharing in Indigenen Kollaborationen und im Fourth Cinema weiterentwickelt. Film kann so auch Amateur:innenwissenspraktiken in kollaborativen Forschungsprojekten abbilden. (shrink)

The long section on knowledge and the philosopher in books V–VII of the Republic is undoubtedly the most famous passage in Plato's work. So it is perhaps a good idea to begin by stressing how very peculiar, and in many ways elusive, it is. It is exciting, and stimulating, but extremely hard to understand.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Realm Without Angels: MENCs Partnerships with Disney and Other Major Corporations Julia EkIund Koza University of Wisconsin-Madison My interest in partnerships between the MENC: The National Association for Music Educators and major corporations such as Disney dates back to 1996 when I was invited to attend a free premiere screening of the movie Mr. Holland 's Opus.1 Never one to turn down anything free, in January of (...) that year I joined more than twenty-fivethousandmusiceducators, administrators, and friends ofthe arts, who gathered at fiftyone locations across the nation to watch the movie. Sponsored and promoted by theNational Coalition for Music Education, ofwhich MENC is a member, in cooperation with the National AcademyofRecordingArts and Sciences Foundation, the American Music Conference, and Hollywood Pictures (a Disney subsidiary), the promotional screening was the result of an education/business partnership. I did not like the film much even though I agreed with its message that public schools and public school music should be adequately funded, and I was sorry that MENC had entered into a partnership to promote it. Part ofthe problem may have been timing. I had recentlyreturned froma parental leave during whichIhad sufferedseriouspostpartumcomplications and had struggled fornearly a yearwithpoor health. January 1996 found me trying to figure out how I would manage a full-blown academic career, my still fragile health, and a lively child. Ibristledatthevisionsofprofessionalismfostered by Mr. Holland's Opus, recognizing that I would never again have the luxury he did of indulging myselfuninterruptedly in my career; I knew that I might never again be seen as a "real professional " even though I was more exhausted and working harder than I ever had. From my perspective the film's images of teachers, teaching, andprofessionalismwereprofoundlymasculinist; I also knew that a popular film can play a powerful role in shapingpublic imaginaries. Who tends tobenefit fromtheperpetuationoftheseimagesof teachers, teaching, and professionalism, I wondered? Who tends to be harmed? So my first step on this journey was to write a critique of Mr. Holland's Opus. I soon discovered that the film itselfwas but one small part of a much larger story about MENCs deepening involvement in education /business partnerships. One of the main themes of Mr. Holland's Opus is that budget cuts can have devastating effects on music programs. The education/business partnership forged to promote Opus and the manner in which the film was promoted suggested that the corporate world is socially responsible and genuinely concerned both aboutthe quality ofAmerican education and the demise of music education. In no way did they intimate that corporate practices may be at least partially responsible for any declines in the quality ofpublic schooling. I was also aware, however, of a corpus of scholarship suggesting that recent trends toward corporate partnerships and philanthropy are window-dressing at a time when corporations are sneaking out the back door carrying everything else in the store. Critics contend that on the one hand, corporationsengageinmuchpublicizedacts of gift-giving or school partnership, which cost the corporations relatively little (or in the case of Opus, result in considerable financial profit for the corporation), while on the other hand, they chisel away at the financial infrastructure of©Philosophy ofMusic Education Review 10, no. 2 (Fall, 2002): 72-79. Julia Eklund Koza 73 schools with unrelenting demands for special corporate tax cuts, breaks, and incentives. This practice is especially detrimental to the arts because, relegated to the feminized status of "frill," they may be among the first subjects to suffer. Tax breaks are but one example of what critics term "corporate welfare." John Hood, in Policy Review, provides a list ofincentives states use to attract and keep corporations. In addition to tax abatements and tax credits, Hood mentions land giveaways, releases from infrastructure costs, the issuanceoftax-exemptdevelopmentbonds, offers to promote products, and job training packages. These deals are unfair to existing businesses, Hood argues, especially small ones that can never hope to receive such treatment, and he concludes that there is no clear-cut evidence these forms of corporate welfare benefit state economies.2 Accordingto JayTaylor, school-business partnerships have become increasingly popular; they quadrupled between 1982 and 1992 as financially strappeddistricts found themselves "dredgingfor dollars."3 Taylor explains that "school officials... (shrink)

El estallido de una epidemia o una pandemia es siempre un momento de amenaza, emergencia e incertidumbre. Cuando la salud y la vida de las personas se pone en peligro se requieren respuestas urgentes y coordinadas por parte de los agentes estatales a nivel nacional, regional y global que tengan el potencial de contener la pandemia y evitar su propagación. De esta situación de emergencia y de continuos cambios en las normas que imponen nuevas restricciones, obligaciones y responsabilidades a los (...) ciudadanos, se deriva dilema sobre el equilibrio entre la protección del derecho a la salud y otros derechos económicos, sociales y culturales. (shrink)

The book's methodology is set out: we must be critically aware of the theoretical assumptions we bring to the study of ancient ethics, or we risk importing anachronism. The limits of the ancient evidence should also be respected. We must also be aware of the structures of modern ethical theories and prepared to find that ancient theories differ. The ancient traditions and their major sources are listed: Aristotle, Stoics, Sceptics, Cyrenaics, Epicurus and hybrid theories.

Academic writings– writings that take place in academic settings, from undergraduate essays to research monographs – are social practices and methods of knowledge enquiry. In virtue of being social and epistemic, they should be of concern to critical realists because of critical realism's stratified approach to reality. By critiquing approaches to academic writing that can flatten reality, I propose that if academic writings were understood as ontologically stratified social practices, they could afford writers the rational judgement to make textual choices. (...) Specifically, I show there is the possibility to produce discourse that is different from standardized ‘objective' and ‘transparent' academic prose, which, inter alia, also has colonial roots. If academic writings were understood ontologically and epistemologically as practices and methods of enquiry that require writers (i.e. agents) to rationally judge what form their texts should take, this could further academic writing’s educative and emancipatory purpose of advancing knowledge and justice. (shrink)