The Victorian period in Britain was an “age of reform.” It is therefore not surprising that two of the era’s most eminent intellects described themselves as reformers. Both William Whewell and John Stuart Mill believed that by reforming philosophy—including the philosophy of science—they could effect social and political change. But their divergent visions of this societal transformation led to a sustained and spirited controversy that covered morality, politics, science, and economics. Situating their debate within the larger context of Victorian society (...) and its concerns, _Reforming Philosophy_ shows how two very different men captured the intellectual spirit of the day and engaged the attention of other scientists and philosophers, including the young Charles Darwin. Mill—philosopher, political economist, and Parliamentarian—remains a canonical author of Anglo-American philosophy, while Whewell—Anglican cleric, scientist, and educator—is now often overlooked, though in his day he was renowned as an authority on science. Placing their teachings in their proper intellectual, cultural, and argumentative spheres, Laura Snyder revises the standard views of these two important Victorian figures, showing that both men’s concerns remain relevant today. A philosophically and historically sensitive account of the engagement of the major protagonists of Victorian British philosophy, _Reforming Philosophy_ is the first book-length examination of the dispute between Mill and Whewell in its entirety. A rich and nuanced understanding of the intellectual spirit of Victorian Britain, it will be welcomed by philosophers and historians of science, scholars of Victorian studies, and students of the history of philosophy and political economy. (shrink)

Young children typically demonstrate a transfer deficit, learning less from video than live presentations. Semantically meaningful context has been demonstrated to enhance learning in young children. We examined the effect of a semantically meaningful context on toddlers’ imitation performance. Two- and 2.5-year-olds participated in a puzzle imitation task to examine learning from either a live or televised model. The model demonstrated how to assemble a three-piece puzzle to make a fish or a boat, with the puzzle demonstration occurring against a (...) semantically meaningful background context (ocean) or a yellow background (no context). Participants in the video condition performed significantly worse than participants in the live condition, demonstrating the typical transfer deficit effect. While the context helped improve overall levels of imitation, especially for the boat puzzle, only individual differences in the ability to self-generate a stimulus label were associated with a reduction in the transfer deficit. (shrink)

Xenotransplantation - the transfer of living tissue between species - has long been heralded as a potential solution to the severe organ shortage crisis experienced by the United Kingdom and other 'developed' nations. However, the significant risks which accompany this biotechnology led the United Kingdom to adopt a cautious approach to its regulation, with the establishment of a non-departmental public body - UKXIRA - to oversee the development of this technology on a national basis. In December 2006 UKXIRA was quietly (...) disbanded and replaced with revised guidance, which entrusts the regulation of xenotransplantation largely to research ethics committees. In this article we seek to problematize this new regulatory framework, arguing that specialist expertise and national oversight are necessary components of an adequate regulatory framework for a biotechnology which poses new orders of risk, challenges the adequacy of traditional understandings of autonomy and consent, and raises significant animal welfare concerns. We argue for a more considered and holistic approach, based on adequate consultation, to regulating biotechnological developments in the United Kingdom. (shrink)

The exhibition Space/Sight/Self was designed to study the role of portraiture in contemporary art as a nexus of three issues identity, vision, and place. The goal was to produce a portrait, as it were, of contemporary portraiture. This catalog documents the exhibition and helps to facilitate viewers' reflections and responses about the spaces, sights, and selves that enable us to construct and question our identity.".

This article presents a new classroom experiment in order to illustrate and initiate discussion on the public good provision of prevention of dangerous anthropogenic climate change. The classroom game aids students’ understanding of the difficulty associated with funding public goods; the role of fairness in climate change negotiations; the risks associated with catastrophic climate change impact; and the free riding concept. The classroom game has been played in various business, economics and political science courses. Feedback received from students indicates a (...) rewarding learning experience. (shrink)

In a letter from May 10, 1852 Adam von Doss, Schopenhauer declared himself a Buddhist. This book is the first study to do justice to Schopenhauer's passion for Buddhism, reconstructing the notions of Buddhism he acquired through his Buddhist readings as well as their influence on his thought.

I propose to show that the use that has often been made of wittgenstein's work in the philosophy of religion is innocuous. the notion that the meaning of a word or a sentence is the use to which it is put has been exploited in such a way that it neither does justice to religious belief nor to wittgenstein's thought. i endeavour to show that the burden of the positivist programme was not to withold from religious language the accolade of (...) 'meaning'. it was to show that no piece of language could be both meaningful and true (or false) which did not satisfy the conditions of either the analytic or the synthetic category. i conclude that wittgenstein's work can provide an effective liberation from positivism if it can be shown that wittgenstein gives us sufficient reason to reject the analytic-synthetic distinction not only as an inadequate criterion of 'meaning', but as an inadequate criterion of 'truth' as well. (shrink)

Examining the health of the population of the industrial world, the authors conclude that it is no healthier than it used to be, rather that diseases have been substituted, not eliminated. They suggest an alternative approach to health care which derives from a philosophy of nature.

The authors of this book show that the failure of public health arises, not from a failure of contemporary medicine, but from a failure of the philosophical assumptions upon which it rests. They suggest an alternative approach to health care that derives from a ecological and holistic philosophy of nature.

Each of us is embodied. Our relationships are reinforced and swayed by physiological processes. States that impose unwanted childbirth on women also force them into unwanted bonds of care. While most people who have given birth understand this because they experienced it, this formative experience is alien to cisgender men. Yet the physiological changes that birthing people undergo are points that few commentators on abortion raise. There are several possible reasons for this, including concerns about reifying biological processes that have (...) been used to assert alleged truths about the “natural” role of women in society and culture. I discuss the physiological underpinnings of maternal/neonate bonds, the importance of this issue in the abortion debate, and the role it ought to play, while keeping in mind the valid critiques of historical and current appeals to biology as a means of subjugating women socially and culturally. (shrink)

Interview of M. Laura Lattanzi and Paz López to the artist and writer Leticia Obeid.

William Ames (1576-1633) a incarné une autorité fondamentale pour les puritains qui ont émigré en Nouvelle-Angleterre. Dans son œuvre, il a la singularité d’allier ses convictions religieuses à une mentalité ramiste. Ames considère la méthode de Ramus comme une manière adéquate de comprendre l’acquisition et la transmission des savoirs. Le système ramiste s’applique aussi au domaine de la théologie et à certaines questions liées au gouvernement de l’individu. Cet article vise à mettre en lumière cette combinaison entre le puritanisme et (...) le ramisme qui caractériserait une façon bien particulière de concevoir le gouvernement de l’individu : un modèle qui renforce la volonté de l’individu et sa capacité de contrôle, en tant qu’instruments essentiels de gouvernement, et qui renferme un objectif émancipateur et égalitaire. (shrink)

El objetivo de este artículo es analizar el uso del término cáncer desde una perspectiva social y su representación en la prensa española a comienzos del siglo xx, en los periódicos La Vanguardia y ABC. A partir de la hemeroteca digital de ambos medios se seleccionaron todas y cada una de las veces que se pudo identificar el término «cáncer» y su aplicación metafórica desde una perspectiva de problemática social, procediéndose a la descripción de los rasgos significativos y al análisis (...) del discurso. Encontramos un uso de la palabra cáncer como metáfora social a lo largo del periodo estudiado, siendo común extender la metáfora del cuerpo enfermo a situaciones de orden político o social. El cáncer es una enfermedad con un gran impacto en nuestra sociedad, cuya utilización metafórica es descriptiva y expresa el deseo del cambio, pero su empleo puede comportar la estigmatización de los enfermos afectados por esta patología. Palabras clave: cáncer, metáfora, sociedad, prensa, España.The objective of this article is to analyze the use of the term cancer from a social perspective and its representation in the Spanish press at the beginning of the 20th Century, in the newspapers La Vanguardia and ABC. From the digital mass media library, each and every one of the times that the term «cancer» and its metaphorical application could be identified from a perspective of the social problem was selected, proceeding to the description of the essential features and the discourse analysis. A use of the word cancer as a social metaphor was found throughout the studied period, being common to extend the metaphor of the sick body in situations of political or social order. Cancer is a disease with a great impact on our society, metaphorical use is descriptive and expresses the desire for change, but its use may involve the stigmatization of patients affected by this pathology. Key words: cancer, metaphor, society, press, Spain. (shrink)

Laura Marcus is one of the leading literary critics of modernist literature and culture. Dreams of Modernity: Psychoanalysis, Literature, Cinema covers the period from around 1880 to 1930, when modernity as a form of social and cultural life fed into the beginnings of modernism as a cultural form. Railways, cinema, psychoanalysis and the literature of detection - and their impact on modern sensibility - are four of the chief subjects explored. Marcus also stresses the creativity of modernist women writers, (...) including H. D., Dorothy Richardson and Virginia Woolf. The overriding themes of this work bear on the understanding of the early twentieth century as a transitional age, thus raising the question of how 'the moderns' understood the conditions of their own modernity. (shrink)

"Although the end be last in the order of execution, yet it is first in the order of intention." This dictum arises in Aquinas's discussion of human acts; it nonetheless comes readily to the mind of readers of Helen Lang's book. Lang's thesis is that in the Physics Aristotle wrote logoi, arguments structured around an initial thesis. This structure is seen across the books of the Physics and provides a framework in which to understand the various parts of Aristotle's science (...) of nature. Lang maintains that Aristotle's Physics establishes his science of nature, and that all logoi of the work address difficulties surrounding the scope of the subject of this science. One ought not understand the arguments in terms of the Physics as a whole; rather, each argument is to be seen in relation to the logos of which it is a part. Lang provides careful study of the arguments comprising books 2, 7, and 8, and concludes that each logos falls under an initially stated thesis. (shrink)

When asked to review a book, one's fondest hope is that it will be interesting; one dare not, even to one's self, utter the word "significant." On the surface, it appears to be a historical study of systematics, the science of biological classification; upon reading, one discovers that systematics is merely the example Atran uses to exemplify a much more penetrating question: What is the relationship of scientific knowledge and the knowledge of common sense?

Laura Nader is a towering figure as anthropologist, teacher, and public intellectual. Her letters give a glimpse of academic life mostly unseen by academics and by the general public. The collection includes letters from academic colleagues, but it also contains correspondence from lawyers, politicians, citizens, people on death row, Peace Corps workers, members of the military, scientists, and more.

Some of the manuscripts of Aelius Anstides include a short oration in the form of an encomium to an unnamed king. The oration is entitled in three manuscripts and in another. It has been pointed out that in the former group of manuscripts the title is not preceded by the words thus casting doubt on Aristidean authorship.

In this comprehensive new study of human free agency, Laura Waddell Ekstrom critically surveys contemporary philosophical literature and provides a novel account of the conditions for free action. Ekstrom argues that incompatibilism concerning free will and causal determinism is true and thus the right account of the nature of free action must be indeterminist in nature. She examines a variety of libertarian approaches, ultimately defending an account relying on indeterministic causation among events and appealing to agent causation only in (...) a reducible sense. Written in an engaging style and incorporating recent scholarship, this study is critical reading for scholars and students interested in the topics of motivation, causation, responsibility, and freedom. In broadly covering the important positions of others along with its exposition of the author’s own view, Free Will provides both a significant scholarly contribution and a valuable text for courses in metaphysics and action theory. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to contribute to understanding the changing role of government in promoting corporate social responsibility (CSR). Over the last decade, governments have joined other stakeholders in assuming a relevant role as drivers of CSR, working together with intergovernmental organizations and recognizing that public policies are key in encouraging a greater sense of CSR. This paper focuses on the analysis of the new strategies adopted by governments in order to promote, and encourage businesses to adopt, CSR (...) values and strategies. The research is based on the analysis of an explanatory framework, related to the development of a relational analytical framework, which tries to analyze the vision, values, strategies and roles adopted by governments, and the integration of new partnerships that governments establish in the CSR area with the private sector and social organizations. The research compares CSR initiatives and public policies in three European countries: Italy, Norway and the United Kingdom, and focuses on governmental drivers and responses. The preliminary results demonstrate that governments are incorporating a common statement and discourse on CSR, working in partnership with the private and social sectors. For governments, CSR implies the need to manage a complex set of relationships in order to develop a win–win situation between business and social organizations. However, the research also focuses on the differences between the three governments when applying CSR public policies. These divergences are based on the previous cultural and political framework, such as the welfare state typology, the organizational structures and the business and social and cultural background in each country. (shrink)

For decades, the field of system safety has designed safe systems by reducing the risk of physical harm to humans, property and the environment to an acceptable level. Recently, this definition of safety has come under scrutiny by governments and researchers who argue that the narrow focus on reducing physical harm, whilst necessary, is not sufficient to secure the safety of AI systems. There is growing pressure to expand the scope of safety in the context of AI to address emerging (...) harms, with particular emphasis being placed on the ways AI systems can reinforce and reproduce systemic harms. In this paper, we advocate for expanding the scope of conventional safety to include non-physical harms in the context of AI. However, we caution against broadening the scope to address systemic harms, as doing so presents intractable practical challenges for current safety methodologies. Instead, we propose that the scope of safety-related harms should be expanded to include psychological harms. Our proposal is partly motivated by the debates and evidence on social media, which fundamentally reshaped how harm is understood and addressed in the digital age, prompting new regulatory frameworks which aimed to protect users from the psychological risks of the technology. We draw on this precedent to motivate the inclusion of psychological harms in AI safety assessments. By expanding the scope of AI safety to include psychological harms, we take a critical step toward evolving the discipline of system safety into one that is better tuned and equipped to protect users against the complex and emerging harms propagated by AI systems. (shrink)

In recent years, business ethics and economic scholars have been paying greater attention to the development of commons organizing. The latter refers to the processes by which communities of people work in common in the pursuit of the common good. In turn, this promotes commons organizational designs based on collective forms of common goods production, distribution, management and ownership. In this paper, we build on two main literature streams: the ethical approach based on the theory of the common good of (...) the firm in virtue ethics and the economic approach based on the theory of institutions for collective action developed by Ostrom’s research on common-pool resources to avert the tragedy of the commons. The latter expands to include the novel concepts of new commons, “commoning” and polycentric governance. Drawing on the analysis of what is new in these forms of organizing, we propose a comprehensive model, highlighting the integration of two sets of organizing principles—common good and collective action – and five problem-solving processes to explain the main dimensions of commons organizing. We contribute to business ethics literature by exploring the convergence between the ethical and economic approaches in the development of a commons organizing view. (shrink)