Combining human embryonic stem cells with SCNT has been a gold standard of stem cell research. Adding a particular individual's genes to pluripotent stem cells might lead to the development of personalized tissue repair or replacement. Enthusiasm for human embryonic stem cell research had flagged in recent years due to controversy over the moral status of in vitro embryos, scientific misconduct by researcher Woo Suk Hwang, and the discovery that induced pluripotent stem cells could be produced from somatic cells. Energy (...) shifted to research on somatic cells, but three successes in the United States during 2013 and 2014 may reinvigorate embryonic stem cell research. (shrink)

Metaphors used to describe new technologies mediate public understanding of the innovations. Analyzing the linguistic, rhetorical, and affective aspects of these metaphors opens the range of issues available for bioethical scrutiny and increases public accountability. This article shows how such a multidisciplinary approach can be useful by looking at a set of texts about one issue, the use of a newly developed technique for genetic modification, CRISPRcas9.

I motivate and develop a novel account of the epistemic assessability of suspension as a development of my knowledge-first, virtue-epistemological research program. First, I extend an argument of Ernest Sosa's for the claim that evidentialism cannot adequately account for the epistemic assessability of suspension. This includes a kind of knowledge-first evidentialism of the sort advocated by Timothy Williamson. I agree with Sosa that the reasons why evidentialism fails motivate a virtue-epistemological approach, but argue that my knowledge-first account is preferable to (...) his view. According to my account, rational belief is belief that manifests proper practical respect for what it takes to know. Beliefs are the only primary bearers of epistemic evaluation since they are the only candidates for knowledge. However, suspension can manifest a derivative kind of practical respect for what it takes to know. Thus, we can explain why the same sort of assessment is applicable to both belief and suspension, and why belief has a privileged claim to these properties. Lastly, I'll look at Sosa's and Williamson's treatments of Pyrrhonian skepticism, which treats a certain kind of suspension as the epistemically superior practice, and argue that my account provides a better anti-skeptical response than either of their approaches. (shrink)

Structural analogies connect Williamson’s epistemology and action theory: for example, action is the direction-of-fit mirror image of knowledge, and knowledge stands to belief as action stands to intention. These structural analogies, for Williamson, are meant to illuminate more generally how ‘mirrors’ reversing direction of fit should be understood as connecting the spectrum of our cognitive and practically oriented mental states. This paper has two central aims, one negative and the other positive. The negative aim is to highlight some intractable problems (...) with Williamson’s preferred analogical picture, which links the cognitive and the practical through the nexus of direction-of-fit mirroring. The positive aim of the paper is to propose a better alternative. In particular, we show that an achievement-theoretic proposal captures what is in common across the range of attitudes that exhibit the kind of structure that knowledge-belief, action-desire/intention do, while at the same time avoiding the problems shown to face Williamson’s proposed picture. Moreover, we draw attention to several key theoretical benefits of embracing our proposed achievement-theoretic picture, including some of the key benefits of the knowledge-first programme that Williamson’s own analogies were designed to secure. (shrink)

ABSTRACTWhile over the last few decades AI research has largely focused on building tools and applications, recent technological developments have prompted a resurgence of interest in building a genuinely intelligent artificial agent – one that has a mind in the same sense that humans and animals do. In this paper, I offer a theoretical and methodological framework for this project of investigating “artificial minded intelligence” that can help to unify existing approaches and provide new avenues for research. I first outline (...) three desiderata that a framework for AMI research should satisfy. In Section 1, I further motivate the desiderata as well as the need for a new framework. Section 2 develops a general methodological approach, the “generative methodology,” and Section 3 develops a version of this methodology, the “Competence Framework for AI research”. (shrink)

This paper argues, on the basis of data from St'át'imcets (Lillooet Salish), for a theory of wide-scope indefinites which is similar, though not identical, to that proposed by Kratzer (1998). I show that a subset of S'át'imcets indefinites takes obligatory wide scope with respect to if-clauses, negation, and modals, and is unable to be distributed over by quantificational phrases. These wide-scope effects cannot be accounted for by movement, but require an analysis involving choice functions (Reinhart 1995, 1997). However, Reinhart's particular (...) choice function analysis is unable to account for the St'át'imcets data. A Kratzer-style theory, on the other hand, accounts not only for the wide-scope effects, but also for the emergence of narrower-than-widest interpretations for indefinites which contain bound variables. I depart from Kratzer's analysis in claiming that St'át'imcets choice function indefinites are not 'specific'; the discourse context does not provide a value for the function variable. Therefore, I utilize wide- scope existential closure over choice functions rather than leaving the variables free. However, my analysis provides support for Kratzer's claim that English indefinites are ambiguous between a choice function interpretation and a quantificational interpretation, since St'át'imcets determiners overtly encode the English ambiguity. I conclude by suggesting that the proposed analysis of wide-scope indefinites may be universally valid. (shrink)

This paper contributes to the debate about ‘tenseless languages’ by defending a tensed analysis of a superficially tenseless language. The language investigated is St’át’imcets (Lillooet Salish). I argue that although St’át’imcets lacks overt tense morphology, every finite clause in the language possesses a phonologically covert tense morpheme; this tense morpheme restricts the reference time to being non-future. Future interpretations, as well as ‘past future’ would-readings, are obtained by the combination of covert tense with an operator analogous to Abusch’s (1985) WOLL. (...) I offer St’át’imcets-internal evidence (of a kind not previously adduced) that the WOLL-like operator is modal in nature. It follows from the analysis presented here that there are only two (probably related) differences between St’át’imcets and English in the area of tense. The first is that St’át’imcets lacks tense morphemes which are pronounced. The second is that the St’át’imcets tense morpheme is semantically underspecified compared to English ones. In each of these respects, the St’át’imcets tense morpheme displays similar properties to pronouns, which may be covert and which may fail to distinguish person, number or gender. Along the way, I point out several striking and subtle similarities in the interpretive possibilities of St’át’imcets and English. I suggest that these similarities may reveal non-accidental properties of tense systems in natural language. I conclude with discussion of the implications of the analysis for cross-linguistic variation, learnability and the possible existence of tenseless languages. (shrink)

The paper develops a responsibility-based account of professional ethics in banking. From this perspective, bankers have duties not only toward clients—the traditional focus of professional ethics—but also regarding the prevention of systemic harms to whole societies. When trying to fulfill these duties, bankers have to meet three challenges: epistemic challenges, motivational challenges, and a coordination challenge. These challenges can best be met by a combination of regulation and ethics that aligns responsibilities, recognition, and incentives and creates what Parsons has called (...) “integrated situations”. Professional associations play an important role for this purpose, especially as spaces in which peer recognition is earned. But financial incentives equally need to be brought in line, for example, through deferred bonuses or claw backs. Such measures can create a new culture of accountability in banking. (shrink)

Here’s a nice, simple view. Knowing that p is the sole fundamental aim and achievement in the epistemic domain. It is a manifestation of epistemic competence, and we can metaphysically explain both the existence and the normative status of all other epistemic states in terms of knowledge and the competence it manifests. In this paper I will defend this view from a challenge from Ernest Sosa that knowledge is too weak and primitive to do the work the Simple View asks (...) it to do. He claims that we not only need knowing that p, but also reflectively knowing that p and knowing full well that p. I argue that Sosa is mistaken. Good old knowledge, what Sosa calls animal knowledge, when properly understood, can do all of the work that reflective knowledge and knowing full well are supposed to do. Knowledge, at least in the epistemic domain, is all you need. In section 1, I explain in more detail the challenge that Sosa poses for the Simple View, and consequently my direct virtue epistemology. I then explain Sosa’s accounts of reflective knowledge and knowing full well, further clarifying the debate. In sections 2, 3, and 4, I consider Sosa’s arguments that reflective knowledge and knowing full well are distinctive epistemic achievements. Section 2 addresses his argument from the epistemic evaluability of suspending belief. Section 3 addresses his arguments for the claim that a variety of cases can only be adequately accounted for by invoking these other states. Section 4 addresses his arguments about the role of reflective knowledge in rebutting dream skepticism. Responding to Sosa’s arguments also helps to clarify certain features of knowledge and epistemic competence. I conclude by reviewing these features. (shrink)

We engage with the nature and the value of achievement through a critical examination of an argument according to which biomedical “enhancement” of our capacities is impermissible because enhancing ourselves in this way would threaten our achievements. We call this the argument against enhancement from achievement. We assess three versions of it, each admitting to a strong or a weak reading. We argue that strong readings fail, and that weak readings, while in some cases successful in showing that enhancement interferes (...) with the nature or value of achievement, fail to establish that enhancement poses an unusual threat to achievement. (shrink)

When anthropologists and other social scientists study health services in medical institutions, tensions sometimes arise as a result of the social scientists and health care professionals having different ideas about the ethics of research. In order to resolve this type of conflict and to facilitate mutual learning, we describe two general categories of research ethics framing: those of anthropology and those of medicine. The latter focuses on protection of the individual through the preservation of autonomy expressed through the requirement of (...) informed consent whereas the former focuses on broader political implications. After providing an example of a conflict, we outline four issues that characterize the occasional clashes between social scientists and medical staff: (1) a discrepancy in the way anthropologists perceive patients and medical staff; (2) ambiguity concerning the role of medical staff in anthropological research; (3) impediments to informed consent in qualitative research projects; and (4) property rights in data. Enhanced dialogue could serve to invigorate the ethical debate in both traditions. (shrink)

While this paper does not explicitly define the concept of autonomy, the way Ubel et al describe clinicians’ failures to enhance their patients’ autonomy reflects a broader understanding of autonomy than the default account as free and informed choice. In this OPC I would demonstrate that the communication strategies the authors recommend reflects a more sophisticated conception of autonomy than the understanding that typically prevails in bioethics. I will also distinguish between weak and strong forms of paternalism, and argue that (...) a weak paternalistic approach is not only defensible but also aligns with the strategies the authors propose. Thus, by clarifying the concept of autonomy we can show how it can be enhanced in practice. (shrink)

In this new interpretation of the political writings of Hannah Arendt, Lisa Jane Disch focuses on an issue that remains central to today's debates in political philosophy and feminist theory: the relationship of experience to critical understanding. Discussing a range of Arendt's work including unpublished writings, Disch explores the function of storytelling as a form of critical theory beyond the limits of philosophy.

Markets allow for the processing of decentralized information through the price mechanism. But in addition, many markets rely on other mechanisms in markets, or non-market institutions, that provide and manage other forms of knowledge. Within national economies, these institutions form an ‘epistemic infrastructure’ for markets. In global markets, in contrast, this epistemic infrastructure is very patchy, undermining the preconditions for morally responsible agency. New technologies might help to improve the epistemic infrastructure of global markets, but they require conceptualizing knowledge not (...) only as a tradable good, but also as a precondition of morally responsible agency. (shrink)

Building on group discussions and interviews with life science researchers in Austria, this paper analyses the narratives that researchers use in describing what they feel responsible for, with a particular focus on how they perceive the societal responsibilities of their research. Our analysis shows that the core narratives used by the life scientists participating in this study continue to be informed by the linear model of innovation. This makes it challenging for more complex innovation models [such as responsible research and (...) innovation ] to gain ground in how researchers make sense of and conduct their research. Furthermore, the paper shows that the life scientists were not easily able to imagine specific practices that would address broader societal concerns and thus found it hard to integrate the latter into their core responsibilities. Linked to this, researchers saw institutional reward structures as strongly focused on scientific excellence. Thus, they saw reward structures as competing with—rather than incentivising—broader notions of societal responsibility. This narrative framing of societal responsibilities is indicative of a structural marginalisation of responsibility practices and explains the claim, made by many researchers in our sample, that they cannot afford to spend time on such practices. The paper thus concludes that the core ideas of RRI stand in tension with predominant narrative and institutional infrastructures that researchers draw on to attribute meaning to their research practices. This suggests that scientific institutions still have a core role to play in providing new and context-specific narratives as well as new forms of valuing responsibility practices. (shrink)

This article contributes to carework scholarship by examining the nexus of gender, class, and race in long-term care facilities. We draw out a family ideology at work that promotes good care of residents and thus benefits nursing homes. We also found that careworkers value fictive kin relationships with residents, yet we uncover how the family model may be used to exploit these low-income careworkers. Reflecting a subordinate and racialized version of being “part of the family,” we call for an ethic (...) of reciprocity and for concrete change toward valuing equally the humanity of those who need and those who give care. (shrink)

In this paper, we consider the relationships among corporate accountability, reputation, and tax behavior as a corporate social responsibility issue. As part of our investigation, we provide empirical examples of corporate reputation and corporate tax behaviors using a sample of large, U.S.-based multinational companies. In addition, we utilize corporate tax controversies to illustrate possibilities for aggressive corporate tax behaviors of high-profile multinationals to become a reputation threat. Finally, we consider whether reputation serves as an accountability mechanism for corporate tax behaviors (...) among other mechanisms for holding firms accountable for corporate tax behaviors. Our conceptual work points to a complicated relationship among shareholder, stakeholder, and civic responsibilities in the development and execution of firm’s corporate tax strategies. Building on those insights, our empirical illustration considers corporate reputation data alongside data which reflects corporate tax behavior. Based on this work, we find no clear trend or pattern indicating that reputation is associated with or affected by certain types of corporate tax behaviors. That is, our exploratory empirical illustration suggests that corporate tax behavior does not produce broad reputational consequences that would motivate a change in firm behavior. Drawing from celebrity and strategic silence research, we then suggest that reputation may not be a well-functioning mechanism for holding corporations to account for contributing their fair share of the resources used by government for the benefit of society and offer-related theoretical insights. (shrink)

As a modern academic Ulysses, the historical scientist is enticed by numerous plausible scientific theories that can explain the historical data in search of the truth. However, the predicament of her work is to inevitably crash onto the rocks and cliffs of uncertainty. The problem discussed in this paper is that several scientific models can be suitable to account for the same empirical observations. The risk of falling into speculation is looming, and exceedingly dangerous in science. This is also the (...) case in archaeological sciences, such as bioarchaeology. A bioarchaeologist frequently encounters traces of disease in ancient skeletons, and pertinent patterns may often result from equally probable different causes. This is a methodological issue commonly encountered in the interpretation of pathological patterns in human remains, and constitutes part of the problem known in bioarchaeology as the osteological paradox. During an informal trilogue, three characters discuss the osteological paradox, and attempt to define it in philosophical terms. The aim of this work is to present the problems of scientists with the philosophical approach to the debate between scientific realism and antirealism, focusing in particular on the so-called problem of underdetermination. Our original approach is to apply the distinction between ‘how-possibly’ models and ‘how-actually’ models by Alisa Bokulich to archaeological issues, integrating various fields of science with a multidisciplinary and omnivorous approach. The trilogue ends providing the historical scientist with reasons and means to believe in her ability to conceive of true and reliable scientific models to interpret the historical past. (shrink)

Impaired hand proprioception can lead to difficulties in performing fine motor tasks, thereby affecting activities of daily living. The majority of children with unilateral cerebral palsy experience proprioceptive deficits, but accurately quantifying these deficits is challenging due to the lack of sensitive measurement methods. Robot-assisted assessments provide a promising alternative, however, there is a need for solutions that specifically target children and their needs. We propose two novel robotics-based assessments to sensitively evaluate active and passive position sense of the index (...) finger metacarpophalangeal joint in children. We then investigate test-retest reliability and discriminant validity of these assessments in uCP and typically developing children, and further use the robotic platform to gain first insights into fundamentals of hand proprioception. Both robotic assessments were performed in two sessions with 1-h break in between. In the passive position sense assessment, participant's finger is passively moved by the robot to a randomly selected position, and she/he needs to indicate the perceived finger position on a tablet screen located directly above the hand, so that the vision of the hand is blocked. Active position sense is assessed by asking participants to accurately move their finger to a target position shown on the tablet screen, without visual feedback of the finger position. Ten children with uCP and 10 age-matched TDC were recruited in this study. Test-retest reliability in both populations was good >0.79). Proprioceptive error was larger for children with uCP than TDC, indicating discriminant validity. The active position sense was more accurate than passive, and the scores were not correlated, underlining the need for targeted assessments to comprehensively evaluate proprioception. There was a significant effect of age on passive position sense in TDC but not uCP, possibly linked to disturbed development of proprioceptive acuity in uCP. Overall, the proposed robot-assisted assessments are reliable, valid and a promising alternative to commonly used clinical methods, which could help gain a better understanding of proprioceptive impairments in uCP, facilitating the design of novel therapies. (shrink)

To reduce the global burden of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is an urgent need to develop a safe vaccine. Vaccine development usually takes many years as it goes through several different phases. To hasten COVID-19 vaccine development, it has been suggested that the final stage could be replaced with a human challenge trial (HCT). Volunteers would be intentionally infected with SARS-CoV-2 to see how the vaccine candidate works. To intentionally infect a healthy human being with a potentially deadly virus is (...) contrary to the highest ethical standards in medical research. This article highlights the benefits and risks of COVID-19 HCTs and summarises what research ethics committees (RECs) need to consider during the ethical assessment of such trials including risk reduction, strict containment measures, specific informed consent measures and avoiding high monetary inducements. (shrink)

back in about 1984 or 1985, when I'd been in graduate school for a couple of years at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, I started hanging around with three chemists who shared a house. They were colleagues of my roommate, a chemistry grad student. One of them, no kidding, was named Lloyd A. Bumm, who would always introduce himself by saying, "My name is the best joke I know." Lloyd was a quirky, curious guy who often explored unusual places around (...) the City, unlike the typical chemistry grad student. For instance, he frequently would head into Chicago on Sunday mornings to go to this crazy street market he knew about. He invited me to go with him one weekend; he was looking for a power supply, whatever... (shrink)

I present and motivate a new solution to the generality problem for reliabilism. I suggest that we shift our focus from process-types that can be characterized independently of a subject’s epistemic concerns to process-types that play important roles in the life of the epistemic agent. Once we do so, a simple, promising solution suggests itself: the C-Typing Thesis. According to the C-Typing Thesis, how an epistemic agent forms her degree of confidence in a believed proposition determines the epistemically relevant type (...) of belief-forming process for that belief. First I motivate this view generally, arguing that it satisfies important desiderata for a solution to the generality problem. Then I show that it makes the intuitively correct predictions for a wide range of cases. I also show how it can solve Brian Weatherson’s temporal generality problem, and, relatedly, Jonathan Vogel’s bootstrapping problem for reliabilism. The C-Typing Thesis is plausible not only because it makes correct predictions, but also because it does so in a way that responds to a common charge against reliabilism: that reliability is disconnected from our lives as epistemic inquirers. The C-Typing Thesis shows how epistemic agency can play a significant role in an externalist account of justification and knowledge. (shrink)

It is often said that the institutions of criminal justice ought or—perhaps more often—ought not to rehabilitate criminal offenders. But the term ‘criminal rehabilitation’ is often used without being explicitly defined, and in ways that are consistent with widely divergent conceptions. In this paper, we present a taxonomy that distinguishes, and explains the relationships between, different conceptions of criminal rehabilitation. Our taxonomy distinguishes conceptions of criminal rehabilitation on the basis of (i) the aims or ends of the putatively rehabilitative measure, (...) and (ii) the means that may be used to achieve the intended end. We also explore some of the implications of each conception, some of the payoffs of a taxonomy of the kind we offer, and some areas for future work. (shrink)

Western analytic epistemology is undergoing an upheaval: the importance of social justice concerns is becoming increasingly recognized. Many of us want epistemology to reflect our lived experiences, and to do real work for us on issues that matter. Motivated by these concerns, researchers are increasingly focusing on ameliorating our epistemic concepts: finding ones that contribute to social justice. At the same time, however, many epistemologists claim that their project is purely metaphysical and thus value-neutral: epistemology is just about the truth, (...) the facts! Ethics and politics thus have no place in epistemology proper. I will argue that, despite appearances to the contrary, these ameliorative and objectivist projects are not in conflict. Indeed, because the same concepts are our tools for both theoretical and practical reasoning, properly carrying out either project must be done in an integrated way with the other. I’ll use the example of medical research to show how social justice concerns can deeply influence scientific practice in ways that contribute to, rather than threaten, its claims to objectivity. I then develop an integrative epistemology on analogy with medical research to resolve both longstanding philosophical disputes and support our understanding and healing of public discourse. (shrink)

Unlike his contemporaries Virginia Woolf and Henry James, Kipling always denied he was a critic. But his letters, speeches, and stories are full of comments on writing and writers. This collection, including many formerly unpublished private letters and papers, details Kipling's response to the commercialisation of literature and the emerging role of the writer as celebrity in the turbulent literary world of the 1890s and beyond. They reveal a mind intensely concerned with questions of literary value, with language and imagination, (...) with truth, realism, and romanticism. Kipling's fame made him a significant spokesperson for important segments of the reading public - the soldiers, engineers, and functionaries central to Britain's imperial expansion. He profoundly influenced English literary language and our perception of English national character. This book offers access to the private and public history of a writer whose continuing influence is still a matter of fierce controversy. (shrink)

This article looks at riots that consumed Paris and much of France for three consecutive weeks in November 2005. The author argues that the uprisings were not instigated by radical Muslims, children of African polygamists, or despairing youth suffering from high unemployment. First and foremost, they were provoked by a terrible incident of police brutality, a tragedy among a litany of similar tragedies. Black and Arab youth were already frustrated: decades of violent enforcement of France's categorical boundaries—both racial and geographic—had (...) filled many with rage. When Minister of Interior Nicholas Sarkozy responded to the violent death of three teenage boys on October 25, 2005, by condemning the boys rather than the police officers who had killed them, he merely reaffirmed what many young blacks and Arabs already believed: that their lives have no value in France. (shrink)

In response to calls for research to improve human-machine teaming, we present a “perspective” paper that explores techniques from computer science that can enhance machine agents for human-machine teams. As part of this paper, we summarize the state of the science on critical team competencies identified for effective HMT, discuss technological gaps preventing machines from fully realizing these competencies, and identify ways that emerging artificial intelligence capabilities may address these gaps and enhance performance in HMT. We extend beyond extant literature (...) by incorporating recent technologies and techniques and describing their potential for contributing to the advancement of HMT. (shrink)

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to provide a description of an innovative web-based ethics module that was designed to integrate ethics education across four accounting courses over two years (second and third year courses) in a large Australian tertiary institution. Approach: The approach taken in designing the ethics web-based module was to base the foundations of the module on Rest’s (1976) ethical behavior model with the adoption of a longitudinal approach to thecoverage of financial reporting ethical issues. Practical (...) Implications: The key objectives of the module are to improve students’ awareness and sensitivity to accounting ethics, and to foster student learning in an interesting and stimulating manner, leading to in-depth understanding of accounting ethics. Originality/value of paper: This paper provides a description of an original web-based approach to delivering ethics education to accounting students across four university courses. Its value lies in not only the innovative and interactive ethics education approach but also in providing feedback from students and the profession. (shrink)

In 2014, the first child in the world was born after live uterus transplantation and IVF (UTx-IVF). Before and after this event, ethical aspects of UTx-IVF have been discussed in the medical and bioethical debate as well as, with varying intensity, in Swedish media and political fora. This article examines what comes to be identified as important ethical problems and solutions in the media debate of UTx-IVF in Sweden, showing specifically how problems, target groups, goals, benefits, risks and stakes are (...) delineated and positioned. It also demonstrates how specific assumptions, norms and values are expressed and used to underpin specific positions within this debate, and how certain subjects, desires and risks become shrouded or simply omitted from it. This approach—which we label the Ethics of the Societal Entrenchment-approach, inspired by Koch and Stemerding (1994)—allows us to discuss how the identification of something as the problem helps to shape what gets to be described as a solution, and how specific solutions provide frameworks within which problems can be stated and emphasised. We also offer a critical discussion of whether some of these articulations and formations should be seen as ethically troubling, and if so, why. (shrink)

While risk of harm is an important focus for whether clinical research on humans can and should proceed, there is uncertainty about what constitutes harm to a trial participant. In Phase I trials on healthy volunteers, the purpose of the research is to document and measure safety concerns associated with investigational drugs, and participants are financially compensated for their enrollment in these studies. In this article, we investigate how characterizations of harm are narrated by healthy volunteers in the context of (...) the adverse events they experience during clinical trials. Drawing upon qualitative research, we find that participants largely minimize, deny, or re-attribute the cause of these AEs. We illustrate how participants' interpretations of AEs may be shaped both by the clinical trial environment and their economic motivation to participate. While these narratives are emblematic of the larger ambiguity surrounding harm in the context of clinical trial participation, we argue that these interpretations also problematically maintain the narrative of the safety of clinical trials, the ethics of testing investigational drugs on healthy people, and the rigor of data collected in the specter of such ambiguity. (shrink)

“Home office” has become a reality for many employees. What is normatively at stake in this shift in the geography of work, given the various forms of structural injustice in our societies? Drawing on the normative criteria of employee well-being and protection from harm, autonomy, non-discrimination, environmental impact, and the role of workplaces as spaces of social encounters, I defend two claims: First, decisions about where individuals work need to be proceduralized on a fair basis, giving employees a voice. Second, (...) giving up the workplace requires a broader discussion about alternatives spaces for social integration. (shrink)

O tema da ética tem ganhado espaço em praticamente todos os campos e setores da nossa sociedade, sejam eles acadêmicos, educacionais, profissionais, empresariais, políticos e científicos. Contudo, as discussões em seu entorno têm se pulverizado numa variedade imensa de abordagens, pautadas em distintas e até mesmo contraditórias bases teóricas, perspectivas e interpretações. Diante disso, estes escritos objetivam distinguir, problematizar e relacionar as noções de moral, ética e deontologia no intuito de preservar tanto o sentido filosófico das proposições éticas quanto o (...) rigor argumentativo das discussões emergentes tanto de contextos teóricos não-filosóficos como e de situações vivenciais. (shrink)

_Abstract_: In this paper, we argue that the recent debates and proclaimed crises in psychology are partly due to a reflection deficit and the reductionist understanding of psychology as exclusively a science. For this reason, we introduce Psychological Humanities as a novel interdisciplinary approach that defines psychology as its object of investigation and opens a field of reflection. Although the study of psychological topics with an orientation toward the humanities is not new, either within or outside of psychology, we argue (...) for the introduction of the collective term Psychological Humanities for four reasons: (1) the definition of Psychological Humanities does more justice to central psychological subject areas such as subjectivity, (2) it serves as a common term of interconnectedness and visibility, (3) it resonates with new reflective fields in related disciplines, such as the medical humanities, and (4) it is more consistent with intersubjective practice in applied psychology. In what follows, we present our approach to Psychological Humanities, developed at the University of Lübeck. Our model differentiates between two fundamental views: a view from the outside on the discipline of psychology and its contexts (e.g., through history, cultural studies, and ethics) and a view from the inside on psychology (e.g., through theoretical psychology, critical psychologies, or epistemology of psychology). _Keywords_: Interdisciplinary Research; Subjectivity; Epistemology of Psychology; Applied Psychology; Psychological Humanities _Guardare la psicologia attraverso una doppia lente: le Psychological Humanities come approccio integrato_ _Riassunto_: In questo articolo sosterremo che le discussioni recenti e le crisi proclamate in psicologia sono dovuti in parte a un deficit di riflessione e a una comprensione riduttiva della psicologia come disciplina esclusivamente scientifica. Per questo motivo presentiamo le _Psychological Humanities_ come nuovo approccio interdisciplinare che ha la psicologia come proprio oggetto di indagine e apre un campo d’indagine. Sebbene lo studio di argomenti psicologici con un orientamento verso le discipline umanistiche non sia nuovo, né all’interno né all’esterno della psicologia, sosterremo l’introduzione del termine collettivo _Psychological Humanities_ per quattro motivi: (1) la definizione di _Psychological Humanities_ rende maggiormente giustizia ad aree tematiche psicologiche centrali come la soggettività, (2) funge da termine comune di interconnessione e visibilità, (3) richiama altri ambiti di riflessione in discipline affini quali le _medical humanities_ ed (4) è più coerente con la pratica intersoggettiva in psicologia applicata. Nel lavoro che segue presenteremo l'approccio alle _Psychological Humanieties_ che abbiamo sviluppato presso l’Università di Lubecca. Il nostro modello differenzia tra due prospettive fondamentali: uno sguardo esterno alla psicologia come disciplina e ai suoi contesti (per esempio attraverso la storia, gli studi culturali e l’etica) e uno sguardo interno alla psicologia (per esempio attraverso la psicologia teoretica, le psicologie critiche o l’epistemologia della psicologia). _Parole chiave_: Ricerca interdisciplinare; Soggettività; Epistemologia della psicologia; Psicologia applicata; Psychological Humanities. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss the work of W. E. B. Du Bois to expose the disastrous effects of white supremacy in the U.S. and the world. While his early works suggest that white supremacy might be rehabilitated by the careful presentation of contrary evidence, in later works he catalogs the primary features of whiteness, including an infantile comportment, a pathological attachment to innocence, and an epistemic incapacity to absorb evidence of its own error. To capture the scope of the (...) delusion of whiteness on Du Bois’s account, I suggest the term “irrevocable license.” The remainder of the paper uses Du Bois’s account to examine the case of a “Karen”—a white woman who obliviously and inappropriately interferes with the lawful actions of a family of color—and further considers police violence against people of color as an outgrowth of white irrevocable license. (shrink)

While the Internet has emerged as a significant resource for women negotiating the questions and circumstances that arise during conception, pregnancy and childbirth, it remains unclear what role the Internet plays in challenging the current biomedical paradigm and empowering women to make meaningful choices. This article explores how women use the Internet to manage their pregnancies and mediate their doctor–patient relationships, particularly examining the role of social class and personal health history in shaping such Internet use. Drawing from in-depth interviews (...) with white middle-class mothers, the findings show that rather than using technology to resist the dominant biomedical paradigm, most women turned to online resources that affirmed mainstream medical authority and continued to rely on their doctors. By providing the means to confirm normalcy and take control in their reproductive experiences, the Internet enables socially privileged women to more fully perform the informed patient role in order to demonstrate their competence as mothers. (shrink)

Lisa Bortolotti introduces the arguments about whether dogs can have beliefs.

Legal definitions of rape traditionally required proof of both force and nonconsent. Acknowledging the difficulty of demonstrating the conjunction of force and nonconsent, many feminists argue that rape should be defined based on one element or the other. Instead of debating which of these two best defines the crime of rape, I argue that this framework is problematic, and that both force and nonconsent must be situated in a critique of social power structures. Catharine MacKinnon provides such a critique, and (...) she reframes rape as a matter of gender inequality. However, rather than rejecting the force/nonconsent dichotomy, MacKinnon focuses exclusively on force, which she thinks can be reconceived to include inequalities. Considering the #MeToo movement and feminist efforts to use Title IX to address campus rape, I argue that the concept of consent is more flexible than MacKinnon suggests and that “affirmative consent” can challenge this liberal model. In requiring active communication, affirmative consent shifts responsibility for rape, opens space for women’s sexual agency, and allows for the transformation of rape culture. Thus, I argue that rape should be defined by the use of force, the lack of affirmative consent, or the presence of both elements. (shrink)

The implicit motivational needs for power, achievement, and affiliation are highly relevant in the context of sports. Sport enables people to experience achievement incentives like mastering challenges as well as social incentives such as recognition by teammates. Further, McClelland’s (1986) hypothesized that implicit motives are particularly associated right-hemisphere functions. Therefore, this preregistered study, conducted online, examines motivational needs using a standard picture-story exercise (PSE) and their associations with indicators of laterality, sports participation, and competition in gymnasts (N = 67). Further (...) it explores how implicit motives interact with suitable motivational incentives in the prediction of sports performance. Results partly confirm a link between indictors of cerebral rightward laterality and implicit motives, showing that the implicit affiliation and achievement motives are positively associated with an indicator of emotional-perceptional laterality (chimeric-faces task), but not with an indicator of motor laterality (turning bias). Moreover, the implicit achievement motive was positively correlated with training hours. The implicit affiliation motive was negatively associated with competition level. The presence of achievement incentives (perceived control, failure) and affiliation incentives (training together or alone) did not interact with corresponding motives to predict sports performance. (shrink)

Egg and sperm have, understandably, been the “stars” of mammalian fertilization biology, particularly because artificial reproductive technologies allow for fertilization to occur outside of the female reproductive tract without other apparent contributions from either sex. Yet, recent research, including an exciting new paper, reveals unexpected and important contributions of seminal plasma to fertility. For example, seminal plasma proteins play critical roles in modulating female reproductive physiology, and a new study in mice demonstrates that effects of some of these proteins on (...) the female can even affect the health of her progeny. Furthermore, although several actions of seminal plasma have been conserved across taxa, male accessory glands and their products are diverse – even among mammals. Taken together, these studies suggest that the actions of seminal plasma components are important to understand, and also to consider in future development of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) for humans, farm species and endangered species of mammals. (shrink)