In this new book, Marko Zlomislić argues that Slavoj Žižek's work does not contain any sort of radical emancipatory project, especially as it passes through the ideology of communism and Lacanian psychoanalysis. The evidence for the failure of communism is vast and includes the more than six hundred mass graves recently located in Žižek's homeland of Slovenia. Zlomislić demonstrates that the way out of the capitalist dilemma is not a repetition of communism but a return to the late medieval (...) notion of haecceity or "individual thisness" that was rejected by modernity. Haecceity, or the indescribable and indefinite here and now of the person, shows that the late medieval Franciscans were already "postmodernists." It is no wonder that the totalitarianism of the modernist Hegel is embraced by thinkers such as Žižek, Badiou, Hardt, Negri, and Laclau and was already rejected by Leibnitz, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Levinas, Deleuze, and Derrida. This important book shows that Žižek's work must be rejected because it does not uphold the dignity, worth, and uniqueness of the person. (shrink)

It has been argued that a biomarker-informed classification system for antisocial individuals has the potential to overcome many obstacles in current conceptualizations of forensic and psychiatric constructs and promises better targeted treatments. However, some have expressed ethical worries about the social impact of the use of biological information for classification. Many have discussed the ethical and legal issues related to possibilities of using biomarkers for predicting antisocial behaviour. We argue that prediction should not raise the most pressing ethical worries. Instead, (...) issues connected with ‘biologisation’, such as stigmatization and negative effects on self-image, need more consideration. However, we conclude that also in this respect there are no principled ethical objections against the use of biomarkers to guide classification and treatment of adult antisocial individuals. (shrink)

The article explores the specific conception of art developed by Danko Grlić, a prominent member of the Yugoslav Praxis School. Grlić conceptualised art beyond both aesthetic norms and technological determinism. Within the context of praxis philosophy, a distinct theory of the subject and a Marxist humanist approach, he reconceptualised art as a distinct type of praxis, a revolutionary and creative practice of changing existing living conditions. The article explains how his unique understanding of art leads Grlić to analyse, criticise and (...) refute various Marxist approaches to art: art as an ideology, art as a reflection of the objective world, art as sociological analysis. Moreover, while sharing many ideas and conceptions with Walter Benjamin’s materialist conception of art, Grlić reached the point where he became critical due to Benjamin’s belief in technology concerning processes of emancipation, which Grlić viewed with scepticism. (shrink)

This daily diary study examined the within-person coupling between four emotion regulation strategies and both subjective well-being and perceived stress in daily life of geriatric nurses. Participants ( N = 89) described how they regulated their emotions in terms of cognitive reappraisal and suppression. They also indicated their subjective well-being and level of perceived stress each day over 3 weeks. At the within-person level, cognitive reappraisal intended to increase positive emotions was positively associated with higher subjective well-being and negatively associated (...) with perceived stress. Suppression of the expression of positive emotions was negatively associated with subjective well-being and positively associated with perceived stress. However, cognitive reappraisal intended to down-regulate negative emotions and suppression as a strategy to inhibit the expression of negative emotions were not associated with daily well-being or perceived stress. Off-days were rated as days with higher subjective well-being and lower perceived stress in contrast to working days. At the between-person level, individuals who reported more daily negative affect reported increased suppression of positive emotions, corroborating the within-person findings. Moreover, findings indicated that nurses with more years of experience in the job reported higher subjective well-being and less perceived stress. These results provide insights into important daily emotional processes of geriatric nurses, both at workdays and in their leisure time. (shrink)

In this study, we examine the influence of senior leadership on firms’ corporate social responsibility. We integrate upper echelons research that has investigated either the influence of the CEO or the top management team on CSR. We contend that functional experience complementarity between CEOs and TMTs in formulating and implementing CSR strategy may underlie differentiated strategies in CSR. We find that when CEOs who have predominant experience in output functions are complemented by TMTs with a lower proportion of members who (...) have experience in output functions, there is a pronounced effect on the community, product, and diversity dimensions of CSR. In turn, when output-oriented CEOs are complemented by output-oriented TMTs, we observe an effect on the employee relations dimension of CSR. Interestingly, we find no influence of CEO-TMT complementarity on the environment dimension of CSR. In general, our empirical results support the relevance of the interaction between CEOs and their TMTs in defining their firms’ CSR profile. (shrink)

The 2-c debate between the Greek Apologists and the pagan Graeco-Roman tradition is multifaceted and complex. Common ground can be found in the mutual commitment to reason as a reflection of the Logos: Reason, or the rationality embedded in things. Logos, in this picture, is participated in through a performance of reasoning whose reliability is presupposed in the discourses of both debating parties—contextualized here as the presupposition that the deliverances and activity of reason are reliable for uncovering reality. Presuppositions are (...) starting points and driving principles of inquiry, here designated as first principles. One presuppositional conflict between 2-c Greek Apologists, taking the apologetic works of Justin, Theophilus, Athenagoras, and the author of the Epistle to Diognetus as a sample, and the pagan tradition, taking Celsus as its 2-c culmination, is over how to justify the commitment to reason’s reliability in the above sense. My claim in this paper is twofold: first, that the pagan position is unable in principle to demonstrate the reliability of its own reasoning and that all such inquiry is circular: it is always a further question for the pagan why reasoning reveals reality. I propose that what would count as an answer to this challenge is a metaphysical ‘fit’ between human embodiment and reality. And second, that the Apologists avoid this unhappy conclusion by committing themselves to the embodiment of Reason in Jesus—that the embodied act of human reasoning reveals reality because Reason itself is embodied in the same way. The upshot is that unless the pagan abandons his position, he is trapped in a circular epistemology and cannot encounter the Christian witness on its own terms. (shrink)

Effective and specifically targeted social and therapeutic responses for antisocial personality disorders and psychopathy are scarce. Some authors maintain that this scarcity should be overcome by revising current syndrome - based classifications of these conditions and devising better biocognitive classifications of antisocial individuals. The inspiration for the latter classifications has been embedded in the Research domain criteria approach (RDoC). RDoC - type approaches to psychiatric research aim at transforming diagnosis, provide valid measures of disorders, aid clinical practice, and improve health (...) outcomes by integrating the data on the genetic, neural, cognitive, and affective systems underlying psychiatric conditions. In the first part of the paper, we discuss the benefits of such approaches in comparison to the dominant syndrome-based ones and review recent attempts at building biocognitive classifications of antisocial individuals. Other researchers, how ever, have objected that biocognitive approaches in psychiatry are committed to an untenable form of explanatory. (shrink)

Die Untersuchung gliedert sich in drei durch eine Einführung und eine Schlussbetrachtung eingerahmte Hauptkapitel. Im ersten Hauptkapitel geht es um Kants Raum- und Zeitkonzeption in seiner vorkritischen Phase unter Berücksichtigung seiner Reaktion auf die zeitgenössische Kritik an seiner Konzeption von 1770. Dabei wird Kants komplexer Denkweg hin zu seiner Wende zum Verständnis von Raum und Zeit als reinen Anschauungen thematisiert. Hieran schließt sich im zweiten Hauptkapitel die Behandlung der prominenteren, systematisch ausgereiften Raum- und Zeitkonzeption in der Kritik der reinen Vernunft (...) an, wobei zunächst die unterschiedlichen Argumente aus der transzendentalen Ästhetik sukzessive und unter Einschluss der Forschungsliteratur diskutiert werden und Raum und Zeit als formale Anschauungen in der transzendentalen Analytik sowie als Ideen der Vernunft in der transzendentalen Dialektik zur Sprache kommen. Ein dritter Hauptteil widmet sich Kants Verständnis von Raum und Zeit in der Kritik der Urteilskraft, wo Kants Lehre neue Impulse erfährt und im Kontext der philosophischen Ästhetik, der Kultur sowie des Erhabenen relevant wird. Abschließend wird auf Kants schwieriges Nachlasswerk hinsichtlich der Themen Raum und Zeit eingegangen, das auf die Werke Fichtes und Schellings vorausweist. (shrink)

This paper discusses how an understanding of Jung's psychological types is important for the relevance of Gilbert's multi-modal argumentation theory. Moreover, it highlights how the types have been confirmed by contemporary neuroscience and cognitive psychology. Based on Gilbert's approach, I extend multi-modal argumentation to the area of legal argumentation. It seems that when we leave behind the traditional fortress of “logical” legal argumentation, we "discover" alternate modes that have always been present, concealed in the theoretically underestimated rhetorical skills of arguers.

In this essay, the author outlines his re-construction of Spinoza’s ontological monism by re-presenting the system of Ethica, ordine geometrico demonstrata , in an “intuitive” model of the Perfect Diamond, called NATURADEUS. So, for example, ordo et connexio idearum et rerum , is presented to the inner eye in the forms of two parallel structures, of rays and of facets within the NATURADEUS, respectively. The conceptual background of the proposed model is mostly analytic, the author essays to develop some ideas (...) of Jonathan Bennett’s Spinoza’s metaphysics (especially “transattributive mode identity”), with strong emphasis on ethical issues of ontological monism or pantheism. This essay is written as a dialogue between master Bruno and his student John (physically absent at the moment). More philosophical dialogues of this kind can be found on the author’s web page and in his book Four Seasons (in Slovenian, 2002). (shrink)

MIRJAM HORN, POSTMODERN PLAGIARISMS: CULTURAL AGENDA AND AESTHETIC STRATEGIES OF APPROPRIATION IN US-AMERICAN LITERATURE, WALTER DE GRUYTER, BERLIN/BOSTON, 2015.Marko Bogunović.

The harm usually associated with psychopathy requires therapeutically, legally, and ethically satisfactory solutions. Scholars from different fields have, thus, examined whether empirical evidence shows that individuals with psychopathic traits satisfy concepts, such as responsibility, mental disorder, or disability, that have specific legal or ethical implications. The present paper considers the less discussed issue of whether psychopathy is a disability. As it has been shown for the cases of the responsibility and mental disorder status of psychopathic individuals, we argue that it (...) is undecided whether psychopathy is a disability. Nonetheless, based on insights from disability studies and legislations, we propose that interventions to directly modify the propensities of individuals with psychopathic tendencies should be balanced with modifications of the social and physical environments to accommodate their peculiarities. We also suggest how this social approach in some practical contexts that involve non-offender populations might be effective in addressing some of the negative effects of psychopathy. (shrink)

In this article I discuss and evaluate the selectivity problem as a problem put forward by Bermudez (1997, 2000) against anti-intentionalist accounts of self-deception. I argue that the selectivity problem can be raised even against intentionalist accounts, which reveals the too demanding constraint that the problem puts on the adequacy of a psychological explanation of action. Finally I try to accommodate the intuitions that support the cogency of the selectivity problem using the resources from the framework provided by an anti-intentionalist (...) account of self-deception. (shrink)

Meaning is a central concept of (bio)semiotics. At the same time, it is also a word of everyday language. Here, on the example of the world information, we discuss the “reduction-inflation model” of evolution of a common word into a scientific concept, to return subsequently into everyday circulation with new connotations. Such may be, in the near future, also the fate of the word meaning if, flexed through objectified semantics, will become considered an objective concept usable in semiotics. We argue (...) that reducing meaning to a technical term essentially synonymous to code and stripped of most of the original semantic field is not a necessary prerequisite for a meaningful application of the concept in semiotics and in biology. (shrink)

The articles in this volume offer a fresh perspective on the important role of the concept of law (lex) in the moral and political philosophy of the 'School of Salamanca'.

The work tends to point out the deficiency of some opinions claiming simplified presentation of the promise as the act that directly rise obligation for the promisor. Promises, either in the moral or legal sphere, are based on communication and so form an order of dependent steps that indicates their procedural nature. These characteristics may differ to a lesser extent, depending on the legal systems, moral norms of the society and its technical level and its needs. In all these cases, (...) however, the procedural characteristics of promises, especially in conditional promises, as well as the promises in contractual relations, persists. In our analysis we wish to show that the consistent conception of promise has to take into account a step of acceptance. The outcome of this approach relativizes a strong distinction between promise and offer. (shrink)

This is a wide ranging and deeply learned examination of evolutionary developmental biology, and the foundations of life from the perspective of information theory. Hermeneutics was a method developed in the humanities to achieve understanding, in a given context, of texts, history, and artwork. In Readers of the Book of Life, the author shows that living beings are also hermeneutical interpreters of genetics texts saved in DNA; an interpretation based on the past experience of the cell (cell lineage, species), confronted (...) with and incorporating present environmental clues. This approach stresses the history, not only of the digital record saved in the DNA, but also of the flesh - the cellular organization which has a direct time-continuity with the very origins of life. This book is aimed at reconciling two opposite approaches to life. The first strictly sticking to a belief that all phenomena observed in the realm of the living can be explained from laws of physics. The opposite stressing the importance of features characteristic for a given level of description. To bring both views into a common understanding, the first part gives a comparison of the two problem solving strategies. The second part surveys the development of 20th century biology, bringing to light branches that never became part of the research mainstream. The third section of the book reviews a large body of recent evidence that can be interpreted in favor of the hermeneutic arguments. (shrink)

In their paper “Is psychopathy a mental disease?”, Thomas Nadelhoffer and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong argue that according to any plausible account of mental disorder, neural and psychological abnormalities correlated with psychopathy should be regarded as signs of a mental disorder. I oppose this conclusion by arguing that at least on a naturalistically grounded account, such as Wakefield’s ‘Harmful Dysfunction’ view, currently available empirical data and evolutionary considerations indicate that psychopathy is not a mental disorder.

The SynBioSecurity argument says that synthetic biology introduces new risks of intentional misuse of synthetic pathogens and that, therefore, there is a need for extra regulations and oversight. This paper provides an analysis of the argument, sets forth a new version of it, and identifies three developments that raise biosecurity risks compared to the situation earlier. The developments include a spread of the required know-how, improved availability of the techniques, instruments and biological parts, and new technical possibilities such as “resurrecting” (...) disappeared pathogens. It is first shown that the general argument from SynBioSecurity needs to be qualified and that many improvements to biosecurity have already been implemented, most notably in the United States. Second, I suggest a new strain of the argument: the situation that most branches of synthetic biology fall under the gene technology regulation in the European Union and that this regulation in its current form does not adequately address SynBioSecurity risks together provide a weighty reason to review and possibly refine the legislation as well as the supervisory practices. Ethically speaking, the rise in the relative risk of bioterrorism brings to the fore new extrinsic issues. (shrink)

Healthcare professionals working in intensive care units are often involved in end-of-life decision-making. No research has been done so far about these processes taking place in Croatian ICUs. The aim of this study was to investigate the perceptions, experiences, and challenges healthcare professionals face when dealing with end-of-life decisions in ICUs in Croatia. A qualitative study was performed using professionally homogenous focus groups of ICU nurses and physicians of diverse professional and clinical backgrounds at three research sites. In total, six (...) institutions at the tertiary level of healthcare were included. The constant comparative analysis method was used in the analysis of the data. Differences were found between the perceptions and experiences of nurses and physicians in relation to end-of-life decisions. Nurses’ perceptions were more focused on the context and features of immediate care, while physicians’ perceptions also included the wider sociocultural context. However, the critical issues these specific professional groups face when dealing with end-of-life decisions seem to overlap. A high variability of practices, both between individual practitioners and between different organizational units, was omnipresent. The lack of adequate legal, professional, and clinical guidelines was commonly expressed as one of the most critical source of difficulties. (shrink)

The recurring claim that the construct of psychopathy is value laden often is not qualified in enough detail. The chapters in this part of the volume, instead, investigate in depth the role and significance of values in different aspects of the construct of psychopathy. Following these chapters, but also by offering a background to them, we show how certain values are involved in the characterisation of psychopathy, inform societal needs satisfied by this construct, and have a central role in determining (...) whether psychopathy is a mental disorder. Moreover, we relate this description to our criticism of the view that the entrenchment of the notion of psychopathy with values in principle renders it irreconcilable with sound psychiatric theory and practice. However, we also recognize that the value-ladenness of psychopathy leaves open other important challenges. Meeting them needs addressing interdisciplinary interrelated issues that have empirical, normative, and theoretical dimensions. (shrink)

In Posterior Analytics 1.3, Aristotle advances three arguments against circular proof. The third argument relies on his discussion of circular proof in Prior Analytics 2.5. This is problematic because the two chapters seem to deal with two rather disparate conceptions of circular proof. In Posterior Analytics 1.3, Aristotle gives a purely propositional account of circular proof, whereas in Prior Analytics 2.5 he gives a more complex, syllogistic account. My aim is to show that these problems can be solved, and that (...) Aristotle’s third argument in 1.3 is successful. I argue that both chapters are concerned with the same conception of circular proof, namely the propositional one. Contrary to what is often thought, the syllogistic conception provides an adequate analysis of the internal deductive structure of the propositional one. Aristotle achieves this by employing a kind of multiple-conclusion logic. (shrink)

This paper considers the question of whether the influential distinction between levels of explanation introduced by David Marr can be used as a general framework for contemplating levels of explanation in cognitive sciences. Marr introduced three levels at which we can explain cognitive processes: the computational, algorithmic, and implementational levels. Some argue that Marr’s levels of explanation can only be applied to modular cognitive systems. However, since many psychological processes are non-modular, it seems that Marr’s levels of explanation cannot explain (...) such psychological processes. To show that the latter claim is not convincing, the paper draws upon an influential paradigm from cognitive sciences that is based on the principle of free energy. Based on this paradigm, the paper argues that even non-modular psychological processes can be computationally analyzed and algorithmically implemented. The conclusion of the paper is that, at least under the assumption that the func- tion of the mind is to minimize free energy, Marr’s levels of explanation can be successfully used as a general framework for understanding psychological processes at different levels of description. (shrink)

Famously, David Lewis argued that we can avoid the apparent paradoxes of time travel by introducing a notion of personal time, which by and large follows the causal flow of the time traveler's life history. This paper argues that a related approach can be adapted for use by three-dimensionalists in response to Ted Sider's claim that three-dimensionalism is inconsistent with time travel. In contrast to Lewis (and others who follow him on this point), however, this paper argues that the order (...) of events captured by so-called "personal time" should be thought of as causal, rather than temporal. (shrink)

Śaiva Rites of Expiation: A First Edition and Translation of Trilocanaśiva’s Twelfth-Century Prāyaścittasamuccaya. Edited and translated by R. Sathyanarayanan, with an introduction by Dominic Goddall. Collection Indologie, vol. 127. Pondicherry: Institut Française de Pondichéry; École Française d’Extrême Orient, 2015. Pp. 651.

In this paper, we present a method for introducing law students to the writing of legal documents. The method uses a machine-readable representation of the legal knowledge to support document assembly and to help the students to understand how the assembly is performed. The knowledge base consists of enacted legislation, document templates, and assembly instructions. We propose a system called LEDAS (LEgal Document Assembly System) for the interactive assembly of legal documents. It guides users through the assembly process and provides (...) explanations of the interconnection between input data and claims stated in the document. The system acts as a platform for practicing drafting skills and has great potential as an education tool. It allows teachers to configure the system for the assembly of some particular type of legal document and then enables students to draft the documents by investigating which information is relevant for these documents and how the input data shape the final document. The generated legal document is complemented by a graphical representation of legal arguments expressed in the document. The system is based on existing legal standards to facilitate its introduction in the legal domain. Applicability of the system in the education of future lawyers is positively evaluated by the group of law students and their TA. (shrink)

According to the so-called ‘Taking Condition’ (a label due to Boghossian 2014) on inference, for a response R in circumstances C to count as an instance of reasoning or inferring, it must be the case that the agent’s taking it that R is warranted or justified in C plays (the right sort of) explanatory role in her R-ing. The Taking Condition has come under much criticism in the theory of reasoning. While I believe that these criticisms can be answered, my (...) aim in this paper is to build a positive case for the Taking Condition. More specifically, I argue that views based on the Taking Condition do a much better job accounting for crucial features of reasoning—especially once we recognize the pervasiveness and significance of defeasibility in our reasoning. (shrink)

This textbook offers the first unified treatment of wave propagation in electronic and electromagnetic systems and introduces readers to the essentials of the transfer matrix method, a powerful analytical tool that can be used to model and study an array of problems pertaining to wave propagation in electrons and photons. It is aimed at graduate and advanced undergraduate students in physics, materials science, electrical and computer engineering, and mathematics, and is ideal for researchers in photonic crystals, negative index materials, left-handed (...) materials, plasmonics, nonlinear effects, and optics. Peter Markos and Costas Soukoulis begin by establishing the analogy between wave propagation in electronic systems and electromagnetic media and then show how the transfer matrix can be easily applied to any type of wave propagation, such as electromagnetic, acoustic, and elastic waves. The transfer matrix approach of the tight-binding model allows readers to understand its implementation quickly and all the concepts of solid-state physics are clearly introduced. Markos and Soukoulis then build the discussion of such topics as random systems and localized and delocalized modes around the transfer matrix, bringing remarkable clarity to the subject. Total internal reflection, Brewster angles, evanescent waves, surface waves, and resonant tunneling in left-handed materials are introduced and treated in detail, as are important new developments like photonic crystals, negative index materials, and surface plasmons. Problem sets aid students working through the subject for the first time. (shrink)

Psychopathy, executive functions, and neuropsychological data: a response to Sifferd and Hirstein.

In this paper, I develop an epistemological argument for freedom from poverty, building on Gerald Gaus’ work on political and moral disagreement in New Diversity Theory (NDT). NDT argues that diversity and disagreement are fundamental to political and moral learning. In this paper, I address Gaus’ central arguments in NDT, and focus on what I argue to be the key epistemological distinction of his account—namely, the argument that the relevant diversity, which is conducive to political and moral learning and should (...) therefore be protected by an institutional order, should not be defended or defined by reference to its performance with regards to discovery of true beliefs, but by reference to the independent epistemic value of protection of disagreeing, redundant and distant investigators. I develop a restatement of this argument from the perspective of institutional epistemology, and show that (along with constitutional liberties, polycentric self-governance and markets) freedom from poverty must be considered an institutional “device” conducive to such a conception of diversity. While Gaus rejects redistributive policies at the level of an institutional order, it is precisely his account of the epistemic powers of diversity and disagreement which provides the strongest defense of minimal redistribution. (shrink)

According to current orthodoxy in the philosophy of action, intentional actions consist in intrinsically mindless bodily movements that stand in causal relations to appropriate mental states. This paper challenges this approach to intentional action, by arguing that there are not enough appropriate mental states around to ‘animate’ all of the bodily movements we intuitively count as intentional actions. In the alternative picture I suggest, the bodily movements that constitute our intentional actions are themselves to be thought of as cognitive events, (...) embodying our grasp of ways of acting. (shrink)

We prove, by a probabilistic argument, that a class of ω-categorical structures, on which algebraic closure defines a pregeometry, has the finite submodel property. This class includes any expansion of a pure set or of a vector space, projective space or affine space over a finite field such that the new relations are sufficiently independent of each other and over the original structure. In particular, the random graph belongs to this class, since it is a sufficiently independent expansion of an (...) infinite set, with no structure. The class also contains structures for which the pregeometry given by algebraic closure is non-trivial. (shrink)