Introduction Financial incentive schemes have been commonly used by the hearing aid industry as a way of encouraging device sales. These schemes can lead to a conflict of interest as the hearing device dispenser is torn between personal reward over the best interests of their client. This conflict of interest has the potential for the dispenser to develop “moral distress”, a negative state of mind when an individual’s ethical values contrast with those of the employing organization. The purpose of this (...) study was to investigate if there was a relationship between financial incentives and moral distress in Australian audiologists and audiometrists. Methods An online survey was distributed to all members of Audiology Australia and the Australian College of Audiology via email. Participants rated their perceived moral distress from 0 to 10 on the Moral Distress Thermometer and answered four questions about financial incentives in their respective workplace. Results A total of 65 participants, 42 females and 23 males, completed the online survey. A quarter of participants rated their moral distress corresponding to levels of uncomfortable or above. A statistically significant association was found between financial incentives, sales target setting, and higher perceived moral distress in participants. Conclusions For our sample, the implementation of financial incentives created ethical challenges for practicing audiologists and audiometrists. Modifications to employee rewards programs as well as a regulation of device sales are recommended. (shrink)

Many of us think that ordinary objects – such as tables and chairs – exist. We also think that ordinary objects have parts: my chair has a seat and some legs as parts, for example. But once we are committed to the (seemingly innocuous) thesis that ordinary objects are composed of parts, we then open ourselves up to a whole host of philosophical problems, most of which center on what exactly the composition relation is. Composition as Identity (CI) is the (...) view that the composition relation is the identity relation. While such a view has some advantages, there are many arguments against it. In this essay, I will briefly canvass three different varieties of Composition as Identity, and suggest why one of them should be preferred over the others. Then I will outline several versions of the most common objection against CI. I will suggest how a CI theorist can respond to these charges by maintaining that some of the arguments are invalid. (In part 2, I show how a CI theorist can maintain that the remaining arguments, while valid, are unsound). (shrink)

Many of us think that ordinary objects – such as tables and chairs – exist. We also think that ordinary objects have parts: my chair has a seat and some legs as parts, for example. But once we are committed to the (seemingly innocuous) thesis that ordinary objects are composed of parts, we then open ourselves up to a whole host of philosophical problems, most of which center on what exactly this composition relation is. Composition as Identity (CI) is the (...) view that the composition relation is the identity relation. While such a view has some advantages, there are many arguments against it. In this essay, I discuss several versions of the most common objection against CI, and show how the CI theorist can maintain that these arguments – contrary their initial intuitive appeal – are nonetheless unsound. (shrink)

Wallace, Meg Review of: Muslim women reformers: Inspiring voices against oppression, by ida Lichter, Prometheus Books 2009.

It has been argued by some that the argument from vagueness is one of the strongest arguments in favor of the theory of temporal parts. I will neither support nor dispute this claim here. Rather, I will present a version of the argument from vagueness, which – if successful – commits one to the existence of modal parts. I argue that a commitment to the soundness of the argument from vagueness for temporal parts compels one to commit to the soundness (...) of the argument from vagueness for modal parts. I say compels, but not entails; an objection to one of the arguments highlights analogous ways to reject the other, making it difficult to endorse one and reject the other. This would be a significant conclusion, if true, since there are far fewer who currently commit themselves to modal parts than the many who currently commit themselves to temporal parts. (shrink)

Hardcover reprint of the original 1921 edition - beautifully bound in brown cloth covers featuring titles stamped in gold, 8vo - 6x9. No adjustments have been made to the original text, giving readers the full antiquarian experience. For quality purposes, all text and images are printed as black and white. This item is printed on demand. Book Information: Fawcett, E. Douglas (Edward Douglas). Divine Imagining; An Essay On The First Principles Of Philosophy, Being A Continuation Of The Experiment Which (...) Took Shape First In The World As Imagination (No. 2 Of The World As Imagination Series). Indiana: Repressed Publishing LLC, 2012. Original Publishing: Fawcett, E. Douglas (Edward Douglas). Divine Imagining; An Essay On The First Principles Of Philosophy, Being A Continuation Of The Experiment Which Took Shape First In The World As Imagination (No. 2 Of The World As Imagination Series),. London: Macmillan And Co., Limited, 1921. Subject: Metaphysics. (shrink)

To be successful, policy must anticipate a broad range of constituents. Yet, all too often, technology policy is written with primarily mainstream populations in mind. In this article, drawing on Value Sensitive Design and discount evaluation methods, we introduce a new method—Diverse Voices—for strengthening pre-publication technology policy documents from the perspective of underrepresented groups. Cost effective and high impact, the Diverse Voices method intervenes by soliciting input from “experiential” expert panels. We first describe the method. Then we report on two (...) case studies demonstrating its use: one with a white paper on augmented reality technology with expert panels on people with disabilities, people who were formerly or currently incarcerated, and women; and the other with a strategy document on automated driving vehicle technologies with expert panels on youth, non-car drivers, and extremely low-income people. In both case studies, panels identified significant shortcomings in the pre-publication documents which, if addressed, would mitigate some of the disparate impact of the proposed policy recommendations on these particular stakeholder groups. Our discussion includes reflection on the method, evidence for its success, its limitations, and future directions. (shrink)

Paul, Meg Review(s) of: The testimony, by Halina Wagowska, Hardie Grant 2012 $24.95.

Wallace, Meg Secular education for all children is a human right. Public education must be free, secular and compulsory in all Australian states except Queensland, so it is a legal right in those states. Nevertheless, federal and state governments are funding and assisting religious instruction in public schools, and children are placed in these classes, subjected to religious persuasion and practices, even when parents specify their child is not to attend. Let me tell you about one parent who is challenging (...) these practices. (shrink)

Wallace, Meg A Northern Ireland Court recently held that a baker's refusal to provide a cake with same-sex decoration is discrimination. Here are the reasons why the judgment is right.

I argue that our current understanding of the philosophical dimensions of environmental injustice neglects an important component of those injustices. Specifically, by focusing on distributive, participatory and recognitional injustice, we fail to respond to the ways that environmental exposures, even in the absence of physiological harms, can impact upon a person's experience of herself as a political agent. This has important implications for interventions in cases of environmental injustice, but also for how we understand what is required for full participation (...) in a polity. (shrink)

Some claim that Composition as Identity (CI) entails Mereological Essentialism (ME). If this is right, then we have an effective modus tollens against CI: ME is clearly false, so CI is, too. Rather than deny the conditional, I will argue that a CI theorist should embrace ME. I endorse a theory of modal parts such that ordinary objects are spatially, temporally, and modally extended. Accepting modal parts is certainly beneficial to CI theorists, but it also provides elegant solutions to the (...) traditional puzzles of constitution, making it a competitive move in its own right. (shrink)

There is an uneasy tension between our ordinary talk about beliefs and desires and the ontological facts supported by neuroscience. Arguments for eliminative materialism can be fairly persuasive, yet error theory about folk psychological discourse may be unacceptable. One solution is to accept mental fictionalism: the view that we are (or should be) fictionalists about mentality. My aim in this paper is to explore mental fictionalism as a viable theoretical option, and to show that it has advantages over other fictionalist (...) views in the literature, as well as advantages over other theories of mind. However, mental fictionalism faces particular objections that do not plague other fictionalist accounts, nor other theories of the mind. These objections may provide some explanation as to why mental fictionalism has not (until recently) gained much traction in the literature. I end with some suggestions on how the mental fictionalist can address these objections, hopefully paving the way for further development of mental fictionalism as a live philosophical position in philosophy of mind. -/- . (shrink)

Despite the substantial research into the peculiar political and legal status of climate migrants, there is comparatively little exploration of the particular forms of loss such migrants might face or how efforts might mitigate such loss. This paper aims to begin filling that void by characterizing such loss, using the framework of the UNFCC’s Warsaw Mechanism, as agential harm. Using existing models for thinking about the preservation of values and links with the past, I aim to use this idea of (...) a threat to agency to discuss how migration could occur to better preserve the agential control of displaced populations. (shrink)

The Odd Universe Argument aims to show that from four intuitive assumptions about parts and wholes, we can conclude a priori that there is an odd number of things in the universe. This Element is an opinionated survey of philosophical issues involving parthood, composition, identity, and counting, guided by an investigation into where this argument has gone awry. We first walk through some general methodology, basic mereology, and plural logic. Next, we explore questions about the nature of composition and decomposition. (...) Does composition always occur? Never? Sometimes? Is the universe, at rock bottom, just many partless bits (simples)? Or do the parts have parts all the way down (gunk)? We then turn to arguments for and against the thesis that composition is identity, with a healthy bias in its favor. We conclude with a return to the odd universe argument, and my thoughts on how best to solve it. -/- *Free to download June 7 to June 21, 2023. (shrink)

While many aspects of human life are vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, values related to selfhood and community are among the most challenging to preserve. In what follows, I focus on the importance of values and valuing in climate change adaptation. To do so, I will first discuss two alternate approaches to valuing, both of which fail to recognise the loss of valued objects and practices that both of which help to generate a sense of self and deserve (...) to be respected and mourned. Ultimately, I argue that an approach to valuing that is responsive to change and open to loss will enable humans to be more resilient in the face of anthropogenic climate change, in order that we may move forward and construct selves that fit the context in which we live. (shrink)

Most ordinary folks think that there are ordinary objects such as trees and frogs. They do not think there are extraordinary objects such as the mereological sum of trees and frogs, as the permissivist does. Nor do they deny the existence of ordinary composite objects such as tables, as the eliminativist does. In his recent book, Objects: Nothing Out of the Ordinary, Korman positions himself alongside ordinary folk. He deftly defends the common sense view of ordinary objects, and argues against (...) the permissivist and eliminativist. One of the ways he does this is by launching what he calls ‘arguments from counterexample’. In this paper, I focus on the dialectical effectiveness of such arguments generally. I discuss whether and how we might sometimes be justified in using arguments from counterexample and commonsense in philosophical debate, even if they appear to be (or are) question-begging. I conclude that, given some of Korman’s other commitments, there is little reason for his opponents to take his arguments from counterexample seriously. (shrink)

Wallace, Meg Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides for 'freedom of religion and belief'. Don't get me wrong, it is an essential part of a democratic society that people can adopt and practice a religious or other life-stance belief of their choice. My concern is that, as it stands, Article 18 fosters the privileging of religious beliefs, hindering the equal right of others to exercise the same right. We can see the tyranny of forcing religion on (...) people by extremists in other countries, but even in liberal democracies, government involvement in religion is ubiquitous. (shrink)

Wallace, Meg The words we use in everyday language are loaded with images and emotion. Words can be used to deliberately manipulate language to 'frame' ideas to fit vested interests. When a term is used often enough in this way, the emotional connotations become part of how people conceive a particular set of facts. George Lakoff explains the politically motivated use of framing in his book 'Don't think of an Elephant'.

An emerging body of research comparing body image disturbance and eating problems among African American and white women suggests that there are major ethnic differences in these areas. African American women appear to be more satisfied with their weight and appearance than are white women, and they are less likely to engage in unhealthy weight control practices, yet they are more likely to have high rates of obesity. Drawing on both Black and white feminist literature on eating problems, this article (...) advances three arguments that may account for these differences: Black women may develop a strong positive self-valuation and an alternative beauty aesthetic to resist societal stigmatization, Black women may be less likely to acquire eating disorders due to differences in the cultural construction of femininity in Black communities, and positive body image among Black women may sometimes reflect a defensive need to deny health problems such as compulsive overeating and obesity. (shrink)

A lump theorist claims that ordinary objects are spread out across possible worlds, much like many of us think that tables are spread out across space. We are not wholly located in any one particular world, the lump theorist claims, just as we are not wholly spatially located where one’s hand is. We are modally spread out, a trans-world mereological sum of world-bound parts. We are lump sums of modal parts. And so are all other ordinary objects. In this paper, (...) I explore lump theory and investigate five arguments against it. These arguments may be the primary reasons why lump theory has not been widely accepted––or extensively explored––until now. I maintain that these arguments can be answered, and moreover, that accepting lump theory has distinct advantages, making it a competitive view in its own right. (shrink)

In this article, I raise an interpretive problem presented by Nietzsche's adulatory attitude toward Epicurus during his middle period. I make the case that Epicurus' ethics is in several major respects identical to that of Schopenhauer. This is problematic for interpreters of Nietzsche insofar as Schopenhauer's ethics provides the main grounds for Nietzsche's emphatic rejection of him as a life-denying ascetic. How is it then, I ask, that the middle Nietzsche felt he was able to embrace Epicurus? I argue that (...) the difference between Nietzsche's appraisals of Epicurus and Schopenhauer can be accounted for in terms of the difference in their respective responses to suffering in general and psychological conflict in particular. (shrink)

J.M. Coetzee has unquestionably achieved the status of ‘international author’ within dominant conceptions of world literature: his works circulate widely in both English and translation and have been legitimated by the principal arbitrators of the global cultural industry. He has, however, recently positioned himself as ‘an international author, but in a different sense’; that is, as a writer whose internationalism is achieved through his location in ‘the South’. This article considers how Coetzee’s narratives thematize being ‘international’ in this ‘different sense’. (...) It focuses on the pivotal works of Youth: Scenes from Provincial Life (2002) and the opening chapters of Elizabeth Costello: Eight Lessons (2003) while tracking an orientation southward across his oeuvre in allusions to Joseph Conrad, Jorge Luis Borges and, in particular, Pablo Neruda as well as in Coetzee’s repeated turn to littoral settings. These settings open to what the article describes as the ‘blue southern hemisphere’, implicating narrative world-making in the geophysical properties and ‘troubled histories’ that constitute the South and recasting the act of writing from ‘the far edges’ into a planetary perspective that contends with the uncanny nature of settler societies in the southern temperate zone. (shrink)

Most men experience from time to time a wish to know something about the character of the larger reality in which they live, move, and have their being; something much more fundamental than any department of research classed as “scientific” can provide. And the most incurably practical of us has good reason for cherishing this wish. Metaphysics, i.e. inquiry into the general nature of reality, makes appeal first to the contemplative student interested in knowledge for its own sake, but it (...) has a very noteworthy practical side as well. Few, like Earl Russell, can build the soul”s habitation on a “foundation of unyielding despair”; very many will not take life seriously unless its value, which must be lasting, is high. The problems stated by pessimism have to be solved; our burdens must be shown to be worth taking up strenuously. Religious consolations, once potent, are losing their force, and the danger of social decay has therefore to be countered. Let man suspect seriously that he is a day-fly, flitting about futilely a short while ere it perishes, and, whatever a few wild optimists may counsel, his big battalions are lost to progress. The East is right. (shrink)

The sharp polarisation of left and right is commonly dwelt on as the big political handicap of our times. Angry divisions on the right itself get less attention. Conservatism fills that gap. Across Europe and the US, a liberal right is at war with an illiberal right. As the leading force in politics, it is vital to understand the roots of the right's struggle with itself, how it stands and how it is likely to come out. From its early 19th-century (...) origins to now, conservatism never finally settled on how far to compromise with liberalism, democracy and the capitalist world out of which both grew. By the late 19th century, the mainstream right had come to terms with all three. Its reward was lasting success in the next century and beyond. On the political fringes and among ethical-cultural critics, a recalcitrant right, unreconciled to liberal democracy, never died. Resistance to liberal democracy is seen today in the hard right, a strange but potent alliance of hyper-liberal globalists and anti-liberal localists. Conservatism focuses on an exemplary core of France, Britain, Germany and the United States. It describes the parties, politicians and thinkers of the right, bringing out strengths and weaknesses in conservative thought. An appendix includes definitions of leading terms, a brief account of conservatism's philosophical origins and mini-lives of more than 200 conservatives. Historical and topical, neither celebration nor caricature, Conservatism is a unique, panoramic survey of the Western world's dominant political tradition. (shrink)

This article critically examines the origins and evolution of China’s unique land institutions and situates land policy in the larger context of China’s reforms and pursuit of economic growth. It argues that the Chinese Communist Party has strengthened the institutions that permit land expropriation—namely, urban/rural dualism, decentralized land ownership, and hierarchical land management—in order to use land as a key instrument of macroeconomic regulation, helping the CCP respond to domestic and international economic trends and manage expansion and contraction. Key episodes (...) of macroeconomic policymaking are analyzed, with the use of local and central documents, to show how the CCP relied on the manipulation and distribution of the national land supply either to stimulate economic growth or to rein in an overheating economy. China’s land institutions, therefore, share “complementarities” with fiscal and financial institutions and benefit powerful political actors while imposing costs on marginal ones. (shrink)

A drug overdose epidemic in North America has sped the expansion of harm reduction services. Drawing on fieldwork in Ottawa, Ontario, we examine forms of care among people offering and accessing these resources. Notably, our interlocutors do not always characterize harm reduction as caring for oneself. Thus, we differentiate between the ethics of care through which one enters desired subject positions, and anethical careful practices. Harm reduction is sometimes anethical, enacted through minor gestures that do not constitute ethical work but (...) allow for its future realization. Une épidémie d’overdose de drogue en Amérique du Nord a accéléré l’expansion des services de réduction des risques. En s’appuyant sur un travail de terrain à Ottawa, Ontario, nous examinons les formes de souci et soin parmi les personnes qui fournissent ces ressources et qui y ont accès. Tout particulièrement, nos interlocuteurs ne caractérisent pas toujours la réduction des risques comme le souci de soi. Ainsi, nous faisons la différence entre l’éthique du souci de soi et des soins par laquelle on entre dans les positions de sujets souhaitées, et les pratiques soignantes anéthiques. La réduction des risques est parfois anéthique, mise en œuvre par des gestes mineurs qui ne constituent pas un travail éthique mais permettent sa réalisation future. (shrink)

Though the federal government covers much of the cost of counterterrorism instruction, it has surprisingly little control over who is chosen to conduct the training. Structural problems abound. There is no unified system of expert evaluation or regulatory authority to impose quality control. The Tenth Amendment, which states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people,” has been interpreted to mean (...) that police powers, and officer training, are the preserve of the states. By design, state and local law enforcement is not the responsibility of the federal government, and neither is officer training. While the Department of Homeland Security offers certification, this only means that approved courses are eligible for DHS funds. If the course is paid for by other means—by a regional source, or by another federal department—DHS accreditation isn’t necessarily required. Even DHS money, once received by a state or local police department, can often be used for trainers without DHS accreditation. (shrink)

Wallace, Meg London's National Theatre recently hosted a debate about freedom of speech, multiculturalism and Islam called Can we talk about this? The opening line was a question to the audience, 'Are you morally superior to the Taliban?' Anne Marie Waters, who was present, wrote in her blog that 'very few people in the audience raised their hand to say they were.' This response demonstrates a misconceived attempt to be seen as tolerant and 'multiculturalist'. People could not bring themselves to (...) say their views are morally superior to a group that, Waters points out, 'denies women medical treatment, imprisons them in their homes, allows domestic violence, and executes people by stoning for having a private life or the audacity to not believe in God.' They fear being labelled, racist, 'Islamophobic', or discriminating against religion. Rather, they adopt a stance that treats all moral views generated by culture or religion as equally valid . They confuse the distinction between the right to think as you want, and the right to act as you want. (shrink)

Wallace, Meg Once again, Fiji church leaders have raised objections to the establishment of a secular state based on erroneous representations of what secularism means - this time in Fiji. In what seems to be the first salvo in an election campaign leading up to the 2014 elections there, senior Catholic and Protestant clerics have come out against provisions in the recently adopted Constitution that declares Fiji a secular state, in which religion is deemed 'personal'. It was reported in the (...) Fiji News 7 December 2013 that 'the Catholic and Methodist Church do not think Fiji is ready for a secular state', declaring that religion is not a personal, but a public matter. (shrink)

The Normal and the Pathological is one of the crucial contributions to the history of science in the last half century. It takes as its starting point the sudden appearance of biology as a science in the 19th-century and examines the conditions determining its particular makeup.Canguilhem analyzes the radically new way in which health and disease were defined in the early 19th-century, showing that the emerging categories of the normal and the pathological were far from being objective scientific concepts. He (...) demonstrates how the epistemological foundations of modern biology and medicine were intertwined with political, economic, and technological imperatives.Canguilhem was an important influence on the thought of Michel Foucault and Louis Althusser, in particular for the way in which he poses the problem of how new domains of knowledge come into being and how they are part of a discontinuous history of human thought. (shrink)

As organizations take on grand challenges in gender equality, anti-racism, LGBTQ+ protections and workplace inclusion, many well-intentioned individuals from dominant groups (e.g., cisgender men, Caucasian, heterosexual) are stepping forward as allies toward underrepresented or marginalized group members (e.g., cisgender women, People of Color, LGBTQ+ identified employees). Past research and guidance assume an inevitable need for external motivation, reflected in the ‘business case’ for diversity and in top-down policies to drive equity and inclusion efforts. This qualitative study explored _internal_ motivations in (...) the form of morally motivated virtues of 25 peer-nominated exemplary allies serving in leadership positions. In-depth life/career story interviews were used to identify the virtues that supported their allyship journeys. Findings demonstrated that they tapped into several virtues that served distinct functions in a 4-stage allyship development process: Stage 1—Energizing psychological investment (compassion, fairness); Stage 2—Thinking through allyship-relevant complexities (intellectual humility, perspective-taking, wisdom); Stage 3—Initiating action (prudence, moral courage, honesty); Stage 4—Committing to allyship (perseverance, patience). We call this the ‘EThIC model of virtue-based allyship development.’ This study has implications for theory and research on a virtue-based approach to diversity, equity and inclusion. (shrink)

A number of the men who would become the 9/11 hijackers were stopped for minor traffic violations. They were pulled over by police officers for speeding or caught by random inspection without a driver’s license. For United States government commissions and the press, these brushes with the law were missed opportunities. For some police officers though, they were of personal and professional significance. These officers replayed the incidents of contact with the 19 men, which lay bare the uncertainty of every (...) encounter, whether a traffic stop, or with someone taking photos of a landmark. Representatives from law enforcement began to design policies to include local police in national intelligence, with the idea of capitalizing on what patrol officers already do in dealing with the general public. Several initiatives were launched, among these, the Suspicious Activity Reporting Initiative. Routine reporting of suspicious activity was developed into steps for gathering, assessing and sharing terrorism-related information with a larger law enforcement and intelligence network. Through empirical analysis of counterterrorism efforts and recent scholarship on it, this chapter discusses prevention, preemption, and anticipation as three technologies of security, focusing on how each deals with uncertainty. The Suspicious Activity Reporting Initiative, this analysis suggests, is an anticipatory technology which constitutes police officers and intelligence analysts as subjects who work in a mode of uncertainty. (shrink)