What enables individually simple insects like ants to act with such precision and purpose as a group? How do trillions of individual neurons produce something as extraordinarily complex as consciousness? What is it that guides self-organizing structures like the immune system, the World Wide Web, the global economy, and the human genome? These are just a few of the fascinating and elusive questions that the science of complexity seeks to answer. In this remarkably accessible and companionable book, leading complex systems (...) scientist Melanie Mitchell provides an intimate, detailed tour of the sciences of complexity, a broad set of efforts that seek to explain how large-scale complex, organized, and adaptive behavior can emerge from simple interactions among myriad individuals. Comprehending such systems requires a wholly new approach, one that goes beyond traditional scientific reductionism and that re-maps long-standing disciplinary boundaries. Based on her work at the Santa Fe Institute and drawing on its interdisciplinary strategies, Mitchell brings clarity to the workings of complexity across a broad range of biological, technological, and social phenomena, seeking out the general principles or laws that apply to all of them. She explores as well the relationship between complexity and evolution, artificial intelligence, computation, genetics, information processing, and many other fields. Richly illustrated and vividly written, Complexity : A Guided Tour offers a comprehensive and eminently comprehensible overview of the ideas underlying complex systems science, the current research at the forefront of this field, and the prospects for the field's contribution to solving some of the most important scientific questions of our time. (shrink)

This paper examines six cross-sector partnerships in South Africa and Zambia. These partnerships were part of a research study undertaken between 2003 and 2005 and were selected because of their potential to contribute to poverty reduction in their respective countries. This paper examines the context in which the partnerships were established, their governance and accountability mechanisms and the engagement and participation of the partners and the intended beneficiaries in the partnerships. We argue that a partnership approach which has proven successful (...) in one context can be used as a valuable learning resource. However, a partnership's work, which includes all aspects of the partnership and its activities, cannot necessarily be transferred directly to another partnership without a thorough and locally informed analysis of the context in which it is implemented. In addition, we suggest that it is difficult to assess whether the good intentions behind partnerships were translated into real benefits for target groups as effective monitoring and evaluation procedures were not in place in the partnerships studied. Similarly, the absence of regularised governance and accountability systems in partnerships made it difficult to support partner and beneficiary participation and engagement. We conclude that there is a need to move beyond a 'one-size-fits-all' approach to partnerships and that partnership replication should focus more strongly on the transfer of learning about partnership processes instead of simply copying partnership activities. Moreover, the development of stronger mechanisms for assessing and ensuring accountability towards both partners and intended beneficiaries is required if partnerships are to meet their intended objectives. (shrink)

Ce texte est écrit à quatre mains : Tamara Dmitrieva est sociologue, spécialiste de l’enfance sourde, qui s’est découverte comme entendante par la rencontre avec des sourd·e·s, et Mélanie Joseph, artiste-chercheuse, sourde signante et implantée, vivant avec le trouble dans sa lutte d’éloignement de la doctrine oraliste. Cet article donne à voir des perspectives de leurs recherches respectives qui s’y entrelacent, en créant un espace de réflexion sur la condition sourde et les possibilités de faire exister les diversités dans la (...) société de demain, selon les perspectives sourdiennes. (shrink)

Our eyes, bodies, and perspectives are constantly shifting as we observe the world. Despite this, we are very good at distinguishing between self-caused visual changes and changes in the environment: the world appears mostly stable despite our visual field moving around. This, it seems, also occurs when we are dreaming. As we visually investigate the dream environment, we track moving objects with our dream eyes, examine objects, and shift focus. These movements, research suggests, are reflected in the rapid movements or (...) saccades of our sleeping eyes. Do we really see the dream world in the same way that we see the real world? If we do, how could dreaming, usually assumed to be mind-generated hallucinations, replicate such an experience? This problem would be deflated if dreams are not hallucinations at all, but rather imagination, illusion or simply unrealistic. I argue that imagination and illusion views do not satisfactorily explain away the problem of vision and action in sleep. The imagination model is not a complete description of dreaming that is consistent with empirical research, and it is unlikely that the visual dream world is an illusion. Given that the dreaming visual experience is most likely active, hallucinatory, and at times a realistic world simulation, there are important implications for our understanding of visual perception and its relationship to movement. Evidence suggests that our dream eyes investigate the dream world as our waking eyes investigate the waking world. If changes to the unconsciously generated dream environment are perceived as external and unintentional while dream body movements are perceived as self-generated and intentional, current theory of visual perception may have to be expanded to account for how the dreaming mind generates a stable world in which we track and visually explore mind-generated objects. (shrink)

In recent decades, evidence-based medicine has become one of the foundations of clinical practice, making it necessary that healthcare practitioners develop keen critical appraisal skills for scientific papers. Worksheets to guide clinicians through this critical appraisal are often used in journal clubs, a key part of continuing medical education. A similar need is arising for health professionals to develop skills in the critical appraisal of medical ethics papers. Medicine is increasingly ethically complex, and there is a growing medical ethics literature (...) that modern practitioners need to be able to use in their practice. In addition, clinical ethics services are commonplace in healthcare institutions, and the lion’s share of the work done by these services is done by clinicians in addition to their usual roles. Education to support this work is important. In this paper, we present a worksheet designed to help busy healthcare practitioners critically appraise ethics papers relevant to clinical practice. In the first section, we explain what is different about ethics papers. We then describe how to work through the steps in our critical appraisal worksheet: identifying the point at issue; scrutinising definitions; dissecting the arguments presented; considering counterarguments; and finally deciding on relevance. Working through this reflective worksheet will help healthcare practitioners to use the ethics literature effectively in clinical practice. We also intend it to be a shared evaluative tool that can form the basis of professional discussion such as at ethics journal clubs. Practising these critical reasoning skills will also increase practitioners’ capacity to think through difficult ethical decisions in daily clinical practice. (shrink)

Many researchers have documented how AI and data driven technologies have the potential to have profound effects on our lives—in ways that make these technologies stand out from those that went before. Around the world, we are seeing a significant growth in interest and investment in AI in healthcare. This has been coupled with rising concerns about the ethical implications of these technologies and an array of ethical guidelines for the use of AI and data in healthcare has arisen. Nevertheless, (...) the question of if and how AI and data technologies can be ethical remains open to debate. This paper aims to contribute to this debate by considering the wide range of implications that have been attributed to these technologies and asking whether current ethical guidelines take these factors into account. In particular, the paper argues that while current ethics guidelines for AI in healthcare effectively account for the four key issues identified in the ethics literature (transparency; fairness; responsibility and privacy), they have largely neglected wider issues relating to the way in which these technologies shape institutional and social arrangements. This, I argue, has given current ethics guidelines a strong focus on evaluating the impact of these technologies on the individual, while not accounting for the powerful social shaping effects of these technologies. To address this, the paper proposes a Multiscale Ethics Framework, which aims to help technology developers and ethical evaluations to consider the wider implications of these technologies. (shrink)

Given the profound influence of social media and emerging evidence of its effects on human behavior and health, bioethicists have an important role to play in the development of professional standards of conduct for health professionals using social media and in the design of online systems themselves. In short, social media is a bioethics issue that has serious implications for medical practice, research, and public health. Here, we inventory several ethical issues across four areas at the intersection of social media (...) and health: the impact of social networking sites on the doctor‐patient relationship, the development of e‐health platforms to deliver care, the use of online data and algorithms to inform health research, and the broader public health consequences of widespread social media use. In doing so, we review discussions of these topics and emphasize the need for bioethics to focus more deeply on the ways online technology platforms are designed and implemented. We argue that bioethicists should turn their attention to the ways in which consumer engagement, bias, and profit maximization shape online content and, consequently, human behavior and health. We also offer a set of recommendations and suggest future directions for addressing ethical challenges in these domains. (shrink)

Background: Few robust autism-specific outcome assessments have been developed specifically for use by teachers in special schools. The Assessment of Barriers to Learning in Education – Autism is a newly developed teacher assessment to identify and show progress in barriers to learning for pupils on the autism spectrum with coexisting intellectual disabilities. Aims: This study aimed to conduct a preliminary validity and reliability evaluation of the ABLE-Autism. Methods and procedures: Forty-eight autistic pupils attending special schools were assessed using the ABLE-Autism. (...) Multi-level modelling was used to evaluate test-retest reliability, internal consistency and convergent validity with the Teacher Autism Progress Scale. Outcomes and results: Results showed excellent test-retest reliability and internal consistency. A large effect size suggested that the ABLE-Autism is strongly correlated with the Teacher Autism Progress Scale. Teacher feedback was positive and suggested that the ABLE-Autism is easily understood by teachers, relevant to autistic pupils in special schools, and adequately covers the skills and behaviours that teachers believe are important to assess for these pupils. Conclusions and implications: Although further validation is recommended, the preliminary evaluation of the ABLE-Autism suggests that it is a useful and has the potential to be an effective outcome assessment for autistic pupils in special schools. (shrink)

While the Web Ontology Language (OWL) provides a mechanism to import ontologies, this mechanism is not always suitable. Current editing tools present challenges for working with large ontologies an...

As we become more aware of the potential causes and consequences of climate change we are left wondering: who is responsible? Climate change has the potential to harm large portions of the global population and, arguably, is already doing so. Further, climate change is argued to be human-caused. If this is true, then it seems to be the case that we can analyze climate change in terms of responsibility. I argue that we can approach environmental harms, such as climate change, (...) through a theory of collective responsibility. I propose an account of reductive collective responsibility that can apply to the unstructured collective causing climate change and determine what we are each individually morally responsible for. To avoid the critiques of reductive collective responsibility for large unstructured harms, I propose we separate the determination of membership and eligibility for responsibility from the attribution of responsibility. Through this method, I can speak to the individual responsibility of each member who contributes to climate change without holding them responsible for that which is outside their control. (shrink)

How does the body influence the way we see the world? _Imagination, Illness and Injury_ examines the psychological factors behind perceptual limitations and distortions and links a broad range of somatic manifestations with their resolution. Melanie Starr Costello applies Jungian theory to a variety of cases, attributing psychosomatic phenomena to cognitive processes that are common to us all. She analyses the role of illness in several life narratives, and interprets the appearance of somatic phenomena during important phases of analytic (...) treatment. Together these case narratives present a significant challenge to established views of psychosomatics. Subjects covered include: archetypal constrictions of identity somatic elements of perception the psyche-soma split. _Imagination, Illness and Injury _brings a fresh perspective to the understanding and treatment of the psychotherapy client as a psycho-somatic unity. Jungian analysts, psychoanalysts, and psychotherapists will greatly benefit from the clinical applications of archetypal theory presented here. (shrink)

Online platforms like Instagram cover potentially distressing imagery with a sensitive-content screen (blurred imagery plus a content warning). Previous research suggests people typically choose to “uncover” and view screened content. In three studies, we investigated whether the presence of screens mitigates the negative emotional impact of viewing content. In Study 1, participants viewed positive and neutral images, and screens (with an option to view the negative images beneath) for a 5-minute period. In Study 2, half the participants saw a grey (...) mask in place of the typical sensitive-content screen. In addition, each image appeared for a fixed period (5 s) and participants had no option to uncover it. Study 3 was like Study 2 except half the participants saw negative images preceded by a sensitive-content screen and half saw negative images without screens. Overall, participants reported a significant increase in state anxiety and negative affect from pre-to post task when they were exposed to sensitive-content screens, whether or not they were also exposed to the negative imagery beneath. Our data suggest sensitive-content screens cause negative responses – state anxiety and negative affect – that do not translate to an emotional benefit when people view negative content. (shrink)

Drawing on in-depth interviews with individuals in current and former plural Mormon fundamentalist families, I demonstrate how gender is structured relationally in plural marriage, dependent on noncoercive power relations. Men perform a “conciliatory masculinity” based on their position as head of the family that requires constant consensus-building skills and emotional labor to maintain family harmony. This masculinity is shaped in relation to women’s performance of “homosocial femininity” that curbs men’s power by building strong bonds among wives to deflect jealousies and (...) negotiate household duties. I argue for the importance of studying masculinities and femininities together as a relational structure to better understand specific religious and family contexts. (shrink)

Melanie Sarzano | : In this paper, I compare cases of self-deception and cases of pragmatic encroachment and argue that confronting these cases generates a dilemma about rationality. This dilemma turns on the idea that subjects are motivated to avoid costly false beliefs, and that both cases of self-deception and cases of pragmatic encroachment are caused by an interest to avoid forming costly false beliefs. Even though both types of cases can be explained by the same belief-formation mechanism, only (...) self-deceptive beliefs are irrational: the subjects depicted in high-stakes cases typically used in debates on pragmatic encroachment are, on the contrary, rational. If we find ourselves drawn to this dilemma, we are forced either to accept—against most views presented in the literature—that self-deception is rational or to accept that pragmatic encroachment is irrational. Assuming that both conclusions are undesirable, I argue that this dilemma can be solved. In order to solve this dilemma, I suggest and review several hypotheses aimed at explaining the difference in rationality between the two types of cases, the result of which being that the irrationality of self-deceptive beliefs does not entirely depend on their being formed via a motivationally biased process. | : Dans cet article, je compare les cas classiques de duperie de soi aux cas que l’on trouve dans les débats sur la question de l’empiètement pragmatique et défends l’idée selon laquelle ces deux types de cas peuvent être compris comme étant produits par un même mécanisme visant à éviter la formation de croyances fausses coûteuses. Cette comparaison nous mène naturellement à former un dilemme à propos de la rationalité des croyances. Le dilemme repose sur l’idée que bien que ce mécanisme mène à la formation de croyances irrationnelles dans les cas de duperie de soi, il ne semble pas affecter la rationa-lité du sujet dans les cas d’empiètement pragmatique : alors que les sujets autodupés sont irrationnels, les sujets décrits dans les cas d’empiètement pragmatique ne le sont pas. Pour résoudre ce dilemme sans rejeter les présupposés selon lesquels les croyances issues de la duperie de soi sont irrationnelles et que les cas sur lesquels repose l’empiètement pragmatique sont rationnels, je propose plusieurs hypothèses visant à expliquer cette différence, prouvant ainsi que ce dilemme n’est qu’apparent et que l’irrationalité de la duperie de soi ne peut uniquement dépendre de ce mécanisme sous l’influence de considérations pratiques. (shrink)

Integrative and naturalistic philosophy of mind can both learn from and contribute to the contemporary cognitive sciences of dreaming. Two related phenomena concerning self-representation in dreams demonstrate the need to bring disparate fields together. In most dreams, the protagonist or dream self who experiences and actively participates in dream events is or represents the dreamer: but in an intriguing minority of cases, self-representation in dreams is displaced, disrupted, or even absent. Working from dream reports in established databanks, we examine two (...) key forms of polymorphism of self-representation: dreams in which I take an external visuospatial perspective on myself, and those in which I take someone else's perspective on events. In remembering my past experiences or imagining future or possible experiences when awake, I sometimes see myself from an external or 'observer' perspective. By relating the issue of perspective in dreams to established research traditions in the study of memory and imagery, and noting the flexibility of perspective in dreams, we identify new lines of enquiry. In other dreams, the dreamer does not appear to figure at all, and the first person perspective on dream events is occupied by someone else, some other person or character. We call these puzzling cases 'vicarious dreams' and assess some potential ways to make sense of them. Questions about self-representation and perspectives in dreams are intriguing in their own right and pose empirical and conceptual problems about the nature of self-representation with implications beyond the case of dreaming. (shrink)

In _Jain Approaches to Plurality_ Melanie Barbato offers a new perspective on the Jain teaching of plurality and how it allowed Jains to engage with other discourses from Indian inter-school philosophy to global interreligious dialogue.

Humans naturally and effortlessly use a set of cognitive tools to reason about biological entities and phenomena. Two such tools, essentialist thinking and teleological thinking, appear to be early developmental cognitive defaults, used extensively in childhood and under limited circumstances in adulthood, but prone to reemerge under time pressure or cognitive load. We examine the nature of another such tool: anthropocentric thinking. In four experiments, we examined patterns of property attribution to a wide range of living and non-living objects, manipulating (...) time pressure, response type, and property in a total of 471 participants. Results showed no tendency toward increased similarity-based attribution patterns indicative of anthropocentric thinking under time pressure. However, anthropocentric thinking was consistently observed for unfamiliar properties. These findings suggest that anthropocentric thinking is not a developmentally persistent cognitive default, but rather a cognitive strategy deliberately employed in situations of uncertainty. (shrink)

Die Begriffe "kollektive Amnesie" und "organisiertes Vergessen" werden oft verwendet, um Fälle zu beschreiben, in denen historisches Wissen, das im gesellschaftlichen, kollektiven Gedächtnis verfügbar sein sollte – weil es sich beispielsweise um gerechtigkeitsrelevantes Wissen handelt – aus unterschiedlichen, meist politisch problematischen Gründen nicht verfügbar ist. Beispielsweise, weil es gegebene Herrschaftsverhältnisse bedrohen würde. In diesem Beitrag soll gezeigt werden, weshalb diese Begriffe gerade in solchen Fällen irreführend sind. Insbesondere nationale Erinnerungspolitik kann oftmals aus Erkenntnispraktiken bestehen oder befördern, die nicht primär Vergessen (...) herbeiführen, sondern in der Gesellschaft verfügbares Wissen über bestimmte Themen verschleiern, verzerren und dadurch die gesellschaftliche Verständigung darüber erschweren oder sogar riskant macht; was vor allem in Fällen offensichtlich wird, in denen koloniale und genozidale Vergangenheiten systematisch geleugnet werden. So kann staatlich geförderte, systematische Genozidleugnung zwar durchaus selektiv zu „vergessen“ oder Wissensverlust führen. Doch viel problematischer aus ethischer und epistemischer Sicht ist, dass dadurch existierendes Wissen und Erinnerungen an die Verbrechen fortlaufend diskreditiert und unterdrückt werden. Genauer werden durch institutionelle und soziale Prozesse und Praktiken historische Fakten und andere Beweise, auf denen Erinnerung basiert, nicht nur ignoriert oder vernachlässigt, sondern vorsätzlich verschleiert, verzerrt und fehlinterpretiert. Es wird dadurch schädliches Unwissen und Unverständnis über die historischen Tatsachen und deren normative Bewertung generiert. Dadurch schafft Genozidleugnung nicht nur Wissenssubjekte, die nichts über den Genozid wissen – denn ein bloßer Wissensmangel könnte durch Bereitstellung des nötigen Wissens behoben werden – sondern das Thema verkennen, aktiv Tatsachen leugnen und dadurch die gesellschaftliche Verständigung über das Thema erschweren oder verunmöglichen. Um also besser zu verstehen, welche ethischen und epistemischen Konsequenzen systematische Genozidleugnung für Überlebende und Nachfahren, wie auch die Gesellschaft insgesamt mit sich bringt, schlage ich vor, systematische Genozidleugnung vielmehr als substanzielle Erkenntnispraxis und somit als Fall vorsätzlichen Unwissens zu verstehen. Wie ich am Beispiel der türkischen Leugnung des Genozids an den Armenier:innen illustrieren werde, wird der Genozid nicht vergessen, sondern erinnert und zugleich verkannt, mit der Absicht, Herrschaftsverhältnisse zu konsolidieren. Dadurch wird epistemische Ungerechtigkeit gefördert und aufrechterhalten. (shrink)

Beim eingeschränkten Fokus auf (historische) Wahrheit und dem Hervorbringen von „Beweisen“ im Kontext der türkischen Leugnung des Genozids an den ArmenierInnen wurde einem wesentlichen ethischen Problem bisher keine sonderliche Beachtung geschenkt: Dass innerhalb dieser sozial situierten Praxis der Etablierung von Wissen über die historischen Tatsachen – also darüber, was passiert ist und wie diese Geschehnisse zu interpretieren sind – Ungerechtigkeiten im Hinblick darauf entstehen können, wen man als glaubwürdige epistemische Akteure anerkennt. Gemäss dieser Überlegung soll der vorliegende Beitrag zeigen, inwiefern (...) Nachfahren von Genozidopfern durch institutionalisierte Genozidleugnung einer spezifischen Art erneuter Dehumanisierung zum Opfer fallen, nämlich der epistemischen Ungerechtigkeit. Diese besagt, dass den Nachfahren der Opfergruppe die Glaubwürdigkeit und damit epistemische Autorität auf der Grundlage ihrer sozialen Zugehörigkeit abgesprochen wird. In diesem Sinne kann die Genozidleugnung als eine fortgesetzte Delegitimierung der Opfergruppe und Herabwürdigung ihrer Mitglieder verstanden werden, diesmal im Gewand einer Aberkennung ihrer essentiellen menschlichen Fähigkeit, Wissen zu generieren und weiterzugeben. (shrink)

Ethics, Policy & Environment, Volume 15, Issue 2, Page 227-229, June 2012.

The human pathogen Vibrio cholerae exhibits two distinct lifestyles: one in the aquatic environment where it often associates with chitinous surfaces and the other as the causative agent of the disease cholera. While much of the research on V. cholerae has focused on the host‐pathogen interaction, knowledge about the environmental lifestyle of the pathogen remains limited. We recently showed that the polymer chitin, which is extremely abundant in aquatic environments, induces natural competence as a mode of horizontal gene transfer and (...) that this competence regulon also includes the type VI secretion system (T6SS), a molecular killing device. Here, I discuss the putative consequences that chitin‐induced T6SS activation could have on intestinal colonization and how the transmission route might influence disease outcome. Moreover, I propose that common infant animal models for cholera might not sufficiently take into account T6SS‐mediated interbacterial warfare between V. cholerae and the intestinal microbiota. (shrink)

Twentieth century philosophers such as Simondon and Heidegger propose theories of subjectivation that inform our thinking about the definition of personhood and how it arises; including in the potentially wide-ranging context of personhood beyond the human. Simondon’s theory of transindividuation unfolds as a series of decenterings that provides a context for future persons that is a dynamic world of processes without fixity or attachment to any one kind of subject. Subjects participate in but do not cause individuation; and they exist (...) on a spectrum of capacity for action with other living beings including animals; human persons; and possibly a variety of future persons. The role of collectivity in the form of the other has been an important aspect of individuation; however I claim that the function of alterity need not be provided exclusively by a self-similar subject. Philosophical individuation theories serve as a foundation for an approach that opens up greater possibility for individuation in the context of future persons by identifying and alternatively fulfilling the underlying functionality required by individuation. (shrink)

Laura U. Marks _The Skin of the Film: Intercultural Cinema, Embodiment, and the Senses_ Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000 ISBN 0-8223-2391-5 298 pp.

Employees at healthcare organizations are experiencing more stress than ever given the current COVID-19 pandemic. Different types of stress are affecting diverse organizational outcomes, including the employees’ voluntary turnover. This is the case of cognitive stress, a type of stress that affects how individuals process information, which can influence employees’ turnover intentions. In this study, we look at the mechanisms that can reduce the adverse effects of cognitive stress on turnover intentions, particularly the role of employees’ perceived psychological safety. We (...) hypothesize that psychological safety mediates the relationship between cognitive stress and turnover intentions, and COVID-19 worry and supervisor support moderate the relationship between cognitive stress and psychological safety. To test our hypothesis, we invited two public health care organizations in Chile to join this study. In total, we obtained a sample of 146 employees in 21 different teams. Using a multilevel model, we found that psychological safety prevents the harmful effects of cognitive stress on employees’ turnover intentions. In addition, while COVID-19 worry can worsen the relationship between cognitive stress and psychological safety, supervisor support only directly affects psychological safety. This study contributes to expanding the stress and psychological safety literature and informs practitioners in healthcare organizations about how to deal with cognitive stress in the “new normality” that the pandemic has brought. (shrink)

Research studying the effects of non-financial goals on stakeholder relationships remains inconclusive, with scholars disagreeing on which goals increase or decrease a firm’s proactive stakeholder engagement (PSE). Instead of examining which goals act as forces for good or evil, we shift the focus of recent discussions by emphasizing the mechanisms that can explain the positive and negative stakeholder outcomes of non-financial goals under the umbrella of one theoretical lens. We do so by introducing an ethics of care perspective. Specifically, we (...) first show that four of the five most distinctive non-financial goals of family owners jointly stipulate care-based morality, which likely enhances PSE. However, we subsequently argue that one goal, namely, the wish to exert power and influence, interacts with other goals and related care-based morality to lower PSE. Finally, we show how female family directors temper these interactions. Our insights into the additive and interactive effects of non-financial goals on PSE contribute to corporate social responsibility research, to the organizational goal literature, to family business studies and to work drawing on care ethics in management studies. (shrink)

This research examines the practice of cryonics and provides empirical evidence for an improved understanding of the motivations and attitudes of participants. Cryonics is the freezing of a person who has died of a disease in hopes of restoring life at some future time when a cure may be available. So far, about 300 people have been cryopreserved, and an additional 1200 have enrolled in such programs. The current work has three vectors. First, the results of a worldwide cryonics survey (...) carried out as part of this research are discussed. Second, a theoretical model is developed from the survey results to propose a Theory of Cryonic Life Extension which explains an individual’s decision to select cryopreservation. Third, the most distinctive survey result, a conceptualization of personal identity malleability, is extended with a philosophical formulation. Personal identity is found to be emergent, not fundamental, and thus may continue to evolve in concept and application, particularly in the longer time frames implicated by cryonics. The potential consequences of this work are that the conceptual norms materializing in the cryonics community could be forerunners of wider societal trends of how humans understand themselves as subjects in an era increasingly configured by science and technology. (shrink)

Nature, not books Content Type Journal Article Category Book Review Pages 1-3 DOI 10.1007/s11016-011-9564-y Authors Melanie Keene, Homerton College, Hills Road, Cambridge, CB2 8PH UK Journal Metascience Online ISSN 1467-9981 Print ISSN 0815-0796.

This article examines the tensions in the identities of men who belong to the Promise Keepers movement by uncovering the social conditions that lead men to rethink gender and racial ideologies. Using participant observation and in-depth interviews, the author draws on gender and social movement scholarship to reveal how contradictory gender and racial ideologies shape PKs' identities. Furthermore, the PKs' impact on gender and race relations is also contradictory. PK fosters men's growth on an interactional level, allowing men to embrace (...) a more expressive and caring masculinity that includes cross-racial bonding. Simultaneously, however, PK ignores, and indirectly reinforces, the structural conditions that underpin gender and racial privilege among white men. (shrink)

Understanding transitional justice and dealing with the past as elements of intergenerational justice puts our focus on the establishment of sustainable, peaceful, social relationships among groups or members thereof within an intergenerational polity or society after violent conflicts, such as genocide or other crimes against humanity. However, what if this process is undermined by institutionally supported denialism? This paper addresses the question of the normative importance of genocide recognition negatively, by examining the way in which subsequent genocide denialism might be (...) considered as a perpetuation of injustice against genocide survivors and their descendants. I will argue that genocide denialism can be considered as a continuation of genocidal violence in epistemic form, that is, an epistemic injustice, whereby members of the victim group are negatively discriminated against with regard to their credibility and intelligibility. Institutional genocide denialism, then, does not just prevent societies from dealing with their genocidal past, but in the first instance constitutes renewed humiliation and violation of the epistemic authority of genocide survivors and their descendants, thus becoming an instance of intergenerational injustice. (shrink)