ABSTRACT Researchers have increasingly acknowledged that affect plays a role in ethical decision making. However, the impact that specific affective states may have on the expression of decision biases in the context of ethical dilemmas has received limited empirical attention. To address this, the present effort examined the impact of happy and sad affective states on biases in ethical decision making. In an online experiment, undergraduate students read short stories that either induced happy, sad, or relaxed affective states, followed by (...) a covert measure of three types of biases held to inhibit ethical decision making. Results demonstrated that happy affective states increased the expression of regulation biases, and sad affective states increased the expression of simplification biases, compared to relaxed affective states. Implications are discussed for advancing research on ethical decision making and reducing unethical behavior in organizations. (shrink)

We present a method for rejecting competing models from noisy time-course data that does not rely on parameter inference. First we characterize ordinary differential equation models in only measurable variables using differential-algebra elimination. This procedure gives input-output equations, which serve as invariants for time series data. We develop a model comparison test using linear algebra and statistics to reject incorrect models from their invariants. This algorithm exploits the dynamic properties that are encoded in the structure of the model equations without (...) recourse to parameter values, and, in this sense, the approach is parameter-free. We demonstrate this method by discriminating between different models from mathematical biology. (shrink)

This visual celebration of Wisconsin's sesquicentennial pairs ninety-five new photos by some of the state's finest documentary photographers and photojournalists. As curator of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin's Visual Materials Archive, Nicolette Bromberg selected dozens of the most interesting photographs in the collections of the Society and then commissioned photographers to capture on film the same locations or activities. Whether portraying Main Streets, factory work, prize cows, or a busy lumber camp transformed back into quiet woodland, these photographs (...) confirm that Wisconsin is a place of both continuity and change. (shrink)

Much social theory tends to emphasize the external goods of social practices, often neglecting the internal goods of those practices. For example, many analyses of religious rituals over-emphasize the instrumental and individualistic ends of prayer and liturgy by describing such religious practices as effective means for achieving external ends like positive emotions, psychological benefits, social status, or social capital. By contrast, we use a neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics perspective to analyze the relational goods, such as trust and intimacy, which are expressed (...) and sustained through ritualized social practices. Using ethnographies of Haitian and Ghanaian Christians in the U.S., we demonstrate that prayer and liturgy can also be understood as constitutive-ends practices, practices in which human persons engage to sustain relations with others because there are goods inherent to those relationships. We further argue that in many religious practices, the end goals and the means—i.e. specific aspects of the practice—are inseparable. Our approach to developing theory combines critical engagement with numerous other theorists and also exploring how well various theories can explain the motivations and experiences of participants in the religious rituals where we conducted our ethnographies. (shrink)

Renewed interest in human space exploration has highlighted the gaps in knowledge needed for successful long-duration missions outside low-Earth orbit. Although the technical challenges of such missions are being systematically overcome, many of the unknowns in predicting mission success depend on human behavior and performance, knowledge of which must be either obtained through space research or extrapolated from human experience on Earth. Particularly in human neuroscience, laboratory-based research efforts are not closely connected to real environments such as human space exploration. (...) As caves share several of the physical and psychological challenges of spaceflight, underground expeditions have recently been developed as a spaceflight analog for astronaut training purposes, suggesting that they might also be suitable for studying aspects of behavior and cognition that cannot be fully examined under laboratory conditions. Our objective is to foster a bi-directional exchange between cognitive neuroscientists and expedition experts by (1) describing the cave environment as a worthy space analog for human research, (2) reviewing work conducted on human neuroscience and cognition within caves, (3) exploring the range of topics for which the unique environment may prove valuable as well as obstacles and limitations, (4) outlining technologies and methods appropriate for cave use, and (5) suggesting how researchers might establish contact with potential expedition collaborators. We believe that cave expeditions, as well as other sorts of expeditions, offer unique possibilities for cognitive neuroscience that will complement laboratory work and help to improve human performance and safety in operational environments, both on Earth and in space. (shrink)

As Sparta was a Dorian polis, many of its heroic cults have been interpreted as part of Sparta’s so-called ‘Achaian’ policy, which introduced Achaian heroes in order to legitimise its territorial claims in the Peloponnese. This article reviews the topic of ethnicity as a motivating factor behind the instigation of hero-cults in the Greek world. It focuses on three case studies in Sparta: the cult of Agamemnon, the transfer of the bones of Orestes, and of those belonging to his son (...) Teisamenos. By examining the evidence within Greek religious tradition and by placing it in its historical context, I challenge the persisting views associated with the cults of these heroes. In turn, I argue that Sparta worshiped these heroes because they were traditionally local and their foundation was not driven by any ethnic consideration. I emphasise how there has been a scholarly tendency to overuse political interpretation in the understanding of these cults, while their religious significance has been frequently neglected. (shrink)

It is widely attested that the perioikoi and helots were an important component of the Lakedaimonian army and fought alongside the Spartans especially during the Persian and Peloponnesian Wars. The current study offers a new perspective on the importance of non-Spartans in the Lakedaimonian army by examining the weapon dedications from Laconian sanctuaries and by reviewing the location and importance of forts and fortifications near or at perioikic poleis. It argues that on the basis of finds from Laconian sanctuaries and (...) of the military realities, the use and presence of archers in the Lakedaimonian army should be re-evaluated. (shrink)

The thought of the limit has in its genetics the questioning of time and place. The essays in this collection, African Thinking and/at Its Limits, demonstrate this essential interrogation ; their address of the limits of African thinking is inevitably also one that presents us with the limitedness of temporal and spatial understandings. For the limit signals the very reach of time and place, and enables the possibility of territory, control, management, and measure – possibilities that can seem at once (...) infinite and inordinately restricted. Possibility, the very provocation of the limit, can itself be formulated in terms of time and place—What can be done? Where is it possible to go? Where do we from here? The limit signifies both expiration, the farthest point a thinking can take one, and consolidation, the demarcation and establishment of a territory. These questions of time and place are, as such and for these very reasons, bound up in any thinking of Africa. This, too, is clear from the issues addressed by the contributions to this collection, not the least of which are the very historicity of the concepts commonly used to assess or explain state crisis, the hangovers of colonial paradigms, and how to think, address, and analyze the crisis of the postcolony. (shrink)

The overall collection we present in Volume V constitutes a celebration of the approach and values embraced within previous volumes. While those acquainted with previous volumes of Ethics, Law & Society will note some marked differences in how we have gone about the work of editing, our hope is that the approach we bring is seen as enriching the work, and building on what has been a highly successful series. To a large degree, however, it has not been possible to (...) emulate what our rather formidable predecessors have achieved, even if many of the concerns which Jenny and Søren had embraced in previous volumes have continued purchase and find their natural home here too. Jenny and Søren, both prominent bioethicists, not only encouraged contributions which explored ethical and regulatory perspectives around the body, genetic technologies, life sciences and the life course, but also sought to embrace far broader concerns relating to the environment, conflict and war, and to issues which are every bit as crucial to our lived experience, such as the use and management of information. All of these concerns relate to our experience of being human and as such, it seems arbitrary – if one is genuinely concerned with social flourishing – to prioritize the kinds of concerns for inclusion in any given collection to specific themes. (shrink)

This article uses the surprising bodily effects of a period following birth to unsettle the reproductive narrative that circumscribes the maternal relation. Drawing on scholarship on skin and touch within philosophy and feminist and queer theory, ‘Beside myself’ demonstrates how an intensely intimate relationship can throw into relief modes of embodiment that trouble the temporality and space presumed of reproduction. Doing so, it calls attention to the limits of materialist discourses of embodiment. With reference to Gayle Salamon’s Assuming a Body, (...) it describes an embodied subjectivity that exceeds the material contours of the body. A sense of being ‘beside’ oneself and ‘beside’ another stretches the time and space of the body, not only creating fractures within the reproductive frame, but also putting pressure on matter and possession as conditions for subjectivity. (shrink)

TheJournal of Medical Ethicspreviously published on the debate in the UK and the Netherlands concerning the legal age limits imposed on donor-conceived people for access to information about the identity of gamete and embryo donors. In that publication, three arguments were foregrounded against lowering these age limits as a general rule for all donor-conceived people. In this contribution, we engage with these arguments and argue why we think they are insufficient to maintain the age limits. In contrast, we argue for (...) a more suited, contextual and relational ethical framework based on care ethics, which emphasises relational autonomy and its dynamic, contextual development. This framework, we argue, provides a comprehensive approach for the analysis we made of the question of age limits and was applied in research performed in the Netherlands, commissioned by the Dutch Minister of Health. The framework enabled us to weigh the multidisciplinary—legal, psychological, phenomenological and ethical—findings of our research. (shrink)

The aim of this study was to explore the influences, processes and environments that shaped the practice of European nurses for indigenous New Zealand (NZ) Māori communities who were being overwhelmed by introduced infectious diseases. Historical data were accessed from multiple archival sources and analysed through the lens of colonial theory. Through their work early last century, NZ nurses actively gained professional status and territory through their work with Māori. By living and working alongside Māori, they learned to practise in (...) new ways that influenced Māori health. By developing a new role in new professional territory, nurses extended their practice to include health promotion as well as disease prevention. Māori survival from epidemics improved, and the population grew over that period. For Māori, however, Eurocentric care alleviated their immediate health problems, but the detrimental impact of the mechanisms of colonisation overall has continued to the present day. (shrink)

Food choices are a key determinant of dietary intake, with brain regions, such as the mesolimbic and prefrontal cortex maturing at differential rates into adulthood. More needs to be understood about developmental changes in healthy and unhealthy food perceptions and preference. We investigated how food perceptions and preference vary as a function of age and how food attributes impact age-related changes. One hundred thirty-nine participants completed computerized tasks to rate high-calorie and low-calorie food cues for taste, health, and liking, followed (...) by 100 binary food choices based on each participant’s ratings. Dietary self-control was considered successful when the healthier food was chosen. Self-control success ratio was the proportion of success trials over total number of choices. Beta-weights for health and taste were calculated as each attribute’s influence on food preference. Adiposity measurements included BMI z-score and waist-to-height ratio. High-calorie foods were rated more tasty and less healthy with increasing age. Older participants liked high-calorie foods more, and β-taste was associated with age. Significant age-by-WHtR interactions were observed for health and taste ratings of high-calorie foods, β-taste, and marginally for preference of high-calorie foods. Stratifying by WHtR, we found age-related increases in taste and preference ratings of high-calorie foods in the high WHtR group alone. In contrast, age-related decreases in health ratings of high-calorie foods were significant in the low WHtR group alone. Age and β-taste were significantly associated in the high WHtR group and only marginally significant with low WHtR. Although participants rated low-calorie foods as less tasty and less healthy with increasing age, there was no association between age and preference for low-calorie foods. Participants made faster food choices with increasing age regardless of WHtR, with a significant age-by-WHtR interaction on reaction time. There were no age-related effects in self-control success ratio and β-health. These results suggest that individual differences in age and central adiposity play an important role in preference for high-calorie foods, and a higher importance of food tastiness in food choice may contribute to greater preference for high-calorie foods with increasing age. (shrink)

Total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is a commonly implemented elective surgical treatment for end-stage osteoarthritis of the knee, demonstrating high success rates when assessed by objective medical outcomes. However, a considerable proportion of TKA patients report significant dissatisfaction postoperatively, related to enduring pain, functional limitations, and diminished quality of life. In this conceptual analysis, we highlight the importance of assessing patient-centred outcomes routinely in clinical practice, as these measures provide important information regarding whether surgery and postoperative rehabilitation interventions have effectively remediated (...) patients’ real-world “quality of life” experiences. We propose a novel precision medicine approach to improving patient-centred TKA outcomes through the development of a multivariate machine-learning model. The primary aim of this model is to predict individual postoperative recovery trajectories. Uniquely, this model will be developed using an interdisciplinary methodology involving non-linear analysis of the unique contributions of a range of preoperative risk and resilience factors to patient-centred TKA outcomes. Of particular importance to the model’s predictive power is the inclusion of a comprehensive assessment of modifiable psychological risk and resilience factors that have demonstrated relationships with TKA and other conditions in some studies. Despite the potential for patient psychological factors to limit recovery, they are typically not routinely assessed preoperatively in this patient group, and thus can be overlooked in rehabilitative referral and intervention decision-making. This represents a research-to-practice gap that may contribute to adverse patient-centred outcomes. Incorporating psychological risk and resilience factors into a multivariate prediction model could improve the detection of patients at risk of sub-optimal outcomes following TKA. This could provide surgeons and rehabilitation providers with a simplified tool to inform postoperative referral and intervention decision-making related to a range of interdisciplinary domains outside their usual purview. The proposed approach could facilitate the development and provision of more targeted rehabilitative interventions on the basis of identified individual needs. The roles of several modifiable psychological risk and resilience factors in recovery are summarised, and intervention options are briefly presented. While focusing on rehabilitation following TKA, we advocate for the broader utilisation of multivariate prediction models to inform individually-tailored interventions targeting a range of health conditions. (shrink)

The recent publication of the books La razionalità, by Paolo Labinaz, and I modi della razionalità, edited by Massimo Dell’Utri and Antonio Rainone, offers the opportunity to provide an overview of some important discussions on rationality. In particular, I highlight how the modern and Cartesian ideal of this notion is undergoing a transformation that is enhanced by results coming from empirical studies in the field of cognitive science. These transformations are visible in many ambits concerning rationality: this discussion privileges (...) the traditional ones, i.e., logical, theoretical, and practical rationality. (shrink)

Tropologies is the first book-length study to elaborate the medieval and early modern theory of the tropological, or moral, sense of scripture. Ryan McDermott argues that tropology is not only a way to interpret the Bible but also a theory of literary and ethical invention. The "tropological imperative" demands that words be turned into works--books as well as deeds. Beginning with Augustine, Jerome, and Gregory the Great, then treating monuments of exegesis such as the Glossa ordinaria and Nicholas of Lyra, (...) as well as theorists including Thomas Aquinas, Erasmus, Martin Luther, and others, Tropologies reveals the unwritten history of a major hermeneutical theory and inventive practice. Late medieval and early Reformation writers adapted tropological theory to invent new biblical poetry and drama that would invite readers to participate in salvation history by inventing their own new works. Tropologies reinterprets a wide range of medieval and early modern texts and performances--including the Patience-Poet, Piers Plowman, Chaucer, the York and Coventry cycle plays, and the literary circles of the reformist King Edward VI--to argue that "tropological invention" provided a robust alternative to rhetorical theories of literary production. In this groundbreaking revision of literary history, the Bible and biblical hermeneutics, commonly understood as sources of tumultuous discord, turn out to provide principles of continuity and mutuality across the Reformation's temporal and confessional rifts. Each chapter pursues an argument about poetic and dramatic form, linking questions of style and aesthetics to exegetical theory and theology. Because Tropologies attends to the flux of exegetical theory and practice across a watershed period of intellectual history, it is able to register subtle shifts in literary production, fine-tuning our sense of how literature and religion mutually and dynamically informed and reformed each other. "This is an original book. It draws confidently on a wide range of medieval critical and scholarly work, as well as on a cogent body of contemporary theory and theology. It not only moves easily and eloquently between the fourteenth and the sixteenth centuries but also delves back into the 'tropological' Christian thought of the previous thousand years." --Nicolette Zeeman, University of Cambridge. (shrink)

This article examines the technique and legality of induced abortion of one or more fetuses in a multiple pregnancy, where the aim is the destruction of some but not all of the fetuses present (selective reduction of pregnancy). It concludes that since the legal status of the procedure in English law is unclear, it may be a criminal offence to perform selective reduction even where there is an ostensible clinical need. Moreover if the procedure is carried out negligently, and any (...) infant damaged as a result is subsequently born alive, he or she may have a civil claim against the practitioner who carried out the procedure. (shrink)

Tom 1. Rannekhristianskiĭ gnosticheskiĭ tekst v rossiĭskoĭ kulʹture (21 i︠a︡nvari︠a︡ 2011 g.) -- Tom 2. Sudʹby religiozno-filosofskikh iskaniĭ Nikolai︠a︡ Novikova i ego kruga (15-17 okti︠a︡bri︠a︡ 2012 g.).

v. 1. Edinyĭ i︠a︡zyk chelovechestva. --.

Russell’s distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description has been recently re-examined in frequently controversial epistemo-logical contributions. The present essay reflects upon the pertinent papers by D. F. Pears, J. Hintikka, R. Chisholm, W. Sellars, A. J. Ayer, and others, but is pri-marily founded on Russell’s significant formulations from his writings published between 1910 and 1918. By employing an auxiliary device of a late-Wittgen-steinian language game, I explore at first the situation in which human subject is “experiencing” and (...) naming particular objects and later the subject’s acquaintance with universals. The reconstruction of such situations shows that, contrary to Russell’s assumptions, even the “purest” acquaintance cannot function without knowledge by description, i.e. without sta-ting propositions about the object of acquaintance . Then the only “descriptionless” alternative would be a kind of intuitive knowledge of such objects which is difficult to reconcile with the position held by Russell in the 1910s. Whatever the consequences, this topic retains its fundamental epistemological significance. (shrink)