The literature on deep brain stimulation (DBS) and adaptive DBS (aDBS) raises concerns that these technologies may affect personality, mood, and behavior. We conducted semi-structured interviews with researchers (n = 23) involved in developing next-generation DBS systems, exploring their perspectives on ethics and policy topics including whether DBS/aDBS can cause such changes. The majority of researchers reported being aware of personality, mood, or behavioral (PMB) changes in recipients of DBS/aDBS. Researchers offered varying estimates of the frequency of PMB changes. A (...) smaller majority reported changes in personality specifically. Some expressed reservations about the scientific status of the term ‘personality,’ while others used it freely. Most researchers discussed negative PMB changes, but a majority said that DBS/aDBS can also result in positive changes. Several researchers viewed positive PMB changes as part of the therapeutic goal in psychiatric applications of DBS/aDBS. Finally, several discussed potential causes of PMB changes other than the device itself. (shrink)

Knowledge about ethical judgments has not advanced appreciably after decades of research. Such research, however, has rarely addressed the possible importance of the content of such judgments; that is, the material appearing in the brief vignettes or scenarios on which survey respondents base their evaluations. Indeed, this content has seemed an afterthought in most investigations. This paper closely examined the vast array of vignettes that have appeared in relevant research in an effort to reduce this proliferation to a more concise (...) set of overarching vignette themes. Six generic themes emerged from this process, labeled here as Dilemma, Classic, Conspiracy, Sophie’s Choice, Runaway Trolley, and Whistle Blowing. Each of these themes is characterized by a unique combination of four key factors that include the extent of protagonist personal benefit from relevant vignette activities and victim salience in vignette descriptions. Theme identification enabled inherent ambiguities in vignettes that threaten construct validity to come into sharp focus, provided clues regarding appropriate vignette construction, and may help to make sense of patterns of empirical findings that heretofore have seemed difficult to explain. (shrink)

The construct of cognitive moral development seemingly has powerful practical relevance in many areas of life. Nonetheless, moral reasoning seems of marginal relevance at best in the context of business ethics. Simply put, moral reasoning measurement indices are often only weakly related to many other apparently pertinent variables, and such findings cast doubt upon the construct validity of cognitive moral development. Many such unexpectedly weak relationships, however, may stem from two largely unrecognized methodological artifacts. The first artifact is an almost (...) total reliance on the P index of the Defining Issues Test (DIT) designed to assess moral development even when this index may be inappropriate in a particular context. A second artifact that seems particularly salient in the context of attitudes toward authority involves a not always appropriate reliance on samples that include respondents whose moral reasoning is uncoupled from their action choices. These artifacts may restrict the amount of variance explained in observed relationships, and thus constrain the potential for moral reasoning to understand and explain behavior and attitudes relevant in the context of business ethics. Researchers are urged to use DIT D scores (in addition to P scores) in specific situations, and to examine relationships among high DIT U scorers whose moral reasoning is tightly coupled with their action choices. The application of these guidelines may have profound implications for advancing our fundamental understanding of moral reasoning, and of increasing its relevance to business ethics. (shrink)

Two contrasting types of individuals were each predicted to agree, for different reasons, that conventional ethical standards of society need not be upheld if organizational interests appear to demand otherwise. The hypotheses were investigated using questionnaire responses from two samples (employed and student, total N=308). Clear support was obtained for the prediction that individuals inclined toward self-interest and behavior counter to conventional standards would agree with the preceding position. Partial support was obtained for the hypothesis that individuals who simply feel (...) obligated to support an employing organization would also agree. While the latter's perspective may be somewhat narrow or perhaps even cynical, they do not seem to reflect the self-interest profile of the first group. This study also extends the groundbreaking work of Froelich and Kottke by exploring individual difference correlates of their promising ethics scale assessing the extent of agreement that organizational interests legitimately supersede more conventional ethical standards. (shrink)

Jones (1990) described ten workplace behaviors of a dubious ethical nature and determined that the hierarchical position adopted by respondents influenced the perceived acceptability of these behaviors. This measure seems promising, and therefore the purpose of this investigation is two-fold: (1) to explore further the psychometric properties of these ten items; and (2) to examine the role of individual difference variables as correlates of perceived acceptability. In two samples of working people, the Jones items were found to be internally consistent, (...) not obviously subject to range restriction, modestly related to social desirability, largely orthogonal to age and managerial status, but clearly linked with Machiavellianism. The nature of the linkage between perceived acceptability and both sex and the Protestant work ethic differed across the two studies, which underscores the need for future research. Two additional variables worth investigating in such research may be locus of control and equity sensitivity. (shrink)

This essay examines Adorno's notoriously puzzling concept of metaphysical experience with special attention to Adorno's remarks on the concept in his 1965 lecture‐course, “Metaphysics: Concepts and Problems.” The essay argues that the concept of metaphysical experience is best understood in the light of Adorno's philosophical critique of metaphysics in the traditional sense. It was Adorno's view that in the age of modern catastrophe, the category of traditional metaphysics (as theorized chiefly by Aristotle, Plato, and Empedocles) could no longer retain its (...) validity, and the notion of “experience” itself was withering away. Adorno concluded that metaphysics in the modern era would have to be reconceived as a category of loss that reflected the damage that had been done to human life. “Metaphysical experience” attached itself especially to special places or childhood memories, even while such privileged experiences also reflected the disappointment and imperfection that marks all experiences today. (shrink)

"A learned work of rhetoric... compiled and made in the English tongue, of [one] who in judgment is profound, in wisdom and eloquence most famous." Thus in 1563 rhetorician Richard Rainolde praised _The Art of Rhetoric_, the work that brought into English the procedures of Ciceronian rhetoric-invention, disposition, style, memory, and delivery—the core of the academic curriculum in Renaissance England. Written in vigorous, native English, the _Art_ went through eight editions between 1553 and 1585. At least part of its appeal (...) was practicality. On the final page of his copy on Quintilian, Gabriel Harvey noted that _The Art of Rhetoric _is the "Daily bread of our common pleaders and discoursers." But its appeal was also academic. In 1619, nearly forty years after the _Art_ had lapsed from print, John Milton's teacher Alexander Gill invoked Wilson as he ridiculed the affectations of pretentiously learned language. Seen in its historical context, Wilson's _The Art of Rhetoric _reveals a great deal about the formal education of such authors as Shakespeare, Spenser, Jonson, and Milton. Since it bears directly on what is basic to imaginative literature—the art of language—the _Art_ encapsulates a literary context relevant to all those studying the English Renaissance, whether their approach is historicist, structuralist, deconstructionist, or new historicist. In addition, it will be of interest to students of rhetoric, education, and intellectual history in general. There have been four editions of the _Art_ in the twentieth century: two facsimiles and two original-spelling texts, none of which is in print. Peter Medine's edition modernizes the spelling and punctuation of the text of the second edition, which Wilson revised and expanded in 1560, and furnishes a fully critical apparatus, including introduction, textual notes, commentary, and glossary. As such, this edition makes available a central work of the English Renaissance in an accessible format. (shrink)

Ensemble musicians play in synchrony despite expressively motivated irregularities in timing. We hypothesized that synchrony is achieved by each performer internally simulating the concurrent actions of other ensemble members, relying initially on how they would perform in their stead. Hence, musicians should be better at synchronizing with recordings of their own earlier performances than with others’ recordings. We required pianists to record one part from each of several piano duets, and later to play the complementary part in synchrony with their (...) own or others’ recordings. The pianists were also asked to identify their own recordings. The pianists were better at synchronizing with their own than with others’ performances, and they were able to recognize their own recordings. Furthermore, synchronization accuracy and recognition were correlated: Pianists who were relatively accurate at synchronizing with their own performances were also good at recognizing them. Thus, action simulation may underlie both synchronization and self-recognition. (shrink)

The mere presence of irrelevant external stimuli results in interference with the fidelity of details retrieved from long-term memory (LTM). Recent studies suggest that distractibility during LTM retrieval occurs when the focus of resource-limited, top-down mechanisms that guide the selection of relevant mnemonic details is disrupted by representations of external distractors. We review findings from four studies that reveal distractibility during episodic retrieval. The approach cued participants to recall previously studied visual details when their eyes were closed, or were open (...) and irrelevant visual information was present. The results showed a negative impact of the distractors on the fidelity of details retrieved from LTM. An fMRI experiment using the same paradigm replicated the behavioral results and found that diminished episodic memory was associated with the disruption of functional connectivity in whole-brain networks. Specifically, network connectivity supported recollection of details based on visual imagery when eyes were closed, but connectivity declined in the presence of visual distractors. Another experiment using auditory distractors found equivalent effects for auditory and visual distraction during cued recall, suggesting that the negative impact of distractibility is a domain-general phenomenon in LTM. Comparisons between older and younger adults revealed an aging-related increase in the negative impact of distractibility on retrieval of LTM. Finally, a new study that compared categorization abilities between younger and older adults suggests a cause underlying age-related decline of visual details in LTM. The sum of our findings suggests that cognitive control resources, although limited, have the capability to resolve interference from distractors during tasks of moderate effort, but these resources are overwhelmed when additional processes associated with episodic retrieval, or categorization of complex prototypes, are required. (shrink)

This study examined some ethical implications of two different individual competitive orientations. Winning is crucially important in hypercompetitiveness , whereas a personal development (PD) perspective considers competition as a means to self-discovery and self-improvement. In a sample of 263 senior-level undergraduate business students, survey results suggested that hypercompetitiveness was generally associated with “poor ethics” and PD competitiveness was linked with “high ethics”. For example, hypercompetitive individuals generally saw nothing wrong with self-interested gain at the expense of others, but PD competitors (...) viewed such activities as largely inappropriate. Hypercompetitive people also tended to be highly Machiavellian but not ethically idealistic. In contrast, PD competitors tended to be ethically idealistic but not Machiavellian. Managers that are interested in both high ethics and high functioning work groups may wish to consider the potential importance of attempting to channel hypercompetitive tendencies into PD directions. (shrink)

Across the Euro-Atlantic world, political leaders have been mobilizing their bases with nativism, racism, xenophobia, and paeans to “traditional values,” in brazen bids for electoral support. How are we to understand this move to the mainstream of political policies and platforms that lurked only on the far fringes through most of the postwar era? Does it herald a new wave of authoritarianism? Is liberal democracy itself in crisis? In this volume, three distinguished scholars draw on critical theory to address our (...) current predicament. Wendy Brown, Peter E. Gordon, and Max Pensky share a conviction that critical theory retains the power to illuminate the forces producing the current political constellation as well as possible paths away from it. Brown explains how “freedom” has become a rallying cry for manifestly un-emancipatory movements; Gordon dismantles the idea that fascism is rooted in the susceptible psychology of individual citizens and reflects instead on the broader cultural and historical circumstances that lend it force; and Pensky brings together the unlikely pair of Tocqueville and Adorno to explore how democracies can buckle under internal pressure. These incisive essays do not seek to smooth over the irrationality of the contemporary world, and they do not offer the false comforts of an easy return to liberal democratic values. Rather, the three authors draw on their deep engagements with nineteenth–and twentieth–century thought to investigate the historical and political contradictions that have brought about this moment, offering fiery and urgent responses to the demands of the day. (shrink)

Hugely facilitated by the Internet, plagiarism by students threatens educational quality and professional ethics worldwide. Plagiarism reduces learning and is correlated with increased fraud and inefficiency on the job, thus lessening competitiveness and hampering development.In this context, the present research examines 48 licenciatura theses and 102 masters theses from five of Mozambique’s largest universities. Of the 150 theses, 75% contained significant plagiarism (>100 word equivalents) and 39%, very much (>500 word equivalents). Significant plagiarism was detected in both licenciatura and masters (...) theses. By using both Turnitin and Urkund to identify potentially plagiarized passages, professionally verifying whether those passages contain plagiarism, and, if confirmed, counting the words involved, the study presents a new method for classifying the quantity and significance of plagiarism. The use of two text-similarity-recognition programs also improved the rate of detection and, in some theses, significantly increased the classification of the gravity of the plagiarism encountered.Based on a broad review of the literature, the article argues that, to combat wide-scale plagiarism, academic institutions need to cultivate a consensus among faculty and students about the definition and types of plagiarism, the appropriate penalties, and the paramount professional and economic need to nurture professional ethics. However, to achieve even partial success requires significant involvement by administrators, faculty, students and student leaders guided by a holistic strategy using technological, pedagogical, administrative and legal components to prevent and detect plagiarism and then reeducate or discipline students caught plagiarizing. (shrink)

This chapter is intended to provide the reader with a brief biographical overview of Adorno's life and thought, with an emphasis on the key turning points in his career. It discusses his childhood, his education in Frankfurt, his musical studies, his emigration first to Oxford and then to the United States, his return to Germany after the Second World War, his tenure as professor at the Goethe Universität Frankfurt and his prominence as a public intellectual, and his confrontation with students. (...) Together with biographical details the chapter also offers a simple overview of Adorno's major concerns as a philosopher. (shrink)

Aristotle Poetics: Editio Maior of the Greek Text with Historial Introductions and Philological Commentaries. Edited by Leonardo Tarán and Dimitri Gutas. Mnemosyne Supplements, vol. 338. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Pp. xiii + 536. $226, €162.

Publishing a collection of fragments from a classical author is a risky business: the moment the book appears in print, it may already be outdated, as new fragments could have come to light. Or, in the words of Ecclesiasticus 18:7: ‘When a man hath done, then he beginneth; and when he leaveth off, then he shall be doubtful’. The same fate befell me shortly after the publication of my collection of fragments from Rufus of Ephesus' On Melancholy. Manfred Ullmann wrote (...) to me that the late Rainer Degen had discovered a new fragment; in the course of my research, I came across some relevant quotations in the Hippocratic Treatments by the tenth-century author aṭ-Ṭabarī; and recently, Klaus-Dietrich Fischer published two related fragments. The following short note contains these new fragments together with an English translation and commentary. At the end, I also offer some addenda and corrigenda, partly in light of the reviews that have since appeared. (shrink)

The production of manuscripts can be an indication for the scientific, linguistic or medical interests of a community. In this paper the author argues that Parisinus Graecus 2293, a bilingual Greek-Arabic manuscript, containing parts of the first three books of Paul of Aegina's medical encyclopaedia, was produced in Sicily or Southern Italy, probably in Palermo during the reign of the Hohenstaufen. It is thus a testimony to the fervent scientific and medical interest of the Swabian court which promoted cultural exchange (...) between the East and the West. The purpose of the manuscript was not so much to help medical practice but rather to further bilingualism by giving the reader a tool with which he could improve his knowledge of either language. (shrink)

The harsh consequences of the American plant closing epidemic in recent years on workers, their families, and their communities, has raised widespread ethical and moral concerns. In the early 1970s, a diverse group of academics, social activists, public policy analysts, and special interest organizations developed a number of legislative proposals designed to restrict closings by law. The proposals encountered many formidable obstacles in an increasingly hostile free-market environment. The business community was itself moved to assume some of the burdens precipitated (...) by closures either unilaterally or through collective bargaining. At the same time, powerful business interests tenaciously fought the enactment of mandatory closing restrictions into law. Nevertheless, through a prolonged and tortuous odyssey, the requirements of advanced notice and worker severence pay have now begun to root in law. Their success stands as evidence of a continuing American public policy receptivity to ethics-driven concerns. (shrink)

Byrne & Russon's notion of program-level imitation is based on the ability of apes to plan novel sequences of behavior and on how information gleaned by observation can aid the planning process. Byrne & Russon would have made a stronger case by focusing on social learning and planning and expending less effort interpreting their results as a new category of imitation.

Webb compares robots to other behavior models in a novel space, but neglects significant portions of this space. The article's analysis of models would have been strengthened by including a broader coverage of physically embodied models and of models of social behavior. Nevertheless, Webb is correct to claim that robot construction will contribute to understanding behavior.

Hippocrates is a towering figure in Greek medicine. Dubbed the 'father of medicine', he has inspired generations of physicians over millennia in both the East and West. Despite this, little is known about him, and scholars have long debated his relationship to the works attributed to him in the so-called 'Hippocratic Corpus', although it is undisputed that many of the works within it represent milestones in the development of Western medicine. In this Companion, an international team of authors introduces major (...) themes in Hippocratic studies, ranging from textual criticism and the 'Hippocratic question' to problems such as aetiology, physiology and nosology. Emphasis is given to the afterlife of Hippocrates from Late Antiquity to the modern period. Hippocrates had as much relevance in the fifth-century BC Greek world as in the medieval Islamic world, and he remains with us today in both medical and non-medical contexts. (shrink)

A special issue of_ New German Critique_ The posthumous publication of Theodor W. Adorno’s works on music continues to reveal the special relationship between music and philosophy in his thinking. These important works have not, however, received as much scholarly attention as they deserve. Contributors to this issue seek to provide insight into some of the key themes raised in these works, including the sociology of musical genre, the historical transformation of music from the "heroic" or high-bourgeois era to late (...) modernity, the meaning of both performance and listening in the era of mass communication, and the specific challenges or deformations of the radio on musical form, a theme that implicates many of the digital practices of our own age. There is much left to discover in these new publications, and they pose again, with renewed vigor, the question of Adorno’s _Aktualität_—his polyvalent, untranslatable term for, among other things, the intellectual relationship between the present and the past. Contributors Daniel K. L. Chua, Lydia Goehr, Peter E. Gordon, Martin Jay, Brian Kane, Max Paddison, Alexander Rehding, Fred Rush, Martin Scherzinger. (shrink)

This paper introduces two newly discovered epistles by the celebrated physician and philosopher Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Zakariyyāʾ al-Rāzī. The first epistle addresses the question of why and how clothing can be used both to stay warm and to stay cool, drawing on the Aristotelian tradition of problem literature. The second epistle arises out of a court polemic and treats the question of whether one should consume mulberries after watermelons. This study offers analysis, editions, and translations of these previously unknown (...) epistles, situating them within their broader literary and cultural contexts. (shrink)

Philosophy courses face unique problems in that students generally have no previous encounter with the subject and have serious misconceptions about its nature and relevance. This paper presents an essay “What Makes the Examined Life Worth Living” that provides students an accessible introduction to philosophy; one that corrects their suspicion that philosophy is nothing more than opinion, where no progress is made, and has no practical importance. The essay begins by replacing the practice of philosophy as merely asserting one’s opinion (...) with philosophy as analysis and argument about fundamental questions, turns to a discuss of progress in philosophy, and concludes with four replies to the view that philosophy lacks practical relevance. (shrink)

Investigations into ethical judgments generally seem fuzzy as to the relevant research domain. We first attempted to clarify the construct and determine domain parameters. This attempt required addressing difficulties associated with pinpointing relevant literature, most notably the varied nomenclature used to refer to ethical judgments (individual evaluations of actions’ ethicality). Given this variation in construct nomenclature and the difficulties it presented in identifying pertinent focal studies, we elected to focus on research that cited papers featuring prominent and often-used measures of (...) ethical judgments (primarily, but not exclusively, the Multidimensional Ethics Scale). Our review of these studies indicated a preponderance of inferences and conclusions unwarranted by empirical evidence (likely attributable at least partly to inconsistent nomenclature). Moreover, ethical judgments related consistently to few respondent characteristics or any other variables, emergent relationships may not always be especially meaningful, and much research seems inclined to repetition of already verified findings. Although we concluded that knowledge about ethical judgments seems not to have advanced appreciably after decades of investigation, we suggested a possible path forward that focuses on the content of what is actually being judged as reflected in the myriad of vignettes used in the literature to elicit judgments. (shrink)