This article explores the ethical concept of neutrality through use of a psychiatric clinical vignette. In this case a psychiatry resident is faced with the treatment of a patient who was found by the FBI to be in possession of child pornography. Although not accused of any other crimes, the patient was a fugitive from the law and requesting treatment for pedophilia. Faced with the pressures of limited resources and anxiety about the patient's dangerousness to others, the resident and his (...) supervisor tried to strike a balance between the ethical principles of neutrality and beneficence. Through this vignette, the importance of neutrality, as well as how it can be compromised by other pressures such as expediency and anxiety, is explored. (shrink)

At the forefront of international concerns about global legislation and regulation, a host of noted environmentalists and business ethicists examine ethical issues in consumption from the points of view of environmental sustainability, economic development, and free enterprise.

The main question that Firestone & Scholl (F&S) pose is whether “what and how we see is functionally independent from what and how we think, know, desire, act, and so forth” (sect. 2, para. 1). We synthesize a collection of concerns from an interdisciplinary set of coauthors regarding F&S's assumptions and appeals to intuition, resulting in their treatment of visual perception as context-free.

I argue that a well-known argument concerning moral luck supports something like the Principle of Alternate Possibilities (PAP), despite the attacks on PAP by Harry Frankfurt and John Martin Fischer.

In the past three decades there has been a rapid development of the formal machinery for modal logic. Quantified modal logic has developed along with a semantics and model theory that is appropriate to it. With this technical development there has been relatively little discussion of what modality is all about. There are two fundamental questions that have gone unanswered. First, to what does necessity amount? Is this a new logical notion, or is it something that can be further analyzed (...) in terms of other notions that we already have at our disposal? The second question is what makes truths involving necessity true? What is their ontological grounding in the world? This essay is directed at the first of these questions. ;There are three possible reductions of metaphysical modality. First, there is the reduction suggested by the semantics for modal logic: a reduction in terms of possible worlds. Second, there is the reduction in terms of cognition. What is possible is what is conceivable. Third, there is the reduction in terms of language. Necessities arise from the structures of language and/or language use. ;I argue that none of these is successful. All of them suffer either from presupposing some form of metaphysical necessity in the reductive base, rendering them circular and not truly reductive, or they do not do justice to the modality being reduced. ;Since necessity is not reducible to any non-modal features of the world, we need to determine whether we ought to reject it as unacceptable on this basis, or whether we ought to retain it, but treat is as a new primitive that is introduced into a philosophical or logical theory. I urge the latter course is the one that we ought to take because without it too many things will likewise be deemed unacceptable. Causal necessity and explanation, normally accepted theories or knowledge and perception, logic and logical validity, and one common manner of distinguishing sets from properties will be deemed unacceptable if de re necessity is unacceptable. All of these presuppose de re metaphysical necessity in some way. I conclude that de re metaphysical necessity ought to be retained in our theory as primitive, unanalyzable notion. (shrink)

The reception of Poincaré’s conventionalist doctrine of space by mathematicians is studied for the period 1891–1911. The opposing view of Riemann and Helmholtz, according to which the geometry of space is an empirical question, is shown to have swayed several geometers. This preference is considered in the context of changing views of the nature of space in theoretical physics, and with respect to structural and social changes within mathematics. Included in the latter evolution is the emergence of non-Euclidean geometry as (...) a new sub-discipline. (shrink)

The law of gravitational attraction is a window on three formal approaches to laws of nature based on Lorentz-invariance: Poincaré’s four-dimensional vector space (1906), Minkowski’s matrix calculus and spacetime geometry (1908), and Sommerfeld’s 4-vector algebra (1910). In virtue of a common appeal to 4-vectors for the characterization of gravitational attraction, these three contributions track the emergence and early development of four-dimensional physics.

Are there good reasons for offering petitionary prayers to God, if God exists? Could such prayers make a difference in the world? Could we ever have good reason to think that such prayers had been answered? In this Element, the author will carefully explore these questions with special attention to recent philosophical discussions.

Prominent atheists claim the Bible is a racist text. Yet Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. read it daily. Then again, so did many ardent segregationists. Some atheists claim religion serves to oppress the masses. Yet the classic text of the French Revolution, What is the Third Estate?, was written by a priest. On the other hand, the revolutionaries ended up banning religion. What do we make of religion's confusing role in history? And what of religion's relationship to science? Some scientists (...) claim that we have no free will. Others argue that advances in neurobiology and physics disprove determinism. As for whispering to the universe, an absurd habit say the skeptics. Yet prayer is a transformative practice for millions. This book explores the most common atheist critiques of the Bible and religion, incorporating Jewish, Christian, and Muslim voices. The result is a fresh, modern re-evaluation of religion and of atheism. (shrink)

Walter Freeman's theory of nonlinear neurodynamics has had a major impact on brain dynamics in modern cognitive neuroscience. Steven Bressler's theory of neurocognitive networks follows from Freeman's work, and his empirical evidence for the coordination of cortical areas by phase-coupled beta rhythms in large-scale cognitive brain networks supports Freeman's ideas on nonlinear brain dynamics. Bressler's work, taking Freeman's concepts into the realm of cognitive neurodynamics, also supports Scott Kelso's theory of metastability in coordination dynamics. The (...) aims of the present paper are threefold: 1) to explore relevant concepts in Freeman's theoretical framework, 2) unify it and provide empirical support for it, and 3) explore its import for the study of consciousness. We take as our point of departure Bressler and Kelso's 2016 publication on cortical coordination dynamics and the Freeman-Kelso dialogue noted in the literature on this topic. In our view, Freeman's conceptual framework has great explanatory power. Its grounding in a dynamical systems approach to the study of brain function, and its incorporation of embodiment, make it relevant to the study of consciousness. Thus, with Freeman, we argue that the scientific understanding of consciousness must move beyond notions of computationalism and mental representations, to employ concepts of nonlinear brain dynamics and embodiment. (shrink)

This essay provides a positive account of coercion that avoids significant difficulties that have confronted most other recent accounts. It enters this territory by noting a dispute over whether coercion has to manipulate the will of the coercee, or whether direct force inhibiting action (such as manhandling or imprisoning) is itself coercive. Though this dispute may at first seem a mere matter of taxonomic categorization, I argue that this dispute reflects an important divergence in thought about the nature of coercion. (...) Though it has rarely been noted, there are two significantly different ways of theorizing coercion found in recent writing on coercion. One focuses on the ability of the coercer to inhibit actions by the coercee through techniques such as force, violence, and like powers, or threats based in such powers. The other approach restricts coercion to cases where coercion manipulates the will of the coercee, though widens it to include any sort of threat that puts pressure on the coercee's will and alters the coercee's intentional choice of action. The former, enforcement approach used to be widely assumed by many political theorists who discussed the place of coercion in law and politics, though it has been largely supplanted by the latter, pressure approach. I show that these approaches are indeed quite distinct, and argue that the enforcement approach is in several ways superior to and more fundamental than the pressure approach for recognizing and understanding coercion in ethics and political and legal philosophy. I also consider and respond to a number of objections to the enforcement approach, showing that it can deal with some puzzle cases such as bluffs, blackmail, inefficacious threats, oblique threats, and economic coercion. (shrink)

: The rights to liberty championed by classical liberal and libertarian theorists may be supported as products of practical reason. The foundations for these rights rest initially on the idea that the separateness of persons is embedded in the circumstances of life that make justice a meaningful concept. We can discover the duties justice imposes […].

The story of the show, The Good Place, begins with a common picture of what happens to us after we die. One of the key philosophical issues in the story involves how to assess correctly the moral goodness or badness of a person's life on Earth, since this is the basis of the judgment concerning their eternal destiny. Thomas Nagel claims that there are four kinds of “moral luck”: luck in the circumstances in which we find ourselves, luck with respect (...) to our constitution or character, luck with respect to the results of our actions, and luck with respect to having free choices at all. Perhaps one moral of the story of The Good Place is that life is really complicated, morally speaking—people are not simply good or evil, and cannot be judged easily. (shrink)

This collection was inspired by the observation that film remakes offer us the opportunity to revisit important issues, stories, themes, and topics in a manner that is especially relevant and meaningful to contemporary audiences. Like mythic stories that are told again and again in differing ways, film remakes present us with updated perspectives on timeless ideas. While some remakes succeed and others fail aesthetically, they always say something about the culture in which_and for which_they are produced. Contributors explore the ways (...) in which the fears of death, loss of self, and bodily violence have been expressed and then reinterpreted in such films and remakes as Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Night of the Living Dead, and Dawn of the Dead. Films such as Rollerball, The Ring, The Grudge, The Great Yokai Wars, and Insomnia are discussed as well because of their ability to give voice to collective anxieties concerning cultural change, nihilism, and globalization. While opening on a note that emphasizes the compulsion of filmmakers to revisit issues concerning fear and anxiety, this collection ends by using films like Solaris, King Kong, Star Trek, Doom, and Van Helsing to suggest that repeated confrontation with these issues allows the opportunity for creative and positive transformation. (shrink)

From the perspective of nonlinear science, it is argued that one may accept physicalism and reject substance dualism without being forced into reductionism. This permits a property dualism under which biological and mental phenomena may emerge from intricate positive feedback networks, involving many levels of both the biological and cognitive hierarchies.

Introduction: What is criticism? (a preliminary dialogue) -- The critic as artist and vice versa -- The eye of the beholder -- Self-criticism (a further dialogue) -- Lost in the museum -- The trouble with critics -- Practical criticism (another dialogue) -- How to be wrong -- The critical condition -- The end of criticism (a final dialogue) -- Afterword.

In response to recent suggestions that the phenomena of consciousness may be related to those described by quantum theory, it is argued that distinctive features of brain activity are more typical of nonlinear classical dynamics than of quantum dynamics, which is a linear theory. Thus natural scientists should turn to hierarchies of nonlinear classical systems rather than quantum theory for explanations of the brain's mysterious behaviour.

_Sonoran Desert, Stuart Hameroff and Alwyn Scott awoke from their_ _siestas to take margaritas in the shade of a ramada. On a nearby_ _table, a tape recorder had accidentally been left on and the following_ _is an unedited transcript of their conversation._.

This chapter discusses the roles of ether and electrons in relativity theory. One of the most radical moves made by Albert Einstein was to dismiss the ether from electrodynamics. His fellow physicists felt challenged by Einstein’s view, and they came up with a variety of responses, ranging from enthusiastic approval, to dismissive rejection. Among the naysayers were the electron theorists, who were unanimous in their affirmation of the ether, even if they agreed with other aspects of Einstein’s theory of relativity. (...) The eventual success of the latter theory (circa 1911) owed much to Hermann Minkowski’s idea of four-dimensional spacetime, which was portrayed as a conceptual substitute of sorts for the ether. (shrink)

Albert Einstein's bold assertion of the form-invariance of the equation of a spherical light wave with respect to inertial frames of reference became, in the space of six years, the preferred foundation of his theory of relativity. Early on, however, Einstein's universal light-sphere invariance was challenged on epistemological grounds by Henri Poincaré, who promoted an alternative demonstration of the foundations of relativity theory based on the notion of a light-ellipsoid. Drawing in part on archival sources, this paper shows how an (...) informal, international group of physicists, mathematicians, and engineers, including Einstein, Paul Langevin, Poincaré, Hermann Minkowski, Ebenezer Cunningham, Harry Bateman, Otto Berg, Max Planck, Max Laue, A. A. Robb, and Ludwig Silberstein, employed figures of light during the formative years of relativity theory in their discovery of the salient features of the relativistic worldview. (shrink)

This chapter discusses the roles of ether and electrons in relativity theory. One of the most radical moves made by Albert Einstein was to dismiss the ether from electrodynamics. His fellow physicists felt challenged by Einstein’s view, and they came up with a variety of responses, ranging from enthusiastic approval, to dismissive rejection. Among the naysayers were the electron theorists, who were unanimous in their affirmation of the ether, even if they agreed with other aspects of Einstein’s theory of relativity. (...) The eventual success of the latter theory (circa 1911) owed much to Hermann Minkowski’s idea of four-dimensional spacetime, which was portrayed as a conceptual substitute of sorts for the ether. (shrink)

This textbook is designed for an Introduction to Proofs course organized around the themes of number and space. Concepts are illustrated using both geometric and number examples, while frequent analogies and applications help build intuition and context in the humanities, arts, and sciences. Sophisticated mathematical ideas are introduced early and then revisited several times in a spiral structure, allowing students to progressively develop rigorous thinking. Throughout, the presentation is enlivened with whimsical illustrations, apt quotations, and glimpses of mathematical history and (...) culture. Early chapters integrate an introduction to sets, logic, and beginning proof techniques with a first exposure to more advanced mathematical structures. The middle chapters focus on equivalence relations, functions, and induction. Carefully chosen examples elucidate familiar topics, such as natural and rational numbers and angle measurements, as well as new mathematics, such as modular arithmetic and beginning graph theory. The book concludes with a thorough exploration of the cardinalities of finite and infinite sets and, in two optional chapters, brings all the topics together by constructing the real numbers and other complete metric spaces. Designed to foster the mental flexibility and rigorous thinking needed for advanced mathematics, Introduction to Mathematics suits either a lecture-based or flipped classroom. A year of mathematics, statistics, or computer science at the university level is assumed, but the main prerequisite is the willingness to engage in a new challenge. (shrink)

Traditional theists believe that there exists an all-knowing, all-powerful, perfectly loving, and perfectly good God. They also believe that God created the world, sustains it in being from moment to moment, and providentially guides all events, in accordance with a plan, towards a good ending. Historically, most traditional theists have believed that God sometimes answers prayers for particular things. In keeping with the literature on this subject, these prayers are referred to as ‘petitionary prayers’. This article discusses several problems related (...) to the concept of the traditional theistic God's answering petitionary prayers. (shrink)

This volume addresses the issues of the Third Age--that time after retirement when financial stability and reduced obligations to others, together, allow for freedom--and good health makes it possible to enjoy that freedom. How, in this special time of life, is meaning and purpose to be found? And what alternatives are available? These difficult questions are responded to by scholars in the field of aging, some themselves in the Third Age.

Systematic entomology flourished as a branch of Natural History from the 1750s to the end of the nineteenth century. During this interval, the “era of Heroic Entomology,” the majority of workers in the field were dedicated amateurs. This article traces the demographic and occupational shifts in entomology through this 150-year interval and into the early twentieth century. The survey is based on entomologists who studied beetles (Coleoptera), and who named sufficient numbers of species to have their own names abbreviated by (...) subsequent taxonomists. In the eighteenth century, 27 entomologists achieved this level of prominence, of whom 37% were academics, 19% were doctors, 11% had private incomes, 19% were clergymen, and 8% were government officials. Many of those with private incomes were members of the European aristocracy, and all but one were European men. The nineteenth century list included 192 entomologists, of whom 17% were academics, 16% were museum curators, 2% were school teachers, 15% were doctors, 6% were military men, 7% were merchants, 2% were government entomologists, 6% had private incomes, 5% were clergymen, 5% were government officials, and 4% were lawyers. The demographics of entomology shifted dramatically in the nineteenth century. Whereas many of the noteworthy entomologists of the eighteenth century were German, Swedish, or French, in the nineteenth century, many more European countries are represented, and almost one-fifth of the noteworthy entomologists were from the United States. The nineteenth century list, like the eighteenth century list, contains no women. By the twentieth century, 63% of 178 noteworthy systematic entomologists were paid professionals, teaching entomology courses in universities, or studying insect taxonomy in museums and government-sponsored laboratories. Only one person on the twentieth century list had a private income, but women (ten individuals) were included on the list for the first time. (shrink)

Academic dishonesty is a persistent problem in the American educational system. The present investigation examined how reports of academic cheating related to students' emphasis on their moral identities and their sensitivity to social evaluation. Seventy college students at a large southeastern university completed a battery of surveys. Symptoms of social anxiety were positively correlated with recall of academic cheating. Additionally, relative to students who placed less importance on their moral identities, students who placed more importance on their moral identities recalled (...) significantly fewer instances of cheating. In summary, these findings suggest that students are less likely to cheat on their school work when they place greater emphasis on their moral identity and are less sensitive to social evaluation. Practical interventions to rampant cheating in American schools are discussed. (shrink)