Nicolas Asselin,Stéphanie Audet,Eric Crégheur,Julio Cesar Dias Chaves,Gavin McDowell,Charles-Frédéric Murray,Louis Painchaud,Paul-Hubert Poirier,Maryse Robert,Philippe Therrien.

This volume represents the first collection of essays devoted exclusively to Jacques Derrida's Death Penalty Seminars, conducted from 1999-2001. The volume includes essays from a range of scholars working in philosophy, law, Francophone studies, and comparative literature, including established Derridians, activist scholars, and emerging scholars.

A common and disabling consequence of stroke is the difficulty in processing contralesional space (i.e., hemispatial neglect). According to paper-and-pencil tests, neglect remits or stabilizes in severity within a few months after a brain injury. This arbitrary temporal limit, however, is at odds with neglect’s well-known dependency on task-sensitivity. The present study tested the hypothesis that the putative early resolution of neglect might be due to the insensitivity of testing methods rather than to the lack of spontaneous recovery at later (...) stages. A right hemisphere stroke patient was studied longitudinally for 3 years. According to paper-and-pencil tests the patient showed no symptom of hemispatial neglect 1 month post stroke. Awareness of spatially lateralized visual targets was then assessed by means of computer-based single- and dual-tasks requiring an additional top-down deployment of attention for the parallel processing of visual or auditory stimuli. Errorless performance at computer-based tasks was reached at month 12 and maintained until month 29 after stroke. A bottom-up manipulation was then implemented by reducing target diameter. Following this change, more than 50% of contralesional targets were omitted, mostly under dual-tasking. At months 40 and 41 the same task revealed a significant (but not complete) reduction in the number of contralesional omissions. Ipsilesional targets were, in contrast, still errorless detected. The coupling of a bottom-up (target change) and a top-down (dual-tasking) manipulation revealed the presence of a long-lasting spontaneous recovery from contralesional spatial awareness deficits. In contrast, neither manipulation was effective when implemented separately. After having excluded the potential confound of practice effects, it was concluded that not only the presence but also the time course of hemispatial neglect strongly depends on the degree of attentional engagement required by the task. (shrink)

In a recent and provocative essay, Christopher Bartel attempts to resolve the gamer’s dilemma. The dilemma, formulated by Morgan Luck, goes as follows: there is no principled distinction between virtual murder and virtual pedophilia. So, we’ll have to give up either our intuition that virtual murder is morally permissible—seemingly leaving us over-moralizing our gameplay—or our intuition that acts of virtual pedophilia are morally troubling—seemingly leaving us under-moralizing our game play. Bartel’s attempted resolution relies on establishing the following three theses: (1) (...) virtual pedophilia is child pornography, (2) the consumption of child pornography is morally wrong, and (3) virtual murder is not murder. Relying on Michael Rea’s definition of pornography, I argue that we should reject thesis one, but since Bartel’s moral argument in thesis two does not actually rely thesis one that his resolution is not thereby undermined. Still, even if we grant that there are adequate resources internal to Bartel’s account to technically resolve the gamer’s dilemma his reasoning is still unsatisfying. This is so because Bartel follows Neil Levy in arguing that virtual pedophilia is wrong because it harms women. While I grant Levy’s account, I argue that this is the wrong kind of reason to resolve the gamer’s dilemma because it is indirect. What we want is to know what is wrong with virtual child pornography itself. Finally, I suggest alternate moral resources for resolving the gamer’s dilemma that are direct in a way that Bartel’s resources are not. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider a particular amoralist challenge against those who would morally criticize our single-player video play, viz., “come on, it’s only a game!” The amoralist challenge with which I engage gains strength from two facts: the activities to which the amoralist lays claim are only those that do not involve interactions with other rational or sentient creatures, and the amoralist concedes that there may be extrinsic, consequentialist considerations that support legitimate moral criticisms. I argue that the amoralist (...) is mistaken and that there are non-consequentialist resources for morally evaluating our single-player game play. On my view, some video games contain details that anyone who has a proper understanding of and is properly sensitive to features of a shared moral reality will see as having an incorrigible social meaning that targets groups of individuals, e.g., women and minorities. I offer arguments to support the claim that there are such incorrigible social meanings and that they constrain the imaginative world so that challenges like “it’s only a game” lose their credibility. I also argue that our responses to such meanings bear on evaluations of our character, and in light of this fact video game designers have a duty to understand and work against the meanings of such imagery. (shrink)

The mental representation of brief temporal durations, when assessed in standard laboratory conditions, is highly accurate. Here we show that adding or subtracting temporal durations systematically results in strong and opposite biases, namely over-estimation for addition and under-estimation for subtraction. The difference with respect to a baseline temporal reproduction task changed across durations in an operation-specific way and survived correcting for the effect due to operation sign alone, indexing a reliable signature of arithmetic processing on time representation. A second experiment (...) replicated these findings with a different set of stimuli. This novel behavioral marker conceptually mirrors in the time domain the representational momentum found with motion, whereby the estimated spatial position of a visual target is displaced in the direction of motion itself. This momentum effect in temporal arithmetic suggests a striking analogy between time processing and visuospatial processing, which might index the presence of common computational principles. (shrink)

Este artículo analiza los diálogos posibles entre el pensamiento de Giorgio Agamben y la novela _Frankenstein_ de Mary Shelley. Así, el filósofo italiano describe aspectos centrales que indagan los modos en que el biopoder captura la nuda vida. En efecto, a través del concepto de _máquina_ –la antropológica, el lenguaje y la gubernamental– se describen los dispositivos capaces de volver la potencia de vida a los cálculos del poder. Por otro lado, _Frankenstein_ construye una serie de escenas en la que (...) la voz de la Cosa interpela a su creador, Víctor Frankenstein, en una dimensión ética por su negligencia y falta de cuidado. La interpelación se dirige a un personaje pero, tomando los términos de Agamben, Víctor Frankenstein forma parte de una maquinaria mayor de la que él mismo termina siendo víctima. La ficción explicita además la falla de la maquinaria biopolítica por cuanto su protagonista se afirma en la vida procurando hallar sentidos posibles de existencia. (shrink)

Moral duties are regularly attributed to groups. Does this make conceptual sense or is this merely political rhetoric? And what are the implications for these individuals within groups? Collins outlines a Tripartite Model of group duties that can target political demands at the right entities, in the right way and for the right reasons.

Many meta-ethicists are alethists: they claim that practical considerations can constitute normative reasons for action, but not for belief. But the alethist owes us an account of the relevant difference between action and belief, which thereby explains this normative difference. Here, I argue that two salient strategies for discharging this burden fail. According to the first strategy, the relevant difference between action and belief is that truth is the constitutive standard of correctness for belief, but not for action, while according (...) to the second strategy, it is that practical considerations can constitute motivating reasons for action, but not for belief. But the former claim only shifts the alethist's explanatory burden, and the latter claim is wrong—we can believe for practical reasons. Until the alethist can offer a better account, then, I argue that we should accept that there are practical reasons for belief. (shrink)

David Lewis famously argued that the time traveller ‘can’ murder her grandfather, even though she never will: it is compossible with a particular set of facts including her motive, opportunity and skill . I argue that while ordinary agents ‘can’ under Lewis’s conception, philosophers cannot – the latter will not only fail to fulfill their homicidal intentions but also fail to form them in the first place.

Far from an elite practice reserved for the highly educated, criticism is all around us. We turn to the Yelp reviewers to decide what restaurants are best, to Rotten Tomatoes to guide our movie choices, and to a host of voices on social media for critiques of political candidates, beach resorts, and everything in between. Yet even amid this ever-expanding sea of opinions, professional critics still hold considerable power in guiding how we make aesthetic judgements. Philosophers and lovers of art (...) continue to grapple with questions that have fascinated them for centuries: How should we engage with works of art? What might enhance such encounters? Should some people’s views be privileged? Who should count as a critic? And do critics actually help us appreciate art? In Two Thumbs Up, philosopher Stephanie Ross tackles these questions, revealing the ways that critics influence our decisions, and why that’s a good thing. Starting from David Hume’s conception of ideal critics, Ross refines his position and makes the case that review-based journalistic or consumer reporting criticism proves the best model for helping us find and appreciate quality. She addresses and critiques several other positions and, in the process, she demonstrates how aesthetic and philosophical concerns permeate our lives, choices, and culture. Ultimately, whether we’re searching for the right wine or the best concert, Ross encourages us all to find and follow critics whose taste we share. (shrink)

Public protest continued to represent a prominent form of social activism in democratic societies during the COVID-19 pandemic. In Australia, a lack of specific legislation articulating protest rights has meant that, in the context of pandemic restrictions, such events have been treated as illegal mass gatherings. Numerous large protests in major cities have, indeed, stirred significant public debate regarding rights of assembly during COVID-19 outbreaks. The ethics of infringing on protest rights continues to be controversial, with opinion divided as to (...) whether public health goals or human rights should take precedence. This paper applies public health ethical theory to an in-depth analysis of arguments on both sides of the debate. Using the Nuffield Council on Bioethics framework as a backdrop, proportionality and necessity of restrictions are understood as key concepts that are common to both public health and human rights perspectives. The analysis presented here finds a middle-ground between the prevailing arguments on opposing sides and is further able to rationalize the use of protest itself as an important element of a mature public health ethics response to restrictive policy. Thus, this paper aims to influence public health policy and legislation regarding protest rights during public health emergencies. (shrink)

Pragmatic clinical trials offer important benefits, such as generating evidence that is suited to inform real-world health care decisions and increasing research efficiency. However, PCTs also present ethical challenges. One such challenge involves the management of information that emerges in a PCT that is unrelated to the primary research question, yet may have implications for the individual patients, clinicians, or health care systems from whom or within which research data were collected. We term these findings as?pragmatic clinical trial collateral findings,? (...) or?PCT-CFs?. In this article, we explore the ethical considerations associated with the identification, assessment, and management of PCT-CFs, and how these considerations may vary based upon the attributes of a specific PCT. Our purpose is to map the terrain of PCT-CFs to serve as a foundation for future scholarship as well as policy-making and to facilitate careful deliberation about actual cases as they occur in practice. (shrink)

This chapter argues that the best way for a non-naturalist to explain why the normative supervenes on the natural is to claim that, while there are some sui generis normative properties whose essences cannot be fully specified in non-normative terms and do not specify any non-normative sufficient conditions for their instantiation, there are certain hybrid normative properties whose essences specify both naturalistic sufficient conditions for their own instantiation and sufficient conditions for the instantiation of certain sui generis normative properties. This (...) is the only metaphysical explanation for supervenience on offer, the chapter argues, that can both clearly maintain the pre-theoretical commitments of non-naturalism, and provide a metaphysical explanation not just for supervenience, but for all metaphysical necessities involving natural and normative properties. (shrink)

There is disagreement in the literature about the exact nature of the phenomenon of empathy. There are emotional, cognitive, and conditioning views, applying in varying degrees across species. An adequate description of the ultimate and proximate mechanism can integrate these views. Proximately, the perception of an object's state activates the subject's corresponding representations, which in turn activate somatic and autonomic responses. This mechanism supports basic behaviors that are crucial for the reproductive success of animals living in groups. The Perception-Action Model, (...) together with an understanding of how representations change with experience, can explain the major empirical effects in the literature. It can also predict a variety of empathy disorders. The interaction between the PAM and prefrontal functioning can also explain different levels of empathy across species and age groups. This view can advance our evolutionary understanding of empathy beyond inclusive fitness and reciprocal altruism and can explain different levels of empathy across individuals, species, stages of development, and situations. Key Words: altruism; cognitive empathy ; comparative; emotion; emotional contagion; empathy ; evolution; human; perception-action; perspective taking. (shrink)

Addressing the contradictions surrounding modern-day femininity and its complicated relationship with feminism and postfeminism, this book examines a range of popular female/feminist icons and paradigms. It offers an innovative and forward-looking perspective on femininity and the modern female self.