In addition to obviating the use of synthetic agrochemicals and emphasizing farming in accordance with agro-ecological guidelines, organic farming acknowledges the integrity of plants as an essential element of its natural approaches to crop production. For cultivated plants, integrity refers to their inherent nature, wholeness, completeness, species-specific characteristics, and their being in balance with their (organically farmed) environment, while accomplishing their “natural aim.” We argue that this integrity of plants has ethical value, distinguishing integrity of life, plant-typic integrity, genotypic integrity, (...) and phenotypic integrity. We have developed qualitative criteria to ethically evaluate existing practices and have applied these criteria to assess whether current plant breeding and propagation techniques violate the integrity of crop plants. This process has resulted in a design of a holistic, scientific approach of organic plant breeding and seed production. Our evaluation has met considerable criticism from mainstream (crop) scientists. We respond to the following questions: (1). Can ethics be incorporated into objective crop sciences? (2). What is the nature of the intrinsic value of plants in organic farming? We argue that criteria to take integrity into account can only be assessed from a holistic perspective and we show that a holistic approach is needed to design such ethical notions in a consistent way. The ethical notions have been further elaborated by formulating human responsibility and respect towards crop plants. Responsibility and respect can only be shown by providing crop plants the right to be nurtured and to express natural behavior at all levels of integrity. (shrink)

In Proposition 4, lines 3, 4 and 8, 9 were scrambled by mistake during the pagination process of the online published article.

This paper introduces a receiver who perceives ambiguity in a binary model of Bayesian persuasion. The sender has a well-defined prior, while the receiver considers an interval of priors and maximizes a convex combination of worst and best expected payoffs. We characterize the sender’s optimal signal and find that the receiver’s payoff differences across states given each action, play a fundamental role in the characterization and the comparative statics. If the sender’s preferred action is the least sensitive one, then the (...) sender’s equilibrium payoff, as well as the sender’s preferred degree of receiver ambiguity, is increasing in the receiver’s pessimism. We document a tendency for ambiguity-sensitive receivers to be more difficult to persuade. (shrink)

The Bellum Hispaniense, often considered alongside the two other pseudo-Caesarian commentarii, the Bellum Alexandrinum and the Bellum Africum, contains the account of Caesar's final battles with Pompey's forces in Spain during 46 and 45 b.c. In terms of its language and style, the BHisp. is certainly the most un-Caesarian of the pseudo-Caesarian Bella. The work abounds in phenomena belonging to different linguistic varieties, and is an important piece of evidence in the process of the standardization of written Latin.

Although the declaratory theory is arguably a central feature of common law adjudication, it is widely disparaged: either the law never changes, which is implausible, or it is changed retrospectively, which is unfair and contrary to the rule of law. These common objections are rooted in misconceptions about the nature of law. When we distinguish more clearly between the sources of law, whether in statute or precedent, and the corpus juris, shaped by general principles of justice, the declaratory theory is (...) vindicated. Structured by familiar precedents and principles, the common law offers a framework within which the rule of law is sustained by moral reflection and argument. There is a close analogy with Rawlsian reflective equilibrium. It is only in virtue of an inquiry into justice, guided but not irrevocably bound by past practice, that there is any law to be declared. Legal judgment is precisely a determination of the requirements of justice as they apply in all the circumstances. (shrink)

Testimony, even in the well-worked parts of antiquity, continues to accrue, some from new papyri, some from texts long known but overlooked. In the result the critic is discomfited, honest men come by their own. οιόνδ' πέβη τόδε πργμα. This document, which consists of two lives of Homer and the Agon inserted between them, has long been derived from the Μουσεîον of Alcidamas. The conjecture was contested and the survival of Alcidamas denied. The publication of twenty-five lines from a papyrus (...) of s. II.–III. p. C. by Professor J. G. Winter , containing a Homeric biography signed αλκι] δαμαντος περι ομηρου put an end to the matter. See on the whole question Mr. Winter's remarks and a paper by Sig. Carlo Gallavotti of Bologna, Rivista di Filologia, 1929, 31. (shrink)

Constant changes in the economic, social and political life of the people of the nations force the Church to enter into a dialogue with the world. The object of her attention is culture, politics, science, dealing with human problems. Church leadership of various Christian denominations sees the possibility of applying their socio-political guides in a wide socio-cultural space - personal and family circles, political and public activities, social life in general.

Postmodern understandings of the god concept, based upon sociological and anthropological insights, support the ontological reality of the god concept. AII such god constructs can be understood as real but human products which come out of a situated Drama of the Holy. The reality quotient of any god concept can be seen as a function of solidarity activities within a society. Social justice concerns are, thus, the best indicators of that reality quotient while divisive, exploitative and oppressive practices in the (...) world tend to desanctify both society and nature thus justify Death of God analyses. Two interrelated solidarity activities are discussed for their efficacy in sanctification of nature and society: 1) situated Dramas of the Holy and, 2) social policies in the political economy. A variety of grand narratives are mentioned, each with differing foundational concepts, with which to institute social justice as we move into the 21st century. (shrink)