In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Things Merely Are: Philosophy in the Poetry of Wallace StevensTom McBrideThings Merely Are: Philosophy in the Poetry of Wallace Stevens, by Simon Critchley. 137 pp. New York: Routledge, 2005; $22.50.This book—a brief meditation on the poetry of Wallace Stevens and an even shorter one on the cinema of Terrence Malick—might have been a disaster. The author, a philosopher, is sometimes in worried denial that Stevens is an "anti-realist" (...) or a "transcendental realist," and one occasionally senses that in the ancient tension between philosophy and poetry, herding the poets into the philosopher's pen is a bullying way to resolve the conflict. But the book isn't a catastrophe at all; it's a lucid, ruminative, and personable reading of Stevens (and Malick) that even offers a good general guide to the reading of poetry in what Critchley calls "the wake of romanticism" (motto: "God is dead; therefore I am").Critchley's major idea is twofold: that poetry is a therapeutic art form because it slows us down and encourages, about countless subjects, "the whole voluptuousness of looking"; and that Stevens's poetry is informed by a contest between a poetry of "supreme fictions" (in which phenomena come under the [End Page 503] dominion of a potent imagination) and a poetry of "antipodes" (in which phenomena resist the imagination—they "merely are"—and thus reduce the imagination to impotence). Here Critchley affirms a usual view of Stevens as a poet of the weather—another way of saying that he is a modernist with strong roots in the Romantic movement—and he notes that the supreme fiction poems often tend to be set in summer, when the imagination seems especially yeasty, while the antipodean poems tend to be set in winter, when the miserly realness of things seems to rule the earth. In his sensitive and astute reading, however, Critchley remarks upon something else: that in his late poems Stevens seems more overtly metaphysical (Critchely says Stevens is the most philosophically interesting poet of the twentieth century) and that his later poems are set more and more in the seasons of transition (late autumn/early spring). Late in Stevens's career the battle between supreme fictions and antipodes is therefore played out in the same, often overtly philosophical poems. Here Critchley's commentary is at its most astute. Occasional lovers of Wallace Stevens's poetry will remember why they adore his work, and have a better idea why.However, lest readers get the wrong idea, some careful qualifications about the dialectic between Stevens's summer and winter poems are in order. For one thing, the poems of supreme fictions always leave phenomena with their particularity, their ordinariness, their concreteness. To cite one such poem, "Anecdote of the Jar," although the poet imaginatively places "a jar in Tennessee" that makes "the lovely wilderness / Surround that hill," the wilderness' birds and bushes, even the jar itself, remain birds and bushes and jars ("gray and bare"). Here Critchley reinterprets Samuel Taylor Coleridge's distinction between "fancy" and "imagination." Fancy dreams of what does not exist, while imagination transfigures what does. Stevens's poems of supreme fiction are always imaginative, never fanciful.A second qualification: Critchley argues that for Stevens (as well as for a number of philosophers) human ways of knowing are always informed, sooner or later, by the conceptual imagination. In that sense a rose is never just a rose, although we need not become overly fanciful about what a cigar might be. And this leads us to a third one: When readers get to the wintry, antipodean poems—the poems of "anti-poetry"—they will find Stevens suggesting that the only way to view objects without imagination is to imagine what that would be like. Even earlier in his career Stevens became interested in this paradox, as in "The Snow Man" where he muses:One must have a mind of winter To regard the frost and boughs Of the pine-trees crusted with snow; And have been cold a long time To behold the junipers shagged with ice, The spruces rough in the distant glitter [End Page 504] Of the January sun; and not... (shrink)

Featuring a new code of ethics for journalists and essays by 14 journalism thought leaders and practitioners, The New Ethics of Journalism: Principles for the 21st Century, by Kelly McBride and Tom Rosenstiel, examines the new pressures brought to bear on journalism by technology and changing audience habits. It offers a new framework for making critical moral choices, as well as case studies that reinforce the concepts and principles rising to prominence in 21st century communication. The book addresses the (...) unique problems facing journalism today, including how we arrive at truth in an era of abundant and unverified information; the evolution of new business models and partnerships; the presence of journalists on independent social media platforms; the role of diversity; the meaning of stories; the value of images; and the role of community in the production of journalism. (shrink)

Most of us are “time-biased” in preferring pains to be past rather than future and pleasures to be future rather than past. However, it turns out that if you are risk averse and time-biased, then you can be turned into a “pain pump”—in order to insure yourself against misfortune, you will take a series of pills which leaves you with more pain and better off in no respect. Since this vulnerability seems rationally impermissible, while time-bias and risk aversion seem rationally (...) permissible, we are left with a puzzle. (shrink)

According to the “Textbook View,” there is an extensional dispute between consequentialists and deontologists, in virtue of the fact that only the latter defend “agent-relative” principles—principles that require an agent to have a special concern with making sure that she does not perform certain types of action. I argue that, contra the Textbook View, there are agent-neutral versions of deontology. I also argue that there need be no extensional disagreement between the deontologist and consequentialist, as characterized by the Textbook View.

It is generally held that doctors and researchers have an obligation to obtain informed consent. Over time there has been a move in relation to this obligation from a requirement to disclose information to a requirement to ensure that that information is understood. Whilst this change has been resisted, in this article I argue that both sides on this matter are mistaken. When investigating what information is needed for consent to be informed we might be trying to determine what information (...) a person would need in order to consent at all, or we might be trying to determine what information a person needs in order to make an informed choice about whether or not to consent. I argue that the obligation to ensure understanding only applies to information generated by the first type of enquiry; but that much of the information generally thought necessary in order for consent to be informed is only required if our concern is with the second type of enquiry. For this reason it is neither the case that doctors and researchers should ensure all the information they provide is understood, nor is it the case that their only obligation is to disclose it. (shrink)

Nietzsche writes a great deal about freedom throughout his work, but never more explicitly than in Twiling of the Idols, a book he described as 'my philosophy in a nutshell'. This paper offers an analysis of Nietzsche's conception freedom and the role it plays within Twilight.

Ulysses contracts are a method by which one person binds himself by agreeing to be bound by others. In medicine such contracts have primarily been discussed as ways of treating people with episodic mental illnesses, where the features of the illness are such that they now judge that they will refuse treatment at the time it is needed. Enforcing Ulysses contracts in these circumstances would require medical professionals to override the express refusal of the patient at the time treatment is (...) required, something that is generally problematic both ethically and legally. In this paper I will argue that despite appearances Ulysses contracts can make it the case that treating a patient in such circumstances is an instance of treating him with his consent, although safeguards are needed to ensure that this is the case. Given the potential benefits to patients I further argue that modified Ulysses contracts should be made legally enforceable. (shrink)

Abstract -- Background, context, overview, and guiding philosophy -- Emotional intelligence meets virtue ethics : implications for educators -- Emotional intelligence as a component of business ethics pedagogy -- Nourishing life, the daoist concept of virtue -- Cultivation of virtue (dé) 1 according to the neiye -- Cultivation of virtuous leaders according to the huainanzi -- Is there a place for contemplation and inner work in business ethics education? -- Incorporating the inner work of ei and contemplation in ethics education (...) -- Glossary -- About the author. (shrink)

Recent years have witnessed an enormous increase in behavioral and neuroimaging studies of numerical cognition. Particular interest has been devoted toward unraveling properties of the representational medium on which numbers are thought to be represented. We have argued that a correct inference concerning these properties requires distinguishing between different input modalities and different decision/output structures. To back up this claim, we have trained computational models with either symbolic or nonsymbolic input and with different task requirements, and showed that this allowed (...) for an integration of the existing data in a consistent manner. In later studies, predictions from the models were derived and tested with behavioral and neuroimaging methods. Here we present an integrative review of this work. (shrink)

A superb example of the bookmaker's and translator's art, this new edition of Plato's "Symposium" exhibits aesthetic, literary, and intellectual excellences rarely found together in a single volume.Tom Griffith's translation of this foundation work of Western culture is unsurpassed for the balance it achieves between readability and fidelity to Plato's Greek. For felicity of phrasing, freshness, care to match the sense of the Greek rather than its wording, and for its idiomatic rendering of the spoken word, it has no peer.Originally (...) published in a limited edition with facing Greek and color wood engravings, Griffith's translation is here presented in reduced format that retains the aesthetic quality of the original version at an affordable price. (shrink)

This paper offers a reading of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, arguing that there is a conflict between Zarathustra's hope for something greater (in the form of the Übermensch) and his conception of the eternal recurrence.

In defense of anarchism Robert Paul Wolff contends that the moral autonomy of individuals cannot be made compatible with legitimate political authority. A state is legitimate, he maintains, if authorities in the state have a right to command where subjects correlatively have an obligation to obey. However, he also holds both that all autonomous individuals have a primary obligation to refuse to be ruled by all authorities and that all men are normally obliged to remain autonomous. It allegedly follows that (...) anarchism is the only political theory consistent with autonomy. We propose to show that his arguments concerning legitimacy contain a crucial inconsistency and that his conclusions concerning the incompatibility of authority and autonomy fail. (shrink)

Piéron's Law describes the relationship between stimulus intensity and reaction time. Previously (Stafford & Gurney, 2004), we have shown that Piéron's Law is a necessary consequence of rise-to-threshold decision making and thus will arise from optimal simple decision-making algorithms (e.g., Bogacz, Brown, Moehlis, Holmes, & Cohen, 2006). Here, we manipulate the color saturation of a Stroop stimulus. Our results show that Piéron's Law holds for color intensity and color-naming reaction time, extending the domain of this law, in line with our (...) suggestion of the generality of the processes that can give rise to Piéron's Law. In addition, we find that Stroop condition does not interact with the effect of color saturation; Stroop interference and facilitation remain constant at all levels of color saturation. An analysis demonstrates that this result cannot be accounted for by single-stage decision-making algorithms which combine all the evidence pertaining to a decision into a common metric. This shows that human decision making is not information-optimal and suggests that the generalization of current models of simple perceptual decision making to more complex decisions is not straightforward. (shrink)

For more than two decades, classes on “professionalism” have been the dominant platform for the non-technical socialization of medical students. It thus subsumes elements of previous foundation courses in bioethics and “medicine and society” in defining the appropriate relation between practitioners, patients, and society-at-large. Despite its importance, there is, however, no clear definition of what “professionalism” entails or the manner in which it serves various purported goals. This essay reviews, first, the historical role of the vocational practitioner in society, and (...) second, the introduction of “professionalism” as a newly constituted, core value in teaching. The structure of the paper is as an archaeology, a Foucauldian term for an investigation of seemingly separate but related antecedent contexts and ideas whose result is a perspective or point of view. The goal thus is an attempt to precisely locate “professionalism” within the greater history of medicine and its contemporary role in medical socialization. (shrink)

claim that his thought experiment shows that a currently living person is not a random sample is refuted. His thought experiment is reduced to a probability model, and is shown to be identical to one previously developed by Dieks. The status of the Doomsday Argument is left unresolved, since Dieks's refutation attempt is disputed in the literature.

Professor Matthew Kramer is one of the most important legal philosophers of our time - even if the label 'legal philosopher' does not do justice to the breadth of his work. This collection of essays brings together esteemed philosophers, as well as junior scholars, to critically assess Kramer's philosophy. The contributions focus on Kramer's work on legal philosophy, metaethics, normative ethics, and political philosophy. The volume is divided into six parts, each focusing on different aspect of Kramer's work. The first (...) part, Rights and Right-holding, contains five essays addressing Kramer's work on rights and right-holding, including the Hohfeldian analysis and the interest theory of right-holding. The four essays in the second part, General Jurisprudence, focus on Kramer's work in general jurisprudence, from the compatibility of legal positivism with universal legal error, to his robust defense of inclusive legal positivism, concluding with reflections on his writings on the rule of law. The third part, General Matters of Ethics, contains two essays addressing Kramer's metaethical work on moral realism as a moral doctrine. The fourth and fifth parts, Freedom and Liberalism, have four essays falling within political philosophy, probing Kramer's work on negative freedom and political liberalism, respectively. The sixth part, Applied Ethics, contains two essays on Kramer's work on capital punishment and freedom of expression. The collection is rounded off by reflections on, and replies to, the contributions by Kramer himself. (shrink)

The central theme of this study is that Descartes is a teacher who develops his arguments for the different philosophical orientations of his students. Indeed, according to Cunning, so respectful is Descartes of their orientations that he actually misrepresents his own view in the Meditations on central doctrinal matters like the basis for dualism. The exegetical argument for this is the central argument of the book, though many other aspects of the Meditations are discussed in novel and interesting ways. Descartes (...) describes himself as establishing the duality of mental and physical substances in two stages in the Meditations. It is in Meditation II, he says in the Fourth Replies, where he shows that a .. (shrink)

RIVALRY AND CENTRAL PLANNING: THE SOCIALIST CALCULATION DEBATE RECONSIDERED by Don Lavoie. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985. 208 pp., $34.95.

This article deals with the gamut of international law. Empirical research on international law, charts three main factors—states and bureaucracies, private actors, and international institutions, specifically international tribunals. International law maintains the centrality of the state, which is also the functioning ground for various sub-state structures, governmental actors, and institutions. Private actors such as corporations and non-governmental organizations are instrumental in influencing the construction and outcome of international law. Regarding the relevance of international laws, some opine that while states do (...) infact deliver on obligations, they only choose those that are easy to comply by. Hence, efficiency becomes doubtful. Further, it is claimed that state's compliance only reflects its intentions, not a behavioral shift. These opinions merit questions regarding the relevance of international law. Studies in this field concern, broadly, international human rights law, criminal law, war laws, trade laws, investment law, and regulatory laws. (shrink)

(2000). Human rightsThe pendulum theory of individual, communal and minority rights. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 3, Human Rights and Global Diversity, pp. 77-90.

This article considers the relationship between subjectivity and representational form. More specifically, it discusses the transformation in self-representation between life and death by the artist Roger de la Fresnaye, reflecting his modernist articulations of life to pre-modern, classicist figurations of death. For the artist, modernity could not bear the demands that dying made upon representation, as unable to fully accord death a sign. Modernity's dissolution of the subject annihilated the very permanence of identity and presence that death guaranteed, but without (...) its covenant of ritual and history. Instead, classicism provided a coherent anterior body, another face from which he could speak after death: ?one? would always be present to speak for him. The face therefore addresses culture through its specific appeal to, and demand of, time, space, and history. (shrink)

In After Parmenides, Tom Rockmore takes us all the way back to the beginning of philosophy. Parmenides held that thought and being are one: what we know is what is. For Rockmore, this established both the good view that we should think of the world in terms of what the mind constructs as knowable entities as well as the bad view that there is some non-mind-dependent "thing"-the world, the real-which we can know or fail to know. No, Rockmore says: what (...) we need to do is give up on the idea that there is any extra-mental "real" for us to know. We know and become acquainted with the objects of cognition that our mind constructs. After Parmenides illustrates the contest between variants of the "standard" view and variants of the "non-standard, constructivist view" in the history of philosophy, from Plato and Aristotle to Descartes and Locke, Leibniz, Spinoza, Hume, Kant, post-Kantians including Fichte, Hegel, and Schopenhauer, Marx, the early pragmatists, analytic philosophy, contemporary French speculative realism, and more. This ambitious but accessibly written book shows how new connections can be made in the history of philosophy when it is reread through a new lens. (shrink)

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to highlight the importance of the ethical investigation of the emerging practice of people analytics (PA) within human resource (HR) management through charting the development of PA before during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approach This paper is designed as a short review of the current thinking in the ethics of PA, a practical journey through the progression of PA across the pandemic and a theoretical exploration of PA through three lenses: virtue ethics, (...) critical social theory and actor network theory. Findings The authors suggest that PA raises novel ethical issues in terms of personal impact, increased penetration into working and home lives and the punch delivered in terms of organisational and behavioural change. Research limitations/implications This study provides a short review of three theoretical approaches to PA. Detailed research and reflection is required to develop and extend an ethics of PA. While engagement with the ethics of PA requires gaining an understanding of the discipline, ideas and jargon of HR management, it is essential that ethicists engage with PA as HR departments take on greater influence and adopt executive roles. Practical implications PA is now at the top of the HR management agenda, but there is limited understanding of the technology, the ethics and the new responsibilities it brings for HR management. This paper raises the profile of an ethical agenda, which practitioners should engage with. Social implications The ethical consequences of PA have social implications as work practices change and hybrid working becomes prevalent. It has the potential to change the relationship between home and the workplace. Originality/value This paper provides a unique synthesis of theory and practice in a new area of ethical importance. (shrink)

While educational settings may be envisioned as safe spaces that facilitate learning, foster creativity, and promote healthy development for youth, research has found that this is not always true for Black girls. Their negative experiences within educational settings are both gendered and racialized, often communicating broader societal perceptions of Black girls that ultimately shape their identity development. Utilizing semi-structured interviews with adolescent Black girls, the current investigation explored Black girls' educational experiences, their meaning making of Black girlhood, and the role (...) of parents in their positive development. By centering Black girls' voices, this study illuminated how Black girls negotiate their multiple marginalized identities and how their identities are shaped by their home and school environments. Findings revealed that Black girls are aware of the difficulties in navigating educational settings for Black girls, but this awareness was coupled with parental support that promoted positive gendered racial identities for Black girls in middle school and high school. This investigation advanced current knowledge of Black girls' identity development and highlighted the protective role of parental socialization. Future research directions and implications are also discussed. (shrink)

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the emancipatory promises and realities of information and communication technology in Egypt.Design/methodology/approachThe combination of Habermasian and Foucauldian ideas implemented by a critical discourse analysis of the Egyptian Information Society Policy and interviews with employees of local decision support systems employees. Promises and rhetoric are contrasted with findings and questioned with regards to their validity.FindingsOn the policy level, analysis shows that the emancipating rhetoric of ICT is not followed through. ICT is mostly seen (...) as a means of attracting foreign direct investment. Neither political participation nor educational benefits are promoted seriously. On the local level, culture and organisational realities prevent individuals from exploiting the emancipatory potential of the technology.Originality/valueThe combination of the Habermasian and Foucauldian approach exposes the problems of ICT use in developing countries. It shows that emancipation is used to legitimise ICT policies but is not taken seriously on a policy level in Egypt. Local implementations also fail to deliver on their promise. In order to have emancipatory effects, ICT policy and use will need to be reconsidered. (shrink)

This article argues that we must distinguish between two distinct currents in the politics of recognition, one centred on demands for equal respect which is consistent with liberal egalitarianism, and one which centres on demands for esteem made on behalf of particular groups which is at odds with egalitarian aims. A variety of claims associated with the politics of recognition are assessed and it is argued that these are readily accommodated within contemporary liberal egalitarian theory. It is argued that, pace (...) Taylor, much of what passes for `identity' or recognition politics is driven by demands for equal respect, not by demands for esteem/affirmation. Given the inherently hierarchical nature of esteem recognition, no liberal state can consistently grant such recognition. Furthermore, these demands pose the risk of intensifying intergroup competition and chauvinism. Esteem recognition is valuable for individuals, but plays a problematic role for egalitarian politics. (shrink)

Agrarianism, according to Paul B. Thompson, is an environmental philosophy focused on agriculture and the nurturing of food, fuel, and fiber. Agrarianism hopes to re-establish our fundamental connection to the land, helping us approach a tenable understanding of sustainability. Thompson enlists Albert Borgmann’s notion of “focal practices” to discuss farming and the culture of the table. With this comes a critique of “the device paradigm,” the modern technological way of life that alienates us from quotidian beauty, lifecycles and seasonality, and (...) vital place-based insights embedded in focal practices and obscures how techno-industrial capitalism limits our opportunities for rich, intimate experiences with our biotic communities. In this paper, McBride outlines the contours of Thompson’s agrarian philosophy in light of Borgmann’s focal practices, noting the enduring wisdom in this position. But McBride evokes Sylvia Wynter’s critique of the hegemonic techno-industrial order of things to conjure alternative conceptions of decolonial agrarian futures (that will not foreground bucolic settler-colonial farms). (shrink)

ABSTRACTAccording to interest theorists of rights, rights function to protect the right-holder's interests. True. But this leaves a lot unsaid. Most saliently here, it is certainly not the case that every agent who stands to benefit from performance of a duty gets to be a right-holder. For a theory to allow this to be the case—to allow for an explosion of right-holders—would be tantamount to a reductio thereof. So the challenge for interest theorists is to respect the core of the (...) interest theory while delimiting the set of right-holders in a principled manner. The foremost explicit attempt to do this has invoked Bentham's test. Predictably, invocation of this test has come under attack, with the ultimate aim of challenging the interest theory itself. My purpose in this paper is to render Bentham's test as clearly and accurately as possible. Doing so will raise issues of modality—ultimately in rendering Bentham's test's logical form. Ultimately a core attack on Bentham's test falls away, and, to that extent, the interest theory remains standing as a promising theory of rights. (shrink)

The chorus of doubts concerning the continued viability of the Western liberal tradition itself, in both ideational and institutional aspects, has grown much louder over the past several years. Can this tradition be said to be in a time of twilight – that time that falls? It is this question that would be explored in this paper. While searching the confirmation of the position, indicated in the title of the paper, author turns to contemporary ideological sources of Western liberalism. Such (...) concepts as capitalism, socialism, justice, democracy are considered in this context based on the works of two thinkers, John Rawls and Fred Dallmayr. By stressing ideal justice and ignoring concrete injustice, Rawls’ ideas seem strange even apart from the present crisis. The subsequent evolution of his thoughts is estimated by the author as the transition from daylight to twilight. It has manifested in Rawls’ refusal to apply his principles of justice to the international arena, his condescending attitude toward underdeveloped countries. The atmosphere of The Law of Peoples is still redolent of the assumption of American hegemony. The author wishes to extract from Dallmayr’s book for present purposes is above all his commitment to a version of socialism. But what neither Dallmayr nor Rawls and other liberal thinkers will gainsay is that central to the twilight zone in which we are wandering is the heavy hand of global capitalism. The next problem is that the modern liberal democratic theory has always professed to make the assumption of equality, but it has never fully embraced it. The most important conceptual element in accounting for this failure is the notion of majority rule. The author mentions three difficulties with the idea of majority rule: the problem of time and the problem of the identity of the human units who compose the majority, and the problem of information. He analyzes the recent political evolutions of both the United Kingdom and the United States, and France as well, which have certainly given Western liberalism a badname in many quarters. (shrink)