The neurological notion of “reserve” arises from an individually observable dissociation between brain health and cognitive status. According to the cognitive reserve hypothesis, high-reserve individuals experience functional compensation for neural atrophy and, thus, are able to maintain relatively stable cognitive functioning with no or smaller-than-expected impairment. Several lifestyle factors such as regular physical exercise, adequate and balanced nutrition, and educational attainment have been widely reported to contribute to reserve and, thus, lead to more successful trajectories of cognitive aging. In recent (...) years, it has become clear that bilingualism is also a potential reserve contributor. Yet, there is little communication between the neuroscience of bilingualism research community and researchers working in the field of CA more generally, despite compelling reasons for it. In fact, bilingualism tends to be overlooked as a contributory factor in the CA literature, or reduced to a dichotomous trait, despite it being a complex experience. Herein, we discuss issues that are preventing recognition of bilingualism as a reserve contributor across all literatures, highlight the benefits of including language experiences as a factor of interest across research disciplines, and suggest a roadmap to better integrate bilingualism and aging moving forward. We close with calls toward a model of aging that examines the contributions across lifestyle factors, including that of bilingual experience. (shrink)

As a result of advances in healthcare, the worldwide average life expectancy is steadily increasing. However, this positive trend has societal and individual costs, not least because greater life expectancy is linked to higher incidence of age-related diseases, such as dementia. Over the past few decades, research has isolated various protective “healthy lifestyle” factors argued to contribute positively to cognitive aging, e.g., healthy diet, physical exercise and occupational attainment. The present article critically reviews neuroscientific evidence for another such factor, i.e., (...) speaking multiple languages. Moreover, with multiple societal stakeholders in mind, we contextualize and stress the importance of the research program that seeks to uncover and understand potential connections between bilingual language experience and cognitive aging trajectories, inclusive of the socio-economic impact it can have. If on the right track, this is an important line of research because bilingualism has the potential to cross-over socio-economic divides to a degree other healthy lifestyle factors currently do not and likely cannot. (shrink)

Arguments, at least the best of them, should be based upon principles of logic, and therefore be beyond dispute. But unfortunately many philosophical arguments are based upon principles which, though claimed by some to be principles of logic, or at least to be true, are disputed or rejected by others. This difficult position arises, no doubt, because it is the philosopher more than anyone else who is entitled to delve into questions of the validity of first principles. In a philosophical (...) undertaking of any magnitude it is therefore imperative for the author to state as clearly as possible the principles which seem to him certain, and which constitute the guiding lines of his method. Any criticism could then take only one of two forms: it could allege that the argument under criticism does not conform to the principles laid down, though these principles are themselves accepted. it could allege that the argument is mistaken because something is wrong with the principles, in which case the object of criticism is properly the principles and not the argument. But a valid criticism could not take the form of condemning a certain argument in the light of a principle which, while appearing to the critic to be true and undisputed, is in fact inconsistent with the principles which the author has laid down. (shrink)

It is my purpose to examine this law in those cases in which it is generally held to be untrue. I inquire what can be meant, in each case of a statement p considered, by denying the law, that is, by saying ‘Neither p nor —p‘. After separating the possible meanings of this declared indeterminacy, I go on to inquire, taking each possibility in turn, whether the law does in fact fail.

The question of how an individual firm's social and environmental performance impacts its firm risk has not been examined in any empirical UK research. Does a company that strives to attain good environmental performance decrease its market risk or is environmental performance just a disadvantageous cost that increases such risk levels for these firms? Answers to this question have important implications for the management of companies and the investment decisions of individuals and institutions. The purpose of this paper is to (...) examine the relationship between corporate environmental performance and firm risk in the British context. Using the largest dataset assembled so far, with community and environmental responsibility (CER) rankings for all rated UK companies between 1994 and 2006, we show that a company's environmental performance is inversely related to its systematic financial risk. However, an increase of 1.0 in the CER score is associated with only a 0.028 reduction in its β. (shrink)

If we pay careful attention to our experience, the presence of awareness running through it all is so evident, that it seems nothing short of insanity to deny it. The forms taken by this awareness seem to be many and various: seeing, hearing, feeling, remembering, imagining, dreaming, deciding. Awareness is what we truly are. Without it, all would be utter blackness, total death, nothing. Awareness is what makes the difference between a dead, behaving body and a living human being, albeit (...) the behaviour is exactly the same. Anyone who pretends that we only seem to be aware, overlooks the fact that he can easily enough discover that he himself is aware, in the very act of pretending that he only seems to be so. (shrink)

The Foucaultian sociologist Nikolas Rose has influentially argued that psychosocial technologies have offered means through which the ideals of democracy can be made congruent with the management of social life and the government of citizens in modern western liberal democracies. This interpretation is contested here through an examination of the 1948 International Congress on Mental Health held in London and the mental hygiene movement that organized it. It is argued that, in Britain, this movement’s theory and practice represents an uneasy (...) and ambiguous attempt to reconcile visions of ‘the modern’ with ‘the traditional’. The mental hygienist emphasis on the family is central. Here it appears as a forcing-house of the modern self-sustaining individual. Mental hygienists cast the social organization of ‘traditional’ communities as static, with rigid authority frustrating both social progress and the full emergence of individual personality. Yet mental hygienists were also concerned about threats to social cohesion and secure personhood under modernity. If the social organization of ‘traditional’ communities was patterned by the archetype of the family, with its personal relations of authority, mental hygienists compressed these relations into the ‘private’ family. Situated here they became part of a developmental process of mental adjustment through which ‘mature’, responsible citizens emerged. This reformulation of the family’s centrality for the social order informed mental hygienist critiques of the growth of state power under existing forms of democracy, as well as suspicion of popular political participation or protest, and of movements towards greater egalitarianism. (shrink)

For forty years, acclaimed photographer and native Minnesotan Tom Arndt has been documenting the faces of Minnesota with unparalleled skill and candor. In Home, Arndt presents what he calls "a poem to my home state" through a series of poignant and compelling photographs that highlight the unique character of Minnesota. From Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis to Main Street in Willmar, from carnival workers at the state fair to drag racing fans in Anoka, and from small town street dances to the (...) sidewalks of Minneapolis, Home captures everyday life in the North Star State. By allowing people's lives to speak for themselves, Arndts photographs reveal the often forgotten moments that build common bridges across a diverse and ever-changing state. Enriched with more than 100 photographs, along with a personal and insightful preface by the author and a foreword by Garrison Keillor, Home is a landmark testimony to the people and culture of Minnesota. Arndt approaches his subjects - he would call them neighbors - with honesty, empathy, and humanity, and what emerges is a portrait of Minnesota that is at once achingly familiar and surprisingly new. (shrink)

Traditionally, the sense of touch—alongside the senses of taste and smell—has been excluded from the aesthetic domain. These proximal modalities are thought to deliver only sensory pleasures, not the complex, world-directed perceptual states that characterize aesthetic experience. In this paper, I argue that this tradition fails to recognize the perceptual possibilities of haptic touch, which allows us to experience properties of the objects with which we make bodily contact, including their weight, shape, solidity, elasticity, and smoothness. These features, moreover, may (...) be indicative of how well-suited an object is for its function, and in feeling them we can thus feel the positive aesthetic quality of functional beauty. (shrink)

Deacon develops a minimal model of a nonparasitic virus to explore how nucleotide sequences came to be characterized by a code-like informational at the origin of life. The model serves to problematize the concept of biological normativity because it highlights two common yet typically implicit assumptions: that life could consist as an inert form, were it not for extrinsic sources of physical instability, and that life could have originated as a singular self-contained individual. I propose that the origin of life, (...) the genetic code, and biological normativity more generally, lead us to reject this passive individualism. (shrink)

Kant's claim that modality is a 'category' provides an approach to modality to be contrasted with Lewis's reductive analysis. Lewis's position is unsatisfactory, since it depends on an inherently modal conception of a world. This suggests that modality is 'primitive'; and the Kantian position is a prima facie plausible position of this kind, which is filled out by considering the relationship between modality and inference. This provides a context for comparing the Kantian position with Wright's non-cognitivist 'conventionalism'. Wright's position is (...) vulnerable to the type of argument used against ethical non-cognitivism, and the Kantian position is further confirmed by Blackburn's acknowledgment that modality is 'antinaturalistic to its core'. The position is further elaborated to show that it can accommodate the famous Kripkean categories of the empirically necessary and the contingent a priori, and finally defended against the criticisms used by Quine against Carnap. (shrink)

The internet presents not just opportunities but also risks that range, to name a few, from online abuse and misinformation to the polarisation of public debate. Given the increasingly digital nature of our societies, these risks make it essential for users to learn how to wisely use digital technologies as part of a more holistic approach to promoting human flourishing. However, insofar as they are exacerbated by both the affordances and the political economy of the internet, this article argues that (...) a new understanding of wisdom that is germane to the digital age is needed. As a result, we propose a framework for conceptualising what we call cyber-wisdom, and how this can be cultivated via formal education, in ways that are grounded in neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics and that build on three prominent existing models of wisdom. The framework, according to which cyber-wisdom is crucial to navigating online risks and opportunities through the deployment of character virtues necessary for flourishing online, suggests that cyber-wisdom consists of four components: cyber-wisdom literacy, cyber-wisdom reasoning, cyber-wisdom self-reflection, cyber-wisdom motivation. Unlike the models on which it builds, the framework accounts for the specificity of the digital age and is both conceptual and practical. On the one hand, each component has conceptual implications for what it means to be wise in the digital age. On the other hand, informed by character education literature and practice, it has practical implications for how to cultivate cyber-wisdom in the classroom through teaching methods that match its different components. (shrink)

Bioethics claimed to offer a set of generally applicable, universally accepted guidelines that would simplify complex situations. In Thieves of Virtue, Tom Koch argues that bioethics has failed to deliver on its promises.

This article develops an unconventional perspective on the utilitarianism of Bentham and Mill in at least four areas. First, it is shown that both authors conceived of utility as irreducibly multi-dimensional, and that Bentham in particular was very much aware of the ambiguity that multi-dimensionality imposes upon optimal choice under the greatest happiness principle. Secondly, I argue that any attribution of intrinsic worth to any form of human behaviour violates the first principles of Bentham's and Mill's utilitarianism, and that this (...) renders both authors immune to the claim by G. E. Moore that they committed a ‘naturalistic fallacy’. Thirdly, in light of these contentions, I find no flaw in Mill's ‘proof of utility’. Fourthly, I use the notion of intrapersonal utility weights to provide an interpretation of Mill's qualitative hedonism that is entirely consistent with his value monism. (shrink)

3500 word interview with Tom Cochrane discussing his philosophical background, the nature of aesthetic value, the benefits of art, and aestheticism.

Tom Beauchamp presents a new edition, designed especially for the student reader, of An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding, the classic work in which David Hume gave a general exposition of his philosophy to a broad educated readership. An authoritative new version of the text is preceded by a substantial introduction explaining the historical and intellectual background to the work and surveying its main themes. The volume also includes detailed explanatory notes on the text, a glossary of terms, and a section (...) of supplementary readings. (shrink)

The principal thesis in this book is that bioethics emerged—in the 1960s through the 1980s—under the influence of philosophers who claimed to have universally valid principles that could steer medicine and research to the solution of ethical problems, including even those arising at the bedside of patients. Tom Koch contends that these philosophers and their allied bioethicists “stole medicine” and its traditional values, substituting a philosophical discourse generally inaccessible to the average person. Philosophers thereby refashioned medical ethics in accordance with (...) their vision of a morally and intellectually robust new field. Koch maintains that philosophers have failed to deliver on their promises and that .. (shrink)

We have reason to believe that phenomenal properties are nothing over and above certain physical properties. However, doubt is cast on this by the apparent epistemic gap that arises for attempts to account for phenomenal properties in physical terms. I argue that the epistemic gap should be divided into two more fundamental conceptual gaps. The first of these pertains to the distinctive subjectivity of phenomenal states, and the second pertains to the intrinsicality of phenomenal qualities. Stoljars ignorance hypothesis (IH) attempts (...) to undermine the epistemic gap by arguing that the apparent inexplicability of the phenomenal is merely a symptom of our limited conception of the non-experiential world. I establish some obstacles to IH, and argue that the correct analysis of the epistemic gap means these obstacles can only partially be overcome. I propose, nonetheless, that IH can still be put to good use as half of a hybrid account of phenomenal consciousness. The proposal combines a self-representationalist account of the subjectivity of phenomenal states with a Russellian version of IH that accommodates the qualitative character of those states. This neo-Russellian ignorance hypothesis (NRIH) credibly undermines the appearance of an epistemic gap between the physical and the phenomenal. (shrink)

Sensation is a concept with a conflicted philosophical history. It has found as many allies as enemies in nearly every camp from empiricism to poststructuralism. Polyvalent, with an uncertain referent, and often overshadowed by intuition, perception, or cognition, sensation invites as much metaphysical speculation as it does dismissive criticism. -/- The promise of sensation has certainly not been lost on the phenomenologists who have sought to ‘rehabilitate’ the concept. In Plastic Bodies, Tom Sparrow argues that the phenomenologists have not gone (...) far enough, however. Alongside close readings of Merleau-Ponty and Levinas, he digs into an array of ancient, modern, and contemporary texts in search of the resources needed to rebuild the concept of sensation after phenomenology. He begins to assemble a speculative aesthetics that is at once a realist theory of sensation and a philosophy of embodiment that breaks the form of the ‘lived’ body. Maintaining that the body is fundamentally plastic and that corporeal identity is constituted by a conspiracy of sensations, he pursues the question of how the body fits into/fails to fit into its aesthetic environment and what must be done to increase the body’s power to act and exist. (shrink)

It is common to focus on the duties of the wrongdoer in cases that involve injustice. Presumably, the wrongdoer owes her victim an apology for having wronged her and perhaps compensation for having harmed her. But, these are not the only duties that may arise. Are other beneficiaries of an injustice permitted to retain the fruits of the injustice? If not, who becomes entitled to those funds? In recent years, the Connection Account has emerged as an influential account that purports (...) to explain cases such as Embezzlement. This account holds that benefiting from injustice can give rise to a corrective duty - that is, a duty of compensation - owed specifically to the victim of the injustice from which the recipient benefits. This duty is grounded in the connection between the victim and the beneficiary of a given injustice. This paper has two aims. First, I show that we must reject the Connection Account on the grounds that it risks failing correctly to identify those who become entitled to the fruits of injustice. I achieve this by developing and defending the fairness objection. Second, I offer an alternative account: the Moral Taintedness Account. This account states that, when identifying who is entitled to the fruits of injustice, the cause and the degree of the harm suffered by a victim are both relevant considerations, though it does not matter whether the victim is the victim of the injustice that gave rise to the fruits in question. This account avoids the problem associated with the Connection Account, and yields intuitive conclusions in an important range of test cases. (shrink)

A response to Kavita Shah's article Selecting Barrenness.

This article argues that in Beyond Good and Evil (BGE) Nietzsche defends “will to power” as a transcendentally ideal condition of objectivity, in the sense in which Kant considers, say, space, time, or the concepts of substance and causation to be such conditions. The article shows how Nietzsche’s engage-ment with the transcendental idealist arguments of his Kantian contemporaries leads him to reject naturalism and to adopt a peculiarly transcendental kind of skepticism, which rejects as unjustified the conditions that would make (...) objec-tivity possible. The article then turns to the argument for “will to power” in BGE 36, showing that it is best read as defending a transcendentally ideal condition of objectivity, and thus as responding to transcendental skepticism. The article concludes by elaborating on this understanding of “will to power,” particularly in relation to the sense of causality that Nietzsche invokes and in comparison with Kant’s own transcendental claims. (shrink)

Tom Sparrow shows how, in the 21st century, speculative realism aims to do what phenomenology could not: provide a philosophical method that disengages the human-centred approach to metaphysics in order to chronicle the complex realm of nonhuman reality. -/- Through a focused reading of the methodological statements and metaphysical commitments of key phenomenologists and speculative realists, Sparrow shows how speculative realism is replacing phenomenology as the beacon of realism in contemporary Continental philosophy.

In this book, Tom Cochrane develops a new control theory of the emotions and related affective states. Grounded in the basic principle of negative feedback control, his original account outlines a new fundamental kind of mental content called 'valent representation'. Upon this foundation, Cochrane constructs new models for emotions, pains and pleasures, moods, expressive behaviours, evaluative reasoning, personality traits and long-term character commitments. These various states are presented as increasingly sophisticated layers of regulative control, which together underpin the architecture of (...) the mind as a whole. Clearly structured and containing numerous diagrams and examples to illustrate the discussion, this study draws on the latest research from fields including philosophy, psychology and neuroscience, and will appeal to readers interested in the philosophy and cognitive science of emotion. (shrink)

A philosophical memoir about becoming a father in an increasingly terrible world – can I hope the child growing in my partner's womb will have a good-enough life? For Kant, philosophy boiled down to three key questions: “What can I know?”, “What ought I do?”, and “What can I hope for?” In philosophy departments, that third question has largely been neglected at the expense of the first two – even though it is crucial for understanding why anyone might ask them (...) in the first place. In Infinitely Full of Hope, as he prepares to become a father for the first time, the philosopher Tom Whyman attempts to answer Kant’s third question, trying to make sense of it in the context of a world that increasingly seems like it is on the verge of collapse. Part memoir, part theory, and part reflection on fatherhood, Infinitely Full of Hope asks how we can cling to hope in a world marked by crisis and disaster. (shrink)