Antimicrobial Resistance is a threat to individual and to population health and to future generations, requiring “collective sacrifices” in order to preserve antibiotic efficacy. ‘Who should make the sacrifices?’ and ‘Who will most likely make them?’ are ethical concerns posited as potentially manageable through Antimicrobial Stewardship. Antimicrobial stewardship almost inevitably involves a form of clinical cost-benefit analysis that assesses the possible effects of antibiotics to treat a diagnosed infection in a particular patient. However, this process rarely accounts properly for (...) patients – above and beyond assessments of potential (non)compliance or adherence to care regimes. Drawing on a vignette of a pregnant woman of colour and migrant diagnosed with Mycoplasma genitalium, a sexually transmissible bacterium, this article draws out some of the ethical, speculative, and practical tensions and complexities involved in Antimicrobial Stewardship. We argue that patients also engage in a form of cost-benefit analysis influenced by experiences of reproductive and social (in)justice and comprising speculative variables - to anticipate future possibilities. These processes have the potential to have effects above and beyond the specific infection antimicrobial stewardship was activated to address. We contend that efforts to practice and research antimicrobial stewardship should accommodate and incorporate these variables and acknowledge the structures they emerge with(in), even if their components remain unknown. This would involve recognising that antimicrobial stewardship is intricately connected to other social justice issues such as immigration policy, economic justice, access to appropriate medical care, racism, etc. (shrink)

For many people "animal rights" suggests campaigns against factory farms, vivisection or other aspects of our woeful treatment of animals. Zoopolis moves beyond this familiar terrain, focusing not on what we must stop doing to animals, but on how we can establish positive and just relationships with different types of animals.

In this paper we explore the sustained and multifaceted attempt of Jürgen Habermas to reconstruct Kant's theory of cosmopolitan right for our own times. In a series of articles written in the post‐1989 period, Habermas has argued that the challenge posed both by the catastrophes of the twentieth century, and by social forces of globalization, has given new impetus to the idea of cosmopolitan justice that Kant first expressed. He recognizes that today we cannot simply repeat Kant's eighteenth‐century vision: that (...) if we are to grapple with the complexities of present‐day problems, it is necessary to iron out certain inconsistencies in Kant's thinking, radicalize it where its break from the old order of nation‐states is incomplete, socialize it so as to draw out the connections between perpetual peace and social justice, and modernize it so as to comprehend the “differences both in global situation and conceptual framework that now separate us from him.”1 His basic intuition, however, is that Kant's idea of cosmopolitan right is as relevant to our times as it was to Kant's own. If it was Kant's achievement to formulate the idea of cosmopolitanism in a modern philosophical form, Habermas takes up the challenge posed by Karl‐Otto Apel: to “think with Kant against Kant” in reconstructing this idea. What follows is a critical assessment of Habermas's response to this challenge. We focus here on the dilemmas he faces in grounding his normative commitment to cosmopolitan politics and in reconciling his cosmopolitanism with the national framework in which he developed his ideas of constitutional patriotism and deliberative democracy. (shrink)

Within Western political philosophy, the rights of groups has often been neglected or addressed in only the narrowest fashion. Focusing solely on whether rights are exercised by individuals or groups misses what lies at the heart of ethnocultural conflict, leaving the crucial question unanswered: can the familiar system of common citizenship rights within liberal democracies sufficiently accommodate the legitimate interests of ethnic citizens? Specifically, how does membership in an ethnic group differ from other groups, such as professional, lifestyle, or advocacy (...) groups? How important is ethnicity to personal identity and self-respect, and does accommodating these interests require more than standard citizenship rights? Crucially, what forms of ethnocultural accommodations are consistent with democratic equality, individual freedom, and political stability? Invoking numerous cases studies and addressing the issue of ethnicity from a range of perspectives, Ethnicity and Group Rights seeks to answer these questions. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Employing utilitarian criteria, Jones and Felps, in “Shareholder Wealth Maximization and Social Welfare: A Utilitarian Critique” (Business Ethics Quarterly23[2]: 207–38), examined the sequential logic leading from shareholder wealth maximization to maximal social welfare and uncovered several serious empirical and conceptual shortcomings. After rendering shareholder wealth maximization seriously compromised as an objective for corporate operations, they provided a set of criteria regarding what a replacement corporate objective would look like, but do not offer a specific alternative. In this article, we draw (...) on neo-utilitarian thought to advance a refined version of normative stakeholder theory that we believe addresses a major remaining criticism of extant versions, their lack of specificity. More particularly, we provide a single-valued objective function for the corporation—stakeholder happiness enhancement—that would allow managers to make principled choices between/among policy options when stakeholder interests conflict. (shrink)

Modalists think that knowledge requires forming your belief in a “modally stable” way: using a method that wouldn't easily go wrong, or using a method that wouldn't have given you this belief had it been false. Recent Modalist projects from Justin Clarke-Doane and Dan Baras defend a principle they call “Modal Security,” roughly: if evidence undermines your belief, then it must give you a reason to doubt the safety or sensitivity of your belief. Another recent Modalist project from Carlotta Pavese (...) and Bob Beddor defends “Modal Virtue Epistemology”: knowledge is a belief that is maximally modally robust across “normal” worlds. We'll offer new objections to these recent Modalist projects. We will then argue for a rival view, Explanationism: knowing something is believing it because it's true. We will show how Explanationism offers a better account of undermining defeaters than Modalism, and a better account of knowledge. (shrink)

The ectoplasmic specialization (ES) is a testis‐specific, actin‐based hybrid anchoring and tight junction. It is confined to the interface between Sertoli cells at the blood–testis barrier, known as the basal ES, as well as between Sertoli cells and developing spermatids designated the apical ES. The ES shares features of adherens junctions, tight junctions and focal contacts. By adopting the best features of each junction type, this hybrid nature of ES facilitates the extensive junction‐restructuring events in the seminiferous epithelium during spermatogenesis. (...) For instance, the α6β1‐integrin–laminin 333 complex, which is usually limited to the cell–matrix interface in other epithelia to facilitate cell movement, is a putative apical ES constituent. Furthermore, JAM‐C and CAR, two tight junction integral membrane proteins, are also components of apical ES involving in spermatid orientation. We discuss herein the mechanisms that maintain the cross‐talk between ES and blood–testis barrier to facilitate cell movement and orientation in the seminiferous epithelium. BioEssays 29: 36–48, 2007. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

The increasing use of information and communication technologies (ICT) to help facilitate neuroscience adds a new level of complexity to the question of how ethical issues of such research can be identified and addressed. Current research ethics practice, based on ethics reviews by institutional review boards (IRB) and underpinned by ethical principalism, has been widely criticised and even called ‘imperialist’. In this paper, we develop an alternative way of approaching ethics in neuro-ICT research, based on discourse ethics, which implements responsible (...) research and innovation through dialogues. We draw on our work in Ethics Support, using the Human Brain Project as empirical evidence of the viability of this approach. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Many scholars and managers endorse the idea that the primary purpose of the firm is to make money for its owners. This shareholder wealth maximization objective is justified on the grounds that it maximizes social welfare. In this article, the first of a two-part set, we argue that, although this shareholder primacy model may have been appropriate in an earlier era, it no longer is, given our current state of economic and social affairs. To make our case, we employ a (...) utilitarian moral standard and examine the apparent logical sequence behind the link between shareholder wealth maximization and social welfare. Upon close empirical and conceptual scrutiny, we find that utilitarian criteria do not support the shareholder model; that is, shareholder wealth maximization is only weakly linked to social welfare maximization. In view of the dubious validity of this sequential argument, we outline some of the features of a superior corporate objective—a variant of normative stakeholder theory. In the second article, we will advance and defend our preferred alternative and then discuss some institutional arrangements under which it could be implemented. (shrink)

The Anthropocene concept arose within the Earth System science (ESS) community, albeit explicitly as a geological (stratigraphical) time term. Its current analysis by the stratigraphical community, as a potential formal addition to the Geological Time Scale, necessitates comparison of the methodologies and patterns of enquiry of these two communities. One means of comparison is to consider some of the most widely used results of the ESS, the ‘planetary boundaries’ concept of Rockström and colleagues, and the ‘Great Acceleration’ graphs of Steffen (...) and colleagues, in terms of their stratigraphical expression. This expression varies from virtually non-existent (stratospheric ozone depletion) to pronounced and many-faceted (primary energy use), while in some cases stratigraphical proxies may help constrain anthropogenic process (atmospheric aerosol loading). The Anthropocene concepts of the ESS and stratigraphy emerge as complementary, and effective stratigraphic definition should facilitate wider transdisciplinary communication. (shrink)

How did the universe begin? What is truth? How can we live good live? The Little Book of Philosophy answers these questions and more. Packed with simple explanations, witty illustrations, and step-by-step diagrams that untangle complex theories, you'll find plenty of food for thought in this book, whether you're a novice, a student, or an armchair philosopher"--Page 4 of cover.

This text considers how a host of ethical traditions define civil society.

Inducing religious thoughts increases prosocial behavior among strangers in anonymous contexts. These effects can be explained both by behavioral priming processes as well as by reputational mechanisms. We examine whether belief in moralizing supernatural agents supplies a case for what McKay & Dennett (M&D) call evolved misbelief, concluding that they might be more persuasively seen as an example of culturally evolved misbelief.

This paper is concerned with everyday data practices, considering how people record data produced through self-monitoring. The analysis unpacks the relationships between taking a measure, and making and reviewing records. The paper is based on an interview study with people who monitor their blood pressure and/or body mass index/weight. Animated by discussions of ‘data power’ which are, in part, predicated on the flow and aggregation of data, we aim to extend important work concerning the everyday constitution of digital data. In (...) the paper, we adopt and develop the idea of curation as a theory of attention. We introduce the idea of discerning work to characterise the skilful judgements people make about which readings they record, how readings are presented, and about the records they retain and those they discard. We suggest self-monitoring produces partial data, both in the sense that it embodies these judgements, and also because monitoring might be conducted intermittently. We also extend previous analyses by exploring the broad set of materials, digital and analogue, networked and not networked, involved in record keeping to consider the different ways these contributed to regulating attention to self-monitoring. By paying attention to which data is recorded and the occasions when data is not recorded, as well as the ways data is recorded, the research provides specificity to the different ways in which self-monitoring data may or may not flow or contribute to big data sets. We argue that ultimately our analysis contributes to nuancing our understanding of ‘data power’. (shrink)

Despite the evidence showing the promise of HIV treatment as prevention (TasP) in reducing HIV incidence, a variety of ethical questions surrounding the implementation and “scaling up” of TasP have been articulated by a variety of stakeholders including scientists, community activists and government officials. Given the high profile and potential promise of TasP in combatting the global HIV epidemic, an explicit and transparent research priority-setting process is critical to inform ongoing ethical discussions pertaining to TasP.

This book showcases the vast array of these exceptional landmarks, built by hand in wood and stone, brick and metal.

The immediate perception after 9/11 was that we were entering a world of “new terrorism”: new actors, new tactics, new responses. And yet more than a decade later, it seems that not much has really changed, or that the changes have been contextual rather than structural. Authors have used the modifier “new” in many different ways, creating a contested and confused understanding of what terrorism is and how it appears in the world. The same applies to how one defines terrorism, (...) examines its domains and forms, delineates its actors and strategies, or compares it to state violence and fear in international relations. This raises the question of why scholars, rather than agreeing on a definition of terrorism, have focused on its many contexts, applications, and psychologies, concluding that there is a substantial and significant difference between the old and the new terrorism. However, when one tests this notion of the “new terrorism” against the case of Al-Qaeda, one finds that the tactical changes, primarily technological, as well as those in motivation and organization, are hardly new, and that the structural, ideological, and political features of terrorism have remained fundamentally the same. (shrink)

Through a series of examples, we illustrate some important drawbacks that the action model logic framework suffers from in its ability to represent the dynamics of information updates. We argue that these problems stem from the fact that the action model, a central construct designed to encode agents’ uncertainty about actions, is itself effectively common knowledge amongst the agents. In response to these difficulties, we motivate and propose an alternative semantics that avoids them by endogenizing the action model. We discuss (...) the relationship between this new framework and action model logic, and provide a sound and complete axiomatization of several new logics that naturally arise. (shrink)

The book combines a series of chapters considering a range of responses to the idea of 'de-westernizing' film studies with a series of in-depth interviews with filmmakers, scholars and critics.

An introduction to An Elemental Anthropocene.

In the recent literature on the nature of knowledge, a rivalry has emerged between modalism and explanationism. According to modalism, knowledge requires that our beliefs track the truth across some appropriate set of possible worlds. Modalists tend to focus on two modal conditions: sensitivity and safety. According to explanationism, knowledge requires only that beliefs bear the right sort of explanatory relation to the truth. In slogan form: knowledge is believing something because it’s true. In this paper, we aim to vindicate (...) explanationism from some recent objections offered by Gualtiero Piccinini, Dario Mortini, and Kenneth Boyce and Andrew Moon. Together, these authors present five purported counterexamples to the sufficiency of the explanationist analysis for knowledge. In addition, Mortini devises a clever argument that explanationism entails the violation of a plausible closure principle on knowledge. We will argue that explanationism is innocent of all these charges against it, and we hope that the strength of the defense we offer of explanationism is evidence in its favor, and a reason to investigate explanationism further as the long-elusive truth about the nature of knowledge. (shrink)

This devastating polemical critique of the existentialist philosophy of Martin Heidegger is a monumental study in Adorno's effort to apply qualitative analysis to the content and impact of cultural phenomena.

The common view of the transition between subitizing and numerosity estimation regimes is that there is a hard bound on the subitizing range, and beyond this range, people estimate. However, this view does not adequately address the behavioral signatures of enumeration under conditions of attentional load or in the immediate post-subitizing range. The possibility that there might exist a numerosity range where both processes of subitizing and estimation operate in conjunction has so far been ignored. Here, we investigate this new (...) proposal, that people strategically combine the processes of subitizing and estimation to maximize accuracy and precision, given time or attentional constraints. We present a process-level account of how subitizing and estimation can be combined through strategic deployment of attention to maximize the precision of perceived numerosity given time constraints. We then describe a computational model of this account and apply it in two experimental simulations to demonstrate how it can explain key findings in prior enumeration research. While recent modeling work has argued that the behavioral signatures of enumeration can best be explained through a single numerosity system with a single form of representation, we argue that our model demonstrates how the traditional two-systems view of numerical representation accounts for behavioral data through coordination with a unified attentional mechanism, rather than a unified representation. (shrink)

Philosophical arguments stemming from the public health ethics arena suggest that public health interventions ought to be subject to normative inquiry that considers relational values, including concepts such as solidarity, reciprocity and health equity. As yet, however, the extent to which ‘public’ values influence the ‘autonomous’ decisions of the public remains largely unexplored. Drawing on interviews with 50 men in Vancouver, Canada, this study employs a critical discourse analysis to examine participants’ decisions and motivations to voluntarily access HIV testing and/or (...) to accept a routine HIV test offer. Within a sub-set of interviews, a transactional discourse emerged in which the decision to test features an arrangement of ‘giving and receiving’. Discourses related to notions of solidarity emphasize considerations of justice and positions testing as a ‘public’ act. Lastly, ‘individualistic’ discourses focused on individual-level considerations, with less concern for the broader public ‘good’. These findings underscore how normative dimensions pertaining to men’s decisions to test are dialectically interrelated with the broader social and structural influences on individual and collective health-related behaviour, thereby suggesting a need to advance an explicit empirical-normative research agenda related to population and public health intervention research. (shrink)

We develop a cultural evolutionary theory of the origins of prosocial religions and apply it to resolve two puzzles in human psychology and cultural history: (1) the rise of large-scale cooperation among strangers and, simultaneously, (2) the spread of prosocial religions in the last 10–12 millennia. We argue that these two developments were importantly linked and mutually energizing. We explain how a package of culturally evolved religious beliefs and practices characterized by increasingly potent, moralizing, supernatural agents, credible displays of faith, (...) and other psychologically active elements conducive to social solidarity promoted high fertility rates and large-scale cooperation with co-religionists, often contributing to success in intergroup competition and conflict. In turn, prosocial religious beliefs and practices spread and aggregated as these successful groups expanded, or were copied by less successful groups. This synthesis is grounded in the idea that although religious beliefs and practices originally arose as nonadaptive by-products of innate cognitive functions, particular cultural variants were then selected for their prosocial effects in a long-term, cultural evolutionary process. This framework (1) reconciles key aspects of the adaptationist and by-product approaches to the origins of religion, (2) explains a variety of empirical observations that have not received adequate attention, and (3) generates novel predictions. Converging lines of evidence drawn from diverse disciplines provide empirical support while at the same time encouraging new research directions and opening up new questions for exploration and debate. (shrink)