In order to operate effectively, modern capitalism depends on agents who evince a rather morally undemanding type of moral character; one that is acquisitive, pecuniary, recognition-seeking and merely prudent. Adam Smith is considered to have been the key legitimiser of this archetype. In this paper I respond to the view that Smith is actually sceptical about the value of material acquisition and explore whether he really believed that the pursuit of tranquillity and virtue—especially beneficence—offers a superior route to happiness than (...) the commercial world of materialist acquisition. I approach these issues partly by considering the roles of beneficence and sympathy in Smith's system and partly by analysing the story of ‘The Poor Man's Son’ related in Book IV of The Theory of Moral Sentiments. As he narrates this story, Smith seems highly critical of the unrelenting drive for worldly success. But what is the real moral of the story? Should people contain their ambition for recognition and material succe... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 62.2 (2001) 281-299 [Access article in PDF] Eighteenth-Century Anticipations of the Sociology of Conflict: The Case of Adam Ferguson Lisa Hill Adam Ferguson (1723-1816), a leading figure of the Scottish Enlightenment, is a most interesting figure in the history of sociological thought. Though sometimes perceived as a secondary figure, there have been some attempts to recover him as one of, if (...) not the first "sociologist." 1 Much has been written about Ferguson's contribution to modern social science; 2 this article focuses upon his highly prescient work in the area of conflict theory. It is important to note at the outset, however, that Ferguson's inspiration for these apparently novel insights is classical. His early social theory is curious because it "straddles traditions"; 3 on the one hand he owes a profound debt to classical civic humanism, [End Page 281] but on the other his work quite authentically signposts the emergence of social science proper. This bridging of traditions in Ferguson is a key theme of this paper.Ferguson relies heavily upon conflict in his explanation of historical processes and in the securing of social order. Conflict generates many positive unintended consequences; it leads to the formation of the state, formal defense institutions, and large scale communities; and it plays a pivotal role in the development of the moral personality and contributes to the maintenance of stability and social cohesion. Conflict preserves the balance of powers in government and prevents the encroachment of despotism. In this regard, then, conflict cannot be regarded as wholly unnecessary, destructive, or undesirable but as integral to progress and the march towards civilization. 4Gladys Bryson has noted that Ferguson's exposition of conflict was original with him and "set him off from the conventional position of his century." 5 Even so the benefits of conflict and dissension had been canvassed long before by Tacitus and Machiavelli, both of whom influenced Ferguson's analysis. 6 In it he challenges the false dichotomy promulgated by contractarians of tranquil society on the one hand and violent, isolated chaos on the other; rather, he argues, we are social beings with belligerent tendencies. He also confronts the Aristotelian (and later Hobbesian) premise that the key purpose of society is stability and social harmony. Instead, Ferguson lays great stress on the positive benefits of competition and conflict in our social development and in the maintenance of community. Conflict is just as natural as repose and may even be equally desirable. In this Ferguson indicates his debt to Socrates' suggestion that "some circumstances in the lot of mankind" prompt us to be social, while others prompt us "to war and dissension." 7 As a highlander, Ferguson was well acquainted with the realities of conflict. He also had a brief but lively career as chaplain to the Black Watch Regiment, 8 and it seems likely that his unique views on the positive aspects of "opposition" were reinforced by this experience.Because of this emphasis Ludwig Gumplowicz identified Ferguson as the first significant exponent of the "group struggle" theory of social development. 9 [End Page 282] Ferguson's discussion of conflict and its unintended effects is also partly responsible for his modern reputation as "father of sociology"; 10 and although it is doubtful that he deserves the title, Ferguson was probably the first thinker to place so great an emphasis upon the positive aspects of conflict. 11 The discussion also anticipates nineteenth- and twentieth-century conflict theory in positing conflict as an authentic medium, even form, of solidary association, there is an early dialectical historiography in which class conflict is shown to give rise to constitutional government. A particularly interesting aspect of the discussion is Ferguson's anticipation of Norbert Elias's work on the social function of competitive sport, particularly its role in the process of achieving "civilization."Because of Ferguson's providentialism and in particular his emphasis on the virtue of beneficence, 12 John Bernstein has suggested that "Ferguson's admiration for the qualities revealed in conflict constitute... (shrink)

In many democracies, voter turnout is low and getting lower. If the people choose not to govern themselves, should they be forced to do so? For Jason Brennan, compulsory voting is unjust and a petty violation of citizens' liberty. The median non-voter is less informed and rational, as well as more biased, than the median voter. According to Lisa Hill, compulsory voting is a reasonable imposition on personal liberty. Hill points to the discernible benefits of compulsory voting (...) and argues that high turnout elections are more democratically legitimate. The authors - both well-known for their work on voting and civic engagement - debate questions such as: • Do citizens have a duty to vote, and is it an enforceable duty? • Does compulsory voting violate citizens' liberty? If so, is this sufficient grounds to oppose it? Or is it a justifiable violation? Might it instead promote liberty on the whole? • Is low turnout a problem or a blessing? (shrink)

The most important parent of the idea of property in the person is undoubtedly John Locke. In this article, we argue that the origins of this idea can be traced back as far as the third century BCE, to classical Stoicism. Stoic cosmopolitanism, with its insistence on impartiality and the moral equality of all persons, lays the foundation for the idea of self-ownership, which is then given support in the doctrine of oikeiosis and the corresponding belief that nature had made (...) all human beings equal, self-preserving, and self-regarding. On the Stoic account, self-ownership is a natural correlate and consequence of oikeiosis, the natural urge to self-preservation, proprioception, and the individuation that came with it. In recognising that people are separate and individual, and entrusting each individual’s welfare to herself, Zeus appears to make everyone a ‘self-guardian’. We uniquely argue that Locke was directly inspired by these Stoic ideas, which he then develops and incorporates into his own theory. (shrink)

The ability to imagine hypothetical events in one’s personal future is thought to involve a number of constituent cognitive processes. We investigated the extent to which individual differences in working memory capacity contribute to facets of episodic future thought. College students completed simple and complex measures of working memory and were cued to recall autobiographical memories and imagine future autobiographical events consisting of varying levels of specificity . Consistent with previous findings, future thought was related to analogous measures of autobiographical (...) memory, likely reflecting overlapping cognitive factors supporting both past and future thought. Additionally, after controlling for autobiographical memory, residual working memory variance independently predicted future episodic specificity. We suggest that when imagining future events, working memory contributes to the construction of a single, coherent, future event depiction, but not to the retrieval or elaboration of event details. (shrink)

Models of risk-taking as used in the social sciences may be improved by including concepts from life history theory, particularly environmental unpredictability and life expectancy. Community college students completed self-report questionnaires measuring these constructs along with several well-known correlates. The frequency of risk-taking was higher for those with higher future unpredictability beliefs and shorter lifespan estimates (as measured by the Future Lifespan Assessment developed for this study), and unpredictability beliefs remained significant after accounting for standard predictors, such as sex and (...) temperament. The results demonstrate the usefulness of applying concepts from life history theory to enhance our understanding of human behavior. (shrink)

This volume is primarily concerned with equality as a basic component of the democratic character of representation. In other words, of the many types of equality that have attracted the attention of theorists since democracy's beginnings - arithmetic equality, equality before the law, equality of opportunity- we would like to draw attention to representational equality, that is, the role of equality in systems of democratic representation. In what form is equality present in traditional forms of electoral representation? How can it (...) be secured in new forms of representation, such as claims-making, deliberative, klerotarian and epistemic representation? And to what extent are electoral or non-electoral models of representation able to accommodate increasing social inequalities? The articles in this volume discuss these issues from a normative and conceptual point of view, seeking to shed new light on the important but under-explored relationship between equality and representation. This book was originally published as a special issue of Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy. (shrink)

This article explores Adam Smith's (1723-90) cosmopolitanism by examining his conception of the ideal global regime and his attitudes to classical cosmopolitanism, British imperialism, American independence, war, mercantilism, benevolence, global integration, specialization, patriotism and his own alleged nationalism. It is argued that Smith shares with the Stoics the ideal of a world community but his cosmopolitanism is based, not on the sympathetic workings of universal benevolence, but on mutual enablement and the desire for and satisfaction of exponential material enrichment. Such (...) a state precludes conflict and territorial rivalry. Patriotism will not disappear but will be moderated by a pacific desire for prosperity via free trade. Eventually fierce nationalistic sentiments and intense alliances between security allies will be subdued by a development-induced aversion to conflict and the habits of amicable strangership underlying commercial cosmopolitanism. The article outlines the efficient mechanisms by which this is to be achieved and, in so doing, shows why, for Smith, economic cosmopolitanism is at once desirable, necessary and natural. (shrink)

This paper extends the sensibilities of the Gilligan-Kohlberg debate into classical political economy and makes links with modern psychotherapeutics and the psychological development of individuals. The model of moral maturity represented in contemporary psychological theories is posited as the direct descendant, not only of Immanuel Kant, as is generally argued, but also of the universal, homogenous agent of classical economics; the ‘rational economic man’ representedin the writings of Adam Smith and J. S. Mill. Both thinkers lent their support to the (...) creation of an order which produces (masculine) actors who are ’rational’ self-governing, separative, competitive, self-asserting, self-interested, acquisitive, pecuniary and driven to success by a desire for the social recognition afforded by consumerism; the same order which typically designates women moral failures and which renders them largely invisible. Liberalism generates conditions which enable it to sustain and reproduce itself at the psychic level. The assumption of the market as the paradigmatic social interaction and its status as the analytical and moral starting point in liberal capitalism infects the putatively private domain of ‘self-governance’ and contemporary psychotherapeutics; the development and management of the self in contemporary culture is a direct reflection of the imperatives and assumptions of market society. The separative self is the ‘healthy’ self, hence the parallel emphasis in modern therapy on ‘individuation’ as the highest level of psychological evolvement. Gilligan’s ‘care ethic’ is approached with some scepticism, nevertheless, her critique of Kohlberg guides us towards a more comprehensive critique of the ‘pneumatic’ and political assumptions of liberalism. (shrink)

Adam Ferguson was a leading light of the Scottish Enlightenment who developed a systematic theory of historical progress in the context of a broader theory of spontaneous order. His exposition of social order outlines a vision of human affairs as harmonious, orderly, progressive and perfectibilist. History is conceived lineally and is presented in the form of a tri-stadial thesis in which progress is both natural and likely. It is also a Providentially inspired process and yet the second major theme of (...) Ferguson's history is that of decline. Ferguson apparently harboured grave fears about the third stage in our cultural and economic evolution, the ‘polished’ or commercial age, and he suggested that this stage contained the seeds of its own destruction.Ferguson fails to make explicit the precise relationship between the parallel themes of progress and decline within his corpus; indeed, his articulation of them within the superstructure of a Providential teleology casts them in direct conflict. The result is a strong sense of ambivalence which throws the whole idea of spontaneous order into doubt. How can Ferguson simultaneously subscribe to notions about progressive, spontaneous history and to others about the onset of decay in the presumably ‘natural stage’ of commercial or ‘polished’ society? This paper explores and seeks to resolve this conundrum textually via a discussion of Ferguson's response to the problem of theodicy and by using his commitment to spontaneous order as the key unifying construct. (shrink)

The identification and amelioration of political corruption has long absorbed political science. But has corruption always been a problem about abuse of public trust for private gain, or a lack of probity, integrity and transparency in governance? For some, the 'modern' conception of corruption is radically different from the classical, whereby corruption is held to be conceived in exclusively moralistic terms as a loss of virtue in the polity, a generalized condition afflicting political elites and citizens indiscriminately. But, as will (...) be shown in the following discussion, the so- called 'modern' conception of corruption (corruption 2) was very well developed in the classical period, particularly in Athens and Rome. This did not mean, however, that this conception always prevailed, therefore this paper is just as concerned to map and comprehend the fractures and contradictions in antique attitudes to 'corruption 2' that prevented it from being either monolithic or universally honoured. (shrink)

(1999). Hume, Smith and Ferguson: Friendship in commercial society. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 2, The Challenge to Friendship in Modernity, pp. 33-49.

Adam Smith (1723–90) provided a novel and subtle account of the new social physics that emerged to accommodate the economic changes taking place in his time. This article explores Smith’s views on the effect of commercialization on friendship, and then questions one prominent interpretation of his approach, that of Allan Silver. Against the contested reading, we argue that the new ‘strangership’ described by Smith is not warm, but rather, cool-friendship enhancing. We suggest that Cicero’s treatment of friendship illuminates Smith’s views (...) on this topic. (shrink)

Although scholars have long recognized that classical Stoicism affected Walt Whitman’s work, a full account of the extent of this debt has yet to be produced. Although he drew inspiration from many sources, we argue that Whitman’s “spinal ideas”—the ontological, moral, metaphysical and political threads of order in his thinking—are most consistently Stoic in origin. We do so by examining Whitman’s poetry, prose, correspondence, manuscripts, notebooks, and autobiography in the context of the primary and secondary Stoic material with which he (...) was familiar. We demonstrate that a number of ideas at the heart of Whitman’s literary vision—his pantheism, materialism, cosmopolitanism, reconciliation of evil and death, and conceptions of both providence and virtue—were strongly indebted to Stoic thought. As background to this argument, we first explore the transmission of Stoicism to America and its reception among American readers. We also show how and why Whitman came under the influence of Stoic teachings. (shrink)

This essay explores the archive of a 1971 interview of Angela Davis by Swedish journalist Bo Holmström—recorded in Santa Clara County Jail where Davis awaited trial—to examine the relationship between Black radical thought and its social and intellectual mediation, especially when it comes to questions of violence versus nonviolence. Where Holmström invokes the “violence/nonviolence” binary in the interview, Davis pointedly resists its distortions, restoring the record of contemporary and historical conditions of racial terror that both necessitate and criminalize Black self-defense. (...) Decades later, the interview was filtered through the violence/nonviolence binary in editing for the acclaimed 2011 documentary, The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975, with Davis’s wider conversation with Holmström not only abridged but remixed into a shorter exchange on armed self-defense. Studying the interview from its conditions of possibility through its later remixing, and reading it together with her opening defense statement (1972) and later speeches and writings, the essay excavates and explicates Davis’s original theoretical interventions and indexes a cluster of forces that mediate Black radical thought, Black women’s radical thought more specifically, and prison texts. The final section historicizes Davis’s theorization of the spatial and relational contexts of Black self-defense in Dynamite Hill, Alabama, and in California, and contends that her incisive interventions into the violence/nonviolence binary in 1971 remain critical here and now. (shrink)

Lisa Hill’s response to my critique of compulsory voting, like similar responses in print or in discussion, remind me how much a child of the ‘70s I am, and how far my beliefs and intuitions about politics have been shaped by the electoral conflicts, social movements and violence of that period. -/- But my perceptions of politics have also been profoundly shaped by my teachers, and fellow graduate students, at MIT. Theda Skocpol famously urged political scientists to ‘bring (...) the state back in’ to their analyses, and to recognise that political identities, interests and coalitions cannot be read off straightforwardly from people’s socio-economic position. In their different ways, this was the lesson that Suzanne Berger, Charles Sabel and Joshua Cohen tried to teach us, emphasising the ways that political participation and conflict, themselves, can change people’s identities, their sense of what it is desirable and possible, and their ability to recognise, or oppose, the freedom and equality of others. -/- I do not therefore take it as self-evident that the poor and seemingly powerless should be politically apathetic, unwilling to vote, or incapable of imagining a political solution to at least some of the problems confronting them. Nor do I suppose that non-voters are all-of-a-piece, and that their shared interests are, inevitably, more significant, morally or politically, than those which divide them. Such assumptions seem mistaken in the case of voters, and I see no reason why they should be true of non-voters. The people we find in these categories are not predestined to be in one rather than the other; they do not always stay where they start off; and at an individual level, the reasons why people fall into one group, rather than another, are likely to be complex and sometimes unpredictable. -/- Above all I see nothing in a commitment to democratic government, understood realistically or in more idealistic terms, that requires us to treat raising turnout at national elections (once every four years or so) as of such moral or political importance that we should make it legally mandatory. Realistically, it is an open question how far the ballot box is, for most people, the path to empowerment – important though it is that people should have an equal right to vote and to stand as candidates at national elections. On a more idealistic view of democratic politics it is hard to avoid the thought that the importance of national elections to self-government, posited by proponents of compulsory voting, reflects an alienated and alienating view of democracy, in which the choice of our leaders becomes more important than the development and exercise of our own capacities to lead; and in which our awe at the power our leaders might wield is matched only by our inability to imagine less intimidating, distant and centralised forms of politics. -/- But before saying a little more about these points, and their significance for compulsory voting, I would like to dispel some misunderstandings or misrepresentations of my views in Hill’s essay. I do not believe socio-economic disparities in turnout are not worrying for democratic politics, nor do I believe that abstention is generally synonymous with consent. I do not assume that people have a right not to vote, but try to explain why moral and legal rights to abstain are an important part of democratic politics, including electoral politics. (shrink)

When it originated in the late 19th century, psychometrics was a field with both a scientific and a social mission: psychometrics provided new methods for research into individual differences, and at the same time, these psychometric instruments were considered a means to create a new social order. In contrast, contemporary psychometrics - due to its highly technical nature and its limited involvement in substantive psychological research - has created the impression of being a value-free discipline. In this article, we develop (...) a contrasting characterization of contemporary psychometrics as a value-laden discipline. We expose four such values: that individual differences are quantitative (rather than qualitative), that measurement should be objective in a specific sense, that test items should be fair, and that utility of a model is more important than its truth. Our goal is not to criticize psychometrics for employing these values, but rather to bring them into the open and to show that these values are not inevitable and are in need of systematic evaluation. (shrink)

I argue that epistemic failings are a significant and underappreciated moral hazard in the financial services industry. I argue further that an analysis of these epistemic failings and their means of redress is best developed by identifying policies and procedures that are likely to facilitate good judgment. These policies and procedures are “best epistemic practices.” I explain how best epistemic practices support good reasoning, thereby facilitating accurate judgments about risk and reward. Failures to promote and adhere to best epistemic practices (...) contributed to the 2008 financial crisis. I identify and discuss some of the ways in which best epistemic practices were violated in the events that led to the crisis, with a focus on the role of the credit rating agencies. I go on to discuss some of the ways in which these failings have been redressed. I conclude by observing how proactive regulation for best epistemic practices might help us to anticipate and avoid future crises. (shrink)

Broadly speaking, a naturalistic approach to epistemology seeks to explain human knowledge – and justification in particular – as a phenomenon in the natural world, in keeping with the tenets of naturalism. Naturalism is typically defined, in part, by a commitment to scientific method as the only legitimate means of attaining knowledge of the natural world. Naturalism is often thought to entail empiricism by virtue of this methodological commitment. However, scientific methods themselves may incorporate a priori elements, so empiricism does (...) not follow from the methodological commitments of naturalism alone. And given a suitably-naturalistic conception of the a priori, a priori forms of justification may be compatible with naturalism generally. A priori justification is, in principle, compatible with naturalism – and hence naturalistic epistemologies – if the a priori is understood in a way that is free of some of the inessential properties that have been associated with the concept. I argue that some of the more prominent strategies for accommodating normative notions within a naturalistic framework allow for the possibility of a priori justification. These include reliabilism, instrumental rationality, and nonfactualism about justification. A priori justification thus need not be seen as standing in opposition to all naturalistic epistemologies. It is only with nonnormative naturalistic epistemologies that a priori justification per se is incompatible, and this only because the notion of justification itself has no role to play within a nonnormative approach to epistemology. (shrink)

A new theory of how the brain constructs emotions that could revolutionize psychology, health care, law enforcement, and our understanding of the human mind Emotions feel automatic, like uncontrollable reactions to things we think and experience. Scientists have long supported this assumption by claiming that emotions are hardwired in the body or the brain. Today, however, the science of emotion is in the midst of a revolution on par with the discovery of relativity in physics and natural selection in biology--and (...) this paradigm shift has far-reaching implications for us all. Leading the charge is psychologist and neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett, whose theory of emotion is driving a deeper understanding of the mind and brain, and shedding new light on what it means to be human. Her research overturns the widely held belief that emotions are housed in different parts of the brain and are universally expressed and recognized. Instead, she has shown that emotion is constructed in the moment, by core systems that interact across the whole brain, aided by a lifetime of learning. This new theory means that you play a much greater role in your emotional life than you ever thought. Its repercussions are already shaking the foundations not only of psychology but also of medicine, the legal system, child-rearing, meditation, and even airport security. Why do emotions feel automatic? Does rational thought really control emotion? How does emotion affect disease? How can you make your children more emotionally intelligent? How Emotions Are Made answers these questions and many more, revealing the latest research and intriguing practical applications of the new science of emotion, mind, and brain. (shrink)

Essays discuss euthanasia and the medical, legal, and ethical controversies surrounding it.

Dr Jardine finds a unifying principle in Bacon's preoccupation with 'method', the evaluation and organisation of information as a procedure of investigation or ...

Both Immanuel Kant and Paul Guyer have raised important concerns about the limitations of Lockean thought. Following Guyer, I will focus my attention on questions about the proper ambitions and likely achievements of inquiry into the natural/physical world. I will argue that there are at least two important respects, not discussed by Guyer, in which Locke’s account of natural philosophy is much more flexible and accommodating than may be immediately apparent. On my interpretation, however, one crucial source of a too-limited (...) vision of natural philosophy remains in Locke, where he is appropriately criticized by both Kant and Guyer. My method will be to begin with a distinction that Locke draws in the very first draft of the Essay, between what he calls “the sensible object” and, on the other hand, “the uncertain philosophical cause.” I believe that Locke’s notion of “sensible object,” as opposed to uncertain philosophical cause, retains a central place in his thought in the published Essay, despite the fact thateven though this contrast is never made explicitly there. Tracing the evolution of these two concepts in his thought will allow us to track and better understand his developing views about the relation between the project of the. (shrink)

Both Immanuel Kant and Paul Guyer have raised important concerns about the limitations of Lockean thought. Following Guyer, I will focus my attention on questions about the proper ambitions and likely achievements of inquiry into the natural/physical world. I will argue that there are at least two important respects, not discussed by Guyer, in which Locke’s account of natural philosophy is much more flexible and accommodating than may be immediately apparent. On my interpretation, however, one crucial source of a too-limited (...) vision of natural philosophy remains in Locke, where he is appropriately criticized by both Kant and Guyer. My method will be to begin with a distinction that Locke draws in the very first draft of the Essay, between what he calls “the sensible object” and, on the other hand, “the uncertain philosophical cause.” I believe that Locke’s notion of “sensible object,” as opposed to uncertain philosophical cause, retains a central place in his thought in the published Essay, despite the fact thateven though this contrast is never made explicitly there. Tracing the evolution of these two concepts in his thought will allow us to track and better understand his developing views about the relation between the project of the. (shrink)

Epistemic practices are an important but underappreciated component of business ethics; good conduct requires making epistemically sound as well as morally principled judgments. Well-founded judgments are promoted by epistemic virtues, and for organizations, epistemic virtues are arguably achieved through organizational good epistemic practices. But how are such practices to be developed? This paper addresses this normative and practical challenge. The first half of the paper explains what organizational good epistemic practices are and outlines a means for their construction. The second (...) half of the paper demonstrates how specific good epistemic practices could be developed by considering a case of corporate epistemic failings: JPMorgan’s notorious 2012 ‘London Whale’ trading losses. Following this, the paper briefly surveys the institutional epistemic failings of the 2008 global financial crisis and the remedial actions that they suggest. Although the discussion is focused on the banking industry, the main ideas, and some of the epistemic practices, generalize to organizations in other industries. (shrink)

Lisa Tessman's Burdened Virtues is a deeply original and provocative work that engages questions central to feminist theory and practice, from the perspective of Aristotelian ethics. Focused primarily on selves who endure and resist oppression, she addresses the ways in which devastating conditions confronted by these selves both limit and burden their moral goodness, and affect their possibilities of flourishing. She describes two different forms of "moral trouble" prevalent under oppression. The first is that the oppressed self may be (...) morally damaged, prevented from developing or exercising some of the virtues; the second is that the very conditions of oppression require the oppressed to develop a set of virtues that carry a moral cost to those who practice them--traits that Tessman refers to as "burdened virtues." These virtues have the unusual feature of being disjoined from their bearer's own well being. Tessman's work focuses on issues that have been missed by many feminist moral theories, and her use of the virtue ethics framework brings feminist concerns more closely into contact with mainstream ethical theory. This book will appeal to feminist theorists in philosophy and women's studies, but also more broadly, ethicists and social theorists. (shrink)

Prolonged solitary confinement has become a widespread and standard practice in U.S. prisons—even though it consistently drives healthy prisoners insane, makes the mentally ill sicker, and, according to the testimony of prisoners, threatens to reduce life to a living death. In this profoundly important and original book, Lisa Guenther examines the death-in-life experience of solitary confinement in America from the early nineteenth century to today’s supermax prisons. Documenting how solitary confinement undermines prisoners’ sense of identity and their ability to (...) understand the world, Guenther demonstrates the real effects of forcibly isolating a person for weeks, months, or years. -/- Drawing on the testimony of prisoners and the work of philosophers and social activists from Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty to Frantz Fanon and Angela Davis, the author defines solitary confinement as a kind of social death. It argues that isolation exposes the relational structure of being by showing what happens when that structure is abused—when prisoners are deprived of the concrete relations with others on which our existence as sense-making creatures depends. Solitary confinement is beyond a form of racial or political violence; it is an assault on being. (shrink)

Moral enhancements aim to morally improve a person, for example by increasing the frequency with which an individual does the right thing or acts from the right motives. Most of the applied ethics literature on moral enhancement focuses on moral bioenhancement – moral enhancement pursued through biomedical means – and considers examples such as the use of drugs to diminish aggression, suppress implicit racial biases, or amplify empathy. A number of authors have defended the voluntary pursuit of moral bioenhancement, or (...) the development of technologies that would enable it. They have highlighted the need for humans to morally improve themselves in order to address moral failures such as the oppression of women, the mistreatment of animals, and anthropogenic climate change. They have also emphasised the moral similarities between moral bioenhancement and more familiar forms of moral enhancement, such as that achieved through childhood education, introspective reflection, and engagement with literature. Critics of moral enhancement have argued that it may undermine our freedom to ‘fall’ (i.e. be immoral), and therefore our moral agency, or exacerbate the domination of individuals by political authorities. They have also questioned the potential for biomedical interventions to produce the deepest and most valuable forms of moral improvement, and have highlighted the risks that technologies for moral bioenhancement might misfire or be intentionally misused, thereby producing moral deterioration. Underlying some of these worries is the observation that there is little agreement on which psychological transformations would constitute moral improvements, and in which contexts. Defenders of moral enhancement have made various proposals for resolving or side-stepping these disagreements, but it remains unclear how far these proposals can take us beyond establishing consensus on the worst types of moral failure. (shrink)

Good epistemic practices are essential to the well-functioning of organizations. Epistemic practices are adopted norms, policies, procedures, and general methodologies that further our epistemic aims or realize our epistemic values. This chapter argues for the importance of organizational good epistemic practices through an analysis of the failures of risk management implicated in JPMorgan’s notorious ‘London Whale’ trading losses, which roiled the financial markets in 2012. A number of these failures of risk management exemplified ways in which we, as fallible reasoners, (...) may be prone to error individually and collectively. Good epistemic practices inter alia anticipate and endeavor to correct for erroneous patterns of reasoning. They help guard against future epistemic failings, and they support good reasoning within and on the part of organizations. In so doing, they constitute some of the key structural elements of organizational epistemic virtues. (shrink)

Moral Failure: On the Impossible Demands of Morality asks what happens when the sense that "I must" collides with the realization that "I can't." Bringing together philosophical and empirical work in moral psychology, Lisa Tessman here examines moral requirements that are non-negotiable and that contravene the principle that "ought implies can.".

It is often thought that the numerous contradictory perspectives in Margaret Cavendish's writings demonstrate her inability to reconcile her feminism with her conservative, royalist politics. In this book Lisa Walters challenges this view and demonstrates that Cavendish's ideas more closely resemble republican thought, and that her methodology is the foundation for subversive political, scientific and gender theories. With an interdisciplinary focus Walters closely examines Cavendish's work and its context, providing the reader with an enriched understanding of women's contribution to (...) early modern scientific theory, political philosophy, culture and folklore. Considering also Cavendish's ideas in relation to Hobbes and Paracelsus, this volume is of great interest to scholars and students of literature, philosophy, history of ideas, political theory, gender studies and history of science. (shrink)

Thomas E. Hill, Jr.; Servility and Self-Respect, The Monist, Volume 57, Issue 1, 1 January 1973, Pages 87–104, https://doi.org/10.5840/monist197357135.

We address the ethics of scenarios in which one party entraps, intentionally tempts or intentionally tests the virtue of another. We classify, in a new manner, three distinct types of acts that are of concern, namely acts of entrapment, of intentional temptation and of virtue testing. Our classification is, for each kind of scenario, of itself neutral concerning the question whether the agent acts permissibly. We explain why acts of entrapment are more ethically objectionable than like acts of intentional temptation (...) and why these, in turn, are more ethically objectionable than like acts of virtue testing. Along the way, we scrutinize, and eventually reject, the view that acts of entrapment are ethically unacceptable because intentional temptation is involved in entrapment. (shrink)

Stem cell research. Drug company influence. Abortion. Contraception. Long-term and end-of-life care. Human participants research. Informed consent. The list of ethical issues in science, medicine, and public health is long and continually growing. These complex issues pose a daunting task for professionals in the expanding field of bioethics. But what of the practice of bioethics itself? What issues do ethicists and bioethicists confront in their efforts to facilitate sound moral reasoning and judgment in a variety of venues? Are those immersed (...) in the field capable of making the right decisions? How and why do they face moral challenge -- and even compromise -- as ethicists? What values should guide them? In The Ethics of Bioethics, Lisa A. Eckenwiler and Felicia G. Cohn tackle these questions head on, bringing together notable medical ethicists and people outside the discipline to discuss common criticisms, the field's inherent tensions, and efforts to assign values and assess success. Through twenty-five lively essays examining the field's history and trends, shortcomings and strengths, and the political and policy interplay within the bioethical realm, this comprehensive book begins a much-needed critical and constructive discussion of the moral landscape of bioethics. (shrink)

This volume presents cutting-edge theory and research on emotions as constructed events rather than fixed, essential entities. It provides a thorough introduction to the assumptions, hypotheses, and scientific methods that embody psychological constructionist approaches. Leading scholars examine the neurobiological, cognitive/perceptual, and social processes that give rise to the experiences Western cultures call sadness, anger, fear, and so on. The book explores such compelling questions as how the brain creates emotional experiences, whether the "ingredients" of emotions also give rise to other (...) mental states, and how to define what is or is not an emotion. Introductory and concluding chapters by the editors identify key themes and controversies and compare psychological construction to other theories of emotion. (shrink)

Objectives: To explore how subjects in a placebo-controlled vitamin A supplementation trial among Ghanaian women aged 15–45 years perceive the trial and whether they know that not all trial capsules are the same, and to identify factors associated with this knowledge.Methods: 60 semistructured interviews and 12 focus groups were conducted to explore subjects’ perceptions of the trial. Steps were taken to address areas of low comprehension, including retraining fieldworkers. 1971 trial subjects were randomly selected for a survey measuring their knowledge (...) that not all trial capsules are the same. The subjects’ fieldworkers were also interviewed about their characteristics and trial knowledge. Factors associated with knowledge were explored using multi-level modeling.Results: Although subjects knew they were taking part in research, most thought they were receiving an active and beneficial medication. Variables associated with knowledge were education and district of residence. Radio broadcasts benefited those with some schooling. Fieldworkers’ characteristics were not associated with subjects’ knowledge.Conclusions: Research and debate on new or improved consent procedures are urgently required, particularly for subjects with little education. (shrink)

Such an absence seems ultimately fatal. Yet as this volume amply demonstrates, the richness of his social theory can be opened up by contemporary feminism.

We are currently seeing dramatic changes in the ways we imagine and experience time. Permanent debt, unending violent conflict, climate change, economic instability, and widening social inequalities have led to suggestions that we are now living in the time of the 'end times'. In the shadow of a foreshortened future, the present is increasingly experienced as a form of 'non-stop inertia', resulting in experiences of time as both frenetic but also stuck - revving up, as Ivor Southwood puts it, to (...) go nowhere. So, where do we go and how when all options seem to have run their course and time is no longer moving forward? Enduring Time proposes some alternative relations of time which provide hopeful alternatives to the dominating models of oppression, limitation and exploitation. A strikingly original philosophy of time which also provides students and scholars with a rigorous and detailed survey of contemporary theories of time, Enduring Time is an indispensable read for those attempting to live meaningfully in the current age. (shrink)

I motivate and develop a novel account of the epistemic assessability of suspension as a development of my knowledge-first, virtue-epistemological research program. First, I extend an argument of Ernest Sosa's for the claim that evidentialism cannot adequately account for the epistemic assessability of suspension. This includes a kind of knowledge-first evidentialism of the sort advocated by Timothy Williamson. I agree with Sosa that the reasons why evidentialism fails motivate a virtue-epistemological approach, but argue that my knowledge-first account is preferable to (...) his view. According to my account, rational belief is belief that manifests proper practical respect for what it takes to know. Beliefs are the only primary bearers of epistemic evaluation since they are the only candidates for knowledge. However, suspension can manifest a derivative kind of practical respect for what it takes to know. Thus, we can explain why the same sort of assessment is applicable to both belief and suspension, and why belief has a privileged claim to these properties. Lastly, I'll look at Sosa's and Williamson's treatments of Pyrrhonian skepticism, which treats a certain kind of suspension as the epistemically superior practice, and argue that my account provides a better anti-skeptical response than either of their approaches. (shrink)

Experiences of emotion are content-rich events that emerge at the level of psychological description, but must be causally constituted by neurobiological processes. This chapter outlines an emerging scientific agenda for understanding what these experiences feel like and how they arise. We review the available answers to what is felt (i.e., the content that makes up an experience of emotion) and how neurobiological processes instantiate these properties of experience. These answers are then integrated into a broad framework that describes, in psychological (...) terms, how the experience of emotion emerges from more basic processes. We then discuss the role of such experiences in the economy of the mind and behavior. (shrink)