Ethics Embodied: Rethinking Selfhood through Continental, Japanese and Feminist Philosophies explores the importance of the body to ethical selfhood. Through her comparative feminist approach to ethics, the critical comparison McCarthy offers in Ethics Embodied not only illuminates complexities in Continental, Japanese and Feminist philosophies, it provides clues about how to live the model of selfhood, ethics, and the body that emerges through the encounter.

Ethics Embodied: Rethinking Selfhood through Continental, Japanese and Feminist Philosophies explores the importance of the body to ethical selfhood. Through her comparative feminist approach to ethics, the critical comparison McCarthy offers in Ethics Embodied not only illuminates complexities in Continental, Japanese and Feminist philosophies, it provides clues about how to live the model of selfhood, ethics, and the body that emerges through the encounter.

These essays engage Jin Y. Park’s recent translation of the work of Kim Iryŏp, a Buddhist nun and public intellectual in early twentieth-century Korea. Park’s translation of Iryŏp’s Reflections of a Zen Buddhist Nun was the subject of two book panels at recent conferences: the first a plenary session at the annual meeting of the Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy and the second at the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association on a group program session sponsored by the (...) International Society for Buddhist Philosophy. This exchange also includes a response from Park. (shrink)

Preparing the Next Generation of Oral Historians is an invaluable resource to educators seeking to bring history alive for students at all levels. Filled with insightful reflections on teaching oral history, it offers practical suggestions for educators seeking to create curricula, engage students, gather community support, and meet educational standards. By the close of the book, readers will be able to successfully incorporate oral history projects in their own classrooms.

This interdisciplinary collection of essays highlights the relevance of Buddhist doctrine and practice to issues of globalization. From philosophical, religious, historical, and political perspectives, the authors show that Buddhism—arguably the world’s first transnational religion—is a rich resource for navigating todays interconnected world.

Written by a diverse range of scholars, this accessible introductory volume asks: What is implicit bias? How does implicit bias compromise our knowledge of others and social reality? How does implicit bias affect us, as individuals and participants in larger social and political institutions, and what can we do to combat biases? An interdisciplinary enterprise, the volume brings together the philosophical perspective of the humanities with the perspective of the social sciences to develop rich lines of inquiry. Its 12 chapters (...) are written in a non-technical style, using relatable examples that help readers understand what implicit bias is, its significance, and the controversies surrounding it. Each chapter includes discussion questions and additional annotated reading suggestions. And a companion webpage contains teaching resources. The volume is invaluable resource for students―and researchers―seeking to understand criticisms surrounding implicit bias, as well as how one might answer them by adopting a more nuanced understanding of bias and its role in maintaining social injustice. (shrink)

Written by a diverse range of scholars, this accessible introductory volume asks: What is implicit bias? How does implicit bias compromise our knowledge of others and social reality? How does implicit bias affect us, as individuals and participants in larger social and political institutions, and what can we do to combat biases? An interdisciplinary enterprise, the volume brings together the philosophical perspective of the humanities with the perspective of the social sciences to develop rich lines of inquiry. It is written (...) in a non-technical style, using relatable examples that help readers understand what implicit bias is, its significance, and the controversies surrounding it. Each chapter includes discussion questions and additional reading suggestions. A companion webpage contains teaching resources. The volume will be an invaluable resource for students—and researchers—seeking to understand criticisms surrounding implicit bias, as well as how one might answer them by adopting a more nuanced understanding of bias and its role in maintaining social injustice. (shrink)

If you care about securing knowledge, what is wrong with being biased? Often it is said that we are less accurate and reliable knowers due to implicit biases. Likewise, many people think that biases reflect inaccurate claims about groups, are based on limited experience, and are insensitive to evidence. Chapter 3 investigates objections such as these with the help of two popular metaphors: bias as fog and bias as shortcut. Guiding readers through these metaphors, I argue that they clarify the (...) range of knowledge-related objections to implicit bias. They also suggest that there will be no unifying problem with bias from the perspective of knowledge. That is, they tell us that implicit biases can be wrong in different ways for different reasons. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the metaphors reveal a deep—though perhaps not intractable—disagreement among theorists about whether implicit biases can be good in some cases when it comes to knowledge. (shrink)

Methods in comparative work -- The sense of justice in Rawls -- The sense of justice in the analects -- Two senses of justice -- The contemporary relevance of a sense of justice.

Encourages Christian teenage girls to explore and discover Truth.

This collection brings together a diverse range of interpretivist perspectives to find fresh takes on the meanings of religion. Cutting across paradigms and traditions, experts from the UK, US, and India apply different approaches to engagement with beliefs and themes, including identity, ritual, and emotion.

Recently, bioethicists and the UNCRPD have advocated for supported medical decision-making on behalf of patients with intellectual disabilities. But what does supported decision-making really entail? One compelling framework is Anita Silvers and Leslie Francis’ mental prosthesis account, which envisions supported decision-making as a process in which trustees act as mere appendages for the patient’s will; the trustee provides the cognitive tools the patient requires to realize her conception of her own good. We argue that supported decision-making would be better understood (...) as a collaborative process, giving patients with intellectual disabilities the opportunity to make decisions in a respectful relationship with trusted others. We offer an alternative account of supported decision-making where the primary constraint is to protect the patient from domination by the trustee. This is advantageous in its preservation of the prospects for genuine collaboration, for the mental prosthesis approach ultimately reinforces a problematic ideal of isolated patient self-determination. (shrink)

In this new textbook two Catholic ethicists with extensive teaching experience present a moral theology based on vision. David Matzko McCarthy and James M. Donohue draw widely from the Western philosophical tradition while integrating biblical and theological themes in order to explore such fundamental questions as What is good? The fourteen chapters in Moral Vision are short and thematic. Substantive study questions engage with primary texts and encourage students to apply theory to everyday life and common human experiences. The (...) book is accessibly written and flexible enough to fit into any undergraduate or seminary course on ethics. (shrink)

A collection of essays examining the writings of William James. Provides a reinterpretation of pragmatism to devise philosophical resources for pragmatist feminism that challenge sexism and male privilege"--Provided by publisher.

Erin Plunkett draws from both analytic and continental sources to argue for the philosophical relevance of style, making the case that the essay form is uniquely suited to address the sceptical problem. The authors examined here-Montaigne, Hume, the early German Romantics, Kierkegaard and Stanley Cavell-bring into relief the relationship between scepticism and ordinary life and situate the will to know within a broader frame of meaningful human activity. The formal features of the essay call attention to time, subjectivity, and (...) language as the existential conditions of knowledge. -/- In contrast to foundationalist approaches, which expect philosophy to reach empirical or rational certainty, Plunkett demonstrates through these writings the philosophical advantages of a fragmentary, non-dogmatic style of writing. A Philosophy of the Essay shows how this medium can help us come to terms with the contingency and uncertainty of life. (shrink)

Michael H. McCarthy has carefully studied the writings of Bernard Lonergan (Canadian philosopher-theologian, 1904-1984) for over fifty years. In his 1989 book, The Crisis of Philosophy, McCarthy argued for the superiority of Lonergan's distinctive philosophical project to those of his analytic and phenomenological rivals. Now in Authenticity as Self-Transcendence: The Enduring Insights of Bernard Lonergan, he develops and expands his earlier argument with four new essays, designed to show Lonergan's exceptional relevance to the cultural situation of late modernity. (...) The essays explore and appraise Lonergan's cultural mission: to raise Catholic philosophy and theology to meet the intellectual challenges and standards of his time. (shrink)

A philosopher and mother mines classic Daoist texts of Chinese philosophy for wisdom relevant to today's parents. The ancient Chinese philosopher Mencius compared children to tender sprouts, shaped by soil, sunlight, water, and, importantly, the efforts of patient farmers and gardeners. At times children require our protection, other times we need to take a step back and allow them to grow. Like sprouts, a child's character, tendencies, virtues, and vices are at once observable and ever-changing. A practical parenting manual, philosophical (...) reflection on the relationship between parent and child, and necessary response to modern stereotypes of Chinese parenting, Little Sprouts reconsiders cultural definitions of success and explores how we might support and nourish young people. Engaging deeply with foundational Daoist and Confucian thinkers, Georgetown philosopher Erin Cline offers accessible, provocative musings on key parenting issues-from family rituals to learning and vocation to challenges and disabilities-and helps us grow into better parents of joyful, fulfilled children. (shrink)

Kierkegaard’s psychological thought has always been acknowledged as very rich—Reinhold Niebuhr hailed him as the greatest psychologist of the soul since Augustine—and has had a major influence on Heidegger, Sartre, and existential psychoanalysis. Nevertheless, his accomplishment has not always been fully appreciated, in part because it is so scattered across his works. As Vincent McCarthy demonstrates in Kierkegaard as Psychologist, Kierkegaard was pursuing “psychology” before there was a formally recognized academic field bearing that name, and a coherent thread runs (...) through the so-called pseudonymous works. McCarthy elucidates often-difficult texts, highlights the rich psychological dimension of Kierkegaard’s thought, and provides an introduction for the nonspecialist and a commentary on Kierkegaard’s psychology that will interest both specialists and nonspecialists, while engaging in rich comparisons with such figures as Freud and Heidegger. (shrink)

This chapter examines the views of seventeenth-century British philosophers on the relation between virtue and hedonism, explaining that many philosophers believed that a defense of virtue required rejection of hedonism. It discusses the reformulation of moral philosophy proposed by Thomas Hobbes, and analyzes the reactions of Richard Cumberland and Cambridge Platonists Ralph Cudworth and Henry More. The chapter also considers the revival of Epicureanism and early modern natural law theory.

Este ensayo busca trazar una genealogía defectuosa de varias escenas de lectura en la obra de Jacques Lezra. Se enfoca en la lectura como práctica metodológica salvaje que conjuga —de manera inesperada, contraintuitiva, e indisciplinada— objetos, discursos, y modalidades conceptuales. Se analiza una selección de escenas de lectura de Materialismo salvaje y República salvaje para identificar en ellas un pensamiento estético-político que imagina corrientes subterráneas y deconstruye conceptos como soberanía, institución, y normatividad, enfatizando su carácter defectuoso.

Saving the World and Healing the Soul treats the heroic and redemptive trials of Jason Bourne, Bruce Wayne, Bella Swan, and Katniss Everdeen. The Bourne films, Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy, the Twilight saga, and the Hunger Games series offer us stories to live into, to make connection between our personal loves and trials and a good order of the world.

The article is a plea for ethicists to regard probability as one of their most important concerns. It outlines a series of topics of central importance in ethical theory in which probability is implicated, often in a surprisingly deep way, and lists a number of open problems. Topics covered include: interpretations of probability in ethical contexts; the evaluative and normative significance of risk or uncertainty; uses and abuses of expected utility theory; veils of ignorance; Harsanyi’s aggregation theorem; population size problems; (...) equality; fairness; giving priority to the worse off; continuity; incommensurability; nonexpected utility theory; evaluative measurement; aggregation; causal and evidential decision theory; act consequentialism; rule consequentialism; and deontology. (shrink)

Much has been made of the importance of training ethical, socially conscious engineers, but does US engineering education actually encourage neophytes to take seriously their professional responsibility to public welfare? Counter to such ideals of engagement, I argue that students’ interest in public welfare concerns may actually decline over the course of their engineering education. Using unique longitudinal survey data of students at four colleges, this article examines (a) how students’ public welfare beliefs change during their engineering education, (b) whether (...) engineering programs emphasize engagement, and (c) whether these program emphases are related to students’ public welfare beliefs. I track four specific public welfare considerations: the importance to students of professional/ethical responsibilities, understanding the consequences of technology, understanding how people use machines, and social consciousness. Suggesting a culture of disengagement, I find that the cultural emphases of students’ engineering programs are directly related to their public welfare commitments and students’ public welfare concerns decline significantly over the course of their engineering education. However, these findings also suggest that if engineering programs can dismantle the ideological pillars of disengagement in their local climates, they may foster more engaged engineers. (shrink)

The computations involved in statistical learning have long been debated. Here, we build on work suggesting that a basic memory process, chunking, may account for the processing of statistical regularities into larger units. Drawing on methods from the memory literature, we developed a novel paradigm to test statistical learning by leveraging a robust phenomenon observed in serial recall tasks: that short‐term memory is fundamentally shaped by long‐term distributional learning. In the statistically induced chunking recall (SICR) task, participants are exposed to (...) an artificial language, using a standard statistical learning exposure phase. Afterward, they recall strings of syllables that either follow the statistics of the artificial language or comprise the same syllables presented in a random order. We hypothesized that if individuals had chunked the artificial language into word‐like units, then the statistically structured items would be more accurately recalled relative to the random controls. Our results demonstrate that SICR effectively captures learning in both the auditory and visual modalities, with participants displaying significantly improved recall of the statistically structured items, and even recall specific trigram chunks from the input. SICR also exhibits greater test–retest reliability in the auditory modality and sensitivity to individual differences in both modalities than the standard two‐alternative forced‐choice task. These results thereby provide key empirical support to the chunking account of statistical learning and contribute a valuable new tool to the literature. (shrink)

Is it possible to donate unpaired vital organs, foreseeing but not intending one's own death? We argue that this is indeed psychologically possible, and thus far agree with Charles Camosy and Joseph Vukov in their recent paper on 'double effect donation.' Where we disagree with these authors is that we see double effect donation not as a morally praiseworthy act akin to martyrdom but as a morally impermissible act that necessarily disrespects human bodily integrity. Respect for bodily integrity goes beyond (...) avoiding the aim to kill: not all side effects of deliberate bodily interventions can be outweighed by intended benefits for another even if the subject fully consents. It is not any necessary intention to kill or harm another or oneself that makes lethal donation/harvesting illicit but the more immediate intention to accept or perform surgery on an (innocent) person combined with the foresight of lethal harm and no health-related good for him or her. Double effect donation falls foul of the first condition of double effect reasoning in that the immediate act is wrong in itself. We argue further that the wider effects of such donation would be socially disastrous and corrupting of the medical profession: doctors should retain a sense of nonnegotiable respect for bodily integrity even when they intervene on willing subjects for the benefit of others. (shrink)

If someone says, “Asians are good at math” or “women are empathetic,” I might interject, “you're stereotyping” in order to convey my disapproval of their utterance. But why is stereotyping wrong? Before we can answer this question, we must better understand what stereotypes are and what stereotyping is. In this essay, I develop what I call the descriptive view of stereotypes and stereotyping. This view is assumed in much of the psychological and philosophical literature on implicit bias and stereotyping, yet (...) it has not been sufficiently defended. The main objection to the descriptive view is that it fails to include the common-sense idea that stereotyping is always objectionable. I argue that this is actually a benefit of the view. In the essay's final part, I put forward two hypotheses that would validate the claim that stereotyping is always morally or epistemically wrong. If these hypotheses are false—which is very likely—we have little reason to build moral or epistemic defect into the very idea of a stereotype. Moreover, we must abandon the seemingly attractive claim that judging individuals based on group membership is intrinsically wrong. (shrink)

In visually cataloging the endearing and enigmatic ways in which the built environment takes shape, 'Best Practices' proposes a new way of thinking about neighbourhoods, housing developments, streetscapes, and storefronts, not so much as places defined by building codes, dimensions, or geographic features, but as assemblages of ad hoc interventions and incidental ephemera. Drawing on the history of architecture, media theory, cultural anthropology, and urban studies, 'Best Practices' pairs photographic documentation with extensive captions and citations to define a territory within (...) the margins between the sanctioned and unsanctioned, the regulated and unregulated, the tasteful and tacky, the novel and the nonsense. While not necessarily in opposition of those mechanisms, Best Practices asserts that interest, knowledge, and meaning are more often generated on the lines that divide such categories. This book advocates for a more thorough consideration of the unauthorised remodels, slap-dash handiwork, haphazard paint jobs, half-hearted do-it-yourself projects, cracked facades, contradictions, compromises, and coincidences. (shrink)

How does our conception of possibility contribute to our understanding of self and world? In what sense does the possible differ from the merely probable, and what would it mean to treat possibility as part of the real? This book is an opportunity to see Kierkegaard as contributing to a distinctive phenomenology, ontology, and psychology of possibility that addresses the question of our existential relationship to the possible. The term 'possibility' (Mulighed) and its variants occur with curious frequency across Kierkegaard's (...) writings. Key to Kierkegaard's understanding of the self, possibility is linked to a number of core concepts in his works: from imagination, anxiety, despair, and 'the moment' to the idea in The Sickness Unto Death that “God is that all things are possible”. Responding to what he sees as a Hegelian and Aristotelian misunderstanding of possibility, Kierkegaard offers a novel reading of the possible that, in turn, directly influences 20th-century philosophers such as Heidegger, Deleuze, and Derrida. Kierkegaard gives a rich account of how anxiety and despair, as lived experiences of possibility, not only show us the contingency and fragility of the systems and identities we presently inhabit but also reveal a more fundamental contingency that demands a new way of relating to the possible. For Kierkegaard, hope, faith, and love are attitudes in which meaning is forged by embracing contingency. In a time of political, social, and environmental uncertainty Kierkegaard's work on radical possibility seems more relevant than ever. (shrink)

If someone says, “You’ve stereotyped me,” we hear the statement as an accusation. One way to interpret the accusation is as follows: you haven’t seen or treated me as an individual. In this essay, I interpret and evaluate a theory of wrongful stereotyping inspired by this thought, which I call the failure-to-individualize theory of wrongful stereotyping. According to this theory, stereotyping is wrong if and only if it involves failing to treat persons as individuals. I argue that the theory—however one (...) interprets it—is inadequate. Either the theory will not reliably identify all cases of wrongful stereotyping or it will fail to adequately explain why they are wrong. I conclude that it does not follow that we must entirely jettison the objection that stereotyping fails to treat persons as individuals. What follows is only that the objection must play a more circumscribed role in a theory of when and why stereotyping is wrong. (shrink)

Cognitive Science, Volume 46, Issue 9, September 2022.

Empirical science, such as psychology and neuroscience, employ diverse methods to develop data driven models and explanations for complex phenomena. In research on the self, differences in these methods produce different depictions of persons. Research in developmental psychology highlights the role of intuitive beliefs, such as psychological essentialism and intuitive dualism, in individuals’ singular, cohesive, and stable sense of self. On the other hand, research in neuroscience highlights the de-centralized, distributed, multitudes of neural networks in competition making selves, with arguments (...) around whether the interpretation of these data imply that the self is somehow fundamental and special to human functioning. In this paper, I explore these discrepant pictures of the self to advance understanding about personhood. Specifically, I suggest that these divergent pictures of self from psychology and neuroscience have the potential to inform philosophical and theological discussions around personhood by anchoring models of persons in empirical views of persons. Likewise, I explore the opportunity for philosophy and theology to inform and enhance scientific research on the self by critiquing scientific bias and construct development as well as highlighting potential limits in understanding selves with empirical models. (shrink)

Local food systems can have economic and social benefits by providing income for producers and improving community connections. Ongoing global climate change and the acute COVID-19 pandemic crisis have shown the importance of building equity and resilience in local food systems. We interviewed ten stakeholders from organizations and institutions in a U.S. midwestern city exploring views on past, current, and future conditions to address the following two objectives: 1) Assess how local food system equity and resilience were impacted by the (...) COVID-19 pandemic, and 2) Examine how policy and behavior changes could support greater equity and resilience within urban local food systems. We used the Community Capitals Framework to organize interviewees’ responses for qualitative analyses of equity and resilience. Four types of community capital were emphasized by stakeholders: cultural and social, natural, and political capital. Participants stated that the local food system in this city is small; more weaknesses in food access, land access, and governance were described than were strengths in both pre- and post-pandemic conditions. Stakeholder responses also reflected lack of equity and resilience in the local food system, which was most pronounced for cultural and social, natural and political capitals. However, local producers’ resilience during the pandemic, which we categorized as human capital, was a notable strength. An improved future food system could incorporate changes in infrastructure (e.g., food processing), markets (e.g., values-based markets) and cultural values (e.g., valuing local food through connections between local producers and consumers). These insights could inform policy and enhance community initiatives and behavior changes to build more equitable and resilient local food systems in urban areas throughout the U.S. Midwest. (shrink)

How linguistic structures evolve so as to become easier to process is addressed by Isbilen and Christiansen for the Now‐or‐Never bottleneck. The authors suggest that this fundamental challenge in language processing is coped with by rapid compression of the transient linguistic input into chunks then to be passed on. As linguistic structures that can be chunked more easily tend to stabilize and proliferate, language evolves to fit learners’ cognitive capabilities.

This article offers a straightforward reading of Hume's ‘narrow circle’ – the boundary employed to define those with whom we sympathize in assessing an agent's moral character – that follows from a more careful look at his account of virtue. Hume employs a principle that can be understood as a virtue ethical equivalent of associative obligation, which thereby delimits the boundaries of this circle. This reading avoids concerns about unjustified partiality, moral blind spots, and demandingness, and shows a clear path (...) for reaching uniform moral judgments; it also offers a new perspective on virtue of interest for contemporary virtue ethics. (shrink)