A growing body of literature critical of ethics review boards has drawn attention to the processes used to determine the ethical merit of research. Citing criticism on the bureaucratic nature of ethics review processes, this literature provides a useful provocation for (re)considering how the ethics review might be enacted. Much of this criticism focuses on how ethics review boards _deliberate,_ with particular attention given to the lack of transparency and opportunities for researcher recourse that characterise ethics review processes. Centered specifically (...) on the conduct of ethics review boards convened within university settings, this paper draws on these inherent criticisms to consider the ways that ethics review boards might enact more communicative and deliberative practices. Outlining a set of principles against which ethics review boards might establish strategies for engaging with researchers and research communities, this paper draws attention to how _Deliberative communication_, _Engagement with researchers_ and the _Distribution of responsibility_ for the ethics review might be enacted in the day-to-day practice of the university human ethics review board. This paper develops these themes via a conceptual lens derived from Habermas’ (The theory of communicative action. Volume 1: Reason and the rationalization of society, 1984 ) articulation of ‘communicative action’ and Fraser’s (Social Text, 25(26), 56–80, 1990 ) consideration of ‘strong publics’ to cast consideration of the role that human ethics review boards might play in supporting university research cultures. _Deliberative communication_, _Engagement with researchers_ and the _Distribution of responsibility_ provide useful conceptual prompts for considering how ethics review boards might undertake their work. (shrink)

Why did Bernhard Riemann, arguably the most original mathematician of his generation, spend the last year of life investigating the mechanism of hearing? Fighting tuberculosis and the hostility of eminent scientists such as Hermann Helmholtz, he appeared to forsake mathematics to prosecute a case close to his heart. Only sketchy pages from his last paper remain, but here we assemble some significant clues and triangulate from them to build a broad picture of what he might have been driving at. Our (...) interpretation is that Riemann was a committed idealist and from this philosophical standpoint saw that the scientific enterprise was lame without the “poetry of hypothesis”. He believed that human thought was fundamentally the dynamics of “mind-masses” and that the human mind interpenetrated, and became part of, the microscopic physical domain of the cochlea. Therefore, a full description of hearing must necessarily include the perceptual dimensions of what he saw as a single manifold. The manifold contains all the psychophysical aspects of hearing, including the logarithmic transformations that arise from Fechner’s law, faithfully preserving all the subtle perceptual qualities of sound. For Riemann, hearing was a unitary physical and mental event, and parallels with modern ideas about consciousness and quantum biology are made. A unifying quantum mechanical model for an atom of consciousness—drawing on Riemann’s mind-masses and the similar “psychons” proposed by Eccles—is put forward. (shrink)

Patient consent has been formulated in terms of radical individualism rather than shared benefits. Medical education relies on the provision of patient consent to provide medical students with the training and experience to become competent doctors. Pelvic examination represents an extreme case in which patients may legitimately seek to avoid contact with inexperienced medical students particularly where these are male. However, using this extreme case, this paper will examine practices of framing and obtaining consent as perceived by medical students. This (...) paper reports findings of an exploratory qualitative study of medical students and junior doctors. Participants described a number of barriers to obtaining informed consent. These related to misunderstandings concerning student roles and experiences and insufficient information on the nature of the examination. Participants reported perceptions of the negative framing of decisions on consent by nursing staff where the student was male. Potentially coercive practices of framing of the decision by senior doctors were also reported. Participants outlined strategies they adopted to circumvent patients’ reasons for refusal. Practices of framing the information used by students, nurses and senior doctors to enable patients to decide about consent are discussed in the context of good ethical practice. In the absence of a clear ethical model, coercion appears likely. We argue for an expanded model of autonomy in which the potential tension between respecting patients’ autonomy and ensuring the societal benefit of well-trained doctors is recognised. Practical recommendations are made concerning information provision and clear delineations of student and patient roles and expectations. (shrink)

Excerpt from The Harmonial Philosophy: A Compendium and Digest of the Works of Andrew Jackson Davis, the Seer of Poughkeepsie His Natural and Divine Revelations, Great Harmonia, Spiritual Inter course, Answers to ever-recurring Questions, Inner Life, Summer. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format (...) whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

In England, higher education institutions, together with the schools whose staff they train, are being required to incorporate synthetic phonics as one of the key approaches to the teaching of reading. Yet even if synthetic phonics can be identified as one of the component ‘skills’ of reading, an assumption vigorously contested in this paper, it does not follow that it can or should be taught explicitly and independently of reading for meaning. Imposing such a ‘method’ is, at a deep level, (...) incompatible with teachers acting as teachers and potentially constitutes a kind of abuse of early readers. Moreover, because of the conceptual difficulties confronting any attempt to specify synthetic phonics as an approach, there cannot exist, in principle, empirical research that actually supports its value. Current policy in England since the Rose Report, at least, assumes the opposite. All this cannot be dismissed as a little local difficulty for England concerning the teaching of reading English with all its spelling irregularities: there are broader implications for the relationship between research and teaching, together with continuing tendencies to impose ‘teacher proof’ approaches on schools and their staff in many countries. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Respect and Valuing Persons Lookism Discrimination and Stereotyping The Self, Stereotyping and Lookism Lookism, Common Schools and Educating for Respect Conclusion References.

This book examines the process philosophies of Whitehead and others against current discussions of astrobiology, extraterrestrial life, and their engagement by theological and religious systems.

Andrew Davis; 7. Matching, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 107–121, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.00080.

Employee buy-in is a key factor in ensuring small- and medium-size enterprise (SME) engagement with corporate social responsibility (CSR). In this exploratory study, we use participant observation and semi-structured interviews to investigate the way in which three fair trade SMEs utilise human resource management (and selection and socialisation in particular) to create employee engagement in a strong triple bottomline philosophy, while simultaneously coping with resource and size constraints. The conclusions suggest that there is a strong desire for, but tradeoff within (...) these companies between selection of individuals who already identify with the triple bottomline philosophy and individuals with experience and capability to deal with mainstream brand management – two critical employee attributes that appear to be rarely found together. The more important the business experience to the organisation, the more effort the organisation must expend in formalising their socialisation programmes to ensure employee engagement. A key method in doing this is increasing employee knowledge of, and affection for, the target beneficiaries of the CSR programme (increased moral intensity). (shrink)

Conflicts of interest pose special problems for the professions. Even the appearance of a conflict of interest can undermine essential trust between professional and public. This volume is a comprehensive and accessible guide to the ramifications and problems associated with important issue. It contains fifteen new essays by noted scholars and covers topics in law, medicine, journalism, engineering, financial services, and others.

This paper reports on a study of ethical decision-making in a fair trade company. This can be seen to be a crucial arena for investigation since fair trade firms not only have a specific ethical mission in terms of helping growers out of poverty, but they tend to be perceived as (and are often marketed on the basis of) having an "ethical" image. Eschewing a straightforward test of extant ethical decision models, we adopt Thompson''s proposal for a more contextualist understanding (...) rooted in ethnographic data. Our findings suggest that the fair trade mission of the firm is experienced as an over-riding ethical claim, which is often invoked to justify potentially ethically questionable decisions. Moreover, decision precedents emerge which can mean that the decision process is bypassed or hurried through. Finally we provide evidence that the significance of these precedents, and indeed, even moral intensity itself, could be actively shaped and constructed by organization members to support different, even shifting, conceptions of what is a morally acceptable decision for a fair trade company to make. (shrink)

Employee buy‐in is a key factor in ensuring small‐ and medium‐size enterprise (SME) engagement with corporate social responsibility (CSR). In this exploratory study, we use participant observation and semi‐structured interviews to investigate the way in which three fair trade SMEs utilise human resource management (and selection and socialisation in particular) to create employee engagement in a strong triple bottomline philosophy, while simultaneously coping with resource and size constraints. The conclusions suggest that there is a strong desire for, but tradeoff within (...) these companies between selection of individuals who already identify with the triple bottomline philosophy and individuals with experience and capability to deal with mainstream brand management – two critical employee attributes that appear to be rarely found together. The more important the business experience to the organisation, the more effort the organisation must expend in formalising their socialisation programmes to ensure employee engagement. A key method in doing this is increasing employee knowledge of, and affection for, the target beneficiaries of the CSR programme (increased moral intensity). (shrink)

This paper discusses the current fashion for brain-based learning, in which value-laden claims about learning are grounded in neurophysiology. It argues that brain science cannot have the ‘authority’ about learning that some seek to give it. It goes on to discuss whether the claim that brain science is relevant to learning involves a category mistake. The heart of the paper tries to show how the contribution of brain science to our grasp of the nature of learning is limited in principle. (...) Finally the paper explores the potential of brain science to illuminate specific learning disabilities. (shrink)

David Carr, Andrew Davis; Can there be a Moral Psychology of Democratic and Civic Education & Understanding Mathematics, Journal of Philosophy of Education.

David Carr, Andrew Davis; Can there be a Moral Psychology of Democratic and Civic Education & Understanding Mathematics, Journal of Philosophy of Education.

In England, current government policy on children's reading is strongly prescriptive, insisting on the delivery of a pure and exclusive form of synthetic phonics, where letter sounds are learned and blended in order to ‘read’ text. A universally imposed phonics ‘check’ is taken by all five year olds and the results are widely reported. These policies are underpinned by the claim that research has shown systematic synthetic phonics to be the most effective way of teaching children to read. Andrew (...) Davis argues that there is a basic problem with this claim. Whatever it is that empirical researchers take themselves to be doing when they investigate synthetic phonics, they are not investigating a specifiable method of teaching reading. This is for two reasons. First, there are no such things as specifiable methods of teaching. Teaching is a vastly complex human activity involving contextual and reactive practical judgments that are responsive to the myriad contingencies of classroom life. The idea that teachers might proceed by way of prescribed methods rather than practical judgments is simply a fantasy. Second, teaching children to correlate letter combinations with sounds, and to blend sounds into sequences, is not teaching them to read. Reading is a matter of grasping meaning conveyed by text. While sustained attention to letter-sound correspondences can be helpful to some novice readers, we should neither assume that it is helpful to all nor confuse mastery of such correspondences with the ability to read. Davis's challenge to government policy on the teaching of reading, and to the empirical research that supposedly underpins it, is timely, radical and compelling. The zeal with which synthetic phonics is championed by its advocates has been remarkably effective in pushing it to the top of the educational agenda; but we should not mistake zeal for warrant. (shrink)

Through a collection of contributions from an international team of empirical researchers and philosophers, _New Philosophies of Learning_ signals the need for a sharper critical awareness of the possibilities and problems that the recent spate of innovative learning techniques presents. Explores some of the many contemporary innovations in approaches to learning, including neuroscience and the focus on learners’ well-being and happiness Debates the controversial approaches to categorising learners such as dyslexia Raises doubts about the preoccupation with quasi-mathematical scrutiny and the (...) neglect of ethical reflection about education Discusses the possible grounds for concern, without exaggerating their similarities or offering sweeping judgements Includes contributions from empirical researchers and philosophers, including Usha Goswami, Howard Gardner, Julian Elliott, David Bakhurst, John White and Christopher Winch. (shrink)

Andrew Davis; Ability and Learning, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 22, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 45–55, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9752.1988.t.

The paper argues that no criterion-referenced assessment system can achieve both reliability and validity at one and the same time. It shows that the reasons for this are conceptual, and hence that empirical research into the‘problem’ is a waste of money and effort. Considerable discussion is devoted to ideas of knowledge and understanding, and to proper educational objectives pertaining to these. Much reference is made to the current National Curriculum context in the United Kingdom, and conclusions are drawn for appropriate (...) educational policy in this area. (shrink)

Teachers are no longer simply being told what to teach, but also how to teach it. It is important therefore to examine whether some prescriptions of teaching methods are acceptable while others are not, and to justify opposition to certain forms of prescription. I show that some attempts to prescribe teaching methods are either empty, or incompatible with holding teachers to account for the pupil learning which is supposed to result. My argument does not depend on making any value assumptions (...) about ultimate educational aims. Examples from the National Literacy and Numeracy Strategies are discussed. (shrink)

Over the last two decades the traditional conception of intelligence and other mental powers as stable individual assets has been challenged by approaches in psychology emphasising context and ‘situated cognition’. This paper argues that the debate should not be seen as an empirical dispute, and relates it to discussions in philosophy of mind between methodological solipsists and varieties of externalists. In the light of this I argue that attempts to conceptualise the identity over time of mental powers qua individual assets (...) run into intractable difficulties. Hence ‘individual asset’ views of many abilities should be abandoned. Implications for education policy particularly in regard to assessment are explored. (shrink)

The transplant community has faced unprecedented challenges balancing risks of performing living donor transplants during the COVID-19 pandemic with harms of temporarily suspending these procedures. Decisions regarding postponement of living donation stem from its designation as an elective procedure, this despite that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services categorise transplant procedures as tier 3b (high medical urgency—do not postpone). In times of severe resource constraints, health systems may be operating under crisis or contingency standards of care. In this manuscript, (...) the United Network for Organ Sharing Ethics Workgroup explores prioritisation of living donation where health systems operate under contingency standards of care and provide a framework with recommendations to the transplant community on how to approach living donation in these circumstances.To guide the transplant community in future decisions, this analysis suggests that: (1) living donor transplants represent an important option for individuals with end-stage liver and kidney disease and should not be suspended uniformly under contingency standards, (2) exposure risk to SARS-CoV-2 should be balanced with other risks, such as exposure risks at dialysis centres. Because many of these risks are not quantifiable, donors and recipients should be included in discussions on what constitutes acceptable risk, (3) transplant hospitals should strive to maintain a critical transplant workforce and avoid diverting expertise, which could negatively impact patient preparedness for transplant, (4) transplant hospitals should consider implementing protocols to ensure early detection of SARS-CoV-2 infections and discuss these measures with donors and recipients in a process of shared decision-making. (shrink)

I use Ian Hacking 's views to explore ways of classifying people, exploiting his distinction between indifferent kinds and interactive kinds, and his accounts of how we 'make up' people. The natural kind/essentialist approach to indifferent kinds is explored in some depth. I relate this to debates in psychiatry about the existence of mental illness, and to educational controversies about the credentials of learner classifications such as 'dyslexic'. Claims about the 'existence' of learning disabilities cannot be given a clear, simple (...) and unambiguous interpretation. In particular I show that science cannot deliver a definitive taxonomy of learner categories, and that this has important implications for teachers and policy makers. (shrink)

Teachers are no longer simply being told what to teach, but also how to teach it. It is important therefore to examine whether some prescriptions of teaching methods are acceptable while others are not, and to justify opposition to certain forms of prescription. I show that some attempts to prescribe teaching methods are either empty, or incompatible with holding teachers to account for the pupil learning which is supposed to result. My argument does not depend on making any value assumptions (...) about ultimate educational aims. Examples from the National Literacy and Numeracy Strategies are discussed. (shrink)

In this essay we present three biases that make it difficult to represent farmer voices in a meaningful way. These biases are information bias, individual bias, and short-term bias. We illustrate these biases through two case studies. One is the case of Golden Rice in the Philippines and the other is the case of Bt cotton in India.

How far can consistent assessment capture all the worthwhile features of educational achievement? Are some important components of learning necessarily open to a range of potentially inconsistent judgments by different assessors? I argue for a cautiously affirmative answer to this question, drawing on analogies with aesthetic judgments and a rehearsal of the holistic characteristics of some assessment criteria. I also employ recent treatments of moral particularism and of concepts of incommensurability to oppose the drive for consistency in assessment required by (...) a high stakes accountability regime. (shrink)

PISA claims that it can extend its reach from its current core subjects of Reading, Science, Maths and problem-solving. Yet given the requirement for high levels of reliability for PISA, especially in the light of its current high stakes character, proposed widening of its subject coverage cannot embrace some important aspects of the social and aesthetic world. Verdicts on the latter often have holistic features, and there are dangers that such verdicts involve attempts to compare what cannot be compared. Judgments (...) about the normative and the social often feature a legitimate lack of consistency. (shrink)

Social externalism implies that many competences are not personal assets separable from social and cultural environments but complex states of affairs involving individuals and persisting features of social reality. The paper explores the consequences for competence identity over time and across contexts, and hence for the predictive role usually accorded to competences.

Rather than a “logical assertion,” Whitehead described a proposition as a “lure for feeling” for a collectivity to come. The unique contributions in Propositions in the Making articulate the newest reaches of Whiteheadian propositions for a postmodern world.

In this response, I agree with much of what Schrag says about the principled limits of neuroscience to inform educators' decisions about approaches to learning. However, I also raise questions about the extent to which discoveries about ‘deficits’ in brain function could possibly help teachers. I dispute Schrag's view that externalism/internalism debates in the philosophy of mind are relatively arcane and lack implications for the importance or otherwise for education of discoveries about the brain.

Andrew Davis; Learning and Belief, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 20, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 7–20, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9752.1986.tb0.

Andrew Davis; 3. Understanding and Holism, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 41–55, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.

Over the last two decades the traditional conception of intelligence and other mental powers as stable individual assets has been challenged by approaches in psychology emphasising context and ‘situated cognition’. This paper argues that the debate should not be seen as an empirical dispute, and relates it to discussions in philosophy of mind between methodological solipsists and varieties of externalists. In the light of this I argue that attempts to conceptualise the identity over time of mental powers qua individual assets (...) run into intractable difficulties. Hence ‘individual asset’ views of many abilities should be abandoned. Implications for education policy particularly in regard to assessment are explored. (shrink)

Arguing that everyone has a right to privacy as control overaccess to `intimate' aspects of one's life, this author draws on thework of Julie Inness to discuss children's rights to privacy inclassrooms. Even if it is agreed that pupils should exercise this right,a central point is that there may be moral or other value considerationsthat justify setting the right aside. Among selected complexities, animportant extension is the right to psychological processes throughwhich learners acquire new knowledge.

This chapter contains sections titled: I II.

What is 'fairness' in the context of educational assessment? I apply this question to a number of contemporary educational assessment practices and policies. My approach to philosophy of education owes much to Wittgenstein. A commentary set apart from the main body of the paper focuses on my style of philosophising. Wittgenstein teaches us to examine in depth the fine-grained complexities of social phenomena and to refrain from imposing abstract theory on a recalcitrant reality. I write philosophy of education for policy (...) makers and teachers. Scrutiny of examples plays a vital role in communicating with such an audience. Starting points include 'accommodations' for disabled students, allegedly gender-biased tests, and the recruitment procedures of 'elitist' music conservatoires. A key intuition that fairness is associated with test validity turns out to be seriously flawed. Problems centre on the idea of a 'construct', and the supposed divide between an underlying construct and its behavioural manifestations. Equality of opportunity notions underlie some accusations of unfairness but there are alternative approaches to a just society. Both the judgments about fairness, and the proposed remedies are open to serious philosophical criticisms. There are widespread conceptual difficulties, together with inconsistent and contestable value judgments. (shrink)

Andrew Davis; 2. Accountability and the Economy, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 19–39, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467.

Andrew Davis; 2. Accountability and the Economy, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 19–39, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467.

Andrew Davis; Bibliography, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 153–155, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.00083.

Andrew Davis; Bibliography, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 153–155, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.00083.

Andrew Davis; 4. Belief and Language-based Assessment, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 57–65, https://doi.org/10.111.

Andrew Davis; 4. Belief and Language-based Assessment, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 57–65, https://doi.org/10.111.

Andrew Davis; 4. Belief and Language-based Assessment, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 57–65, https://doi.org/10.111.

Andrew Davis; 5. Implications for Assessment, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 67–74, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-97.

Andrew Davis; 2. Accountability and the Economy, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 19–39, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467.

Andrew Davis; 9. Is there a Future for Assessment and Accountability?, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 32, Issue 1, 7 March 2003, Pages 145–152, http.