This text provides a lively introduction to the developments in philosophy of language in this century, and to the way these have impinged upon religious language. Included is the relevance of analytical philosophy of language, but the text also covers important historical debates about religious language that have had increasing impact upon biblical studies and theology.

Paul’s Ricoeur’s Lectures on Ideology and Utopia are more pertinent than ever forty years later. The chapters in this book reflect the lectures’ original intricacy as the authors not only insightfully analyze them but also creatively apply them.

This book offers a sustained engagement with the political philosophy of Paul Ricoeur and demonstrates both the significance of the political in his own thinking throughout his career, and how his understanding of the political offers something valuable to current discussions of issues in political philosophy.

This book offers a sustained engagement with the political philosophy of Paul Ricoeur and demonstrates both the significance of the political in his own thinking throughout his career, and how his understanding of the political offers something valuable to current discussions of issues in political philosophy.

Abstract:This paper examines two recent trends relative to boards of directors’ compensation, and their potential incompatibility. There has been some progress in increasing board diversity, specifically the inclusion of women and minorities on boards. The increasing trend requiring directors to hold/purchase equity as a requirement of board membership may seriously compromise further improvements in diversifying boards. Also, an increasing number of companies compensate directors partially or fully in stock grants and options. These compensation policies may be exclusionary, especially for women (...) and minorities, impacting the quality of boardroom discussions and decisions. This study systematically examines whether corporations requiring director equity are exclusionary toward women and minority directors. Contrary to being exclusionary, companies with director stock requirements and annual stock awards have greater representation by women and minorities on their board. Moreover, larger companies are both more likely to have such policies and have higher proportions of women and minorities on the board. (shrink)

Abstract:While a ubiquitous phenomenon, initial public offerings (IPOs) have received no attention in the ethics literature. We provide an overview of a series of potential conflicts of interest that pervade the IPO process. We also report the results of an empirical assessment of IPOs and those elements that may inform a substantive moral hazard faced by key players in the period prior to and just after an IPO.

Many areas of business ethics research are “sensitive.” We provide an empirical assessment of the randomized response techniquewhich provides absolute anonymity to subjects and “legal immunity” to the researcher. Beyond that, RRT techniques provide complete disclosure to subjects, unconditional privacy is maintained, and there is no deception.

Many areas of business ethics research are “sensitive.” We provide an empirical assessment of the randomized response technique which providesabsoluteanonymity to subjects and “legal immunity” to the researcher. Beyond that, RRT techniques provide complete disclosure to subjects, unconditional privacy is maintained, and there is no deception.

This research, relying on companies continuously listed on the Fortune 500 over a five-year period (n=384), provides an empirical assessment of two hypotheses. Based on 334 violations over the period the results indicate: (1) gross differences in illegal activity based on corporate size, and (2) similar differences in corporate recidivism also based on size. Discussion includes a number of size related dynamics which may account in part for such results.

Federal legislation (the Employee Polygraph Protection Act) adopted in 1988 prohibits virtually all private sector employers from requiring or requesting preemployment polygraph examinations for prospective employees. Since then, written integrity testing designed to reliably distinguish those prospective employees who may steal from the company from those who are far less likely to do so has been something of a growth industry. Indeed, the American Psychological Association has recently noted that honesty tests have demonstrated useful levels of validity as an employee (...) selection measure. We provide an alternative perspective. We argue that, even under the most charitable of assumptions, the propensity of integrity tests to generate false positives (i.e., to identify prospective employees as potential thieves when, in fact, they are not) is unsuitably large. Thus, the integrity test as currently configured is largely without merit as a personnel selection device. (shrink)

Some would argue that the more promising areas of business ethics research are "sensitive." In such areas, it would be expected that subjects, if inclined to respond at all, would be guarded in their responses, or respond inaccurately. We provide an introduction to an empirical approach -- the unmatched block count (UCT) -- for collecting these potentially sensitive data which provides absolute anonymity and confidentiality to subjects and "legal immunity" to the researcher. Interestingly, under UCT protocol researchers could not divulge (...) subjects' responses even if they were inclined to do so. Beyond that, UCTs provide complete disclosure to subjects and there is no deception. (shrink)

Overestimation of one’s ability to argue their position on socio-political issues may partially underlie the current climate of political extremism in the U.S. Yet very little is known about what factors influence overestimation in argumentation of socio-political issues. Across three experiments, emotional investment substantially increased participants’ overestimation. Potential confounding factors like topic complexity and familiarity were ruled out as alternative explanations. Belief-based cues were established as a mechanism underlying the relationship between emotional investment and overestimation in a measurement-of-mediation and manipulation-of-mediator (...) design. Representing a new bias blind spot, participants believed emotional investment helps them argue better than it helps others ; where in reality emotional investment harmed or had no effect on argument quality. These studies highlight misguided beliefs about emotional investment as a factor underlying metacognitive miscalibration in the context of socio-political issues. (shrink)

We introduce a game model for an Algol-like programming language with primitives for parallel composition and synchronization on semaphores. The semantics is based on a simplified version of Hyland–Ong-style games and it emphasizes the intuitive connection between the concurrent nature of games and that of computation. The model is fully abstract for may-equivalence.

This study of major corporations (n=481) provides an empirical assessment of the effects of several corporate governance variables (CEO duality, boards of director composition, officers and directors common stock holdings, institutional common stock holdings, number of majority owners) on the adoption of so-called severance agreements. A discriminant analysis indicates a significant multivariate function. Wilks lambda univariate analyses suggest that the percentage of common stock held by owners and directors and number of majority stock holders are the more robust discriminators.

While the notion of establishing a value for human life may be uncomfortable for some, we argue that it is a fundamental requirement for many aspects of public policy. We compare a number of approaches which have been traditionally relied on to make estimations. Also, we provide an exercise which provides an unusual, but we hope provocative, perspective on the evaluation of human life.

The United States Sentencing Commission’s guidelines for the sentencing of organizations found guilty of violating federal laws recently became effective. Dramatically increased penalties are possible under these gudelines, but so too is a substantial reduction in the penalties imposed on organizations that have an effective program in place to prevent and detect violations. This provides corporations with a tremendous new incentive in inaugurate organizational ethics audits both to avoid violations in the first instance and to reduce the penalty imposed in (...) the event that a violation occurs. We argue, however, that there have always been very good reasons for organizations to conduct such audits, which emphasize the identification of the organizational factors that create incentives for unethical behavior. Corporate ethics programs initiated without reference to such factors cannot reasonably be expected to be effective in improving a company’s internal ethical environment. (shrink)

Paul Ricoeur's philosophy, including notably the Lectures on Ideology and Utopia, has been rather underappreciated in the contemporary critical theory literature. This is in spite of some excellent attempts to highlight the value of his contribution to the field. In the Lectures on Ideology and Utopia Ricoeur brings two traditionally opposed concepts of ideology and utopia together in a dialectic, a move that is both innovative and radical. While the lectures were first delivered in Chicago back in 1975, they still (...) have something to offer contemporary scholarship in critical theory. Some forty years on, the collection edited by Stephanie Arel and Dan Stiver... (shrink)

This study investigated the proficiency of CPAs in recognizing and evaluating ethical and unethical situations. In addition, CPAs provided attitudes on ethics education. Respondents were asked to evaluate the ethical acceptability of CPA behavior as presented in six vignettes involving a variety of ethical dilemmas from questions of conflict of interest to questions of personal honor. The results tend to signify that CPAs can, to a degree, distinguish ethical and unethical behaviors. It appears that ethical behaviors and very specific unethical (...) behaviors were more easily identified by practitioners. This may reveal uncertainty and apprehension as to exactly what constitutes unethical behavior since, in many circumstances, this resolution is made on a case-specific basis rather that via a universal rule. In addition, it is interesting to note that CPAs tend to picture themselves as more ethically-oriented than their peers.With respect to ethics education, the CPAs indicated that instruction in ethical concepts and literacy was important and should definitely be embodied in the accounting curriculum as well as at all educational levels. However, the CPAs were remarkably uncertain and ambivalent as to the qualifications of university faculty to provide this instruction and guidance. (shrink)

Director compensation can potentially represent an ethical minefield. When faced with supporting strategic decisions that can lead to an increase in director pay, directors may consider their own interests and not solely those of the shareholders to whom they are legally bound to represent. In such cases, directors essentially become agents, rather than those installed to protect principals (shareholders) from agents. Using acquisitions as a study context, we employ a matched-pair design and find a statistically significant difference in outside director (...) compensation between acquiring and control firms. Outside directors of acquiring firms earn more than twice as much as their counterparts in the matched-sample. (shrink)

This paper presents an enhanced ontology formalization, combining previous work in Conceptual Structure Theory and Order-Sorted Logic. Most existing ontology formalisms place greater importance on concept types, but in this paper we focus on relation types, which are in essence predicates on concept types. We formalize the notion of ‘predicate of predicates’ as meta-relation type and introduce the new hierarchy of meta-relation types as part of the ontology definition. The new notion of closure of a relation or meta-relation type is (...) presented as a means to complete that relation or meta-relation type by transferring extra arguments and properties from other related types. The end result is an expanded ontology, called the closure of the original ontology, on which automated inference could be more easily performed. Our proposal could be viewed as a novel and improved ontology formalization within Conceptual Structure Theory and a contribution to knowledge representation and formal reasoning (e.g., to build a query-answering system for legal knowledge). (shrink)

This study of 481 corporations provides an assessment of the relationship between several corporate governance variables (board composition, type of board leadership, officer and director stock holdings, institutional stock holdings, number of majority owners, existence of severance agreements) and adoption of anti-takeover amendments. The results of analysis suggest that the two groups (adopters/non-adopters) differ significantly in regards to these variables.

This paper discusses legal and ethical issues related to genetic screening. It is argued that persons identified with actual or perceived deleterious genetic markers are protected by the American with Disabilities Act of 1990 and the Civil Rights Act of 1991, if members of a protected group, regardless of whether or not they are currently ill. However, legislation may not protect all employees in all scenarios, in which case, ethical principles should guide decision-making. In doing so a model of preventive (...) ethics is proposed to better understand the multiple levels on which this issue resides. (shrink)

On the face of it both aggregation and deliberation represent alternative ways of producing a consensus. I argue, however, that the adequacy of aggregation mechanisms should be evaluated with an eye to the effects, both possible and actual, of public deliberation. Such an evaluation is undertaken by sketching a Bayesian model of deliberation as learning from others.

Wlodek Rabinowicz suggested in an e-mail conversation (2001) to me that one might be able to use a particular Hats Puzzle to make a Dutch Book against a group of individually rational persons. I present a fanciful story here that has the same structure as Rabinowicz’s Dutch Book.

EveryK-trivial set is computable from an incomplete Martin-Löf random set, i.e., a Martin-Löf random set that does not compute the halting problem.

Many countries have regulations that require firms to engage in minimum levels of corporate social activities in areas such as the environment and social welfare. In this paper, we argue that changes in a firm’s compliance with CS regulations are reflected in its reputation for corporate social responsibility, which affects the firm’s performance. The performance impacts depend on whether the firm’s CSR reputation in the current and prior periods is positive, neutral, or negative. Our theoretical framework draws on the reputation (...) literature and on the concepts of recency bias, which weights the present more heavily than the past, and negativity bias, which weights negative assessments more heavily than neutral or positive assessments. We test our hypotheses on a sample of 7317 banks over 1992–2007 where we compare a bank’s return on assets with its current and prior compliance ratings under the U.S. Community Reinvestment Act. We find that changes in CSR reputation have predictable, asymmetric, and sizeable impacts on firm performance. For example, for an average bank with $1 billion in assets, gaining a positive CSR reputation translates into a rise in profits of 4.04%; gaining a negative CSR reputation results in a drop in profits of − 7.8%. (shrink)

The progression of research and scholarly inquiry does not occur in isolation and is wholly dependent on accurate reporting of methods and results, and successful replication of prior work. Without mechanisms to correct the literature, much time and money is wasted on research based on a crumbling foundation. These guidelines serve to outline the respective responsibilities of researchers, institutions, agencies, and publishers or editors in maintaining the integrity of the research record. Delineating these complementary roles and proposing solutions for common (...) barriers provide a foundation for best practices. (shrink)

If stem cell-based therapies are developed, we will likely confront a difficult problem of justice: for biological reasons alone, the new therapies might benefit only a limited range of patients. In fact, they might benefit primarily white Americans, thereby exacerbating long-standing differences in health and health care.

Mitochondrial bioenergetics plays a key role in multiple basic cellular processes, such as energy production, nucleotide biosynthesis, and iron metabolism. It is an essential system for animals' life and death (apoptosis) and it is required for embryo development. This, in conjunction with its being subjected to adaptive processes in multiple species and its gene products being involved in the formation of reproductive barriers in animals, raises the possibility that mitochondrial bioenergetics could be a candidate genetic mechanism of speciation. Here, we (...) discuss genetic and biochemical evidence for the possible involvement of this unique system, encoded by two genomes (the mitochondrial and nuclear genomes), that differ by an order of magnitude in their mutation rates in processes leading to speciation events. (shrink)

Recent EEG studies on the early postmortem interval that suggest the persistence of electrophysiological coherence and connectivity in the brain of animals and humans reinforce the need for further investigation of the relationship between the brain’s activity and the dying process. Neuroscience is now in a position to empirically evaluate the extended process of dying and, more specifically, to investigate the possibility of brain activity following the cessation of cardiac and respiratory function. Under the direction of the Center for Healthy (...) Minds at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, research was conducted in India on a postmortem meditative state cultivated by some Tibetan Buddhist practitioners in which decomposition is putatively delayed. For all healthy baseline and postmortem subjects presented here, we collected resting state electroencephalographic data, mismatch negativity, and auditory brainstem response. In this study, we present HB data to demonstrate the feasibility of a sparse electrode EEG configuration to capture well-defined ERP waveforms from living subjects under very challenging field conditions. While living subjects displayed well-defined MMN and ABR responses, no recognizable EEG waveforms were discernable in any of the tukdam cases. (shrink)

1 Evidence-based policy requires researchers to provide the answers to ecological questions that are of interest to policy makers. To find out what those questions are in the UK, representatives from 28 organizations involved in policy, together with scientists from 10 academic institutions, were asked to generate a list of questions from their organizations. 2 During a 2-day workshop the initial list of 1003 questions generated from consulting at least 654 policy makers and academics was used as a basis for (...) generating a short list of 100 questions of significant policy relevance. Short-listing was decided on the basis of the preferences of the representatives from the policy-led organizations. 3 The areas covered included most major issues of environmental concern in the UK, including agriculture, marine fisheries, climate change, ecosystem function and land management. 4 The most striking outcome was the preference for general questions rather than narrow ones. The reason is that policy is driven by broad issues rather than specific ones. In contrast, scientists are frequently best equipped to answer specific questions. This means that it may be necessary to extract the underpinning specific question before researchers can proceed. 5 Synthesis and applications. Greater communication between policy makers and scientists is required in order to ensure that applied ecologists are dealing with issues in a way that can feed into policy. It is particularly important that applied ecologists emphasize the generic value of their work wherever possible. (shrink)

We studied collaborative skill acquisition in a dynamic setting with the game Co-op Space Fortress. While gaining expertise, the majority of subjects became increasingly consistent in the role they adopted without being able to communicate. Moreover, they acted in anticipation of the future task state. We constructed a collaborative skill acquisition model in the cognitive architecture ACT-R that reproduced subject skill acquisition trajectory. It modeled role adoption through reinforcement learning and predictive processes through motion extrapolation and learned relevant control parameters (...) using both a reinforcement learning procedure and a new to ACT-R supervised learning procedure. This is the first integrated cognitive model of collaborative skill acquisition and, as such, gives us valuable insights into the multiple cognitive processes that are involved in learning to collaborate. (shrink)