Quarantine and spatial distancing measures associated with COVID-19 resulted in substantial changes to individuals’ everyday lives. Prominent among these lifestyle changes was the way in which people interacted with media—including music listening. In this repeated assessment study, we assessed Australian university students’ media use throughout early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia, and determined whether media use was related to changes in life satisfaction. Participants were asked to complete six online questionnaires, capturing pre- and during-pandemic experiences. The results indicated (...) that media use varied substantially throughout the study period, and at the within-person level, life satisfaction was positively associated with music listening and negatively associated with watching TV/videos/movies. The findings highlight the potential benefits of music listening during COVID-19 and other periods of social isolation. (shrink)

Biological ontologies are used to organize, curate, and interpret the vast quantities of data arising from biological experiments. While this works well when using a single ontology, integrating multiple ontologies can be problematic, as they are developed independently, which can lead to incompatibilities. The Open Biological and Biomedical Ontologies Foundry was created to address this by facilitating the development, harmonization, application, and sharing of ontologies, guided by a set of overarching principles. One challenge in reaching these goals was that the (...) OBO principles were not originally encoded in a precise fashion, and interpretation was subjective. Here we show how we have addressed this by formally encoding the OBO principles as operational rules and implementing a suite of automated validation checks and a dashboard for objectively evaluating each ontology’s compliance with each principle. This entailed a substantial effort to curate metadata across all ontologies and to coordinate with individual stakeholders. We have applied these checks across the full OBO suite of ontologies, revealing areas where individual ontologies require changes to conform to our principles. Our work demonstrates how a sizable federated community can be organized and evaluated on objective criteria that help improve overall quality and interoperability, which is vital for the sustenance of the OBO project and towards the overall goals of making data FAIR. Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest. (shrink)

We analyze the relationship between evolutionary theory and classification of higher taxa in the work of three ichthyologists: Albert C.L.G. Günther (1830–1914), Edward Drinker Cope (1840–1897), and Theodore Gill (1837–1914). The progress of ichthyology in the early years following the Origin has received little attention from historians, and offers an opportunity to further evaluate the extent to which evolutionary theorizing influenced published views on systematic methodology. These three ichthyologists held radically different theoretical views. The apparent commensurability of claims about relationships (...) among groups of fishes belies differences in what the relationships actually were supposed to be. As well, interpreting classification as genealogical did not lead to agreement about taxonomic methodology; instead, applying evolutionary theory raised new axes of disagreement. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Case against Rational Egoism in Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground*James P. ScanlanWriting in his own voice, in letters, notebooks, and diaries, Fyodor Dostoevsky frequently attacked the philosophy of the Russian “nihilists,” as he typically called them—Nikolay Chernyshevsky, Dmitry Pisarev, and other representatives of the radical Russian intelligentsia in the third quarter of the nineteenth century. But because Dostoevsky also used fiction to argue against them, if we wish (...) to discern the full contours of his opposition, we must turn to his stories and novels; and there we face the problem of determining to what extent, if any, the statements of his narrators and characters express his own views.This problem is particularly challenging in regard to the radicals’ “Rational Egoism,” to use the label by which the Russian variant of the theory of enlightened egoism came to be known. 1 Dostoevsky’s most sustained and spirited attack on that aspect of “nihilist” philosophy is found in Part One of Notes from Underground (1864), but it is voiced by one of the darkest, least sympathetic of all his characters—the nameless narrator and protagonist known as the Underground Man. Was this repellent creature speaking for Dostoevsky? The Underground Man, moreover, can easily be viewed as a sheer irrationalist whose rejection of Rational Egoism is a tortured emotional outburst with no logical credentials. Robert L. Jackson, in his groundbreaking study of 1958, describes the Underground Man’s thinking at one point as follows: “It is impossible to argue [End Page 549] with the rationalists: reason is on their side. All that remains is irrationally to negate reason.” 2 If those words were to be taken not simply as a moment in Jackson’s rich analysis but as a comprehensive description of the Underground Man’s attitude, it would be senseless to expect philosophically nuanced arguments from him. And we would have no grounds for thinking that Dostoevsky’s own treatment of Rational Egoism went beyond emotional rejection.Critics from Vasily Rozanov to Joseph Frank have debated the Underground Man’s stance toward Rational Egoism and its relation to Dostoevsky’s, with no sign yet of a definitive resolution. Frank’s recent treatment, presented in the third volume of his monumental literary biography of Dostoevsky, offers a helpful history of the dispute as well as his own finely elaborated interpretation of the Underground Man as an irrational opponent of Rational Egoism. 3 Frank reads Notes from Underground as satire, and he contends that the Underground Man is caught in an agonizing self-contradiction: intellectually, he accepts the basic premises of the Rational Egoists’ outlook, such as the denial of free will; but he finds that, “despite the convictions of his reason,” he cannot live with the amoral and dehumanizing implications of those premises, which strip human beings of moral responsibility. 4 From a rational point of view, of course, rejection of the implications should force the Underground Man to reject the premises as well (by the hoary logical law of modus tollendo tolens), and indeed he does at times passionately condemn them. But according to Frank, these condemnations simply show the depth of his predicament: his “intellectual acceptance” of Chernyshevsky’s determinism is conjoined with “simultaneous rejection of it with the entire intuitive-emotional level of personality identified with moral conscience,” causing him to respond irrationally in a multitude of instances. 5 Frank’s Underground Man, then, is an intellectual disciple but an emotional critic of Rational Egoism; and he is triply an irrationalist: his thinking is mired in self-contradiction, he acts irrationally as a result, and his opposition to Rational Egoism has not a rational but an “intuitive-emotional” basis.But where does this leave Dostoevsky? Must we conclude that he, too, is somehow suspended between acceptance and rejection of Rational Egoism and for that reason has created in Notes from Underground a Bakhtinian equilibrium in which neither position is clearly privileged? For Frank, certainly not. It follows from Frank’s analysis that Dostoevsky himself, unlike the Underground [End Page 550] Man, is a fully consistent opponent of Rational Egoism, for that theory is the target of the inverted irony at the core of his satire; “the... (shrink)

This article critically evaluates the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency’s announcement, in March 2008, that GlaxoSmithKline would not face prosecution for deliberately withholding trial data, which revealed not only that Seroxat was ineffective at treating childhood depression but also that it increased the risk of suicidal behaviour in this patient group. The decision not to prosecute followed a four and a half year investigation and was taken on the grounds that the law at the relevant time was insufficiently clear. (...) This article assesses the existence of significant gaps in the duty of candour which had been assumed to exist between drugs companies and the regulator, and reflects upon what this episode tells us about the robustness, or otherwise, of the UK’s regulation of medicines. (shrink)

Organ donation after the circulatory determination of death requires the permanent cessation of circulation while organ donation after the brain determination of death requires the irreversible cessation of brain functions. The unified brain-based determination of death connects the brain and circulatory death criteria for circulatory death determination in organ donation as follows: permanent cessation of systemic circulation causes permanent cessation of brain circulation which causes permanent cessation of brain perfusion which causes permanent cessation of brain function. The relevant circulation that (...) must cease in circulatory death determination is that to the brain. Eliminating brain circulation from the donor ECMO organ perfusion circuit in thoracoabdominal NRP protocols satisfies the unified brain-based determination of death but only if the complete cessation of brain circulation can be proved. Despite its medical and physiologic rationale, the unified brain-based determination of death remains inconsistent with the Uniform Determination of Death Act. (shrink)

Research Ethics Committees (RECs) are frequently a focus of complaints from researchers, but evidence about the operation and decisions of RECs tends to be anecdotal. We conducted a systematic study to identify and compare the ethical issues raised in 54 letters to researchers about the same 18 applications submitted to three RECs over one year. The most common type of ethical trouble identified in REC letters related to informed consent, followed by scientific design and conduct, care and protection of research (...) participants, confidentiality, recruitment and documentation. Community considerations were least frequently raised. There was evidence of variability in the ethical troubles identified and the remedies recommended. This analysis suggests that some principles may be more institutionalized than others, and offers some evidence of inconsistency between RECs. Inconsistency is often treated as evidence of incompetence and caprice, but a more sophisticated understanding of the role of RECs and their functioning is required. (shrink)

Scepticism about ought simpliciter is the view that there is no such thing as what one ought simpliciter to do. Instead, practical deliberation is governed by a plurality of normative standpoints, each authoritative from their own perspective but none authoritative simpliciter. This paper aims to resist such scepticism. After setting out the challenge in general terms, I argue that scepticism can be resisted by rejecting a key assumption in the sceptic’s argument. This is the assumption that standpoint-relative ought judgments bring (...) with them a commitment to act in accordance with those judgments. Instead, I propose an alternative account of our normative concepts according to which only ought simpliciter judgments commit one to acting in accordance with those judgments. In addition to answering the sceptical challenge, the proposal offers an independently motivated account of what makes a concept normatively authoritative. (shrink)

In a seminal 1977 article, Rumelhart argued that perception required the simultaneous use of multiple sources of information, allowing perceivers to optimally interpret sensory information at many levels of representation in real time as information arrives. Building on Rumelhart's arguments, we present the Interactive Activation hypothesis—the idea that the mechanism used in perception and comprehension to achieve these feats exploits an interactive activation process implemented through the bidirectional propagation of activation among simple processing units. We then examine the interactive activation (...) model of letter and word perception and the TRACE model of speech perception, as early attempts to explore this hypothesis, and review the experimental evidence relevant to their assumptions and predictions. We consider how well these models address the computational challenge posed by the problem of perception, and we consider how consistent they are with evidence from behavioral experiments. We examine empirical and theoretical controversies surrounding the idea of interactive processing, including a controversy that swirls around the relationship between interactive computation and optimal Bayesian inference. Some of the implementation details of early versions of interactive activation models caused deviation from optimality and from aspects of human performance data. More recent versions of these models, however, overcome these deficiencies. Among these is a model called the multinomial interactive activation model, which explicitly links interactive activation and Bayesian computations. We also review evidence from neurophysiological and neuroimaging studies supporting the view that interactive processing is a characteristic of the perceptual processing machinery in the brain. In sum, we argue that a computational analysis, as well as behavioral and neuroscience evidence, all support the Interactive Activation hypothesis. The evidence suggests that contemporary versions of models based on the idea of interactive activation continue to provide a basis for efforts to achieve a fuller understanding of the process of perception. (shrink)

I consider the role of cognitive modeling in cognitive science. Modeling, and the computers that enable it, are central to the field, but the role of modeling is often misunderstood. Models are not intended to capture fully the processes they attempt to elucidate. Rather, they are explorations of ideas about the nature of cognitive processes. In these explorations, simplification is essential—through simplification, the implications of the central ideas become more transparent. This is not to say that simplification has no downsides; (...) it does, and these are discussed. I then consider several contemporary frameworks for cognitive modeling, stressing the idea that each framework is useful in its own particular ways. Increases in computer power (by a factor of about 4 million) since 1958 have enabled new modeling paradigms to emerge, but these also depend on new ways of thinking. Will new paradigms emerge again with the next 1,000‐fold increase? (shrink)

The distinction between the "permanent" (will not reverse) and "irreversible" (cannot reverse) cessation of functions is critical to understand the meaning of a determination of death using circulatory–respiratory tests. Physicians determining death test only for the permanent cessation of circulation and respiration because they know that irreversible cessation follows rapidly and inevitably once circulation no longer will restore itself spontaneously and will not be restored medically. Although most statutes of death stipulate irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions, the accepted (...) medical standard is their permanent cessation because permanence is a perfect surrogate indicator for irreversibility, and using it permits a more timely declaration. Therefore, patients properly declared dead in donation after circulatory death (DCD) protocols satisfy the requirements of death statutes and do not violate the dead donor rule. The acronym DCD should represent organ "donation after circulatory death" to clarify that the death standard is the permanent cessation of circulation, not heartbeat. Heart donation in DCD does not retroactively negate the donor's death determination because circulation has ceased permanently. (shrink)

Abstract:Disturbing cases continue to be published of patients declared brain dead who later were found to have a few intact brain functions. We address the reasons for the mismatch between the whole-brain criterion and brain death tests, and suggest solutions. Many of the cases result from diagnostic errors in brain death determination. Others probably result from a tiny amount of residual blood flow to the brain despite intracranial circulatory arrest. Strategies to lessen the mismatch include improving brain death determination training (...) for physicians, mandating a test showing complete intracranial circulatory arrest, or revising the whole-brain criterion. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be (...) preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

This paper examines the general prospects for conceptual role expressivism, expressivist theories that embrace conceptual role semantics. It has two main aims. The first aim is to provide a general characterisation of the view. The second aim is to raise a challenge for the general view. The challenge is to explain why normative concepts are not a species of defective concepts, where defective concepts are those that cannot meaningfully embed and participate in genuine inference. After rejecting existing attempts to answer (...) the challenge, I propose an alternative solution. However, the solution leaves conceptual role expressivism a far less distinctive and interesting position than its proponents claim. I conclude that we should be sceptical about how much expressivists gain by appealing to conceptual role semantics. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Rhetoric 35.2 (2002) 138-152 [Access article in PDF] Respecting the Rupture: Not Solving the Problem of Unity in Plato's Phaedrus James L. Kastely Plato's Phaedrus is a particularly instructive example of the double nature and status of rhetoric, for it embodies a tension at the heart of rhetoric. The first half of the dialogue presents three examples of rhetorical practice, while the second develops a theoretical (...) justification of rhetoric as an art. Thus, the dialogue would seem to offer a productive negotiation of the practice/theory tension. What makes the dialogue interesting, however, is the fact that this negotiation does not occur. The dialogue does not bring theory and practice into a harmonious relation, for there is a troubling discontinuity between its two halves, and rhetorical practice feels fractured. The exploration of eros that had occupied the first half of the dialogue is abandoned before the beginning of the second half, and then, following a logic that is at best associational, Socrates and Phaedrus explore the standards that should govern the practice of rhetoric. The infelicity of this transition raises a question: why did Plato structure the Phaedrus in such a way that it emphasized the dissonance between the two halves of the dialogue? To pose the question this way, however, is to go in a direction different from many of the best contemporary interpretations of the dialogue, which either argue that the dialogue is unified (Griswold 164) or suggest that the dissonance between its two halves reflects a shift in Plato's approach to philosophy (Kahn 373; Nehamas 352). In contrast, I will argue that the rupture in the dialogue is thematically purposive, for it points to an inescapable schism within rhetoric that makes rhetoric philosophically interesting.Socrates' second speech, his palinode to Eros, is a rhetorical tour de force that closes the first half of the dialogue. The importance of the palinode, however, is not limited to its role as an exemplary rhetorical performance, [End Page 138] for it also plays a crucial role in resolving the problem of erotic madness that organizes the intellectual drama of the first half. It would seem reasonable to expect that such an important and powerful moment in the dialogue would, at the very least, play a significant role in the philosophical discussion that composes the dialogue's second half. But that doesn't happen. While Socrates does refer to the palinode in his theoretical discussion of rhetoric, he makes little use of it, and, more important, he is silent on the subject of eros. Both the dramatic organization of the second half of the dialogue and its theoretical discussion cooperate to turn the rhetorical triumph of the palinode into a problem. Why has eros been abandoned as a philosophic topic, and what does this abandoning imply about the erotically grounded rhetoric that Socrates practiced and defended?To make matters worse, Socrates himself dismisses the palinode as a serious effort. He characterizes the speech as little more than a pleasant game, one that is not without value only because "these two certain forms (of gathering and dividing) were stated by chance" (265c). Far from viewing the palinode as possessing philosophical significance, Socrates appears to value it principally for its being a so-so example of a work of rhetoric that has been shaped by dialectic. While it is hard not to take Socrates' dismissal of the seriousness of the speech as partially disingenuous (just prior to his dismissal, he refers to the palinode as serious and reverent [265b]), he also does seem to mean what he says. Whether he is being straightforward or ironic does not finally matter because in either case the problem that occupies him and Phaedrus in the first half has disappeared from the dialogue. And that creates a problem: for if the philosophic issues of the first half of the dialogue drop out, then the dialogue is not coherent.This incoherence is especially troubling given Socrates' explicit endorsement of coherence as an important rhetorical value. In fact, when he begins his... (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to explore the spiritually formative experiences of fifteen female seminary spouses who participated in a phenomenological research study. Graduate theological education is not limited to married, male students. Seminaries are diverse educational institutions that equip married and single students, as well as men and women from every country in the world for gospel ministry. Because of this broad population in theological education, the qualitative proposals in this essay are not generalizable to all schools, students, (...) and settings equally, but the perspectives of these seminary spouses are useful in cultivating a robustly holistic education for students who are married during their academic pursuits. It is the intent here to explore how theology can crossover from the academy to the home so that it is experienced in marriage. The goal then is to equip students, professors, and administrators to actively nurture the faith formation of the second-person of the ministry dyad. In order for these stakeholders to understand how to nurture this faith formation of the seminary spouse, we must first hear and understand the experiences of these wives as they share their reflections on these formational years as a part of their husband's education. (shrink)