This article aims to show how the traditions of ethical reasoning and policy-making shape stem cell research in Britain. To do so I give a detailed account of the earlier developments of regulations on embryo research and the specific scientific advances made in Britain. The subsequent regulation of stem cell research was largely predetermined by those structures and the different and partly opposing orientations of a utilitarian approach to policies on biomedicine. The setting up of the first stem cell bank (...) and the directing of public funding into not only bioethical but also sociological guidance of the development of the new science field are aspects of the particular British way of supporting stem cell research. However, there is also an ongoing philosophical and juridical debate on the possible erosion of fundamental values caused by incremental regulatory weakening. Although I am highly sympathetic to the critical position that there is a need for a metaphysical anchor to secure individual human rights, one has to admit that the British mode of handling the inevitable ethical problems we face with biomedical progress is rather successful in terms of securing some of the basic needs and values of a modern democratic society. (shrink)

The history and context of the public policy regarding stem cell research in the European Union are complex. The regulations respond to and aim to realize political and economic goals across a large region that is culturally diverse, as well as addressing moral judgments on a contested emerging area of research. This history and context are relevant for the arguments developed here in relation to autologous stem cell research and how it is affected by those regulations.The EU is currently an (...) open market across 28 countries with different languages as well as varied cultural, religious, and political histories. Bridging the diverse traditions and their corresponding local policies and regulations is often a... (shrink)

What do psychedelics reveal about consciousness? What impact have psychedelics had on philosophy? In this rapidly growing area of study, this is the first volume to explore the philosophy of psychedelic experience, from a range of interdisciplinary and cross-cultural perspectives. In doing so, Philosophy and Psychedelics reveals just why the place of psychedelics in our societies should not be left to medical sciences alone, as psychedelic experience opens up new perspectives on fundamental philosophical questions relating to human experience, ethics, and (...) the metaphysics of mind. Mapping a range of philosophical responses to the surge in studies into psychedelic drugs in the cognitive sciences, this go-to volume examines topics including psychedelics and the role of governance; psychedelics and mysticism; what psychedelics can tell us about dyadic thankfulness; and psychedelics as ways to gain new knowledge. Written by leading international scholars, the essays cover Western and non-Western traditions, from analytic philosophy to Zen Buddhism, and discuss a variety of hallucinogens, such as LSD, MDMA, and Ayahuasca, in order to build a much-needed bridge between the rapidly growing scientific research and the philosophy behind psychedelic experience. (shrink)

A central problem for the international governance of heritable germline gene editing is that there are important differences in attitudes and values as well as ethical and health care considerations around the world. These differences are reflected in a complicated and diverse regulatory landscape. Several publications have discussed whether reproductive uses would be legally permissible in individual countries and whether clinical applications could emerge in the context of regulatory gaps and gray areas. Systematic comparative studies that explore issues related to (...) the governance of this technology from different national and international perspectives are needed to address the lack of knowledge in this area. In this research report, we contribute to filling this gap by presenting views of stakeholders in the United Kingdom on challenges to the governance of heritable genome editing. We present findings from a multistakeholder study conducted in the United Kingdom between October 2016 and January 2018 and funded by the Wellcome Trust. This research included interviews, literature analysis, and a workshop. We involved leading U.K. scientists, in vitro fertilization clinicians, and representatives from regulatory bodies, patient organizations, and other civil societal organizations, as well as fertility companies. Part one of this article explores stakeholder perceptions of possible global developments in heritable genome editing and associated risks and governance challenges. Part two presents a range of policy options that were generated during the workshop in relation to the challenges discussed in part one. (shrink)

This book should be essential reading for anyone interested in the new reproductive technologies, biomedical ethics, and women's health.

Ethical ideology is predicted to play a role in the occurrence of workplace deviance. Forsyths (1980) Ethics Position Questionnaire measures two dimensions of ethical ideology: idealism and relativism. It is hypothesized that idealism will be negatively correlated with employee deviance while relativism will be positively related. Further, it is predicted that idealism and relativism will interact in such a way that there will only be a relationship between idealism and deviance when relativism is higher. Results supported the hypothesized correlations and (...) idealism and relativism interacted to predict organizational deviance. Idealism was a significant predictor of interpersonal deviance, but no interaction was found. (shrink)

The interdisciplinary field of neurorobotics looks to neuroscience to overcome the limitations of modern robotics technology, to robotics to advance our understanding of the neural system’s inner workings, and to information technology to develop tools that support those complementary endeavours. The development of these technologies is still at an early stage, which makes them an ideal candidate for proactive and anticipatory ethical reflection. This article explains the current state of neurorobotics development within the Human Brain Project, originating from a close (...) collaboration between the scientific and technical experts who drive neurorobotics innovation, and the humanities and social sciences scholars who provide contextualising and reflective capabilities. This article discusses some of the ethical issues which can reasonably be expected. On this basis, the article explores possible gaps identified within this collaborative, ethical reflection that calls for attention to ensure that the development of neurorobotics is ethically sound and socially acceptable and desirable. (shrink)

This review argues that the role of technology in business and society debates has predominantly been examined from the limited, narrow perspective of technology as instrumental, and that two additional but relatively neglected perspectives are important: technology as value-laden and technology as relationally agentic. Technology has always been part of the relationship between business and society, for better and worse. However, as technological development is frequently advanced as a solution to many pressing societal problems and grand challenges, it is imperative (...) that technology is understood and analyzed in a more nuanced, critical, and comprehensive way. The two additional perspectives invite a broader research agenda, one that includes questions, such as “Which values and whose interests has technology come to emulate?”; “How do these values and interests play out in stabilizing the status quo?”; and, importantly, “How can it be contested, disrupted, and changed?” Any research that endorses green, sustainable, environmental, or climate mitigating technologies potentially contributes to maintaining the very thing that it seeks to change if questions such as these are not being addressed. (shrink)

We clarify aspects of our Dynamic Functional Model of Jealousy in response to D’Arms and Stets. Our model proposes that jealousy is an evolved motivational state that arises over threat by a rival to one’s relationship or some aspect of one’s relationship. The formation or loss of relationships rarely occurs instantaneously. Therefore, we argue that jealousy, whose goal is to remove or reduce the rival threat, can occur over a longer time course than is often assumed in theories of specific (...) emotions. We further suggest that other emotions such as grief and fear also can occur over extended periods. This raises challenges for emotion theories that assume that emotions must be short-lived. (shrink)

Organizations have long struggled to find ways to reduce the occurrence of unethical behaviors by employees. Unfortunately, time theft, a common and costly form of ethical misconduct at work, has been understudied by ethics researchers. In order to remedy this gap in the literature, we used the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to investigate the antecedents of time theft, which includes behaviors such as arriving later to or leaving earlier from work than scheduled, taking additional or longer breaks than is (...) acceptable, and on-the-job daydreaming. We surveyed 135 employed undergraduate business students regarding the TPB variables at Time 1. Two months later, participants reported the frequency they engaged in time theft since Time 1. Results indicate that behavioral, normative, and control beliefs significantly predicted attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control, respectively. Attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control, in turn, were significantly related to time theft intentions, which predicted later enactment of time theft. Thus, employers can decrease time theft by primarily focusing on altering employees’ attitudes toward time theft, followed by reducing social pressures to engage in it, and lastly, by implementing organizational practices that make it difficult to commit time theft. (shrink)

Who owns frozen human embryos? Are "surrogate motherhood" arrangements dangerous for women? Should access to in vitro fertilization be limited or increased? With the development of complex reproductive technologies and the ensuing controversies in reproductive ethics, there is an urgent need for more careful examination of moral principles, current practices, and social policies pertaining to reproduction. The issues examined in this collection of nine papers focusing of the Canadian experience include abortion, the cryopreservation of embryos, the selective termination of fetuses (...) within multiple pregnancies, social policy for gestational "surrogacy," and the regulation of in vitro fertilization. Adopting a feminist perspective, the book places reproductive autonomy at the center of debates about the control of reproduction. (shrink)

How should we approach the daunting task of renewing the ideal of equality? In this book, Christine Sypnowich proposes a theory of equality centred on human flourishing or wellbeing. She argues that egalitarianism should be understood as seeking to make people more equal in the constituents of a good life. Inequality is a social ill because of the damage it does to human flourishing: unequal distribution of wealth can have the effect that some people are poorly housed, badly nourished, (...) ill-educated, unhappy or uncultured, among other things. When we seek to make people more equal our concern is not just resources or property, but how people fare under one distribution or another. Ultimately, the best answer to the question, equality of what?, is some conception of flourishing, since whatever policies or principles we adopt, it is flourishing that we hope will be more equal as a result of our endeavours. Sypnowich calls for both retrieval and innovation. What is to be retrieved is the ideal of equality itself, which is often assumed as a background condition of theories of justice, yet at the same time, dismissed as too homogenising, abstract and rigid a criterion for political argument. We must retrieve the ideal of equality as a central political principle. In doing so, she casts doubt on the value of focussing on cultural difference, and rejects the idea of neutrality that dominates contemporary political philosophy in favour of a view of the state as enabling the betterment of its citizens. ". (shrink)

Journal of Political Philosophy, Volume 30, Issue 1, Page 94-115, March 2022.

This article explores the emergence of leadership during implementation of a water saving initiative in the rural community surrounding Barren Box Swamp in the Murray Darling Basin, Australia. Qualitative data analysis indicated that the system elements affecting the type of leadership to emerge included the extent to which the groups were engaged in the process, the level of access to resources, and the level of investment in the outcomes of the project. Although these results reinforced key aspects of complex problem-solving (...) through collaboration, they demonstrated varying degrees and types of both engagement and leadership within the case community. Given the current finding that these varying elements can coincide within one system, this case suggests that each community’s characteristics, resources and context will determine the optimal combination of leadership style and level of collaboration needed to facilitate sustainable community development. (shrink)

Was Natur für uns ist und welche Bereiche unserer Umwelt als natürlich erfahren werden, scheint sich einer prinzipiellen Bestimmung zu entziehen. Auch ist weitgehend unklar, worauf sich der verantwortliche Umgang "des" Menschen mit "der" Natur beziehen soll? Etwa auf die Erhaltung des Status quo der Natur oder auf die maßvolle Steuerung des Wandels der Natur? Ist in den gegenwärtigen umweltpolitischen und den Naturschutz betreffenden Überlegungen tatsächlich "die" Natur der Referenzrahmen verantwortlichen Handelns oder geht es uns vor allem um die Erhaltung (...) eines nützlichen Zustands für uns und nachfolgende Generationen? Die Autorinnen und Autoren des Bandes ziehen die Gewissheiten unseres theoretischen und praktischen Umgangs mit der Natur in Frage und suchen nach neuen Perspektiven. -/- Unter den Stichworten Objektive Natur (I.), Natur als Resonanzraum (II.), Natur als Ressource und Wert (III.), Natur als natürliche Umwelt (IV.), Künstliche Natur (V.), Vergesellschaftete Natur (VI.) und Verantwortete Natur (VII.) sind Beiträge der Philosophinnen Heike Baranzke und Christine Zunke sowie der Philosophen Michael Großheim, Michael Hauskeller, Kristian Köchy, Ulrich Krohs und Gregor Schiemann versammelt. Interdisziplinäre Herausforderungen zur Thematik werden in den Studien von Jörn Ahrens (Kultursoziologie), Karl-Werner Brand (Umwelt- und Nachhaltigkeitsforschung), Hans Diefenbacher (Wirtschaftswissenschaften), Thomas Fuchs (Psychiatrie), Ulrich Gebhard (Erziehungswissenschaften), Thomas Kirchhoff (Ökologie), Dörte Martens/ Nicole Bauer (Umweltpsychologie), Hartmut Rosa (Soziologie), Heinrich Spanier (Umweltschutz), Vera Tekken/ Josef Settele (Umweltforschung), Frank Uekötter (Umweltgeschichte) und Michael Wink (Biologie) deutlich herausgearbeitet. Die Beiträge der Theologen Dirk Evers und Thorsten Moos runden den Band ab. (shrink)

This article describes developments in the use of information technology in the biological discipline of taxonomy, using both a historical overview and a detailed case study of a particular information systems project. Taxonomy has experienced problems with both its scientific legitimacy and its utility to other biologists. IT has been introduced into the discipline m response to these perceived problems. The information systems project described here served as a means of managing the tensions between scientific legitimacy and utility. It is (...) argued that this project represents an example of the use of a technological development m an attempt to re-engineer a discipline. The development of the information system is analyzed as an attempt to develop a scientific instrument that will embody a particular model of the discipline. The concerns of taxonomy with status and legitimacy make it appropriate that this new technology should be introduced at the interface between the discipline and the rest of biology as a means of disseminating results, and thus come to represent the discipline and the plants described to outsiders, just as the system represents outsiders to taxonomists. (shrink)

At times the personal beliefs or values of graduate students in training programs for professional psychology can create complications in their providing therapy for certain patient populations. This issue has been brought to national attention recently through several prominent legal cases in which students have contested their expulsion from graduate programs due to their assertions that they were unable to treat clients in same-sex relationships because of their own religious beliefs. The goals of the current article are to review the (...) literature on values conflicts, provide an analysis of how portions of our professional Ethics Code directly relate to this issue, describe a developmentally sensitive theoretical framework that is designed to foster the growth of ethical reasoning over time, and provide a forum for trainee perspectives on this issue based on trainees’ responses to an ethical vignette describing an intern struggling with a values conflict. The trainee quotations are used to structure a discussion of practical recommendations for how to handle values conflicts within the context of training and clinical supervision in professional psychology. (shrink)

This Article examines the ways in which market vendors in Kampala, Uganda, responded to plans to redevelop their markets through the concession of long-term leases to private investors. These plans met with massive resistance from the marketers, with significant outcomes. The Article uncovers how the marketers actively negotiated a “gray space” between legality and illegality and creatively used the law, with a view to asserting themselves as the legitimate rulers of their markets. It shows how the marketers engaged in highly (...) diverse modalities of struggle, stretching across the legal/illegal boundary. They organized in multiple configurations which were flexible, hybrid and mutant in character, rather than being fixed in particular organizational categories. In their struggles, the marketers engaged in shifting alliances and with a disparate range of political allies. Their politics were fluid, untamed and pragmatic, but also contradictory and fractured. This flexibility and pragmatism enabled them to navigate a complex political landscape and to make instrumental use of a generally unfavorable legal environment. (shrink)

Opinion leaders are informal leaders who have the ability to influence others' decisions about adopting new products, practices or ideas. In the healthcare setting, the importance of translating new research evidence into practice has led to interest in understanding how opinion leaders could be used to speed this process. Despite continued interest, gaps in understanding opinion leadership remain. Agent‐based models are computer models that have proven to be useful for representing dynamic and contextual phenomena such as opinion leadership. The purpose (...) of this paper is to describe the work conducted in preparation for the development of an agent‐based model of nursing opinion leadership. The aim of this phase of the model development project was to clarify basic assumptions about opinions, the individual attributes of opinion leaders and characteristics of the context in which they are effective. The process used to clarify these assumptions was the construction of a preliminary nursing opinion leader model, derived from philosophical theories about belief formation. (shrink)

Le propos de l’article est l’analyse de la cérémonie de la prise d’habit au sein de l’Ordre Notre-Dame du Mont-Carmel aux xviie et xviiie siècles. À partir des sources normatives, picturales et hagiographiques, cette cérémonie est détaillée, notamment la scénographie de l’avant/après, gommant toute marque féminine. Certaines pratiques témoignent de la mise en impatience de ce passage de la soie au drap, qui se traduit par des prises d’habit clandestines, prématurées ou des portraits de mondaines usurpatrices en habit de carmélites. (...) Il est vrai que le modèle absolu de La Madeleine, compte tenu des origines le plus souvent princières des postulantes, n’est pas étranger au prestige de la métamorphose. Réalité et construction représentative permettent de montrer comment le Carmel s’est approprié une cérémonie, qui, dans le contexte compétitif entre les ordres de la liturgie tridentine, valorise la femme, par le biais de la moniale, affranchie des attributs de son sexe. Mais surtout, la vêture a su rendre spectaculaire et désirable ce qui a priori ne l’est pas, la pauvreté et la pénitence du corps et de ses attributs, dans le but avoué du recrutement de nouvelles postulantes. De la rivalité entre drap et soie, le vainqueur n’est pas forcément celui que l’on croit. (shrink)

Le propos de l’article est l’analyse de la cérémonie de la prise d’habit au sein de l’Ordre Notre-Dame du Mont-Carmel aux xviie et xviiie siècles. À partir des sources normatives, picturales et hagiographiques, cette cérémonie est détaillée, notamment la scénographie de l’avant/après, gommant toute marque féminine (présence de cheveux, soins pour un teint pâle, vêtement ajusté, usage de soieries, de bijoux, etc.). Certaines pratiques témoignent de la mise en impatience de ce passage de la soie au drap, qui se traduit (...) par des prises d’habit clandestines, prématurées ou des portraits de mondaines usurpatrices en habit de carmélites. Il est vrai que le modèle absolu de La Madeleine, compte tenu des origines le plus souvent princières des postulantes, n’est pas étranger au prestige de la métamorphose. Réalité et construction représentative permettent de montrer comment le Carmel s’est approprié une cérémonie, qui, dans le contexte compétitif entre les ordres de la liturgie tridentine, valorise la femme, par le biais de la moniale, affranchie des attributs de son sexe. Mais surtout, la vêture a su rendre spectaculaire et désirable ce qui a priori ne l’est pas, la pauvreté et la pénitence du corps et de ses attributs, dans le but avoué du recrutement de nouvelles postulantes. De la rivalité entre drap et soie, le vainqueur n’est pas forcément celui que l’on croit. (shrink)

This book examines links between post-conflict security, peace and development in Africa, Latin America, Europe and New Zealand. Young peace researchers from the Global South as well as from Italy and New Zealand address in case studies traumas in Northern Uganda, demobilisation and reintegration of ex-combatants in the Ivory Coast, economic and financial management of terrorism in Kenya, organised crime in Brazil, mental health issues in Colombia, macro realism in Europe and global defence reforms within the military apparatus since 1990. (...) The book reviews linkages between regional stability, development and peace in post-conflict societies while adding on to the post 2015 international agenda and discusses linkages between peace, security and development. (shrink)