Previous research indicates that Euro-American women are more upset by imagining their male partners committing homosexual infidelities than heterosexual ones. The present studies sought to replicate these findings and extend them to two non-Western cultures wherein masculine men frequently engage in sexual interactions with feminine third-gender males. Across six studies in three cultural locales, women were asked to rate their degree of upset when imagining that their partner committed infidelity that was heterosexual in nature, as well as infidelity that was (...) homosexual. In two Canadian undergraduate samples, women reported greater upset at imagining partner infidelity with a female, whereas a community sample of middle-aged women reported equal upset across infidelity types. Samoan women reported substantially less upset at the thought of partner infidelity with a third-gender male than with a female. Istmo Zapotec women reported equal upset toward infidelity with a female or a third-gender male, whereas a second Zapotec sample reported slightly greater upset at the thought of infidelity with a muxe. Results illustrate how cultural contexts moderate the degree to which same-sex infidelity scenarios are upsetting to women. (shrink)

The present study examined women’s mate competition tactics in response to female and feminine-male rivals in two cultures in which competition against both occurs. In Samoa and the Istmo Zapotec (Southern Mexico), women not only compete with other women (intrasexually) but also compete with rival feminine males (_intersexually_) in order to access/retain the same masculine men as sexual/romantic partners. Using a mixed-method paradigm, women were asked about their experiences of intra- and intersexual mate competition, and these narratives were recorded. The (...) tactics reportedly employed by participants, and those attributed to mate competitors, were categorized according to established taxonomies of mate competition tactics, and their frequencies compared. Within-culture, the likelihood that participant women had ever experienced intra- and intersexual mate competition did not differ. Furthermore, participants reported a similar pattern of behavioral tactics whether their rival was another woman or a feminine male. These included benefit provisioning tactics during mate acquisition and cost-inflicting tactics during mate retention. Similarly, the mate competition tactics attributed to rival women and rival feminine males bore a striking resemblance, focused on enticing target men. Results highlight the mate competition tactics employed by women outside of a Euro-American context, and the way cultural factors impact mating landscapes presumed to be exclusively heterosexual. The presence of feminine males, alongside masculine men’s willingness to engage in sexual activity with them, induces women in such cultures to compete intersexually in comparable ways to intrasexual competition with rival women. (shrink)

Previous research has found that sex differences in occupational preferences are both substantial and cross-culturally universal. Androphilic males tend to display “gender-shifted” occupational preferences, with relatively female-typical interests. Past research has overwhelmingly relied on Western samples; this article offers new insights from a non-Western setting. Known locally as fa’afafine, androphilic males in Samoa occupy a third-gender category. Data were collected in Samoa from 103 men, 103 women, and 103 fa’afafine regarding occupational preferences and recalled childhood gender nonconformity (CGN). A substantial (...) sex difference was observed in the occupational preferences of men and women (d = 2.04). Interestingly, women and fa’afafine did not differ in their preferences (p = 0.89), indicating a complete gender inversion of occupational preferences in the latter. Although there was no correlation between women’s CGN and masculine occupational preferences, there was a significant correlation (r = −0.62) between these variables in both men and fa’afafine. Among males (both men and fa’afafine), increased CGN was associated with preference for feminine occupations. The present research corroborates past findings and furnishes support for the conclusion that female-typical occupational preferences are a cross-culturally invariant aspect of male androphilia. (shrink)

It now seems technically feasible to culture human embryos beyond the “fourteen‐day limit,” which has the potential to increase scientific understanding of human development and perhaps improve infertility treatments. The fourteen‐day limit was adopted as a compromise but subsequently has been considered an ethical line. Does it remain relevant in light of technological advances permitting embryo maturation beyond it? Should it be changed and, if so, how and why? What justifications would be necessary to expand the limit, particularly given that (...) doing so would violate some people's moral commitments regarding human embryos? Robust stakeholder engagement preceded adoption of the fourteen‐day limit and should arguably be part of efforts to reassess it. Such engagement could also consider the need for enhanced oversight of human embryo research. In the meantime, developing and implementing reliable oversight systems should help foster high‐quality research and public confidence in it. (shrink)

It now seems technically feasible to culture human embryos beyond the “fourteen‐day limit,” which has the potential to increase scientific understanding of human development and perhaps improve infertility treatments. The fourteen‐day limit was adopted as a compromise but subsequently has been considered an ethical line. Does it remain relevant in light of technological advances permitting embryo maturation beyond it? Should it be changed and, if so, how and why? What justifications would be necessary to expand the limit, particularly given that (...) doing so would violate some people's moral commitments regarding human embryos? Robust stakeholder engagement preceded adoption of the fourteen‐day limit and should arguably be part of efforts to reassess it. Such engagement could also consider the need for enhanced oversight of human embryo research. In the meantime, developing and implementing reliable oversight systems should help foster high‐quality research and public confidence in it. (shrink)

The current study used cross-modal oddball tasks to examine cardiac and behavioral responses to changing auditory and visual information. When instructed to press the same button for auditory and visual oddballs, auditory dominance was found with cross-modal presentation slowing down visual response times more than auditory response times (Experiment 1). When instructed to make separate responses to auditory and visual oddballs, visual dominance was found with cross-modal presentation decreasing auditory discrimination and participants also made more visual-based than auditory-based errors on (...) cross-modal trials (Experiment 2). Experiment 3 increased task demands while requiring a single button press and found evidence of auditory dominance, suggesting that it is unlikely that increased task demands can account for the reversal in Experiment 2. Auditory processing speed was the best predictor of auditory dominance, with auditory dominance being stronger in participants who were slower at processing the sounds, whereas, auditory and visual processing speed and baseline heart rate variability did not predict visual dominance. Examination of cardiac responses that were time-locked with stimulus onset showed cross-modal facilitation effects, with auditory and visual discrimination occurring earlier in the course of processing in the cross-modal condition than in the unimodal conditions. The current findings showing that response demand manipulations reversed modality dominance and that time-locked cardiac responses show cross-modal facilitation, not interference, suggest that auditory and visual dominance effects may both be occurring later in the course of processing, not from disrupted encoding. (shrink)

Prior research has shown the importance of institutional pressures in investigating corporate environmental behaviour. To date, the literature has been lacking in survey-based reflective measures of institutional pressures. This paper focuses on the development of reflective measures of coercive, mimetic, and normative isomorphism.

Physicians generally recommend that patients resuscitated with naloxone after opioid overdose stay in the emergency department for a period of observation in order to prevent harm from delayed sequelae of opioid toxicity. Patients frequently refuse this period of observation despiteenefit to risk. Healthcare providers are thus confronted with the challenge of how best to protect the patient’s interests while also respecting autonomy, including assessing whether the patient is making an autonomous choice to refuse care. Previous studies have shown that physicians (...) have widely divergent approaches to navigating these conflicts. This paper reviews what is known about the effects of opioid use disorder on decision-making, and argues that some subset of these refusals are non-autonomous choices, even when patients appear to have decision making capacity. This conclusion has several implications for how physicians assess and respond to patients refusing medical recommendations after naloxone resuscitation. (shrink)

Toward a Science of Consciousnessmarks the first major gathering -- a landmark event -- devoted entirely to unlocking the mysteries of consciousness.

DBS Think Tank IX was held on August 25–27, 2021 in Orlando FL with US based participants largely in person and overseas participants joining by video conferencing technology. The DBS Think Tank was founded in 2012 and provides an open platform where clinicians, engineers and researchers can freely discuss current and emerging deep brain stimulation technologies as well as the logistical and ethical issues facing the field. The consensus among the DBS Think Tank IX speakers was that DBS expanded in (...) its scope and has been applied to multiple brain disorders in an effort to modulate neural circuitry. After collectively sharing our experiences, it was estimated that globally more than 230,000 DBS devices have been implanted for neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. As such, this year’s meeting was focused on advances in the following areas: neuromodulation in Europe, Asia and Australia; cutting-edge technologies, neuroethics, interventional psychiatry, adaptive DBS, neuromodulation for pain, network neuromodulation for epilepsy and neuromodulation for traumatic brain injury. (shrink)

Quantum aspects of brain activity and the role of consciousness. Proceedings of the National ... Casti, JL 1996. Confronting science's logical limits. ...

This volume presents a selection of invited papers from the second conference, held in April 1996.

There is a section in Samuel Delany’s magnificent autobiographical meditation, The Motion of Light in Water, that dramatically raises the problem of writing the history of difference, the history, that is, of the designation of “other,” of the attribution of characteristics that distinguish categories of people from some presumed norm.1 Delany recounts his reaction to his first visit to the St. Marks bathhouse in 1963. He remembers standing on the threshold of a “gym-sized room” dimly lit by blue bulbs. The (...) room was full of people, some standing, the rest an undulating mass of naked, male bodies, spread wall to wall. My first response was a kind of heart-thudding astonishment very close to fear. I have written of a space at certain libidinal saturation before. That was not what frightened me. It was rather that the saturation was not only kinesthetic but visible.2Watching the scene establishes for Delany a “fact that flew in the face” of the prevailing representation of homosexuals in the 1950s as “isolated perverts,” as subjects “gone awry.” The “apprehension of massed bodies” gave him a “sense of political power”:what this experience said was that there was a population—not of individual homosexuals … not of hundreds, not of thousands, but rather of millions of gay men, and that history had, actively and already, created for us whole galleries of institutions, good and bad, to accommodate our sex. [M, p. 174] 2. Samuel R. Delany, The Motion of Light in Water: Sex and Science Fiction Writing in the East Village, 1957-1965 , p. 173; hereafter abbreviated M. Joan W. Scott is professor of social science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. She is the author, most recently, of Gender and the Politics of History and is currently at work on a history of feminist claims for political rights in France during the period 1789-1945 as a way of exploring arguments about equality and difference. (shrink)

Presents a plethora of approaches to developing human potential in areas not conventionally addressed. Organized in two parts, this international collection of essays provides viable educational alternatives to those currently holding sway in an era of high-stakes accountability.

It is widely assumed that common sense psychological explanations of human action are a species of causal explanation. I argue against this construal, drawing on Ramsey et al.'s paper, “Connectionism, eliminativism, and the future of folk psychology”. I argue that if certain connec-tionist models are correct, then mental states cannot be identified with functionally discrete causes of behavior, and I respond to some recent attempts to deny this claim. However, I further contend that our common sense psychological practices are not (...) committed to the falsity of such connectionist models. The paper concludes that common sense psychology is not committed to the identification of mental states with functionally discrete causes of behavior, and hence that common sense psychology is not committed to the causal account of action explanation. (shrink)

We offer a topological treatment of scattered theories intended to help to explain the parallelism between, on the one hand, the theorems provable using Descriptive Set Theory by analysis of the space of countable models and, on the other, those provable by studying a tree of theories in a hierarchy of fragments of infinintary logic. We state some theorems which are, we hope, a step on the road to fully understanding counterexamples to Vaught's Conjecture. This framework is in the early (...) stages of development, and one area for future exploration is the possibility of extending it to a setting in which the spaces of types of a theory are uncountable. (shrink)

© 2015, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.Genetic studies have identified single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with the risk of prostate cancer. It remains unclear whether such genetic variants are associated with disease aggressiveness. The NCI-SPORE Genetics Working Group retrospectively collected clinicopathologic information and genotype data for 36 SNPs which at the time had been validated to be associated with PC risk from 25,674 cases with PC. Cases were grouped according to race, Gleason score and aggressiveness. Statistical analyses were used to compare the frequency (...) of the SNPs between different disease cohorts. After adjusting for multiple testing, only PC-risk SNP rs2735839 was significantly and inversely associated with aggressive and high-grade disease in European men. Similar associations with aggressive and high-grade disease were documented in African-American subjects. The G allele of rs2735839 was associated with disease aggressiveness even at low PSA levels in both European and African-American men. Our results provide further support that a PC-risk SNP rs2735839 near the KLK3 gene on chromosome 19q13 may be associated with aggressive and high-grade PC. Future prospectively designed, case-case GWAS are needed to identify additional SNPs associated with PC aggressiveness. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Peacebuilding: Catholic Theology, Ethics, and Praxis ed. by Robert J. Schreiter, R. Scott Appleby, Gerard F. PowersJames W. McCarty IIIPeacebuilding: Catholic Theology, Ethics, and Praxis Edited by Robert J. Schreiter, R. Scott Appleby, and Gerard F. Powers Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2010. 480pp. $27.00Peacebuilding results from a four-year research project sponsored by the Catholic Peacebuilding Network. A wide-ranging and interdisciplinary set of fifteen essays, Peacebuilding not only brings (...) to the fore the unique ways that Roman Catholic theology and practice has contributed to the global work of peacebuilding, but it also makes the case that the Catholic Church needs to develop a more robust theology of peacebuilding to complement and strengthen traditional Catholic approaches to the ethics of war and peace. The two most bold proposals along these lines are Daniel Philpott’s call for a papal encyclical on peacebuilding (92, 120) and Maryann Cusimano Love’s proposal of “just peace” criteria for guiding peacebuilding work in a fashion similar to the way “just war” criteria have guided the conduct of war (82, 425–27).Peacebuilding is organized into two main sections. The first documents and theorizes the work of Catholic actors and organizations in peacebuilding work. In one of the most helpful essays in this section, John Paul Lederach describes how the “ubiquitous presence” of the Catholic Church in a society is, in fact, one of the most unique contributions the Church has to make to global peacebuilding. Lederach uses the phrase “ubiquitous presence” to describe the unique role Catholic “actors” play within the “pyramid approach” to peacebuilding that he develops elsewhere (see Lederach, The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Peacebuilding [New York: Oxford University Press, 2005], 79). Because of its hierarchical structure, the Catholic Church—especially in Catholic-majority countries—has the potential to cultivate peacebuilding allies among different sectors of a society: the elite, “midlevel” actors, and at the grassroots level. Many other peacebuilding actors—politicians, civil society activists, and the historic peace churches, for instance—do not have such a ubiquitous presence. While Lederach has previously emphasized the importance of midlevel actors in peacebuilding, in this essay he argues that the “ubiquitous presence” of the Catholic Church [End Page 213] in a society provides a basis for making connections for peacebuilding work among a range of sectors within a society. Several of the other contributors to this book draw on this observation and demonstrate its usefulness to a variety of settings. In my estimation, this is the most important contribution of the volume.The second section consists of six essays that both expand upon existing Catholic moral theology and make the case that Catholic theology needs to develop a more robust theology of peacebuilding. Here we find a range of arguments—from Robert Schreiter’s proposal for a practical theology of reconciliation and Peter Phan’s outline of a fourfold Catholic understanding of interreligious dialogue to Kenneth Himes’s discussion of the ways peacebuilding theory challenges and complements contemporary Catholic social teaching. Himes, in particular, claims that the current acceptance of a Catholic “presumption against war” requires a more robust Catholic approach to conflict transformation; in making his case, he draws on resonances between contemporary peacebuilding theory and recent reflections on jus post bellum (justice after war) as a new category of just war thinking.As in nearly every edited collection, the quality of the essays in Peacebuilding varies. I found the essays in the first section to be the most stimulating. Not only do they highlight the peacebuilding work the Catholic Church is currently doing around the world, they also ground their proposals for how we should understand and do peacebuilding from a Catholic perspective in relevant historical examples.Indeed, the varied nature of the essays in Peacebuilding is precisely what makes it a valuable resource for both researchers and teachers of peacebuilding. On the one hand, it includes essays that break new ground and move forward our understanding of the unique nature of Catholic peacebuilding. On the other, it includes essays that introduce the topic of peacebuilding to students of religion and ethics. This book, then, serves as an excellent resource for a range... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Peacebuilding: Catholic Theology, Ethics, and Praxis ed. by Robert J. Schreiter, R. Scott Appleby, Gerard F. PowersJames W. McCarty IIIPeacebuilding: Catholic Theology, Ethics, and Praxis Edited by Robert J. Schreiter, R. Scott Appleby, and Gerard F. Powers Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2010. 480pp. $27.00Peacebuilding results from a four-year research project sponsored by the Catholic Peacebuilding Network. A wide-ranging and interdisciplinary set of fifteen essays, Peacebuilding not only brings (...) to the fore the unique ways that Roman Catholic theology and practice has contributed to the global work of peacebuilding, but it also makes the case that the Catholic Church needs to develop a more robust theology of peacebuilding to complement and strengthen traditional Catholic approaches to the ethics of war and peace. The two most bold proposals along these lines are Daniel Philpott’s call for a papal encyclical on peacebuilding (92, 120) and Maryann Cusimano Love’s proposal of “just peace” criteria for guiding peacebuilding work in a fashion similar to the way “just war” criteria have guided the conduct of war (82, 425–27).Peacebuilding is organized into two main sections. The first documents and theorizes the work of Catholic actors and organizations in peacebuilding work. In one of the most helpful essays in this section, John Paul Lederach describes how the “ubiquitous presence” of the Catholic Church in a society is, in fact, one of the most unique contributions the Church has to make to global peacebuilding. Lederach uses the phrase “ubiquitous presence” to describe the unique role Catholic “actors” play within the “pyramid approach” to peacebuilding that he develops elsewhere (see Lederach, The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Peacebuilding [New York: Oxford University Press, 2005], 79). Because of its hierarchical structure, the Catholic Church—especially in Catholic-majority countries—has the potential to cultivate peacebuilding allies among different sectors of a society: the elite, “midlevel” actors, and at the grassroots level. Many other peacebuilding actors—politicians, civil society activists, and the historic peace churches, for instance—do not have such a ubiquitous presence. While Lederach has previously emphasized the importance of midlevel actors in peacebuilding, in this essay he argues that the “ubiquitous presence” of the Catholic Church [End Page 213] in a society provides a basis for making connections for peacebuilding work among a range of sectors within a society. Several of the other contributors to this book draw on this observation and demonstrate its usefulness to a variety of settings. In my estimation, this is the most important contribution of the volume.The second section consists of six essays that both expand upon existing Catholic moral theology and make the case that Catholic theology needs to develop a more robust theology of peacebuilding. Here we find a range of arguments—from Robert Schreiter’s proposal for a practical theology of reconciliation and Peter Phan’s outline of a fourfold Catholic understanding of interreligious dialogue to Kenneth Himes’s discussion of the ways peacebuilding theory challenges and complements contemporary Catholic social teaching. Himes, in particular, claims that the current acceptance of a Catholic “presumption against war” requires a more robust Catholic approach to conflict transformation; in making his case, he draws on resonances between contemporary peacebuilding theory and recent reflections on jus post bellum (justice after war) as a new category of just war thinking.As in nearly every edited collection, the quality of the essays in Peacebuilding varies. I found the essays in the first section to be the most stimulating. Not only do they highlight the peacebuilding work the Catholic Church is currently doing around the world, they also ground their proposals for how we should understand and do peacebuilding from a Catholic perspective in relevant historical examples.Indeed, the varied nature of the essays in Peacebuilding is precisely what makes it a valuable resource for both researchers and teachers of peacebuilding. On the one hand, it includes essays that break new ground and move forward our understanding of the unique nature of Catholic peacebuilding. On the other, it includes essays that introduce the topic of peacebuilding to students of religion and ethics. This book, then, serves as an excellent resource for a range... (shrink)

Until the late twentieth century, there were three main political currents in the Netherlands: Christian, Labor, and Liberal, giving Christian party politics a stronger position than in European countries with a binary division between conservative and progressive. The history of the debate about embryo research coincides with the end of this period. Whereas in the 1980s the Christian Democrat party still had strong religiously motivated views about embryo protection, it has since lost both the power and the drive to pursue (...) this. However, due to strategic opportunities arising in the margin of Dutch coalition politics, smaller parties inspired by Christian belief are still quite influential on issues of medical ethics in the highly fragmented political landscape of the present. (shrink)