Normal 0 false false false EN-US JA X-NONE In what sense is the self, as Ricœur conceives it, a vulnerable self? We shall argue that vulnerability, as far as it concerns the self, can be approached on three levels: reflexive, of human abilities and ontological. However, if Ricœur helps us think human fragility and thus define a new concept of self, vulnerability remains understood in the framework of a reflection on human acting of which it is, in a certain way, (...) the negative. Autonomy, as the culminating point of acting, remains the ultimate goal. For us, approaching vulnerability from such a reference point ought to be put into question: does it enable us to really determine what vulnerability is? In order to answer this question, we will confront Ricœur’s conception of vulnerability with levinasian ethics. Indeed, Levinas operates a double reversal: not only does vulnerability come first, but in addition, vulnerability is of the other before being of the self. Normal 0 false false false EN-US JA X-NONE. (shrink)

Computing formulae and solving equations are essential elements of scientific analysis. While today digital tools are almost always applied, analog computing is a rich part of the larger history of science and technology. Graphical methods are an integral element of computing history and still find some use today. This paper presents the history of nomograms, a historically-relevant tool for solving mathematical problems in various branches of science and engineering; in particular, we consider their role in mechanical engineering, especially for education, (...) and discuss their mathematical properties. Each nomogram is a graphical description of a specific mathematical equation, designed such that the solution can be found through a simple geometric construction that can be performed with a straightedge. By design, using nomograms requires little skills and can be done even in adverse environments; a solution of sufficient accuracy for most purposes can then be found in a very short time. Another important advantage of nomograms is that they offer clear insight on the relationships between the variables, an insight which can be lost by looking at a complex equation. First introduced in the late $$19^{\textrm{th}}$$ century, nomograms were used by engineers and scientists due to their speed with respect to manual calculations, before being superseded by computers. While now mostly obsolete in practice, nomograms can still prove useful in workshops and teaching classes: we thus also discuss their educational applications and present a few original examples. (shrink)

Nous voudrions, à partir de la prise en compte de la vulnérabilité humaine et de la réponse à y apporter, questionner la conception ricœurienne de l’homme capable. Au sein des théories morales contemporaines dominantes, la vulnérabilité fait figure d’oubliée. C’est en effet plutôt à partir d’une conception de l’individu considéré comme autonome qu’elles se sont élaborées. Pourtant, qui n’a pas expérimenté au cours de sa vie des périodes de vulnérabilité? L’enfance peut, à cet égard, être tenue pour paradigmatique. C’est cette (...) expérience humaine universelle de fragilité que les éthiques du care visent à penser et dont elles cherchent à rendre visible la valeur morale. Elles partent du constat qu’en tant qu’êtres incarnés, nous avons besoin des autres pour satisfaire nos besoins fondamentaux. Humains, nous sommes des êtres de relation : nous dépendons des autres. Ce qui nous porte, ce qui permet à la vie de se maintenir, c’est le souci dont d’autres font preuve à notre endroit, c’est-à-dire l’attention à nos besoins et l’activité pratique consistant à y répondre, autrement dit, une « capacité de care ». Or, si Ricœur, dans son anthropologie philosophique, fait certes la part belle à la vulnérabilité, s’il reconnaît que l’homme capable est tout autant homme fragile, quelle réponse, cependant, apporte-t-il à la vulnérabilité? Certes, il nous montre que les capacités humaines peuvent faire place à leur envers : la capacité à dire, par exemple, se muer en impuissance à maîtriser le verbe. Il reconnaît donc tout à fait que l’actualisation de nos pouvoirs n’est pas garantie. Mais, voudrions-nous demander : qu’est-ce qui vient alors soutenir ces pouvoirs? Qu’est-ce qui leur permet de se déployer? Qu’est-ce qui leur permet de se restaurer? Prenant appui sur les éthiques du care, nous nous proposons de développer l’hypothèse selon laquelle l’actualisation des pouvoirs du soi dépendrait, fondamentalement, de relations de care. Les différentes capacités humaines que Ricœur décline et déploie ne sont-elles pas, au fond, soutenues par la capacité de care dont dépend, du début à la fin de sa vie, le soi? (shrink)

Essays devoted to the legal thought of Thomas Hobbes, arguably the greatest political philosopher to write in English.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Neo-Idealist Reception of Kant in the Moscow Psychological SocietyRandall A. Poole*The Moscow Psychological Society, founded in 1885 at Moscow University, was the philosophical center of the revolt against positivism in the Russian Silver Age. By the end of its activity in 1922 it had played the major role in the growth of professional philosophy in Russia. 1 The Society owes its name to its founder, M. M. (...) Troitsky (1835–99), an empiricist psychologist. Although it sponsored significant psychological research, its greater importance in the history of Russian philosophy began to emerge already in 1888, when Nikolai Ia. Grot (1852–99) took over as director. Grot’s principal colleagues in the affairs of the Society included the major Russian idealist philosophers Vladimir S. Solov’ev (1853–1900), Sergei N. Trubetskoi (1862–1905), and Lev M. Lopatin (1855–1920). In 1889 the Psychological Society began publication of Russia’s first regular, specialized journal in philosophy, Questions of Philosophy and Psychology (Voprosy Filosofii i Psikhologii). Grot characterized the journal’s prevailing direction as idealist or, “in respect to method, metaphysical.” 2While the cultural revival of the Silver Age mounted a broad-based revolt against positivism, neo-idealist philosophy in the Psychological Society was distinctive in the theoretical depth of its critique. Positivism was remarkably pervasive [End Page 319] in Russia from the middle of the nineteenth century. The main characteristics of this positivist Weltanschauung were reductionism, which dismissed as a meaningless proposition (neither analytic nor empirical) the possibility of being beyond the positively-given data of sense experience, i.e., phenomena in space and time; scientism, the claim, consistent with the positivist reduction of being to natural phenomena, that the methodology of the natural sciences covered eve-rything; and utopianism, the hope that the application of natural scientific methods to man and society would make human existence as regular and well-ordered as nature. 3 The defining trait was reductionism or, in other words, naturalism or atheism: the reduction of being to nature. In ethics, epistemology, ontology, and social philosophy neo-idealism emerged as a response to these characteristics. Its development by philosophers in the Psychological Society, apart from comprising a basic chapter in the history of Russian thought, informs the European-wide revolt against positivism characteristic of fin-de-siècle culture.According to scientistic positivism, philosophy had no distinctive methodology and thus no legitimate right to exist as its own type of scientific (nauchnyi or wissenschaftlich) discipline. Empirical sciences were the only sciences; philosophy could at best serve as a field that systematized empirical research. Against these claims Russian neo-idealists sought to advance the autonomy of philosophy by showing that the positivist measure of reality was far from exhaustive and that what it did not exhaust comprised the domain of philosophy. This domain was human consciousness itself, to the extent it could be shown to be irreducible to empirical experience (the positivist sphere). Neo-idealism thus took shape as a type of philosophy of consciousness. In the inaugural issue of Questions of Philosophy and Psychology S. N. Trubetskoi published the first installment of a large essay bearing the title, “On the Nature of Human Consciousness.” “The question of the nature of consciousness is the principal question of philosophy, not only of psychology,” Trubetskoi wrote, “for in consciousness we know everything that we know.” 4 Trubetskoi and his colleagues in the Psychological Society were convinced that philosophy had to develop through specification of its own internal standards and through autonomization from the spurious criteria positivism applied externally to it. Their goal was to match, in theoretical rigor, the professionalism associated with the natural sciences by making philosophy “scientific,” but on idealist, not empirical grounds. [End Page 320]The Kantian Critique of PositivismIn their defense of the self against positivist reductionism and naturalism, neo-idealists of the Psychological Society were deeply indebted to Kant, in both epistemology and moral philosophy. This claim revises the traditional view that Russian philosophy developed without significant assistance from Kant. 5In two ways Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason defends the minimal idealist claim that not everything intellectual can be reduced to the natural (sensible or psychological), that consciousness cannot... (shrink)

This paper examines the cosmological theories of Francis Lodwick (1619-94), the Fellow of the Royal Society, language theorist and close associate of Robert Hooke, concentrating on some unnoticed manuscripts he wrote on this issue. It is demonstrated that Lodwick's account of creation acts as a commentary on the opening chapters of Genesis, influenced in equal measures by the new corpuscular philosophy, and by the heretical, messianic ideas of the Frenchman Isaac La Peyrere, whose Prae-Adamitae (1655) so shocked European scholars. Such (...) a conclusion emphasizes that in the case of Lodwick no clear distinction between biblical criticism and natural philosophy can be maintained, and that the theological ideas he brought to his vortical model of creation were strongly heretical. Such a situation contradicts the proposition insisted upon by early apologists for the Royal Society that the institutionalizing of scientific work would promote orthodox Christianity. (shrink)

First published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This paper argues that management practices are more readily portable across the sectors than has often been supposed, while indicating where particular care will be needed in translation. The paper suggests, however, that political pressure for control and an epistemological bias may prove to be management's Achilles heel. Further, it examines some dilemmas in the relationship between the manager and the managed, and queries the professions' outrage at being subject to increasingly overt management.

Provides an integrated introduction to artificial intelligence. Develops AI representation schemes and describes their uses for diverse applications, from autonomous robots to diagnostic assistants to infobots. DLC: Artificial intelligence.

Ross Poole displays the social content of the various conceptions of morality at work in contemporary society, and casts a strikingly fresh light on such fundamental problems as the place of reason in ethics, moral objectivity and the distinction between duty and virtue. The book provides a critical account of the moral theories of a number of major philosophers, including Kant, Marx, Nietzsche, Habermas, Rawls, Gewirth and MacIntyre. It also presents a systematic critique of three of the most significant (...) responses to modernity: liberalism, nationalism and nihilism. It takes seriously the suggestion that men and women are subject to different conceptions of morality, and places the issue of gender at the centre of moral philosophy. Poole has written a valuable addition to the Ideas series. (shrink)

A code of ethics is used by individuals to justify their actions within an environment. Medical professionals require a keen understanding of specific ethical codes due to the potential consequences of their actions. Over the past thirty years there has been an increase in the scope and depth of ethics instruction in the medical profession; however the teaching of these codes is still highly variable. This inconsistency in implementation is problematic both for the medical practitioner and for the patient; without (...) standardized training, neither party can be assured of the practitioner's overall depth of knowledge. Within the field of ethics certain principles have reached a consensus of importance. Incorporation of these concepts in meaningful ways via a consistent curriculum would provide students with an appropriate skill set for navigating their ethical environment. Moreover, this curriculum should also be extended to residents and professionals who may have missed formal ethical training. This would provide a consistent framework of knowledge for practitioners, creating a basis for clear judgment of complex issues. (shrink)

The jury remains out about the bottom-line relevance of organisational spirituality. This article reviews the arguments made thus far, using those sources most commonly cited as providing ‹evidence’ that organisational spirituality adds value to the bottom line. Having collated the evidence, this article offers some observation about the robustness of this existing ‹business case’. It then offers some preliminary conclusions on the literature review, examining the merits of pursuing a ‹business case’ in this field and identifying some specific questions for (...) future research. (shrink)

Two problems involving Thucydides and medicine have attracted intense treatment by classical scholars and medical men working separately or in combination. They are, first, the nature of the Athenian Plague which Thucydides describes and, second, the possibility of his having been influenced by the doctrines and outlook of Hippocrates and his followers. It is the purpose of the present paper to reconsider both these problems, to indicate some false assumptions made in the methodology of previous attempts to identify the Plague, (...) and to suggest a somewhat radical revaluation of Thucydides' approach to medical matters compared with that of Hippocrates. (shrink)

Numerous scenarios explain the origin of the eukaryote cell by fusion or endosymbiosis between an archaeon and a bacterium (and sometimes a third partner). We evaluate these hypotheses using the following three criteria. Can the data be explained by the null hypothesis that new features arise sequentially along a stem lineage? Second, hypotheses involving an archaeon and a bacterium should undergo standard phylogenetic tests of gene distribution. Third, accounting for past events by processes observed in modern cells is preferable to (...) postulating unknown processes that have never been observed. For example, there are many eukaryote examples of bacteria as endosymbionts or endoparasites, but none known in archaea. Strictly post‐hoc hypotheses that ignore this third criterion should be avoided. Applying these three criteria significantly narrows the number of plausible hypotheses. Given current knowledge, our conclusion is that the eukaryote lineage must have diverged from an ancestor of archaea well prior to the origin of the mitochondrion. Significantly, the absence of ancestrally amitochondriate eukaryotes (archezoa) among extant eukaryotes is neither evidence for an archaeal host for the ancestor of mitochondria, nor evidence against a eukaryotic host. BioEssays 29: 74–84, 2007. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Prokaryotes are generally assumed to be the oldest existing form of life on earth. This assumption, however, makes it difficult to understand certain aspects of the transition from earlier stages in the origin of life to more complex ones, and it does not account for many apparently ancient features in the eukaryotes. From a model of the RNA world, based on relic RNA species in modern organisms, one can infer that there was an absolute requirement for a high-accuracy RNA replicase (...) even before proteins evolved. In addition, we argue here that the ribosome (together with the RNAs involved in its assembly) is so large that it must have had a prior function before protein synthesis. A model that connects and equates these two requirements (high-accuracy RNA replicase and prior function of the ribosome) can explain many steps in the origin of life while accounting for the observation that eukaryotes have retained more vestiges of the RNA world. The later derivation of prokaryote RNA metabolism and genome structure can be accounted for by the two complementary mechanisms of r-selection and thermoreduction. BioEssays 21:880–889, 1999. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

Nation and Identity provides a concise and comprehensive account of the place of national identity in modern life. Ross Poole argues that the nation became a fundamental organising principle of social, political and moral life during the period of early modernity and that is has provided the organising principle of much liberal, republican and democratic thought. Ross Poole offers us a new and urgently needed analysis of the concept of identity, arguing that we are now in a position (...) to envisage the end of nationalism. We see that the impact of issues like multiculturalism, republicanism, and indigenous rights have made it very difficult to see how the possibility of a postnational cosmopolitanism could not degenerate into a nihilistic moral universe. Nation and Identity will be a fascinating read for all those interested in issues of national identity, both politically and philosophically. (shrink)

We reflect, using a vignette, on conceptual tensions and the value judgements that lie behind difficult decisions about whether or not the older person with dementia should return home or move into long-term care following hospital admission. The paper seeks, first, to expose some of the difficulties arising from the assessment of residence capacity, particularly around the nature of evaluative judgements and conceptual tensions inherent in the legal approach to capacity. Secondly, we consider the assessment of best interests around place (...) of residence, which demonstrates significant conceptual tensions. In addition, ‘best interests’ raise issues around the perception of risk and the perceptions of the family and crucially involve the notions of autonomy and trust. Finally, we not only gesture at some practical considerations based on insights from values-based medicine, but also make the suggestion that we require tighter functional assessments of residence capacity coupled with broader judgements about best interests. (shrink)

Commentators have sometimes interpreted Arendt’s criticism of the use of measures in politics as leading to an anti-idealistic vision of politics that prioritizes sui generis action over normatively guided action. In this essay, I argue that Arendt was more ambivalent on the role of measures in politics than has often been supposed. I argue, first, that Arendt’s criticism of measures in The Human Condition extends only as far as instrumental kinds derived from extra-worldly sources, like a transcendent realm of forms (...) or an immanent realm of passions or cognitions. Second, I argue that Arendt prepares for an appropriately political conception of measures within The Human Condition, thus linking that text to her later writings on judgment where exempla are suggested as fulfilling this role. Finally, I summarize how exempla satisfy a conception of measures consistent with worldliness, plurality and natality. (shrink)

This article critically reviews what is known about the ethical status of psychologists’ putative involvement with enhanced interrogations and torture. We examine three major normative ethical accounts of EITs and conclude, contra the American Psychological Association, that reasonable arguments can be made that in certain cases the use of EITs is ethical and even, in certain circumstances, morally obligatory. We suggest that this moral question is complex as it has competing moral values involved, that is, the humane treatment of detainee (...) competes with the ethical value/duty/virtue of protecting innocent third parties. We also suggest that there is an ethical duty to minimize harm by making only judicious and morally responsible allegations against the psychologists alleged to be involved in EITs. Finally, we make recommendations regarding completing the historical record, improvements in the professional ethics code, and the moral treatment of individuals accused in this controversy. (shrink)

The vector product method developed in previous articles for space rotations and Lorentz transformations is extended to the cases of four-vectors, anti-symmetric tensors, and their transformations in Minkowski space. The electromagnetic fields are expressed in “six-vector” form using the notationH +iE, and this vector form is shown to be relativistically invariant. The wave equations of electromagnetism are derived using these vector products. The following three equations are deduced, which summarize electrodynamics in a compact form: (1) Maxwell's four equations expressed as (...) one, (2) the scalar and vector potential wave equations combined into one relation, and (3) the wave equations for the electric and magnetic fields and the continuity equation combined together. Space inversion, time reversal, and magnetic monopoles are also treated. (shrink)

It has been theorized that the contagion of behaviors may be related to social cognitive abilities, but empirical findings are inconsistent. We recorded young adults’ behavioral expression of contagious yawning and contagious smiling to video stimuli and employed a multi-method assessment of sociocognitive abilities including self-reported internal experience of emotional contagion, self-reported trait empathy, accuracy on a theory of mind task, and observed helping behavior. Results revealed that contagious yawners reported increases in tiredness from pre- to post-video stimuli exposure, providing (...) support for the internal experience of emotional contagion, and were more likely to provide help to the experimenter relative to non-contagious yawners. Contagious smilers showed stably high levels of self-reported happiness from pre- to post-video exposure, were more likely to provide help to the experimenter, and had increased accuracy on a theory of mind task relative to non-contagious smilers. There were no differences in self-reported trait empathy for contagious versus non-contagious yawners or smilers. Contagious yawning may be related to some basic (i.e., emotional contagion) and advanced (i.e., helping behavior) sociocognitive processes, whereas contagious smiling is related to some advanced sociocognitive processes (i.e., theory of mind and helping behavior). (shrink)

Arrigo, DeBatto, Rockwood, and Mawe take issue with a number of arguments in our previous article. We respond in four major ways: pointing out that they never really take on, let alone refute, the key argument in our article—that utilitarian, deontic, and virtue ethical theories are not only consistent with the use of enhanced interrogation and torture in the ticking time bomb scenario but these prescribe it; there are numerous other exegetical problems in their article; they make unsubstantiated claims about (...) the ineffectiveness of EITSLs techniques that we argue are much too strong; and they conflate the ethical with the legal and but even in doing so miss many important issues regarding the legality of EITSLs in the war on terrorism. (shrink)

This article reports a corpus-aided ecological discourse analysis of texts from an international mining company and an environmental advocacy group regarding a proposal to build a massive open-pit copper mine in the Santa Rita Mountains of Arizona, USA. The analysis details the grammatical and semantic clusters within the controversial environmental debate and how these clusters reflect the values and beliefs of each group as well as their conceptualization of the mountains and the environment. The integration of the ecolinguistic framework with (...) corpus linguistic methods of keyword analysis as well as part of speech and semantic tag analysis facilitated the identification of clusters of linguistic features perpetuating a dominant and ultimately destructive cultural discourse that places humans in a role of dominion and authority over the environment in the company texts. In contrast, clusters within the oppositional discourse forwarded by the environmental group promote the aesthetic value of the land and a need for responsible environmental stewardship. (shrink)

Journal Name: The Law & Ethics of Human Rights Issue: Ahead of print.