This paper explores prevailing notions about gender, based on African realities, and their possible implications for the education of girls. Without ignoring the basic parameters articulated by European and American feminist movements, this paper takes the stand that an understanding of gender in the context of African realities is fundamentally connected to questions about the cultural identity, social experience, interests, and priorities of the purveyors of feminist knowledge or feminists positions across the African continent. The main goal is to render (...) the concept of gender, and subsequently girl-child education, within an approach that is more realistic and consistent with the history of women vis-à-vis their station in present-day, postcolonial Africa. (shrink)

I-Language introduces the uninitiated to linguistics as cognitive science. In an engaging, down-to-earth style Daniela Isac and Charles Reiss give a crystal-clear demonstration of the application of the scientific method in linguistic theory. Their presentation of the research programme inspired and led by Noam Chomsky shows how the focus of theory and research in linguistics shifted from treating language as a disembodied, human-external entity to cognitive biolinguistics - the study of language as a human cognitive system embedded within the (...) mind/brain of each individual. The recurring theme of equivalence classes in linguistic computation ties together the presentation of material from phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics. The same theme is used to help students understand the place of linguistics in the broader context of the cognitive sciences, by drawing on examples from vision, audition, and even animal cognition.This textbook is unique in its integration of empirical issues of linguistic analysis, engagement with philosophical questions that arise in the study of language, and treatment of the history of the field. Topics ranging from allophony to reduplication, ergativity, and negative polarity are invoked to show the implications of findings in cognitive biolinguistics for philosophical issues like reference, the mind-body problem, and nature-nurture debates.This textbook contains numerous exercises and guides for further reading as well as ideas for student projects. A companion website with guidance for instructors and answers to the exercises features a series of pdf slide presentations to accompany the teaching of each topic. (shrink)

It is widely believed that we ought not to criticize others for wrongs that we ourselves have committed. The author draws out and challenges some of the background assumptions about the practice of criticism that underlie our attraction to this claim, such as the tendency to think of criticism either as a social sanction or as a didactic intervention. The author goes on to offer a taxonomy of cases in which the moral legitimacy of criticism is challenged on the grounds (...) that the critic him- or herself engages in the behavior that he or she criticizes in others. The author argues that, in each type of case, the would-be critics should not constrain their participation in moral discourse on the grounds that they are not themselves innocent of the wrongdoing they criticize in others. (shrink)

This paper explores a distinctive form of social interaction—interpersonal inquiry—in which two or more people attempt to understand one another by engaging in conversation. Like many modes of inquiry into human beings, interpersonal inquiry partly shapes its own objects. How we conduct it thus affects who we become. I present an ethical ideal of conversation to which, I argue, at least some of our interpersonal inquiry ought to aspire. I then consider how this ideal might influence philosophical conceptions of the (...) self. (shrink)

Seed libraries are institutions that support the creation of semi-formal seed systems, but are often intended to address larger issues that are part of the “food movement” in the global north. Over 100 SLs are reported present in California. I describe a functional framework for studying and comparing seed systems, and use that to investigate the social and biological characteristics of California SLs in 2016 and how they are contributing to alternative seed systems based on interviews with 45 SL managers. (...) At a minimum, SLs function as new seed distribution institutions founded and overseen by dedicated, values-driven individuals and groups with goals including education, seed access, local adaptation, biodiversity conservation, community-building, and human health. Annually about 4776 people borrow seeds from, and 238 people return seeds to the SLs in this study, that operate through over 17,000 hours of work/year. These SLs distribute approximately 6456 packets of seed annually, mostly of commercial seeds from small seed companies, but some SLs emphasize local and culturally meaningful seeds. The significance of a 6% seed return rate depends on SL goals and can be investigated once appropriate indicators for those goals are identified and documented. Beyond distribution, the seed system functions accomplished by SLs differ, and all can have consequences for the processes shaping the diversity and adaptation of their crops. The SLs engaged in seed system functions beyond distribution are new forms of socially-motivated community science, poised to develop biological and social innovations reflecting their values and interests. (shrink)

Academic dishonesty is a major problem and is thus a highly relevant area of inquiry. Considerable research has shown that key traits from the Big Five model of personality are associated with various forms of anti-social behaviour. To date, however, relatively little research interest has been devoted to study the relationship between personality traits and plagiarism. This study attempts to fill this gap by examining the relationship between the Big Five personality traits and the inclination to commit plagiarism by undergraduate (...) students. The main conclusion is that the inclination to plagiarize is negatively associated with Conscientiousness and Agreeableness traits. Neuroticism was not found to be related to the inclination to plagiarize. Implications of the findings are discussed. (shrink)

Analyses Deleuze's notion of transcendental and genetic Ideas as conditions of creative thought. From his early work in 'Nietzsche and Philosophy' to 'Difference and Repetition', Deleuze develops a unique notion of transcendental philosophy. It comprises a radical critique of the illusions of representation and a genetic model of thought.Engaging with questions of representation, Ideas and the transcendental, Daniela Voss offers a sophisticated treatment of the Kantian aspects of Deleuze's thought, taking account of Leibniz, Maimon, Lautman and Nietzsche along the (...) way. (shrink)

Ist das Politische Macht? Ist es öffentliches Handeln oder die beste Gesellschaftsordnung? Daniela Hüttinger sucht dort nach einer Antwort, wo die historische Wurzel des Politischen vermutet wird: im Griechenland des 5. und 4.

An extensive literature has focused on the impact of new public management oriented structural changes on academics’ practice and identity. These critical studies have been resolute in concluding that NPM inevitably leads to a degeneration of academics’ ethos and values. Drawing from the moral philosophy of Alasdair MacIntyre, we argue that these previous analyses have overlooked the moral agency of the academics and their role in ‘moralizing’ and consequently shaping the ethical nature of their practices. The paper provides a new (...) theoretical understanding of NPM-oriented reforms in light of the virtue ethics approach, thereby directing the attention to the moral character and moral agency of academics. Our analysis of interviews collected in the business department of a Danish university provides an example of how individuals have divergent ethical understandings of these structural changes and enact/resist pre-defined social roles in different ways. While in some cases the NPM agenda of the institutions has triggered internal moral conflict and a crisis of moral character, in other cases the new logic resonates with academics’ values and evaluative standards. Partially departing from the theoretical ground of MacIntyre, we conclude that academics can play a crucial role in shaping the morality of NPM-oriented institutions and in transforming these settings into suitable contexts for the cultivation of virtues. (shrink)

O objetivo deste estudo foi analisar o bem-estar dos trabalhadores da saúde de um centro de reabilitação e readaptação, relacionando-o com a crença no mundo justo e com o lócus de controle. Participaram 146 profissionais que responderam a um questionário formado por perguntas sobre dados sócio-demog..

Estilos parentais e práticas educativas têm sido considerados preditores para o desenvolvimento infantil. Esta pesquisa teve como objetivo realizar um estudo piloto ao investigar e comparar os estilos parentais e as práticas educativas de pais de crianças com TDAH do tipo combinado e desatento. Part..

This paper begins by illustrating how the social model of disability currently dominant in emancipatory disability research projects a reality ‘out there’. Drawing on John Law’s (2004) writing on how statements are turned into taken-for-granted assumptions, we argue that the model of research exemplified by Colin Barnes (2002) stifles rather than enables the emancipatory understanding of disability. We explore how disability research might be otherwise conceived through Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s (1988, 1994) concepts of series, layers and rhizomes. We (...) suggest that by engaging with the intensities offered by the research, instead of standing aloof from them, the researcher can expose herself to new possibilities of understanding disability. Research is rethought as becoming through engagement with intensities rather than as interpretation of a pre-existent reality out there. (shrink)

El presente trabajo tiene por objeto delinear aquellos conceptos centrales de la narración en Walter Benjamin que se despliegan en las lecturas de los cuentos y relatos que forman parte del corpus central del movimiento jasídico. Para ello se analiza la concepción de la experiencia, el uso de las palabras y las alusiones del narrador en ese instante en que, a través del consejo, el maestro transmite sabiduría. El consejo no es una respuesta cerrada ni un saber exclusivo sobre los (...) aspectos metafísicos, sino que es –ante todo– la transmisión del aspecto de unificación del mundo, donde lo cotidiano devela su carácter inexplicable y lo trascendental –en un instante fugaz– se aproxima a la vida misma. Lo que narra el maestro jasídico sucede entre el cielo y la tierra, entre la vida práctica y la mística. La narración no abrevia: se despliega, da cuenta de lo inacabado, del requerimiento de la tarea del hombre en el mundo, de la labor paciente, insistente, del constructo de una artesanía que sólo la convicción –aquello más allá del mero y puro intelecto– y el amor a la letra del texto sagrado puede reavivar. (shrink)

Background: Using the power of Internet, crowdfunding platforms are currently changing the traditional landscape of fundraising. Social media-based IT platforms in particular are bringing the creators of crowdfunding projects closer than ever to potential investors. A large variety of factors function as determinants of individuals' intention to participate in crowdfunding and have an intertwined impact on funding as the ultimate project goal.Objectives: For a better understanding of investor behavior in social media-based crowdfunding projects, this paper covers identifying, analyzing, and classifying (...) general and specific factors of investor motivation, based on the literature in the field.The main focus is the relationship between the affordances provided by social media-based crowdfunding platforms and the psychological determinants of investor motivation in innovative start-up projects.Methods: Using IEEE Explore, Clarivate Web of Science, ScienceDirect, and Scopus, we conducted a systematic review of the existing research on the emerging role of crowdfunding as a disruptive technology in financing the start-up innovative projects. The paper explores the main determinants of investor motivation and aims to streamline the success factors in crowdfunding campaigns.Results: A total of 1,216 publications were identified after searching the aforementioned databases and, upon refining the results, 515 articles were considered for the final sample. After reading the titles and abstracts, the sample was reduced to 78 articles that were read in-depth and synthesized in accordance with the defined research questions. The selected articles were clustered into three main categories: general studies, determinants of investor behavior, and success factors.Conclusions: In the new global economy, crowdfunding platforms have become the nexus between the emerging creators of innovative products and services and the necessary funding sources. This connection is possible via a cumulative collection of contributions from multiple investors recruited from the audience of the selected platform, without time or space constraints. However, the determinants of the investment decision are very different in the case of social media-based crowdfunding platforms compared to determinants in the mainstream environment. This paper surveys these motivators and reveals how platform features can be used to persuade individuals to make a financial contribution toward the success of a project. (shrink)

Justified belief is a core concept in epistemology and there has been an increasing interest in its logic over the last years. While many logical investigations consider justified belief as an operator, in this paper, we propose a logic for justified belief in which the relevant notion is treated as a predicate instead. Although this gives rise to the possibility of liar-like paradoxes, a predicate treatment allows for a rich and highly expressive framework, which lives up to the universal ambitions (...) of investigating epistemological concepts. We start with a base theory for justified belief, and then systematically present putative additional axioms for justified belief. We provide an overview of consistency results when the additional principles are added to the base theory, and discuss their philosophical plausibility. (shrink)

This article analyzes the autofigurative strategies of La travesía by Luisa Valenzuela in terms of the narratives of the self, the Argentine dictatorship and feminism. A correspondence is found between the disavowal of the voice, the structure of the autobiographical account and the portrait of the experience of the violence of the military regime and of gender. Initially, the novel is situated at the height of the narratives of the self that, with literary resources that are separated from the most (...) conservative autobiographical writings, denounce the impossibility of understanding the subject as univocal, while founding different approaches to the retelling of the experience. This location allows exploring the formal experiments that Valenzuela carries out around the autobiographical exercise and that highlight the crisis of the construction of memory and the exposure of contemporary subjectivity. In addition, it is shown how such strategies serve as a vehicle for reflection on feminism and dictatorship that permeate all of her work. For this, Valenzuela's notion of feminine writing is used, which puts the multiplicity of perspectives before the univocity of the autobiographical voice, the ambiguous before the precise, and the collective before the authoritarian. La travesía is, then, read as part of the works that come to the narration of the experience itself in a framework of the retelling of collective memory, with narrative games that point out the deictic futility of the self and the difficulty of recounting past time, without, therefore, abandoning the call for its reconstruction as a guarantee of non-repetition. (shrink)

Daniela Serna investiga y crea sobre el tránsito que se produce entre el objeto verbal de origen literario y el artefacto visual de carácter plástico y estético. Su obra expande la idea de la literatura formal, donde las dimensiones temporales y sensoriales se experimentan en la imaginación del lector, para proponer poemas visuales en los cuales propicia una experiencia de sentido que amplifica o diluye los límites de lo posible. En esta reseña se abordan un conjunto de obras, cuyo (...) eje central permite múltiples lecturas, tamizadas por una reserva de signos ideológicos, políticos y estéticos en los cuales la artista inscribe su obra, y que permiten interrogar la relación entre el mundo ficcional representado y la representación que el lector/espectador realiza. (shrink)

Physicians working in the world of competitive sports face unique ethical challenges, many of which center around conflicts of interest. Team-employed physicians have obligations to act in the club's best interest while caring for the individual athlete. As such, they must balance issues like protecting versus sharing health information, as well as issues regarding autonomous informed consent versus paternalistic decision making in determining whether an athlete may compete safely. Moreover, the physician has to deal with an athlete's decisions about performance (...) enhancement and return to play, pursuit of which may not be in the athlete's long-term best interests but may benefit the athlete and team in the short term. These difficult tasks are complicated by the lack of evidence-based standards in a field influenced by the lure of financial gains for multiple parties involved. In this article, we review ethical issues in sports medicine with specific attention paid to American professional football. (shrink)

The family is commonly regarded as being an important social institution. In several policy areas, evidence can be found that the family is treated as an entity towards which others can have moral obligations; it has needs and interests that require protection; it can be ill and receive treatment. The interests attributed to the family are not reducible to those of its members – and may even come into conflict with them. Using Warren's criteria for moral status, we show that, (...) although the status of the family is not explicitly described in terms of moral status, the way in which it is treated implies that it has such status. (shrink)

It is generally believed that one argument advanced by Aristotle in favor of the political authority of the multitude is that large groups can make better decisions by pooling their knowledge than individuals or small groups can make alone. This is supported by two analogies, one apparently involving a “potluck dinner” and the other aesthetic judgment. This article suggests that that interpretation of Aristotle’s argument is implausible given the historical context and several features of the text. It argues that Aristotle’s (...) support for the rule of the multitude rested not on its superior knowledge but rather on his belief that the virtue of individuals can be aggregated and even amplified when they act collectively. This significantly alters our understanding of Aristotle’s political thought and presents a powerful alternative to the epistemic defenses of mass political activity popular today. (shrink)

"Theory of mind� describes the ability to impute mental states, such as beliefs, desires and intentions, to oneself and to other people. Usually we want to know why people did what they did and we wonder what they are going to do next. That is, everyday we try to predict and explain human behaviour. In order to do this we refer to a person"s beliefs, desires, emotions, intentions etc. Behaviour is the product of belief and desire: People do things because (...) they desire something and believe some act will achieve it. For adults it is clear that our assumptions about reality do not necessarily match the real world; but we know, regardless of whether our beliefs are true or not, our beliefs direct our actions. In contrast, it is not until the age of 4 years that children understand that one can be mistaken about the world and that actions can be based on this false belief. (shrink)

Crowdfunding is regarded a financing mechanism that could improve the funding opportunities of businesses with a pro-social orientation. Indeed, it is assumed that on digital platforms, citizens are inclined to provide more support to projects with a social benefit than to those without such an orientation, with significant ethical implications for the common good. Yet, extant empirical evidence regarding such a claim is still inconclusive. To advance this discussion, the present paper analyzes the conditions that influence crowd support for projects (...) displaying a pro-social orientation on a reward-based crowdfunding platform. To build our hypotheses, we adopt the lens of framing theory, and we relate it to the digital context. Beginning from the premise that, on crowdfunding platforms, information about projects has a hierarchical structure, we argue that a project’s success crucially depends on how much its proponent emphasizes the pro-social cues within this structure. Moreover, we propose that because pro-social cues demarcate a project over others, the effectiveness of pro-social framing is enhanced when the number of projects on the platform, i.e., its crowdedness, increases. Logit estimates on 8631 Kickstarter projects indicate that pro-social framing is positively associated with success as we expected, yet only when it is moderately emphasized. Further, we find that crowdedness on the platform positively moderates the effect of pro-social orientation on success. (shrink)

In his main doctoral thesis, Individuation in the Light of the Notions of Form and Information, Simondon offers a genetic theory of individuation that takes into account the individuation of physical, biological, psychic and social systems. While he takes his main paradigm for the explanation of individuating processes from physical science and transfers the notions derived from it to other domains, he is careful not to reduce the regime of the living to the non-living. The notion of the problem plays (...) a crucial role in this regard: the essential characteristic of life is its ability to solve problems through acts of invention. The living being is nothing but the perpetual resolution of problems. In his 1966 review, Gilles Deleuze recognises the “tremendous importance” of Simondon’s notion of the problem. However, in his own work Deleuze develops the concept in a very different way. This paper will examine Simondon’s use of the notion of the problem within his theory of individuation and point to its divergence from Deleuze’s. (shrink)

Placing the analyses in an interdisciplinary manner, the present paper fallows to catch and value, form a moral-formative perspective, the interpretations of the ethical theories regarding the evolutions in a moral plan, in order to build a structural model of the morality development levels, with all the complex and dynamiccomponents that this one transmits. We have proposed that this should have as final purpose the transfer and focalization of this data over the significant space of forming the human being as (...) a moral, autonomous and responsible personality, by offering, we hope, in the terms in of efficiency, a rich space, a more complete and operational form about the levels of morality and moral education. The education in mostly very responsible for the step that defines the educated morality, of the community, of the society and a re-thinking, a restructuring and direction of the moral education on different levels is, we think, a way of responding to the challenges of today and tomorrow’s world. (shrink)

Cultural practices and artifacts, in their multiple and varied forms, are grounded on values, which are so deeply internalized by people that usually remain in the background, as taken-for-granted guides for interpretations and decisions in everyday life. Shaping individual moral horizons is at the core of socialization processes, through which older generations aim to disseminate their culturally established values to the new ones, making use of suggestions mainly implicit in daily experiences and interactions. Despite the strength of these processes of (...) cultural canalization, people find particular ways of positioning and interpreting social suggestions, drawing singular life trajectories and developing themselves as unique beings. This is truthful also in case of highly institutionalized settings like the military, in which people play in many forms an agentic role in their own development, being prepared to perform their professional duties in very complex and challenging activity contexts. This book is an invitation to dive deeper into human experiences lived in the military through qualitative and in-depth approaches, observing their affective qualities, the meanings they acquire and how they shape individuals' identities, fostering the development and try-out of specific ethical and moral values. The present work can contribute to research and professional practice in fields related to human development, social processes, education and people management in the military, as well as in other institutional contexts, especially by highlighting the affective, meaningful and moral-ethical dimensions of cultural experiences. (shrink)