This paper summarizes the consequences of safety and health inattentiveness, and reviews four primary dangers in the workplace. In addition, perspectives of employee health and safety are presented from industry and academia which provide the basis for a strong recommendation to include safety and health issues in business school curricula.

The current work builds a definition of irritability from both academic definitions and lay perspectives. In Study 1, a quantitative content analysis of academic definitions resulted in eight main content categories. In Study 2, a community sample of 39 adults participated in qualitative interviews. A deductive thematic analysis resulted in two main themes. The first main theme dealt with how participants positioned irritability in relation to other negative states. The second dealt with how participants constructed irritability as both a loss (...) of control and as an experience that should be controlled. The discussion integrates the findings of both studies and provides a concise, but comprehensive definition. (shrink)

What constitutes better schooling for today's youth? In 1984 educational theorist Theodore R. Sizer formulated nine Common Principles to answer this question and launched The Coalition of Essential Schools, an organization of schools attempting to change their own structure, curriculum, pedagogy, and power relations according to Sizer's Principles. This important book, the first comprehensive look at Coalition schools, charts the course of reform at eight charter member schools. The Coalition now counts over 900 private, parochial, public, urban, suburban, and rural (...) secondary schools among its affiliates nationwide. Donna E. Muncey and Patrick J. McQuillan, experts in anthropology as well as education, conducted a five-year ethnographic study to understand what happened in Coalition schools. The authors looked at curricular and pedagogical developments; how changes affected individual students, teachers, administrators, and other school personnel; and how American cultural beliefs influenced efforts to change. The schools' reform experiences differed: some efforts were sustained when others stalled, change divided some faculties while others found a sense of shared purpose, and the principals of some schools facilitated change while others clearly inhibited it. This compelling book, written for all who are concerned with education in America, offers a wealth of insights into the complexities of change efforts in individual schools and in classrooms. (shrink)

The objective in this paper is to demonstrate the indispensability of Peirce’s double consciousness to foster abductive reasoning, so that internal/external dialogue inform the worthiness of hunches. These forms of dialogue establish a mental give-and-take forum in which novel meanings/effects are particularly highlighted and noticed. Such attentional shifts are compelled by surprising states of affairs within the beholder’s internal, interpretive competencies, or from external factors (pictures, gestural or linguistic performatives). The dialogic nature of these signs pre-forms operations not possible non-dialogically; (...) they command, interrogate, or suggest alterations to established conduct/beliefs in contexts in which propositional/argumentative conflicts are obviated. This inquiry proposes experimental methodologies to measure when double consciousness (via private/inner speech) mediates hypothesis-making. Vygotsky’s conflict of motive at four distinct developmental stages constitutes the foundation for the proposed experiments. Designs draw upon Vygotsky’s ‘double stimulation’ paradigms that force decision-making processes when conflicts of motive surface. Paradigms include forced imitation of one model while ignoring another (imitating bear, not dragon), and altering a visual array to depict logical sequencing accurately (the “Cycles Test”; “The Odd One Out”). These conflicts require children to change their conduct/beliefs to accommodate to atypical states of affairs. (shrink)

This account will demonstrate that the element of surprise is a fundamental device in establishing double consciousness regimes; it further shows how such dialogic paradigms foster abductive inferences by filtering out irrelevant percepts/antecedents. The account sets up Peirce’s Pheme to be the primary device which shocks interpreters’ sensibilities – starting them on a course to question conflicting principles between ego and non-ego. The natural disposition of surprise to instantaneously deliver insight into which antecedents are relevant to vital, anomalous consequences demonstrates (...) its indispensability in generating logical and semiotic advances. For Peirce, vividness, as an element of surprise in Secondness, is largely responsible for the nuts and bolts of how surprise facilitates logic; its means to activate searches for plausible antecedents makes vividness the prime candidate. The success of vividness at turning the mind of interpreters to new ways of explaining the consequence largely hinges upon the external properties of the unexpected consequence – not merely objects’ instantaneity, but their striking characteristics, as well. Even though vividness is external, it produces internal responses, in the form of a war against feelings. In this way, double consciousness paradigms are initiated, which, in turn, call for hypothesis generation. (shrink)

Esta investigação ilustra como o Interpretante energético de Peirce facilita a conscientização entre os usuários de signos. Peirce caracteriza o Interpretante energético/existencial como “empenho” e “esforço”. Por forçar a atenção e a progressão da ação, o Interpretante energético destaca as relações de signos atomísticos/pontuais de causa e efeito apresentando junções entre os eventos: começo, meio e fim. A Primeiridade e a Terceiridade subjacentes perpetuam ainda mais o componente pontual presente nas relações de ação, operacional quando o esforço produz resistência contra (...) um sentimento/força oposta. O esforço é, no entanto, apenas um lado do Interpretante energético de Peirce; o lado oposto ocorre quando os elementos externos têm um papel mais ativo na destruição de crenças/ações anteriores. Os Interpretantes energéticos podem inibir, ou seja, resultar em atenção a um estímulo, enquanto ignoram outro. No entanto, inibir/resistir conscientemente a uma força introduz o controle além de si mesmo—reflexos do outro sobre os atos conscientes de um agente. Essa influência entre interlocutores satisfaz a máxima de Peirce de um “lugar comum para ficar”, demonstrando compreensão mútua do efeito próprio do signo. De fato, os Interpretantes energéticos podem resultar em um efeito de tal proporção sobre um ou ambos os interlocutores que uma mudança de hábito se materialize. Assim, os Interpretantes energéticos condensam a perfectividade exercida por esforços particulares, sugerindo a probabilidade de seu sucesso discursivo. (shrink)

This article demonstrates how Peirce’s core definition of Index extends even to Objects which do not co-occur in space and time with their referent. Although the arguments are philosophical in nature, they are supported by developmental and empirical findings. The case of absent Objects as constituting Objects of indexical use is the primary focus; and rationale is offered from Peirce’s early and later work to bolster this claim. The analysis proffers the bold assertion that Index, especially in its Degenerate use (...) without an Interpretant, qualifies as the most primary sign vehicle, and that Index to absent Objects determines whether indexical use is Degenerate or Genuine. (shrink)

Th is inquiry outlines Karl Buhler’s three kinds of deixis, focusing particularly on his most advanced use – deixis am phantasma (deictics to refer to absentreferents). This use is of primary import to the semiosis of index, given the centrality of the object and the interpretant in changing the function of the indexical sign in ontogeny. Employing deictic signs to refer to absent objects (some of which are mental) constitutes a catalyst from more social, conventional, uses to more internal, imaginative, (...) ones. Buhler’s analogy of mental objects as a “mimesis” serves as the genesis for the claim that static and more dynamic memories, fuelled by affect, drive deictics to refer to more dynamic objects and more dynamic interpretants, into more constructed realities. Peirce’s two types of objects and three types of interpretants complete Buhler’s deictic framework; they determine advances in deictic semiosis undeveloped by Buhler, and offer rationale for how it is that deictic use extends the semiosis of index. (shrink)

Dans cette enquête, j’affirme que les signes occupent une place centrale dans la cosmologie de Peirce, et que le fait de soutenir de nouvelles propositions à travers le dialogue a le pouvoir de favoriser l’unité nécessaire pour souder les membres de son continuum. Le dialogue tel que conçu par Peirce devient le moyen de souder chaque membre du continuum. Le principal moteur dans la réalisation de cette «soudure», selon Peirce, est le hasard/l’habitude dans l’utilisation des signes elle-même. Bien que la (...) place du soi, conçu comme une expression de toutes les composantes du monde physique, sera considérée, je m’intéresserai principalement aux changements logiques constatés par le passage du dialogue inter-actionnel au dialogue intra-actionnel. (shrink)

This article demonstrates how Peirce’s core definition of Index extends even to Objects which do not co-occur in space and time with their referent. Although the arguments are philosophical in nature, they are supported by developmental and empirical findings. The case of absent Objects as constituting Objects of indexical use is the primary focus; and rationale is offered from Peirce’s early and later work to bolster this claim. The analysis proffers the bold assertion that Index, especially in its Degenerate use (...) without an Interpretant, qualifies as the most primary sign vehicle, and that Index to absent Objects determines whether indexical use is Degenerate or Genuine. (shrink)

This inquiry illustrates how Peirce’s Energetic Interpretant facilitates consciousness-raising between sign users. Because it forces attention and progression of action, the Energetic Interpretant highlights perfective aspectual characteristics, namely atomistic/punctual cause-effect sign relations by featuring junctures between events: beginning, middle, end. For example, the stops and starts of events are influenced by the nature of the action, in addition to the agent’s idiosyncratic preferences and predilections. The Thirdness underlying it further perpetuates the punctual component present in action relations, operational when effort (...) produces resistance against an opposing force. Because effort can materialize physically, or internally, it demonstrates the continued primacy of Peirce’s categories in fostering certain consequences. Energetic Interpretants can inhibit, i.e., attention to one stimulus, while ignoring another. Nonetheless, consciously inhibiting/resisting a force introduces control beyond the self—another’s reflections upon the conscious acts of an agent. This influence between interlocutors satisfies Peirce’s maxim of a “common place to stand”, demonstrating mutual comprehension of the sign’s proper effect. In fact, Energetic Interpretants may result in an effect of such proportion upon either or both interlocutors that a habit-change materializes. As such, Energetic Interpretants epitomize the perfectivity exercised by particular efforts, intimating the likelihood of their discursive success. Inherent in punctual events is the element of surprise, which ultimately hastens the kind of habit-change especially exhibited in Peirce’s double consciousness —self talking to self or other. (shrink)

Th is inquiry outlines Karl Buhler’s three kinds of deixis, focusing particularly on his most advanced use – deixis am phantasma (deictics to refer to absentreferents). This use is of primary import to the semiosis of index, given the centrality of the object and the interpretant in changing the function of the indexical sign in ontogeny. Employing deictic signs to refer to absent objects (some of which are mental) constitutes a catalyst from more social, conventional, uses to more internal, imaginative, (...) ones. Buhler’s analogy of mental objects as a “mimesis” serves as the genesis for the claim that static and more dynamic memories, fuelled by affect, drive deictics to refer to more dynamic objects and more dynamic interpretants, into more constructed realities. Peirce’s two types of objects and three types of interpretants complete Buhler’s deictic framework; they determine advances in deictic semiosis undeveloped by Buhler, and offer rationale for how it is that deictic use extends the semiosis of index. (shrink)

Th is inquiry outlines Karl Buhler’s three kinds of deixis, focusing particularly on his most advanced use – deixis am phantasma (deictics to refer to absentreferents). This use is of primary import to the semiosis of index, given the centrality of the object and the interpretant in changing the function of the indexical sign in ontogeny. Employing deictic signs to refer to absent objects (some of which are mental) constitutes a catalyst from more social, conventional, uses to more internal, imaginative, (...) ones. Buhler’s analogy of mental objects as a “mimesis” serves as the genesis for the claim that static and more dynamic memories, fuelled by affect, drive deictics to refer to more dynamic objects and more dynamic interpretants, into more constructed realities. Peirce’s two types of objects and three types of interpretants complete Buhler’s deictic framework; they determine advances in deictic semiosis undeveloped by Buhler, and offer rationale for how it is that deictic use extends the semiosis of index. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2016 Heft: 210 Seiten: 35-56.

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2014 Heft: 202 Seiten: 459-480.

Peirce’s Pheme directs interpretation of narratives via a “series of surprises” (ep2:154). The indexical and iconic elements inherent in Phemes are particularly potent in forcing attention and depicting relevant events. Index intrudes upon interpreters’ consciousness to notice the unexpected consequence; but icons exploit vividness. As imperatives, Phemes compel particular behaviors (1906: ms295). When narratives are portrayed in pictures, interpreters remember happenings in which Phemes feature surprising percepts, evoking an attentional response, and securing a confluence of events in memory. Findings from (...) children’s narrations demonstrate that events represented by Phemes are more often included in children’s retellings, because surprising images command active participation. This viewpoint impels listeners to build episodes, ascribing meanings across events, and proposing rationale for novel outcomes. (shrink)

The ‘managed-metabolism’ hypothesis suggests that a ‘cooperation barrier’ must be overcome if self-producing chemical organizations are to undergo the transition from non-life to life. This dynamical barrier prevents un-managed autocatalytic networks of molecular species from individuating into complex, cooperative organizations. The barrier arises because molecular species that could otherwise make significant cooperative contributions to the success of an organization will often not be supported within the organization, and because side reactions and other ‘free-riding’ processes will undermine cooperation. As a result, (...) the barrier seriously impedes the emergence of individuality, complex functionality and the transition to life. This barrier is analogous to the cooperation barrier that also impedes the emergence of complex cooperation at all levels of living organization. As has been shown at other levels of organization, the barrier can be overcome comprehensively by appropriate ‘management’. Management implements a system of evolvable constraints that can overcome the cooperation barrier by ensuring that beneficial co-operators are supported within the organization and by suppressing free-riders. In this way, management can control and manipulate the chemical processes of a collectively autocatalytic organization, producing novel processes that serve the interests of the organization as a whole and that could not arise and persist in an un-managed chemical organization. Management self-organizes because it is able to capture some of the benefits that are produced when its interventions promote cooperation, thereby enhancing productivity. Selection will therefore favour the emergence of managers that take over and manage chemical organizations so as to overcome the cooperation barrier. The managed-metabolism hypothesis demonstrates that if management is to overcome the cooperation barrier comprehensively, its interventions must be digitally coded. In this way, the hypothesis accounts for the two-tiered structure of all living cells in which a digitally-coded genetic apparatus manages an analogically-informed metabolism.GraphicalOpen image in new window. (shrink)

The ‘managed-metabolism’ hypothesis suggests that a ‘cooperation barrier’ must be overcome if self-producing chemical organizations are to undergo the transition from non-life to life. This dynamical barrier prevents un-managed autocatalytic networks of molecular species from individuating into complex, cooperative organizations. The barrier arises because molecular species that could otherwise make significant cooperative contributions to the success of an organization will often not be supported within the organization, and because side reactions and other ‘free-riding’ processes will undermine cooperation. As a result, (...) the barrier seriously impedes the emergence of individuality, complex functionality and the transition to life. This barrier is analogous to the cooperation barrier that also impedes the emergence of complex cooperation at all levels of living organization. As has been shown at other levels of organization, the barrier can be overcome comprehensively by appropriate ‘management’. Management implements a system of evolvable constraints that can overcome the cooperation barrier by ensuring that beneficial co-operators are supported within the organization and by suppressing free-riders. In this way, management can control and manipulate the chemical processes of a collectively autocatalytic organization, producing novel processes that serve the interests of the organization as a whole and that could not arise and persist in an un-managed chemical organization. Management self-organizes because it is able to capture some of the benefits that are produced when its interventions promote cooperation, thereby enhancing productivity. Selection will therefore favour the emergence of managers that take over and manage chemical organizations so as to overcome the cooperation barrier. The managed-metabolism hypothesis demonstrates that if management is to overcome the cooperation barrier comprehensively, its interventions must be digitally coded. In this way, the hypothesis accounts for the two-tiered structure of all living cells in which a digitally-coded genetic apparatus manages an analogically-informed metabolism.GraphicalOpen image in new window. (shrink)

Inequities in access to oncology care among Indigenous peoples in Canada are well documented. Access to oncology care is mediated by a range of factors; however, emerging evidence suggests that healthcare providers, including nurses, play a significant role in shaping healthcare access. The purpose of this study was to critically examine access to oncology care among Indigenous peoples in Canada from the perspective of oncology nurses. Guided by postcolonial theoretical perspectives, interpretive descriptive and critical discourse analysis methodologies informed study design (...) and data analysis. Oncology nurses were recruited from across Canada to complete an online survey (n = 78). Nurses identified a range of barriers experienced by Indigenous peoples when accessing oncology care, yet located these barriers primarily at the individual and systems levels. Nurses perceived themselves as mediators of access to oncology care; however, their efforts to facilitate access to care were constrained by the dominance of biomedicine within healthcare. Nurses' constructions of access to oncology care highlight the embedded narrative of individualism within nursing practice and the relative invisibility of racism as a determinant of equitable access to care among Indigenous peoples. This suggests a need for oncology nurses to better understand and incorporate structural determinants of health perspectives. (shrink)

The Evolutionary Manifesto shows that evolution is directional and demonstrates that this has major implications for humanity. The Manifesto shows that humanity must align its social systems and behaviour with the trajectory of evolution if we are to survive and thrive into the future. The Manifesto goes on to demonstrate that humanity has an essential role to play in the future evolution of life on this planet. It demonstrates that life on Earth has reached a critical stage in evolution’s trajectory. (...) Up to now evolution has moved along its trajectory blindly and unconsciously. But if evolution on Earth is to continue to advance successfully in the future, the process will have to be driven intentionally and consciously by humanity. In this way, a proper understanding of evolution shows us how we can live a life that matters in a larger scheme of things. An evolutionary worldview answers the fundamental existential question that faces us all: “What should I do with my life?” The Manifesto outlines in broad terms what humanity must do to advance the evolutionary process—how we will intentionally have to re-make our political, social and economic systems, and how we will need to develop our cognition and consciousness. As such, the Manifesto presents a detailed case for evolutionary activism--coordinated action directed at advancing the evolutionary process intentionally. (shrink)

Can a human society be constrained in such a way that self-organization will thereafter tend to produce outcomes that advance the goals of the society? Such a society would be self-organizing in the sense that individuals who pursue only their own interests would none-the-less act in the interests of the society as a whole, irrespective of any intention to do so. The paper sketches an agent-based model that identifies the conditions that must be met if such a self-organizing society is (...) to emerge. The model draws heavily on an understanding of how self-organizing societies have emerged repeatedly during the evolution of life on Earth. The model demonstrates that the key enabling requirement for a self-organizing society is ‘consequence-capture’. Broadly this means that all agents in the society must capture sufficient of the beneficial consequences of their actions for the goals of the society. ‘Consequence-capture’ can be organized in a society by appropriate management that suppresses free riders and supports pro-social actions. In human societies these constraints include institutions such as systems of governance and social norms. If a self-organizing society is to emerge, consequence-capture must apply to all agents in the society, including those involved in the establishment and adaptation of institutions. If this is achieved, the result will be a fully self-organizing society in which the interests of all agents are aligned with the interests of the society as a whole. (shrink)

Evolution's Arrow argues that evolution is directional and progressive, and that this has major consequences for humanity. Without resort to teleology, the book demonstrates that evolution moves in the direction of producing cooperative organisations of greater scale and evolvability - evolution has organised molecular processes into cells, cells into organisms, and organisms into societies. The book founds this position on a new theory of the evolution of cooperation. It shows that self-interest at the level of the genes does not prevent (...) cooperation from increasing as evolution unfolds. Evolution progresses by discovering ways to build cooperative organisations out of self-interested individuals. The book also shows that evolution itself has evolved. Evolution has progressively improved the ability of evolutionary mechanisms to discover effective adaptations. And it has produced new and better mechanisms. Evolution's Arrow uses this understanding of the direction of evolution to identify the next great steps in the evolution of life on earth - the steps that humanity must take if we are to continue to be successful in evolutionary terms. A key step for humanity is to increase the scale and evolvability of our societies, eventually forming a unified and cooperative society on the scale of the planet. We must also transform ourselves psychologically to become self-evolving organisms - organisms that are able to escape their biological and cultural past by adapting in whatever directions are necessary to achieve future evolutionary success. (shrink)

If C.S. Lewis' A Grief Observed can be considered an account of a lost human relationship, then Cunsolo and Landman's Mourning Nature forms a posthuman, but nonetheless personal, examination of the losses of relationships with plants, animals, and even entire ecosystems—an ecological grief observed. In this regard, one of the motivations for this book was Cunsolo's interviews with Inuit residents who experienced profound sadness and despair at the changes in the landscape brought by climate change. Beyond this, each of the (...) contributors to Mourning Nature brought a variety of written, auditory, visual, and meaning-making experiences to their acts of mourning wild nature. The parallels to Lewis' book end here... (shrink)