The Agriculture, Food and Human Values Society and the journal _Agriculture and Human Values_ provided a crucial intellectual space for the early transdisciplinary critique of the industrial agrifood system. This paper describes that process and presents the concept of “The Doctors of Agrifood Studies” as a metaphor for the key role critical agrifood social scientists played in documenting the unsustainability of conventional agriculture and working to create an alternative, ethical, sustainable agrifood system. After the introduction, the paper details the “Critical (...) Turn” in agrifood studies, followed by a reconsideration of my “Four Questions” framework, focusing on the current tension between the food security and food sovereignty discourses and movements. (shrink)

The critical studies in the Sociology of Agriculture can be generally divided into four questions: Agrarian, Environmental, Food, and Emancipatory. While the four questions overlap and all address social justice concerns, there is a chronological sequence to the studies. In this presidential address presented at the joint meetings of the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society and the Association for the Study of Food in Society held in June 2008 in New Orleans, LA, I provide an overview of the four (...) questions and call for researchers and activists in agrifood studies to engage as public social scientists to bring about a more just and equitable agrifood system. (shrink)

The critical studies in the Sociology of Agriculture can be generally divided into four questions: Agrarian, Environmental, Food, and Emancipatory. While the four questions overlap and all address social justice concerns, there is a chronological sequence to the studies. In this presidential address presented at the joint meetings of the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society and the Association for the Study of Food in Society held in June 2008 in New Orleans, LA, I provide an overview of the four (...) questions and call for researchers and activists in agrifood studies to engage as public social scientists to bring about a more just and equitable agrifood system. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Domains of Microevolution and Macroevolution Changing Meanings of Macroevolution An Expanding Hierarchy of Selection Origins of Novelty Mass Extinctions Is Evolution Uniformitarian? Conclusions Postscript: Counterpoint References.

This annotated bibliography comprehensively covers the entire range of international English-language philosophy serials. Over 300 citations represent serials that are especially instrumental in philosophical research and development. The entries are arranged alphabetically by title for rapid use and are fully annotated. Each entry includes detailed information about publishers, prices, circulation, manuscript selection, indexes and abstracts, target audiences, and acceptance rates. In addition, the annotations evaluate critically the strengths and weaknesses of the serial as it substantially impacts philosophy and its related (...) disciplines. The Guide also includes an extensive subject index and a geographical index. (shrink)

Psychopathy is a personality disorder characterized by emotional deficits and a failure to inhibit impulsive behavior and is often subdivided into “primary” and “secondary” psychopathic subtypes. The maladaptive behavior related to primary psychopathy is thought to reflect constitutional “fearlessness,” while the problematic behavior related to secondary psychopathy is motivated by other factors. The fearlessness observed in psychopathy has often been interpreted as reflecting a fundamental deficit in amygdala function, and previous studies have provided support for a low-fear model of psychopathy. (...) However, many of these studies fail to use appropriate screening procedures, use liberal inclusion criteria, or have used unconventional approaches to assay amygdala function. We measured brain activity with BOLD imaging in primary and secondary psychopaths and non-psychopathic control subjects during Pavlovian fear conditioning. In contrast to the low-fear model, we observed normal fear expression in primary psychopaths. Psychopaths also displayed greater differential BOLD activity in the amygdala relative to matched controls. Inverse patterns of activity were observed in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) for primary versus secondary psychopaths. Primary psychopaths exhibited a pattern of activity in the dorsal and ventral ACC consistent with enhanced fear expression, while secondary psychopaths exhibited a pattern of activity in these regions consistent with fear inhibition. These results contradict the low-fear model of psychopathy and suggest that the low fear observed for psychopaths in previous studies may be specific to secondary psychopaths. (shrink)

Have the large-scale evolutionary patterns illustrated by the fossil record been driven by fluctuations in environmental opportunity, by biotic factors, or by changes in the types of phenotypic variants available for evolutionary change? Since the Modern Synthesis most evolutionary biologists have maintained that microevolutionary processes carrying on over sufficient time will generate macroevolutionary patterns, with no need for other pattern-generating mechanisms such as punctuated equilibrium or species selection. This view was challenged by paleontologists in the 1970s with proposals that the (...) differential sorting and selection of species and clades, and the effects of biotic crises such as mass extinctions, were important extensions to traditional evolutionary theory. More recently those interested in macroevolution have debated the relative importance of abiotic and biotic factors in driving macroevolutionary patterns and have introduced comparative phylogenetic methods to analyze the rates of change in taxonomic diversity. Applying Peter Godfrey-Smith’s distinction between distributional explanations and explanations focusing on the origin of variation, most macroevolutionary studies have provided distributional explanations of macroevolutionary patterns. Comparative studies of developmental evolution, however, have implicated the origin of variants as a driving macroevolution force. In particular, the repatterning of gene regulatory networks provides new insights into the origins of developmental novelties. This raises the question of whether macroevolution has been pulled by the generation of environmental opportunity, or pushed by the introduction of new morphologies. The contrast between distributional and origination scenarios has implications for understanding evolutionary novelty and innovation and how macroevolutionary process may have evolved over time. (shrink)

Eric Davidson had a deep and abiding interest in the role developmental mechanisms played in generating evolutionary patterns documented in deep time, from the origin of the euechinoids to the processes responsible for the morphological architectures of major animal clades. Although not an evolutionary biologist, Davidson’s interests long preceded the current excitement over comparative evolutionary developmental biology. Here I discuss three aspects at the intersection between his research and evolutionary patterns in deep time: First, understanding the mechanisms of body plan (...) formation, particularly those associated with the early diversification of major metazoan clades. Second, a critique of early claims about ancestral metazoans based on the discoveries of highly conserved genes across bilaterian animals. Third, Davidson’s own involvement in paleontology through a collaborative study of the fossil embryos from the Ediacaran Doushantuo Formation in south China. (shrink)

The distribution of organisms in morphologic space is clumpy. Cats are like felids, dogs are like canids and snails are (mostly) like gastropods. But cats are not like dogs and snails are not like clams. This clumpy distribution of morphology has long posed one of the greatest challenges to evolutionary biologists. Does it represent the extinction and disappearance of a oncecontinuous distribution of morphologies, clades perched on the summits of persistent selective peaks ala Sewell Wright, or a primary signature of (...) the evolutionary processes? And if the latter, what processes are responsible for generating it? Although often couched in discussions of the origin of higher taxa, such taxa are but proxies for this clumpy distribution, and ultimately the latter is the critical issue for macroevolution and for Stephen Jay Gould’s opus. Underneath all the controversies over whether species constitute individuals, whether speciation serves to divide intra-specific adaptation driven by natural selection from a set of inter- and supra-specific evolutionary processes, and over the impact of catastrophic mass extinctions on evolutionary trends, the fundamental issue is simply one of clumpiness (or, if you prefer, the inhomogeneous distribution of morphologies). Iurii Filipchenko, a Russian geneticist and the mentor of Theodosius Dobzhansky, introduced the term macroevolution in 1927 because he believed that the origin of the characters associated with higher taxa (those beyond the species level) required a different process of evolution. Filipchenko believed macroevolution was driven by cytoplasmic inheritance, but his general argument was consistent with other saltationists and macro-mutationists of the time, including the paleontologist Henry Fairfield Osborne and the geneticist Richard Goldschmidt. These evolutionary biologists shared the.. (shrink)

This analysis uses an analytical frameworkgrounded in political economy perspectives of theglobalization of the agro-food sector combined with acase study approach focusing on the Marine StewardshipCouncil (MSC) to inform discussions regarding thecharacteristics of societal regulation in thepost-Fordist era. More specifically, this analysisuses the case of the emergence of the MSC toinvestigate propositions regarding the existence of,and location of, nascent forms of a transnationalState. The MSC proposes to regulate the certificationof sustainable fisheries at the global level throughan eco-labeling program. The MSC (...) was created in 1996by the transnational environmental organization theWorld Wildlife Fund and the transnational corporationUnilever. The emergence of the MSC has generatedheated discussion in fisheries management circles thatis in general divided along North/South lines. Thisanalysis indicates that the case of the MSC providesvaluable insights into the possible characteristics ofsupranational regulatory mechanisms that might emulatethe role of the nation-State in the post-Fordist era. (shrink)

I provide an historical overview of the development of the Sociology of Agriculture as a critical response to perceived inadequacies of conservative theories of social change regarding rural society in general, and agriculture in particular. I do this by focusing on the three questions that have dominated the discourse on agrifood studies: “The Agrarian Question,” “The Environment Question,” and “The Food Question.” I analyze the success and constraints of selected alternative agrifood initiatives in relation to the three questions and introduce (...) a fourth, the Emancipatory Question. I conclude that agrifood social scientists need to embrace a praxis orientation to agrifood studies and participate in social movements designed to create a more socially just alternative agrifood system. (shrink)

Employing the case of the global tuna-fish industry, it is argued that the process of globalization is contested terrain as it opens “free spaces” to some classes or groups and closes “free spaces” to others; that the nation-States' regulatory abilities are weakened; and finally, that while some social movements may gain, others are marginalized. Three basic conclusions are reached. (1) The industry's actions were successfully “contested” by environmental groups supported by the legislative and judicial branches of the US State. (2) (...) Simultaneously, pro-environmental legislation is currently threatened, along with several national and international environmental accords. (3) Workers in the US and, particularly, in Latin America are paying the consequences of the introduction of pro-environmental legislation and the actions of transnational corporations (TNCs). (shrink)

As emerging technologies support new ways in which people relate, ethical discourse is important to help guide designers of new technologies. This article endeavors to do just that by presenting an ethical analysis and design of technology intended to gather and act upon information on behalf of its users. The article elaborates on socio-technological factors that affect the development of technology to support ethical action. Research and practice implications are outlined.

Two experiments examined how affective values from visual and auditory modalities are integrated. Experiment 1 paired music and videos drawn from three levels of valence while holding arousal constant. Experiment 2 included a parallel combination of three levels of arousal while holding valence constant. In each experiment, participants rated their affective states after unimodal and multimodal presentations. Experiment 1 revealed a congruency effect in which stimulus combinations of the same extreme valence resulted in more extreme state ratings than component stimuli (...) presented in isolation. An interaction between music and video valence reflected the greater influence of negative affect. Video valence was found to have a significantly greater effect on combined ratings than music valence. The pattern of data was explained by a five parameter differential weight averaging model that attributed greater weight to the visual modality and increased weight with decreasing values of valence. Experiment 2 revealed a congruency effect only for high arousal combinations and no interaction effects. This pattern was explained by a three parameter constant weight averaging model with greater weight for the auditory modality and a very low arousal value for the initial state. These results demonstrate key differences in audiovisual integration between valence and arousal. (shrink)

Participants maneuvered a rat image through a circular region on the computer screen to find a hidden target platform, blending aspects of two well-known spatial tasks. Like the Morris water maze task, participants first experienced a series of learning trials before having to navigate to the hidden target platform from different locations and orientations. Like the dot-location task, they determined the location of a position within a two-dimensional circular region. This procedure provided a way to examine how the number of (...) surrounding cues (1, 2, or 3) affects the memory for spatial location in navigation. Memory performance was better when there were more cues and when targets were close to cues, consistent with the idea that cues bolster fine-grain memory, especially in proximal regions. Early and late measures of bias in memory reflected biases in a direction toward the nearest cue, implicating a cue-based category structure of the navigational space. Collectively, results suggest cue-based spatial memory representations that have been inferred from the dot-location task generalize to a navigation task within a simple, computer-based environment, as demonstrated by the good fits of the spatial model developed for the dot-location task (Fitting, Wedell, & Allen, 2005, 2007). (shrink)

As concerns over the negative social and environmental impacts of industrial agriculture become more widespread, efforts to define and regulate sustainable agriculture have proliferated in the US. Whereas the USDA spearheaded previous efforts, today such efforts have largely shifted to Tripartite Standards Regimes (TSRs). Using a case study of the Leonardo Academy’s initiative to develop a US sustainable agriculture standard, this paper examines the standards-development process and efforts by agribusiness to influence the process. Specifically, we analyze how politics operate in (...) seemingly “depoliticized” TSRs, and how agribusiness and the USDA use “framing practices” and procedural complaints to influence the standard-development process. We contend that although governance mechanisms are a potentially powerful tool for advocates of alternative agrifood, their efficacy may be constrained by science-based requirements, an agribusiness countermovement, and a captured state. (shrink)

This article explores the limits of introductory social justice education and the ways in which a social foundations course could expand and deepen the social justice lens of current and future educators. The authors, members of an introductory graduate-level Social Foundations course, discuss the limitations they realized in their previous social justice education courses, and the importance of courses that further student's understandings of the ever-evolving ways people enact and experience identity, power, and privilege. The authors identify three main pedagogical (...) and theoretical elements that advanced their social justice knowledge: examining theories for their potential to uncover or obscure lived experience; unpacking binary constructions of identity; and exploring the limits and possibilities of intersectional thinking. This article offers implications and suggestions for educators who seek to challenge and expand the social justice knowledge of future educators and administrators. (shrink)

The US poultry industry based on flexible accumulation has been advanced as the model of agro-industrial development for agrifood globalization. Similarly, Mexico has been presented as a noteworthy example of the negative effects of neoliberal restructuring associated with the globalization project. In this paper we use both of these assertions as points of departure to guide an investigation of the case of the restructuring of the Mexican poultry industry. Informed by a commodity systems analysis, archival data and key informant interviews (...) are used to generate an overview of the history of the poultry industry in Mexico. A sociology of agrifood theoretical framework informed by regimes theory is employed to analyze the events of the case. We conclude that neoregulation related to the IMF and NAFTA restructuring in Mexico facilitated the diffusion of the US model of poultry production. (shrink)

In this overview article, we first explain what we take informal logic to be, discussing misconceptions and distinguishing our conception of it from competing ones; second, we briefly catalogue recent informal logic research, under 14 headings; third, we suggest four broad areas of problems and questions for future research; fourth, we describe current scholarly resources for informal logic; fifth, we discuss three implications of informal logic for philosophy in particular, and take note ofpractical consequences of a more general sort.