The term ‘moral resilience’ has been gaining momentum in the nursing ethics literature. This may be due to it representing a potential response to moral problems such as moral distress. Moral resilience has been conceptualised as a factor that inhibits immoral actions, as a favourable outcome and as an ability to bounce back after a morally distressing situation. In this article, the philosophical analysis of moral resilience is developed by challenging these conceptualisations and highlighting the risks of such limiting perspectives. (...) It is argued that moral resilience is best understood as a virtue with two associated vices, faintheartedness and rigidity. The intellectual virtue of practical wisdom is required to express resilience as a virtue. This understanding leads to recommendations for professional education, for practice and for further research. (shrink)

McCoy and colleagues (2023) offer a reflective framework for data ethics and governance with several historical bioethics principles as a foundation. Their framework is one among a plethora of othe...

This article examines three early writings of Hans L. Martensen, Søren Kierkegaard’s teacher and the target of his criticisms. The writings focus respectively on self-consciousness, mysticism, and freedom. They each make important claims about religion, and together they disclose the young Martensen’s systematic understanding of the epistemological, mystical, and moral-ethical dimensions of human experience as shaped by the representations of Christian faith and life. The analysis reveals an agile thinker, whose creative philosophical and theological ideas are the product of imaginative (...) speculation growing out of passionate religiosity. Some connections will be drawn from these essays to the writings of Søren Kierkegaard. (shrink)

B L Curtis; Learning and Intentionality, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 5, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 105–121, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9752.

This study expands the application of deonance theory into organizations’ upper echelons by examining how CEOs imprinted with a sense of duty can influence managerial decision-making. We hypothesize an imprint of bounded autonomy, an ought-force that constrains their decision-making and understanding of behavioral freedom, influences duty-bound CEOs to self-report errors in past financial reporting. We test deonance theory propositions of instrumentality for behavioral expansion, namely loss avoidance and gain attainment, related to institutional ownership concentration and CEO equity ownership. We use (...) CEOs that are graduates of U.S. service academies as a proxy for duty-bound executives and find firms they lead are more likely to issue a financial restatement to correct a previous reporting error. This finding is robust to alternate explanations such as being error-prone, earnings management, auditor oversight, and risk behaviors. We also find evidence that deonance may be subject to behavioral expansion. The likelihood of issuing a restatement decreases as institutional ownership concentration and CEO equity ownership increases. This study shows imprinted deonance within the C-suite influences important organizational outcomes. (shrink)

This chapter describes the Danish church, with the focus centered primarily on its life during the years 1835 to 1855 when Søren Kierkegaard was productive. The beginnings of the church up to 1835 are briskly examined, and then contributions of Jacob Peter Mynster, Nicolai Frederik Severin Grundtvig, and Hans Lassen Martensen are delineated. These three figures have been chosen because of their importance both for the Danish church and for Kierkegaard. The chapter ends with a few comments on some creative (...) thinkers who find in Kierkegaard's critique a resource for critically reforming the church so that it might more appropriately serve its intended purpose. At points in the chapter, the analysis utilizes the Kierkegaardian categories of the objective and the subjective. (shrink)

This chapter treats in roughly chronological order ten Lutheran theologians other than Rudolf Bultmann and Paul Tillich, who were examined in the previous chapter. All of these figures can be discussed in relation to their reception of Søren Kierkegaard's writings, even though the level of appropriation of Kierkegaard varies significantly. They include German national Lutheran theologians Karl Holl, Friedrich Gogarten, Paul Althaus, and Emanuel Hirsch, Scandinavian Lutheran theologians Anders Nygren, Knud Løgstrup, Regin Prenter, and Gustaf Wingren, and contemporary German Lutheran (...) theologians Wolfhart Pannenberg and Eberhard Jüngel. The chapter attempts to identify distinctive characteristics of each thinker and their connections to Kierkegaard. (shrink)

The second volume of Hegel’s Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion emphasizes the pulsating particularities that distinguish the religions of history from one another. This volume discloses Hegel’s philosophical theology to be an open system whose concepts, as Jon Stewart points out, are no mere abstractions but principles concretely instantiated in the real world. This article first reviews key analytical notions used in investigating religions, with the notion of freedom being the most important. Next are examined two models of the (...) God-world relation that have gained significant attention in the secondary literature on Hegel: pantheism, which affirms God as the substantial power in all things, and panentheism, which affirms all things as being in God. The essay’s final portion turns to a third model of the God-world relation, pantransentheism, which affirms that all things are being transformed in God. There I offer a very abbreviated gesture towards a Hegelian pantransentheism. (shrink)

Porpora offers an a priori argument for the conclusion that there are infinitely many thoughts that it is physically possible for us to think. That there should be such an a priori argument is astonishing enough. That the argument should be simple enough to teach to a first-year undergraduate class in about 20 min, as Porpora’s is, is more astonishing still. Porpora’s main target is Max Tegmark’s recent argument for the claim that if current physics is right, then there are (...) mental duplicates of us in far flung regions of the Universe. His argument is directed against Tegmark’s assumption that mental facts supervene upon physical facts. So, if Porpora’s argument is sound then not only is Tegmark’s argument unsound, but physicalism is also false. So, Porpora’s argument is powerful indeed. Who would have thought that a simple a priori argument, together with the physical facts, could solve the issue of whether physicalism is true?. Not I. In this paper I take a closer look at Porpora’s argument and show that it is fallacious. I also consider the other reasons Porpora gives for thinking there are infinitely many thinkable thoughts and find them similarly lacking. (shrink)

Antiques are undoubtedly objects worthy of aesthetic appreciation, but do they have a distinctive aesthetic value in virtue of being antiques? In this article we give an account of what it is to be an antique that gives the thesis that they do have a distinctive aesthetic value a chance of being true and suggests what that distinctive value consists in. After introducing our topic in Section I, in Section II we develop and defend the Adjectival Thesis: the thesis that (...) the concept of being an antique is an adjectival concept. This provides us with the means to formulate our definition, which we do in Section III. In Section IV we further explicate and defend our definition. In Section V we conclude by briefly saying where we think our definition could be improved, by making a few comments about the aesthetics of antiques and by stating an interesting consequence of our definition: that it is not analytic that antiques are old. (shrink)

Much of the debate about identity in recent decades has been about personal identity, and specifically about personal identity over time, but identity generally, and the identity of things of other kinds, have also attracted attention. Various interrelated problems have been at the centre of discussion, but it is fair to say that recent work has focussed particularly on the following areas: the notion of a criterion of identity; the correct analysis of identity over time, and, in particular, the disagreement (...) between advocates of perdurance and advocates of endurance as analyses of identity over time; the notion of identity across possible worlds and the question of its relevance to the correct analysis of de re modal discourse; the notion of contingent identity; the question of whether the identity relation is, or is similar to, the composition relation; and the notion of vague identity. A radical position, advocated by Peter Geach, is that these debates, as usually conducted, are void for lack of a subject matter: the notion of absolute identity they presuppose has no application; there is only relative identity. Another increasingly popular view is the one advocated by Lewis: although the debates make sense they cannot genuinely be debates about identity, since there are no philosophical problems about identity. Identity is an utterly unproblematic notion. What there are, are genuine problems which can be stated using the language of identity. But since these can be restated without the language of identity they are not problems about identity. (For example, it is a puzzle, an aspect of the so-called “problem of personal identity”, whether the same person can have different bodies at different times. But this is just the puzzle whether a person can have different bodies at different times. So since it can be stated without the language of personal “identity”, it is not a problem about identity, but about personhood.) This article provides an overview of the topics indicated above, some assessment of the debates and suggestions for further reading. (shrink)

Dance is proposed as the most representative of somaesthetic arts in Thinking Through the Body: Essays in Somaesthetics and other writings of Richard Shusterman. Shuster- man offers a useful, but incomplete approach to somaesthetics of dance. In the examples provided, dance appears as subordinate to another art form or as a means to achieving bodily excellence. Missing, for example, are accounts of the role of dance as an independent art form, how somaesthetics would address differences in varying approaches to dance, (...) and attention to the viewer’s somaesthetic dance experience. Three strategies for developing new directions for dance somaesthetics are offered here: identify a fuller range of applications of somaesthetics to dance as an independent art form ; develop somaesthetics for a wider range of theatre dance ; and relate somaesthetics to more general features of dance necessary for understanding the roles of the choreographer/dancer and the viewer. (shrink)

In this paper I argue against Mark Jago’s recent suggestion that ordinary knowers can move from knowledge of essence to knowledge of metaphysical necessity.

The author identifies and discusses the most important elements of Étienne Gilson’s thought which emanate out of his articulation and defense of the Western Creed. To the question: why Gilson, why now?, the author offers a following answer: because we need to champion the Western Creed, defend philosophical realism, rightly interpret the history of philosophy, correctly comprehend Christian philosophy, and show that modernist and postmodernist systems are arbitrary. The author maintains that Gilson delivers us with the realist philosophy of the (...) human person, shows us the undeniable advantages of philosophical realism, and formulates an original notion of Christian philosophy which appreciates that genuine philosophy is non-systematic in its nature, and that it can expose the failure of modernist philosophies that strive to be systems. (shrink)

Inspired by the recovery of natural law and virtue ethics in recent ethical discourse, certain members of the American Maritain Association have written essays to stimulate this recovery further. Their efforts are assembled in this volume, Freedom, Virtue, and the Common Good. Writing under the influence of Jacques Maritain and Yves R. Simon, they herein examine the requirements of a satisfactory natural law and virtue ethics, broadly understood as a moral philosophy giving primacy to character-formation and to the development of (...) individual and social habits necessary to perfect human life. The ethics herein envisioned is one that must first be grounded in a sound philosophy of the human person. (shrink)

The underlying skepticism of ancient Greek culture made it unreceptive of philosophy. It was the Catholic Church that embraced philosophy. Still, Étienne Gilson reminds us in Reason and Revelation in the Middle Ages that some early Christians rejected philosophy. Their rejection was based on fideism: the view that faith alone provides knowledge. Philosophy is unnecessary and dangerous, fideists argue, because (1) anything known by reason can be better known by faith, and (2) reason, on account of the sin of pride, (...) seeks to replace faith. To support this twofold claim, fideists, like Tertullian and Tatian, quote St. Paul. However, a judicious interpretation of St. Paul’s remarks shows that he does not object to philosophy per se but to erroneous philosophy. This interpretation is reinforced by St. Paul’s own background in philosophy and by his willingness to engage intellectuals critical of Christianity in the public square. The challenge of fideism brings up the interesting question: what would Jesus himself say about the discipline of philosophy? Could it be that Jesus himself was a philosopher (as George Bush once declared)? As the fullness of wisdom and intelligence, Jesus certainly understood philosophy, although not in the conventional sense. But surely, interpreting his life through the lens of fideism is unconvincing. Instead, an appreciation of his innate philosophical skills serves better to understand important elements of his mission. His perfect grasp of how grace perfects nature includes a philosophy of the human person. This philosophy grounded in common-sense analysis of human experience enables Jesus to be a profound moral philosopher. Specifically, he is able to explain the principles of personal actualization. Relying on ordinary experience, where good philosophy must start, he narrates moral lessons—parables—that illumine difficulties regarding moral responsibility and virtue. These parables are accessible but profound, showing how moral understanding must transcend Pharisaical legalism. Additionally, Jesus’ native philosophical power shows in his ability to explain away doctrinal confusions and to expose sophistical traps set by his enemies. If fideism is unconvincing, and if the great examples of the Patristics, the Apostles, and Jesus himself show an affinity for philosophy, then it is necessary to conclude that Christianity is a rational religion. Accordingly, the history of Christian culture is arguably an adventure in faith and reason. Since God is truth and the author of all truths, there is nothing in reality that is incompatible with Christian teaching. As John Paul II explains effectively in the encyclical, Fides et Ratio, Christianity is a religion that is rational and can defend itself. This ability to marshal a defense makes Christianity a religion for all seasons. (shrink)

The underlying skepticism of ancient Greek culture made it unreceptive of philosophy. It was the Catholic Church that embraced philosophy. Still, Étienne Gilson reminds us in Reason and Revelation in the Middle Ages that some early Christians rejected philosophy. Their rejection was based on fideism: the view that faith alone provides knowledge. Philosophy is unnecessary and dangerous, fideists argue, because (1) anything known by reason can be better known by faith, and (2) reason, on account of the sin of pride, (...) seeks to replace faith. To support this twofold claim, fideists, like Tertullian and Tatian, quote St. Paul. However, a judicious interpretation of St. Paul’s remarks show that he does not object to philosophy per se but to erroneous philosophy. This interpretation is reinforced by St. Paul’s own background in philosophy and by his willingness to engage intellectuals critical of Christianity in the public square. The challenge of fideism brings up the interesting question: what would Jesus himself say about the discipline of philosophy? Could it be that Jesus himself was a philosopher (as George Bush once declared)? As the fullness of wisdom and intelligence, Jesus certainly understood philosophy, although not in the conventional sense. But surely, interpreting his life through the lens of fideism is unconvincing. Instead, an appreciation of his innate philosophical skills serves better to understand important elements of his mission. His perfect grasp of how grace perfects nature includes a philosophy of the human person. This philosophy grounded in common-sense analysis of human experience enables Jesus to be a profound moral philosopher. Specifically, he is able to explain the principles of personal actualization. Relying on ordinary experience, where good philosophy must start, he narrates moral lessons—parables—that illumine difficulties regarding moral responsibility and virtue. These parables are accessible but profound, showing how moral understanding must transcend Pharisaical legalism. Additionally, Jesus’ native philosophical power shows in his ability to explain away doctrinal confusions and to expose sophistical traps set by his enemies. If fideism is unconvincing, and if the great examples of the Patristics, the Apostles, and Jesus himself show an affinity for philosophy, then it is necessary to conclude that Christianity is a rational religion. Accordingly, the history of Christian culture is arguably an adventure in faith and reason. Since God is truth and the author of all truths, there is nothing in reality that is incompatible with Christian teaching. As John Paul II explains effectively in the encyclical, Fides et Ratio, Christianity is a religion that is rational and can defend itself. This ability to marshal a defense makes Christianity a religion for all seasons. (shrink)

Peter Redpath is a distinguished historian of philosophy. He believes that the best way to acquire a philosophical education is through the study of philosophy’s history. Because he is convinced that ideas have consequences, he holds that the history of philosophy illuminates important events in history. Philosophy is a necessary condition for sound education, which, in turn, is a necessary condition for cultural and political leadership. Hence, the way educators and leaders shape culture reflects the effects of philosophy on culture. (...) In light of this background, it is possible to discern in Redpath’s account of the history of philosophy a corresponding philosophy of history. This emerges as he explains how philosophers have produced changes in thinking that have profound consequences for the culture at large. Some of these changes, many of them significant, have been positive, but others have been disastrous. Much of Redpath’s philosophy of history diagnoses what went wrong in the history of philosophy so as to indicate why modern culture suffers considerable disorder. The good news is that Redpath’s philosophy of history prescribes ways to correct Western Civilization’s current malaise. (shrink)

If contemporary philosophers of science could transcend the skepticism that seems to have become obligatory in modern epistemologies, they could restore a comprehensive vision of science that would be a boon to science and scientific education. Science is not mere knowledge. Science is knowledge of something that is necessary and universal because its causes are understood. This was Aristotle’s conception of science (epistēmē), a conception which includes knowledge of substances and the first ontological principles of things. St. Thomas Aquinas refined (...) this understanding of science in a way that, perhaps surprisingly, has escaped the notice of many Thomists, especially the way St. Thomas understands physical substance to be a generic universal grounding necessary relations for some of its accidents. The recovery of Aristotle’s and St. Thomas’s conception of science would in no way threaten contemporary empirical science. Instead, it would explain how empirical science complements the ontology of science. (shrink)

Corporate governance scholarship focuses on executive malfeasance, specifically its antecedents and consequences. Academic efforts primarily focus on prevention while practitioners are often left to hold firms and executives (including directors) accountable through a variety of sanctions. Even so, executive malfea­sance still occurs even in the face of the vast resources used to monitor, control, and penalize firms and executives. In this paper, we posit equity markets do not adequately penalize firms for inaccurate earnings reports. Using a sample of 129 firms (...) identified by the U.S. General Accounting Office for reporting fraudulent earnings in 10K filings, we found support for our assertion. Consequently, the one party who may benefit but escape accountability is firm shareholders. Moreover, we find little empirical evidence that the subset of firms sanctioned by the SEC is penalized more heavily than the full sample by markets at the time they report and correct their 10K filings. Our results raise serious questions whether such mana­gerial opportunism can be eradicated given the apparent lack of consequences in equity markets for investors. We also question whether the SEC is able to discern between fraud and error in financial reporting and its implications. (shrink)

What is the nature of time? Does it flow? Do the past and future exist? Drawing connections between historical and present-day questions, A Critical Introduction to the Metaphysics of Time provides an up-to-date guide to one of the most central and debated topics in contemporary metaphysics. Introducing the views and arguments of Parmenides, Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Newton and Leibniz, this accessible introduction covers the history of the philosophy of time from the Pre-Socratics to the beginning of the 20th Century. The (...) historical survey presents the necessary background to understanding more recent developments, including McTaggarts 1908 argument for the unreality of time, the open future, the perdurance/endurance debate, the possibility of time travel, and the relevance of current physics to the philosophy of time. Informed by cutting-edge philosophical research, A Critical Introduction to the Metaphysics of Time evaluates influential historical arguments in the context of contemporary developments. (shrink)

Background and objective: Code status discussions may fail to address patients’ treatment-related goals and their knowledge of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). This study aimed to investigate patients’ resuscitation preferences, knowledge of CPR and goals of care. Design, setting, patients and measurements: 135 adults were interviewed within 48 h of admission to a general medical service in an academic medical centre, querying code status preferences, knowledge about CPR and its outcome probabilities and goals of care. Medical records were reviewed for clinical information (...) and code status documentation. Results: 41 (30.4%) patients had discussed CPR with their doctor, 116 (85.9%) patients preferred full code status and 11 (8.1%) patients expressed code status preferences different from the code status documented in their medical record. When queried about seven possible goals of care, patients affirmed an average of 4.9 goals; their single most important goals were broadly distributed, ranging from being cured (n = 36; 26.7%) to being comfortable (n = 8; 5.9%). Patients’ mean estimate of survival to discharge after CPR was 60.4%. Most patients believed it was helpful to discuss goals of care (n = 95; 70.4%) and the chances of surviving inhospital CPR (n = 112; 83.0%). Some patients expressed a desire to change their code status after receiving information about survival following inhospital CPR (n = 11; 8.1%) or after discussing goals of care (n = 2; 1.5%). Conclusions: Doctors need to address patients’ knowledge about CPR and take steps to avoid discrepancies between treatment orders and patients’ preferences. Addressing CPR outcome probabilities and goals of care during code status discussions may improve patients’ knowledge and influence their preferences. (shrink)