Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is widely viewed as an important feature of contemporary business. It is characterized by the notion that organizations ought to voluntarily recognize and, where possible, practically mitigate the social impacts of its business activities, and that doing so allows organizations to meet the expectations of affected stakeholders. However, CSR initiatives are almost universally tethered to the idea that corporations exist to serve their own performance objectives, and that these will ultimately take precedence over wider macro-social considerations. (...) The present paper proposes that this conception of CSR mirrors the underlying neurological tension between the domains of analytic reasoning and empathic or socioemotional reasoning, and the neural correlates of each. Using the opposing domains hypothesis, it is proposed that CSR, as it is currently conceived of and practiced, is antithetical to social and ethical reasoning at the level of the brain, can increase the scope for dehumanization, and demands calling the ethical dimensions of CSR into question. (shrink)

This is a transcript of a conversation between P F Strawson and Gareth Evans in 1973, filmed for The Open University. Under the title 'Truth', Strawson and Evans discuss the question as to whether the distinction between genuinely fact-stating uses of language and other uses can be grounded on a theory of truth, especially a 'thin' notion of truth in the tradition of F P Ramsey.

This volume collects thirteen papers by one of the leading philosophers of his generation, who died prematurely in 1980.

SUMMARYThe nineteenth-century Orientalist and ethnologist, John Crawfurd, publicly rejected Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution in 1868. Crawfurd was a leading advocate of polygenesis but also a supporter of racial equality. In 1820 he published his History of the Indian Archipelago, where he advocated granting household suffrage to all races in the British colonies. After finishing a career in the East India Company in 1828 he became the foremost expert on South-East Asia in Britain. Crawfurd became a regular writer on ethnology (...) and Asian affairs for the Examiner newspaper and in the 1860s he was President of the Ethnological Society of London. Accounts of nineteenth-century anthropology in Britain characterise debate around race as falling into two camps: advocates of monogenesis and advocates of polygenesis. In the United States of America, advocates of polygenesis were often associated with advocates of slavery and racial inequality. Recent research has demonstrated that Charles Darwin’s hatred of slavery drove him to write Origin of the Species to demonstrate the unity of the human species and reject the polygenesis position. This paper explores Crawfurd’s ideas and demonstrates that a belief in polygenesis in the nineteenth century did not necessarily equate with a belief in racial inequality. (shrink)

Some philosophers, notably Professors Quine and Geach, have stressed the analogies they see between pronouns of the vernacular and the bound variables of quantification theory. Geach, indeed, once maintained that ‘for a philosophical theory of reference, then, it is all one whether we consider bound variables or pronouns of the vernacular'. This slightly overstates Geach's positition since he recognizes that some pronouns of ordinary language do function differently from bound variables; he calls such pronouns ‘pronouns of laziness'. Geach's characterisation of (...) pronouns of laziness has varied from time to time, but the general idea should be clear from a paradigm example: A man who sometimes beats his wife has more sense than one who always gives in to her.The pronouns ‘one’ and ‘her’ go proxy for a noun or a noun phrase in the sense that the pronoun is replaceable in paraphrase by simple repetition of its antecedent. (shrink)

Some philosophers, notably Professors Quine and Geach, have stressed the analogies they see between pronouns of the vernacular and the bound variables of quantification theory. Geach, indeed, once maintained that ‘for a philosophical theory of reference, then, it is all one whether we consider bound variables or pronouns of the vernacular'. This slightly overstates Geach's positition since he recognizes that some pronouns of ordinary language do function differently from bound variables; he calls such pronouns ‘pronouns of laziness'. Geach's characterisation of (...) pronouns of laziness has varied from time to time, but the general idea should be clear from a paradigm example: A man who sometimes beats his wife has more sense than one who always gives in to her.The pronouns ‘one’ and ‘her’ go proxy for a noun or a noun phrase in the sense that the pronoun is replaceable in paraphrase by simple repetition of its antecedent. (shrink)

In this essay, hegemony in traditional Marxism is posited as a social ontology based on overcoming the alienation of the masses. The aim of hegemony is to produce the full realization through the work of the proletariat as one specific political subject, as a collective version of the bourgeois subject. The emancipation through hegemony marks the self-realization of the proletariat as the subject of history, as one subject that somehow imposes itself on the alienated forms of capitalism. On the other (...) hand, poshegemony is thought from the decline of the subjectivist and productivist idolatry of hegemony, from the end of its expired truth, in the name of another promise. (shrink)

‘A logical theory may be tested by its capacity for dealing with puzzles, and it is a wholesome plan, in thinking about logic, to stock the mind with as many puzzles as possible, since these serve much the same purpose as is served by experiments in physical science.’ This paper is an attempt to follow Russell’s advice by using a puzzle about the contingent a priori to test and explore certain theories of reference and modality. No one could claim that (...) the puzzle is of any great philosophical importance by itself, but to understand it, one has to get clear about certain aspects of the theory of reference; and to solve it, one has to think a little more deeply than one is perhaps accustomed about what it means to say that a statement is contingent or necessary. (shrink)

In L. Frank Baum's story, Ozma of Oz, which is a sequel to Baum's much more famous story, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Dorothy and her companion come upon a wound-down mechanical man bearing a label on which are printed the following words: Smith and Tinker's Patent Double-Action, Extra-Responsive, Thought-Creating Perfect-Talking MECHANICAL MAN Fitted with our Special Clock-Work Attachment Thinks, Speaks, Acts, and Does Everything but Live As Dorothy and her companion are made to discover when they wind up this (...) man, he is indeed capable of doing all the things of which his label boasts—acting, speaking and even thinking. But as Tik-Tok himself insists, and no one in the story casts doubt on the matter, he is not alive. (shrink)

In his note on lines 27–8 Luck gives two Ovidian parallels for conversation outlasting the day, P. 2.4.11–12 and P. 2.10.37–8, but he makes no reference to lines 2–3 of Callimachus' epigram on Heraclitus of Halicarnassus.

ABSTRACT Thematic analysis is the most widely used method for analysing qualitative data. Recent debates, highlighting the binary distinctions between reflexive TA grounded within the qualitative paradigm and codebook TA with neo-positivist orientations, have emphasized the existence of numerous tensions that researchers must navigate to produce coherent and rigorous research. This article attempts to resolve some of these tensions through developing an approach to TA underpinned by realist philosophy of science. Focusing on interview data, we propose the use of three (...) types of themes and the use of corresponding validity indicators. Using an illustrative example, we outline the conceptual foundations of a realist approach to TA and present recommendations for conducting it in practice. This approach, we claim, reconciles several existing binaries between distinctive types of TA by incorporating the contributions of both for the development of different types of themes. (shrink)

‘A logical theory may be tested by its capacity for dealing with puzzles, and it is a wholesome plan, in thinking about logic, to stock the mind with as many puzzles as possible, since these serve much the same purpose as is served by experiments in physical science.’ This paper is an attempt to follow Russell’s advice by using a puzzle about the contingent a priori to test and explore certain theories of reference and modality. No one could claim that (...) the puzzle is of any great philosophical importance by itself, but to understand it, one has to get clear about certain aspects of the theory of reference; and to solve it, one has to think a little more deeply than one is perhaps accustomed about what it means to say that a statement is contingent or necessary. (shrink)

In a series of exquisite examples that could only have been gathered by a professional philosopher with an extraordinary respect for young minds, Gareth...

Heroides 11 has long enjoyed a favourable reputation among critics, largely because Ovid appears to show a tactful restraint in his description of Canace's last moments and to refrain, for once in the Heroides, from descending into what Jacobson terms ‘nauseating mawkishness’. Despite appearances, however, Ovid's wit is not entirely extinguished in this poem, for a devastating irony accompanies the certainty of Canace's imminent death. My objective is to demonstrate the nature of this irony by adopting a methodological approach which (...) owes much to Kennedy's analysis of Heroides 1 in the light of the later books of the Odyssey. Kennedy's argument – that without knowing it Penelope is about to give her letter to its intended addressee – is based on two premises which are postulated by the epistolary mode of the poem. The first is that we are to imagine Ovid's heroines writing at a specific moment within a dramatic context; the second is that they have a specific motive for writing at that moment. In Kennedy's hands, this approach assumes the privileged position of the reader of Heroides 1 who, through access to the Odyssey, is alive to the ironies which Ovid's Penelope cannot realize. I propose to establish a similarly privileged position for the reader of Heroides 11, a position from which Canace's death can be seen to be both ill-timed and unnecessary. The key to identifying the ironic circumstances of Canace's death lies in reconstructing the background to the Canace and Macareus myth and the possible precedents which Ovid drew on in his treatment of the story. The situation is more complex than in the case of Heroides 1, however, since the literary sources familiar to Ovid and his readers have, in this instance, largely been lost to us and can only be reconstructed from fragmentary evidence. (shrink)

Theoria, EarlyView. -/- In his recent book Thin Objects, Øystein Linnebo (2018) argues for the existence of a hierarchy of abstract objects, sufficient to model ZFC, via a novel and highly interesting argument that relies on a process called dynamic abstraction. This paper presents a way for a nominalist, someone opposed to the existence of abstract objects, to avoid Linnebo's conclusion by rejecting his claim that certain abstraction principles are sufficient for reference (RBA). Section 1 of the paper explains Linnebo's (...) argument for RBA. It offers a reading of Linnebo's work upon which he has two arguments for RBA: one deductive and one abductive, and argues that whilst the deductive argument is unsound the abductive one is prima facie plausible. The nominalist must therefore find a way to respond to the abductive argument. Section 2 outlines just such a response, by offering an alternative explanation of the cases Linnebo wishes to argue from. Most interestingly, it shows that abstraction in Linnebo's most difficult case (the “reference to ordinary bodies” case) can be achieved using mereological means, rather than relying on RBA. (shrink)

It is occasionally tempting, after climbing a mountain, to use the elevation one has gained to dash up to the top of a connected peak which does not have sufficient interest to induce one to climb so high for its sake alone. It is in this spirit that I turn to Geach's Latin Prose theory of relative clauses. The matter itself is of no very great moment, and some new ground will have to be covered in dealing with Geach's arguments. (...) Nevertheless we shall primarily be applying the theory constructed in the body of the paper, and when one is in a position to expose bad arguments relatively rapidly, it is perhaps a good idea not to leave them unchallenged, especially when they appear to be gaining currency. (shrink)

We report on an interview-based study of decision-making capacity in two classes of patients suffering from depression. Developing a method of second-person hermeneutic phenomenology, we articulate the distinctive combination of temporal agility and temporal inability characteristic of the experience of severely depressed patients. We argue that a cluster of decision-specific temporal abilities is a critical element of decision-making capacity, and we show that loss of these abilities is a risk factor distinguishing severely depressed patients from mildly/moderately depressed patients. We explore (...) the legal and clinical consequences of this result. (shrink)

In ‘Thinking Beyond the Lockdown’, Panagiotis Sotiris argues that lockdowns are repressive and should be opposed. In this response I take issue with his analysis. He posits the existence of a ‘lockdown strategy’ which has little relation to reality. He identifies lockdowns with neoliberalism, flirts with the Great Barrington project, and calls for anti-lockdown resistance – without so much as a glance at the right-wing libertarian camps that are also staked out on this terrain. On these points, and in respect (...) of his interpretation of Foucault, I offer a rebuttal. (shrink)

As has recently been highlighted, despite the prevalence of methodological “confessional tales” in ethnography generally, the challenges of undertaking ethnographic research specifically in institutional sports settings remain underexplored. Drawing on data from a 3-year ethnographic study of competitive swimming in the United Kingdom (UK), here we explore some of the practical challenges of balancing different elements of the researcher’s role when undertaking ethnographic “insider” research in familiar settings. In particular, we consider the difficulties of balancing the role of a doctoral (...) researcher and the chosen research role of a volunteer coach with a competitive swimming program. Employing the anthropological concept of liminality, we also analyze the lived challenges of leaving a highly familiar field and entering a state of liminality, where the researcher was caught on the threshold betwixt and between a return to full-time employment in the former “known” role of coach, and a move forward to embrace a new “unknown” role as a full-time member of academic staff. (shrink)