In the summer of 2017, wildflower seeds were spread on a large, empty open space close to a motorway flyover just outside Copenhagen, Denmark. This was an effort to use non-mechanical methods to prepare the soil for an ‘urban forest’ to be established on the site, since the flowers’ roots would penetrate the ground and enable the planned new trees to settle. As a result, the site was transformed into a gorgeous meadow, and all summer long Copenhageners were invited to (...) come and pick the flowers. In this article, I critically examine different aspects of this project – including the role of design, the perception of nature–culture relationships, climate change, and flower-picking as an event – in relation to my personal experience of visiting this meadow both on-site and on social media. The different temporalities that clash at the site give rise to conflicting interpretations, and I suggest that the meadow can be seen as a living plant archive of the Anthropocene, both physically and digitally. In doing so, I introduce and critique key conceptual pairs, including archive/death and bloom/decay, suggested by Lee Edelman’s queer cross-reading of Jacques Derrida’s ‘Archive Fever’ and Shakespeare’s Hamlet. I thereby contrast flower motifs pertaining to the cycles of blooming, decay, and nature’s (failed) eternal return in the meadow with the expansive futurity of the digitally mediated archive. (shrink)

An anthology of writings by and about Rudolf Steiner qua economist that documents his search for a deeper understanding of modern economic life. This book throws light on many of the problems that face us today, problems that we cannot solve unless we take hold of the economic life in a conscious, human way and resist the temptation to defer to market forces alone. Though well-known as a seer, the idea of Rudolf Steiner as an economist may seem (...) surprising. Seers do not usually have much concrete to say about economic life, beyond laments about its evils and injunctions that it be guided by some moral dimension. Rudolf Steiner, however, gave many lectures and wrote many articles about modern economic life, which he saw as the arena in which humanity has to find a new relationship to the spirituality that formerly came from above or outside -- from churches and external principles. Today the human being has to find morality within, which one cannot fully do unless one takes hold of the economic realm in a conscious, human way. Whether through concrete references to the meaning and working of money, or in attempting to give a fuller understanding of work or of the significance of market economics in our time, Steiner shows himself to be well versed in the subject. This publication presents a selection of his articles in a context of essays by Christopher Houghton Budd. (shrink)

Rudolf Steiner developed a comprehensive view of social life which he viewed as being made up of three inter-dependent realms: spiritual-cultural, political and economic. Out of this grew his philosophy known as 'associative economics', which in contrast to our global financial systems, is collaborative and serves the real needs of consumers.This book, a companion to Gary Lamb's Associative Economics, is a comprehensive collection of Rudolf Steiner's statements on economics, compiled from all of his works currently available in English. (...) It will be an indispensable resource for anyone interested in alternative approaches to our current financial crises. (shrink)

Nous avons cherché à identifier un aspect du refoulement du cosmopolitismel'des Lumières, complémentaire de la fabrique des identités nationales enl'Europe au XIXe siècle et dans l'entre-deux-guerres. L'idée de civilisation communel'serait maintenue par la capacité réciproque de traduction des langues nationales, dul'fait de leurs origines communes indo-européennes. L'utopie de la langue remplaceraitl'le parcours matériel des Lumières. C'est l'échec de la construction du mythe indianistel'européen et non pas son succès qui explique le dévoiement idéologique des relationsl'entre langue et nation. La promotion manquée (...) de la langue tsigane dans le mondel'académique illustre bien cet échec. Après la Première Guerre mondiale, la transformationl'du principe des nationalités en ethnopolitique fit disparaître jusqu'au souvenirl'de cette ambition commune. (shrink)

An ethics reflection group is one of a range of ethics support services developed to better handle ethical challenges in healthcare. The aim of this article is to evaluate the implementation process of interdisciplinary ERGs in psychiatric and general hospital departments in Denmark. To our knowledge, this is the first study of ERG implementation to include both psychiatric and general hospital departments. The implementation and evaluation strategies are inspired by action research, using a qualitative approach and systematic text condensation of (...) 28 individual interviews and 4 focus groups with clinicians, ethics facilitators and ward managers. The implementation process was influenced by both structural factors and factors related to clinicians having different values, interests and experiences. Structural barriers and promotors in the process to implement ERG included the following sub-categories: Organizational factors, recruitment and training of ethics facilitators, the deliberation model, planning and recruitment of participants to the ERGs, the support of the ward managers and the project group. Barriers and promotors found among clinicians included the following sub-categories: Expectations and pre-understandings of ERGs, understandings of a physician’s job, challenges experienced by ethics facilitators. At the end of the study, when it was decided that the ERGs should be continued, the implementation strategies were remodeled by the participants to meet new challenges. The study of ERG implementation identified important structural and professional barriers and promotors that are likely to be relevant to anyone wanting to implement ethics support services across various types of healthcare services. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungBedingt durch den demographischen Wandel wird der Anteil an alten Patienten in Kliniken und Arztpraxen zunehmen. Damit müssen sich Ärzte verstärkt auf die spezifischen Anforderungen der Behandlung von alten Patienten einstellen. Diese sind wesentlich durch die Faktoren Alter, Multimorbidität und Demenz geprägt. Die Abhandlung analysiert die hiermit gegebenen sozial- und personalethischen Implikationen für Ausbildung und Arbeitsalltag der Ärzte sowie für das Gesundheitssystem.

Deliberative democracy is now an influential approach to the study of democracy and political behaviour. Its key proposition is that, in politics, it is not only power that counts, but good discussions and arguments too. This book examines the interplay between the normative and empirical aspects of the deliberative model of democracy. Jürg Steiner presents the main normative controversies in the literature on deliberation, including self-interest, civility and truthfulness. He then summarizes the empirical literature on deliberation and proposes methods (...) by which the level of deliberation can be measured rather than just assumed. Steiner's empirical research is based in the work of various research groups, including experiments with ordinary citizens in the deeply divided societies of Colombia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Belgium, as well as Finland and the European Union. Steiner draws normative implications from a combination of both normative controversies and empirical findings. (shrink)

This is a concise guide to the educational philosophy of Rudolf Steiner. He pioneered a comprehensive, co-educational form of holistic education for children from kindergarten to the end of high school.

Fred. L. Polak explored the mechanisms of social change in terms of “future—visions” held by a community. The future, says Polak, participates actively in the present, providing part of the context within which today's decisions are made. Barbara McClintock acquired her insights in maize genetics by developing “a feeling for the organism.” New insights, she maintains, emerge through a mutual relationship between researcher and subject. Though scholars in different fields, both acknowledge the power of images in the creative process. There (...) is a difference in the extent to which each scientist perceives this power to be available to create new ideas. (shrink)

Ever decreasing numbers of applicants arrive in language departments at UK universities. In the face of this decline, and against the backdrop of higher education languages departments being reduced across the UK, it is important to investigate the supply chain of languages undergraduates in the pre-entry sector. This article reports on a collaborative action research project between Language Networks for Excellence, University of Wolverhampton, and King Edward VI College, Stourbridge. The objective was to investigate how the HE sector can effectively (...) influence and support linguists and post-16 establishments in enhancing progression to studying languages at university and how the post-16 sector can ensure they meet language students’ needs in progression to HE. The research presents a number of conclusions and recommendations, not least that, whilst support from HE for 17—18-year-old school students and their institutions is welcome and contributes to students’ confidence and skills, there may be merit in targeting students much further down the supply chain, encouraging progression to HE through tailored linguistic and motivational support strategies. (shrink)

To reduce global greenhouse gas emissions in order to limit global warming to 1.5°C, individuals and households play a key role. Behavior change interventions to promote pro-environmental behavior in individuals are needed to reduce emissions globally. This systematic literature review aims to assess the a) evidence-based effectiveness of such interventions and b) the content of very successful interventions without limiting the results to specific emitting sectors or countries. Based on the “PICOS” mnemonic and PRISMA statement, a search strategy was developed, (...) and eligibility criteria were defined. Three databases were searched to retrieve and review potential literature. As a result, 54 publications from 2010 to 2021 were included in the analysis. The results show that most interventions only have small positive effects or none at all. A total of 15 very successful interventions focused on the sectors of mobility, energy, and waste and incorporated improved structures, education, feedback, enablement or made the sustainable option the default. Six evidence-based recommendations for content, timing, and setting are deducted and given for interventions on enhancing pro-environmental behavior. In summary, although the various interventions and intervention types to promote PEB differ in their effectiveness, very successful interventions have common elements. Future research should focus on high-/low-impact and high-/low-cost behavior to develop interventions that aim at high-impact but low-cost behavior changes, or avoid low-impact but high-cost behavior. (shrink)

Background Ethical challenges constitute an inseparable part of daily decision-making processes in all areas of healthcare. Ethical challenges are associated with moral distress that can lead to burnout. Clinical ethics support has proven useful to address and manage such challenges. This paper explores how prehospital emergency personnel manage ethical challenges. The study is part of a larger action research project to develop and test an approach to clinical ethics support that is sensitive to the context of emergency medicine. Methods We (...) explored ethical challenges and management strategies in three focus groups, with 15 participants in total, each attended by emergency medical technicians, paramedics, and prehospital anaesthesiologists. Focus groups were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. The approach to data analysis was systematic text condensation approach. Results We stratified the management of ethical challenges into actions before, during, and after incidents. Before incidents, participants stressed the importance of mutual understandings, shared worldviews, and a supportive approach to managing emotions. During an incident, the participants employed moral perception, moral judgments, and moral actions. After an incident, the participants described sharing ethical challenges only to a limited extent as sharing was emotionally challenging, and not actively supported by workplace culture, or organisational procedures. The participants primarily managed ethical challenges informally, often using humour to cope. Conclusion Our analysis supports and clarifies that confidence, trust, and safety in relation to colleagues, management, and the wider organisation are essential for prehospital emergency personnel to share ethical challenges and preventing moral distress turning into burnout. (shrink)

The author traces the ways in which various patients and collective associations of patients come to regard themselves as the users of future stem cell technologies. The author uses Althusser’s notion of interpellation, whereby an identity is the result of the situated encounter of a subject and an authority, to analyze the ways in which patient associations’ current involvement with basic research is related to the enactment of science as a series of technology development projects. The author argues that this (...) ‘‘project-ness’’ forms a certain privileged logic that interpellates patients and their associations in specific ways. Through the listings of illnesses circulated in the mass media, which are hoped to be treatable or curable with stem cell therapies, patients come to recognize themselves as the projected users of stem cell technologies. The author fleshes out the process of this userfication and the various responses made by patients and their associations when hailed by the entrepreneurial projects of stem cell research. (shrink)

How do creative people think? Do great works of the imagination originate in words or in images? Is there a rational explanation for the sudden appearance of geniuses like Mozart or Einstein? Such questions have fascinated people for centuries; only in recent years, however, has cognitive psychology been able to provide some clues to the mysterious process of creativity. In this revised edition of Notebooks of the Mind, Vera John-Steiner combines imaginative insight with scientific precision to produce a startling (...) account of the human mind working at its highest potential. To approach her subject John-Steiner goes directly to the source, assembling the thoughts of "experienced thinkers"--artists, philosophers, writers, and scientists able to reflect on their own imaginative patterns. More than fifty interviews, along with excerpts from the diaries, letters, and autobiographies of such gifted giants as Leo Tolstoy, Marie Curie, and Diego Rivera, among others, provide illuminating insights into creative activity. We read, for example, of Darwin's preoccupation with the image of nature as a branched tree while working on his concept of evolution. Mozart testifies to the vital influence on his mature art of the wondrous "bag of memories" he retained from childhood. Anais Nin describes her sense of words as oppressive, explaining how imagistic free association freed her as a writer. Adding these personal accounts to laboratory studies of thought process, John-Steiner takes a refreshingly holistic approach to the question of creativity. What emerges is an intriguing demonstration of how specific socio-cultural circumstances interact with certain personality traits to encourage the creative mind. Among the topics examined here are the importance of childhood mentor figures; the lengthy apprenticeship of the talented person; and the development of self- expression through highly individualistic languages, whether in images, movement or inner speech. Now, with a new introduction, this award-winning book provides an uniquely broad-based study of the origins, development and fruits of human inspiration. (shrink)

With characteristic lucidity and style, Steiner makes Heidegger's immensely difficult body of work accessible to the general reader. In a new introduction, Steiner addresses language and philosophy and the rise of Nazism. "It would be hard to imagine a better introduction to the work of philosopher Martin Heidegger."--George Kateb, The New Republic.

This exciting collection offers a range of perspectives from some of the most prominent feminist voices of our time, including Rosi Braidotti, Judith Butler, Claire Colebrook, Elizabeth Grosz, and Jack Halberstam. Employing experimental modes of thinking and writing, the contributors remain faithful to the feminist tradition of subversion and resistance, while refusing to submit to its political tradition of a loving sisterhood or dutiful daughterhood. Through productive disagreement and cognitive dissonance, the essays presented here reflect the specific circumstances of our (...) present, and attempt to dream and envision possible alternatives for the future. The volume thus invites us to think of the becoming of feminism itself, and the possibilities of future feminisms-to-come. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungIn der Erfahrung, Kommunikation und Bewältigung von Krankheit spielen Metaphern eine wichtige Rolle: Als Denkkonzepte spiegeln sie zugrundeliegende Haltungen gegenüber den durch sie beschriebenen Vorgängen wider. Susan Sontag hat mit ihrem Essay „Illness as Metaphor“ nachhaltig die moralisch kritischen Implikationen einer unreflektierten Metaphernverwendung im Umgang mit Erkrankung aufgezeigt, indem sie deren stigmatisierende und hierin zusätzlich belastende Wirkung für Erkrankte reflektiert.In der gegenwärtigen Situation der Covid-19-Pandemie trifft ein bisher unbekanntes Virus mit der Macht und Dynamik der Globalisierung auf die hierauf nicht (...) vorbereiteten spätmodernen Gegenwartsgesellschaften, die nun nach Erklärung und Sinnzuschreibung suchen. Auch hier fungieren Metaphern als Denkkonzepte und Vehikel von Interpretation. Im Rückgriff auf die Perspektive Susan Sontags und ihren Appell für einen entmystifizierten Umgang mit Krankheit geht dieser Beitrag folgenden Fragen nach: Welche Bilder werden in der Berichterstattung über CoV‑2 vermittelt? Welche Einstellung gegenüber Gesundheit und Krankheit wird mit den Metaphern transportiert, und welche Lebenshaltung liegt dieser zugrunde? Welche Einsichten für einen gesunden Umgang mit Covid-19 und Krankheit generell ergeben sich, wenn man die Pandemie aus ihren Metaphern und zugrundliegenden Denkkonzepten herausschält? (shrink)

Gary Steiner argues that ethologists and philosophers in the analytic and continental traditions have largely failed to advance an adequate explanation of animal behavior. Critically engaging the positions of Marc Hauser, Daniel Dennett, Donald Davidson, John Searle, Martin Heidegger, and Hans-Georg Gadamer, among others, Steiner shows how the Western philosophical tradition has forced animals into human experiential categories in order to make sense of their cognitive abilities and moral status and how desperately we need a new approach to (...) animal rights. Steiner rejects the traditional assumption that a lack of formal rationality confers an inferior moral status on animals vis-à-vis human beings. Instead, he offers an associationist view of animal cognition in which animals grasp and adapt to their environments without employing concepts or intentionality. Steiner challenges the standard assumption of liberal individualism according to which humans have no obligations of justice toward animals. Instead, he advocates a "cosmic holism" that attributes a moral status to animals equivalent to that of people. Arguing for a relationship of justice between humans and nature, Steiner emphasizes our kinship with animals and the fundamental moral obligations entailed by this kinship. (shrink)

Enactivism does not have its primary philosophical roots in pragmatism: phenomenology (from Husserl to Jonas) is its first source of inspiration (with the exception of Hutto & Myin’s radical enactivism). That does not exclude the benefits of pragmatist readings of enactivism, and of enactivist readings of pragmatism. After having sketched those readings, this paper focuses on the philosophical concept of intentionality. I show that whereas enactivists endorse the idea that intentionality is a base-level property of cognition, pragmatism offer(ed) us some (...) reasons not to proceed this way. It is therefore doubtful to hold that pragmatists and enactivists would converge in the defence of a common, non-representational conception of intentionality. (shrink)

'Deliberative politics' refers to the role of conversation and arguments in politics. Until recently discussion of deliberative politics took place almost exclusively among political philosophers, but many questions raised in this philosophical discussion cry out for empirical investigation. This book provides the first extended empirical study of deliberative politics, addressing, in particular, questions of the preconditions and consequences of high level deliberation. Using parliamentary debates in Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States as an empirical base, the authors (...) measure the level of deliberation by constructing a 'Discourse Quality Index'. As deliberative politics moves to the forefront of political theory, this book makes an important contribution to deliberative democracy. (shrink)

_Anthropocentrism and Its Discontents_ is the first-ever comprehensive examination of views of animals in the history of Western philosophy, from Homeric Greece to the twentieth century. In recent decades, increased interest in this area has been accompanied by scholars’ willingness to conceive of animal experience in terms of human mental capacities: consciousness, self-awareness, intention, deliberation, and in some instances, at least limited moral agency. This conception has been facilitated by a shift from behavioral to cognitive ethology, and by attempts to (...) affirm the essential similarities between the psychophysical makeup of human beings and animals. Gary Steiner sketches the terms of the current debates about animals and relates these to their historical antecedents, focusing on both the dominant anthropocentric voices and those recurring voices that instead assert a fundamental kinship relation between human beings and animals. He concludes with a discussion of the problem of balancing the need to recognize a human indebtedness to animals and the natural world with the need to preserve a sense of the uniqueness and dignity of the human individual. (shrink)

Abordagem do protagonismo social, analisando sua relação com a informação, concluindo pela compreensão deste como objetivo do trabalho informacional, situando a mediação da informação como sua ação central. Parte da apresentação das origens conceituais em torno do protagonismo, buscando, à medida que debate as referências acerca do tema, demonstrar a relação do desenvolvimento do protagonismo social com o trabalho informacional, assim como sua posição de meta da atividade da mediação da informação, executada nas suas cinco dimensões e na condição de (...) elemento central desse trabalho. As assertivas apresentadas são resultado do estudo crítico da bibliografia da área da Ciência da Informação que aborda o protagonismo e a mediação da informação, assim como de estudos de filósofos e pensadores que abordam os aspectos sociais e políticos da comunicação e da formação de sujeitos socialmente ativos, permitindo a identificação das relações entre protagonismo e mediação da informação, como também que a mediação consciente favorece o primeiro, concluindo que o apoio ao seu desenvolvimento representa a principal responsabilidade social do trabalho com a informação. (shrink)

During the last two years several committees discussed the question of enlarging patients' autonomy in living wills. The problern is to tind a way to grant patients' wishes without violating the state's duty to preserve human life. One basic question in the debate is the meaning of human dignity. Deducing from the Christian image of man the author describes chances and Iimits of living wills and presents a way of handling them. In her opinion living wills represent a chance for (...) a succeeding, trusting physician-patient- relationship in the age of high-tech medicine. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungBedingt durch den demographischen Wandel wird der Anteil an alten Patienten in Kliniken und Arztpraxen zunehmen. Damit müssen sich Ärzte verstärkt auf die spezifischen Anforderungen der Behandlung von alten Patienten einstellen. Diese sind wesentlich durch die Faktoren Alter, Multimorbidität und Demenz geprägt. Die Abhandlung analysiert die hiermit gegebenen sozial- und personalethischen Implikationen für Ausbildung und Arbeitsalltag der Ärzte sowie für das Gesundheitssystem.

Interpersonal coordination is a key factor in team performance. In interactive team sports, the limited predictability of a constantly changing context makes coordination challenging. Approaches that highlight the support provided by environmental information and theories of shared mental models provide potential explanations of how interpersonal coordination can nonetheless be established. In this article, we first outline the main assumptions of these approaches and consider criticisms that have been raised with regard to each. The aim of this article is to define (...) a theoretical perspective that integrates the coordination mechanisms of the two approaches. In doing so, we borrow from a theoretical outline of group action. According to this outline, group action based on a priori shared mental models is an example of how interpersonal coordination is established from the top down. Interpersonal coordination in reaction to the perception of affordances represents the bottom-up component of group action. Both components are inextricably involved in the coordination of interactive sports teams. We further elaborate on the theoretical outline to integrate a third, constructivist approach. Integrating this third approach helps to explain interpersonal coordination in game situations for which no shared mental models are established and game situations that remain ambiguous in terms of perceived affordances. The article describes how hierarchical, sequential and complex dimensions of action organization are important aspects of this constructivist perspective and how mental models may be involved. A basketball example is used to illustrate how top-down, bottom-up and constructivist processes may be simultaneously involved in enabling interpersonal coordination. Finally, we present the implications for research and practice. (shrink)

Sartori (1970) warned a long time ago of the danger of concept stretching for effective and cumulative theory building. Such concept stretching has happened with regard to deliberation, which has become a very faddish term. For theoretically well-founded empirical research it is better conceptually to distinguish clearly between strategic bargaining and deliberation, although in the empirical political world the two concepts are usually heavily intertwined. Keywords deliberation; concept stretching; strategic bargaining.

ABSTRACTRecent discussions in the field of moral cognition suggest that the relationship between emotion and judgment-formation can be described in three separate ways: firstly, it narrows our atte...