This article proposes an analytical approach to algorithms that stresses operations of folding. The aim of this approach is to broaden the common analytical focus on algorithms as biased and opaque black boxes, and to instead highlight the many relations that algorithms are interwoven with. Our proposed approach thus highlights how algorithms fold heterogeneous things: data, methods and objects with multiple ethical and political effects. We exemplify the utility of our approach by proposing three specific operations of folding—proximation, universalisation and (...) normalisation. The article develops these three operations through four empirical vignettes, drawn from different settings that deal with algorithms in relation to AIDS, Zika and stock markets. In proposing this analytical approach, we wish to highlight the many different attachments and relations that algorithms enfold. The approach thus aims to produce accounts that highlight how algorithms dynamically combine and reconfigure different social and material heterogeneities as well as the ethical, normative and political consequences of these reconfigurations. (shrink)

This research note analyzes the relationship between indicators of corporate social and financial performance within a comprehensive theoretical framework. The results, based on data for 67 large U.S. corporations for 1982-1992, reveal no significant negative social-financial performance relationships and strong positive correlations in both contemporaneous and lead-lag formulations.

People frequently see design in nature that reflects intuitive teleological thinking– that is, the order in nature that supports life suggests it was designed for that purpose. This research proposes that inferences are stronger when nature supports human life in particular. Five studies (total N = 1788) examine evidence for an anthro-teleological bias. People agreed more with design statements framed to aid humans (e.g., “trees produce oxygen so that humans can breathe”) than the same statements framed to aid other targets (...) (“trees produce oxygen so that leopards can breathe”). The bias was greatest when advantages for humans were well-known and salient (e.g., the ozone layer) and decreased when advantages for other targets were made explicit. The bias was not eliminated by highlighting the benefits for other species, however, and emerged spontaneously for novel phenomena (Jupiter’s gravity protects Earth from asteroids). We conclude that anthropocentric biases enhance existing teleological biases to see stronger design in phenomena where it enables human survival. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to set the stage by presenting a sketch of the global economic setting within which the environmental issues, which are our main concerns here, have arisen. It is important to note that this is also the setting within which any human, social and technological responses to these issues and concerns win have to be developed and implemented. There is no use thinking about arrangements that will work only in some other world. This world-the Planet (...) Earth, with all its demographic, physical and climatological characteristics—is the only one we have to work with. (shrink)

An important component of souls is the capacity for free will, as the origin of agency within an individual. Belief in souls arises in part from the experience of conscious will, a compelling feeling of personal causation that accompanies almost every action we take, and suggests that an immaterial self is in charge of the physical body.

The Global Positioning System has been used as an experiential educational tool for nearly twenty years. Innovative educators have expanded the educational use of GPS devices beyond the geocache. This essay uses Leopold’s land ethic as a philosophical framework for relational education, and outlines the practical application of the GPS ecocache. The experiential, place-based ecocache has learners navigate to sites of ecological significance, where they must answer a question or riddle related to this site. We discuss the contradictory nature of (...) using a gadget to connect with the outdoors, and integrate the GPS ecocache with Kolb’s model of experiential education. Ultimately, we hope to cultivate the values of Leopold’s land ethic through the use of a ubiquitously available device, and for learners to engage in relational pedagogy relevant to ecology, geography, environmental ethics, philosophy of science, philosophy of education and other courses concerned with human-nature connection and the nature of space. (shrink)

The authors found that the feeling of authorship for mental actions such as solving problems is enhanced by effort cues experienced during mental activity; misattribution of effort cues resulted in inadvertent plagiarism. Pairs of participants took turns solving anagrams as they exerted effort on an unrelated task. People inadvertently plagiarized their partners’ answers more often when they experienced high incidental effort while working on the problem and reduced effort as the solution appeared. This result was found for efforts produced when (...) participants squeezed a handgrip during the task (Experiment 1) or when the anagram was displayed in a font that was difficult to read (Experiments 2, 3a, and 3b). Plagiarism declined, however, when participants attended to the source of the effort cues (Experiments 3a and 3b). These results suggest that effort misattribution can influence authorship processing for mental activities. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to set the stage by presenting a sketch of the global economic setting within which the environmental issues, which are our main concerns here, have arisen. It is important to note that this is also the setting within which any human, social and technological responses to these issues and concerns win have to be developed and implemented. There is no use thinking about arrangements that will work only in some other world. This world-the Planet (...) Earth, with all its demographic, physical and climatological characteristics—is the only one we have to work with. (shrink)

The earlier volume in this series dealt with two religions of Indian origin, namely, Buddhism and Jainism. The Indian religious scene, however, is characterized by not only religions which originated in India but also by religions which entered India from outside India and made their home here. Thus religious life in India has been enlivened throughout its history by the presence of religions of foreign origin on its soil almost from the very time they came into existence. This volume covers (...) three such religions—Zoraoastrianism, Judaism, and Islam. In the case of Zoraostianism, even its very beginnings are intertwined with India, as Zoroastrianism reformed a preexisting religion which had strong links to the Vedic heritage of India. This relationship took on a new dimension when a Zoroastrian community, fearing persecution in Persia after its Arab conquest, sought shelter in western India and ultimately went on to produce India’s pioneering nationalist in the figure of Dadabhai Naoroji ( 1825-1917), also known as the Grand Old Man of India. Jews found refuge in south India after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. and have remained a part of the Indian religious scene since then, some even returning to Israel after it was founded in 1948. Islam arrived in Kerala as soon as it was founded and one of the earliest mosques in the history of Islam is found in India. Islam differs from the previously mentioned religions inasmuch as it went on to gain political hegemony over parts of the country for considerable periods of time, which meant that its impact on the religious life of the subcontinent has been greater compared to the other religions. It has also meant that Islam has existed in a religiously plural environment in India for a longer period than elsewhere in the world so that not only has Islam left a mark on India, India has also left its mark on it. Indeed all the three religions covered in this volume share this dual feature, that they have profoundly influenced Indian religious life and have also in turn been profoundly influenced by their presence in India. (shrink)

The earlier volume in this series dealt with two religions of Indian origin, namely, Buddhism and Jainism. The Indian religious scene, however, is characterized by not only religions which originated in India but also by religions which entered India from outside India and made their home here. Thus religious life in India has been enlivened throughout its history by the presence of religions of foreign origin on its soil almost from the very time they came into existence. This volume covers (...) three such religions—Zoraoastrianism, Judaism, and Islam. In the case of Zoraostianism, even its very beginnings are intertwined with India, as Zoroastrianism reformed a preexisting religion which had strong links to the Vedic heritage of India. This relationship took on a new dimension when a Zoroastrian community, fearing persecution in Persia after its Arab conquest, sought shelter in western India and ultimately went on to produce India’s pioneering nationalist in the figure of Dadabhai Naoroji ( 1825-1917), also known as the Grand Old Man of India. Jews found refuge in south India after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. and have remained a part of the Indian religious scene since then, some even returning to Israel after it was founded in 1948. Islam arrived in Kerala as soon as it was founded and one of the earliest mosques in the history of Islam is found in India. Islam differs from the previously mentioned religions inasmuch as it went on to gain political hegemony over parts of the country for considerable periods of time, which meant that its impact on the religious life of the subcontinent has been greater compared to the other religions. It has also meant that Islam has existed in a religiously plural environment in India for a longer period than elsewhere in the world so that not only has Islam left a mark on India, India has also left its mark on it. Indeed all the three religions covered in this volume share this dual feature, that they have profoundly influenced Indian religious life and have also in turn been profoundly influenced by their presence in India. (shrink)

“It is this distancing of personal relationships, combined with their replacement by written contractual terms and conditions, which make the discussion of ethics within a corporate institutionalised context highly limited and problematic.’ The challenge is to find means of personalising modern corporations so as to encourage ethical behaviour. Atul K. Shah PhD ACA gained his doctorate from the London School of Economics and is Lecturer in the Department of Accounting and Financial Management, at the University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester (...) CO4 3SQ; e‐mail [email protected]. This article was conceived while he was Visiting Assistant Professor at the College of Business, University of Maryland, USA. The author wishes to thank Dan Ostas, Lee Preston and Stephen Loeb for helpful comments on earlier drafts. (shrink)

This issue of Business & Society contains the transcripts of 12 oral history interviews with founders of and early contributors to the business and society/social issues in management field. The publication of these interviews is the culmination of a very long-term project, with the first interview having been conducted in 1993 with Lee Preston and the most recent interview having been conducted in 2011 with Jim Post. This project has been very much of a team effort with Sandra Waddock, (...) John Steiner, Mary Mallott, Ariane Berthoin Antal, and, of course, our interviewees all playing important roles. (shrink)

“It is this distancing of personal relationships, combined with their replacement by written contractual terms and conditions, which make the discussion of ethics within a corporate institutionalised context highly limited and problematic.’ The challenge is to find means of personalising modern corporations so as to encourage ethical behaviour. Atul K. Shah PhD ACA gained his doctorate from the London School of Economics and is Lecturer in the Department of Accounting and Financial Management, at the University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester (...) CO4 3SQ; e‐mail [email protected]. This article was conceived while he was Visiting Assistant Professor at the College of Business, University of Maryland, USA. The author wishes to thank Dan Ostas, Lee Preston and Stephen Loeb for helpful comments on earlier drafts. (shrink)

Gut Reactions is an interdisciplinary defense of the claim that emotions are perceptions of changes in the body.

The Conscious Brain brings neuroscientific evidence to bear on enduring philosophical questions. Major philosophical and scientific theories of consciousness are surveyed, challenged, and extended.

This book focuses on material culture as a subject of philosophical inquiry and promotes the philosophical study of material culture by articulating some of the central and difficult issues raised by this topic and providing innovative solutions to them, most notably an account of improvised action and a non-intentionalist account of function in material culture. Preston argues that material culture essentially involves activities of production and use; she therefore adopts an action-theoretic foundation for a philosophy of material culture. Part (...) 1 illustrates this foundation through a critique, revision, and extension of existing philosophical theories of action. Part 2 investigates a salient feature of material culture itself—its functionality. A basic account of function in material culture is constructed by revising and extending existing theories of biological function to fit the cultural case. Here the adjustments are for the most part necessitated by special features of function in material culture. These two parts of the project are held together by a trio of overarching themes: the relationship between individual and society, the problem of centralized control, and creativity. (shrink)

When Fodor titled his (1983) book the _Modularity of Mind_, he overstated his position. His actual view is that the mind divides into systems some of which are modular and others of which are not. The book would have been more aptly, if less provocatively, called _The Modularity of Low-Level Peripheral Systems_. High-level perception and cognitive systems are non-modular on Fodor’s theory. In recent years, modularity has found more zealous defenders, who claim that the entire mind divides into highly specialized (...) modules. This view has been especially popular among Evolutionary Psychologists. They claim that the mind is massively modular (Cosmides and Tooby, 1994; Sperber, 1994; Pinker, 1997; see also Samuels, 1998). Like a Swiss Army Knife, the mind is an assembly of specialized tools, each of which has been designed for some particular purpose. My goal here is to raise doubts about both peripheral modularity and massive modularity. To do that, I will rely on the criteria for modularity laid out by Fodor (1983). I will argue that neither input systems, nor central systems are modular on any of these criteria. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in (...) the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

Situationists argue that virtue ethics is empirically untenable, since traditional virtue ethicists postulate broad, efficacious character traits, and social psychology suggests that such traits do not exist. I argue that prominent philosophical replies to this challenge do not succeed. But cross-cultural research gives reason to postulate character traits, and this undermines the situationist critique. There is, however, another empirical challenge to virtue ethics that is harder to escape. Character traits are culturally informed, as are our ideals of what traits are (...) virtuous, and our ideals of what qualifies as well-being. If virtues and well-being are culturally constructed ideals, then the standard strategy for grounding the normativity of virtue ethics in human nature is undermined. (shrink)

Reviled and fetishized, the work of Georges Bataille has been most often reduced to his outrageous, erotic, and libertine fiction and essays. But increasingly, readers are finding his insights into politics, economics, sexuality, and performance revealing and timely. Focusing on Bataille’s most extensive work, The Accursed Share, Shannon Winnubst and the contributors to this volume present contemporary interpretations that read Bataille in a new light. These essays situate Bataille in French and European intellectual traditions, bring forward key concepts for understanding (...) the challenges posed by his important work, and draw out his philosophy. Established voices and younger scholars cover a range of topics and themes, including ethics, politics, economy, psychology, and performance so readers can think with and through Bataille. While focusing attention on Bataille and his provocative work, this book offers a sympathetic, yet critical, reappraisal and rehabilitation. Contributors are Alison Leigh Brown, Andrew Cutrofello, Zeynep Direk, Jesse Goldhammer, Dorothy Holland, Pierre Lamarche, Richard A. Lee, Jr., Alphonso Lingis, Ladelle McWhorter, Lucio A. Privitello, Allan Stoekl, Amy Wendling, and Shannon Winnubst. (shrink)

In one of the most frequently quoted passages in the history of emotion research, William James (1884: 189f) announces that emotions occur when the perception of an exciting fact causes a collection of bodily changes, and “our feeling of the same changes as they occur IS the emotion.” The same idea occurred to Carl Lange (1984) around the same time. These authors were not the first to draw a link between the emotions and the body. Indeed, this had been a (...) central theme of Descartes’ exquisite opus, The Passions of the Soul. But James and Lange wanted to push things farther than most, suggesting that emotions are exhausted by bodily changes or perceptions thereof. Other kinds of mental episodes might co-occur when we have an emotion state. For James, an emotion follows an exciting perception. But the exciting perception is not a part of the emotion it excited (Ellsworth, 1994, reads James differently, but see Reisenzein et al.’s 1995 convincing response). The majority of contemporary emotion researchers, especially those in philosophy, find this suggestion completely untenable. Surely, emotions involve something more. At their core, emotions are more like judgments or thoughts, than perceptions. They evaluate, assess, or appraise. Emotions are amendable to rational assessment; they report, correctly or incorrectly, on how we are faring in the world. Within this general consensus, there is a further debate about whether the body should figure into a theory of emotions at all. Perhaps James and Lange offer a theory that is not merely incomplete, but entirely off base. Where they view judgments as contingent and non-constitutive concomitants of emotions, it is actually bodily perceptions that deserve this demotion. Perhaps emotions can be, and often are, disembodied in some fundamental sense. (shrink)

Philosophers should listen to punk rock. Though largely ignored in analytic aesthetics, punk can shed light on the nature, limits, and value of art. Here, I will begin with an overview of punk aesthetics and then extrapolate two lessons. First, punk intentionally violates widely held aesthetic norms, thus raising questions about the plasticity of taste. Second, punk music is associated with accompanying visual styles, fashion, and attitudes; this points to a relationship between art and identity. Together, these lessons suggest that (...) art appreciation is not just about finding beauty or aesthetic worth but is also about constructing a self. (shrink)

Once upon a time, people thought that all perception was conscious. Indeed, it was widely believed that all mental states are conscious, so the problem of explaining consciousness collapses into the problem of explaining mentality. But things have changed. Most people now believe that a lot goes on unconsciously. Indeed, some people believe that mental states that are not perceptual in nature are never conscious. That’s a matter of controversy. Less controversial is the claim that perceptual states are conscious some (...) of the time, but not all of the time. This raises a question. When are perceptual states conscious? A theory of consciousness is, in large part, an answer to that question. In this chapter, I will offer a few critical remarks on one answer that has been popular in philosophy, and then I will offer a defense of another answer that has emerged out of cognitive science. To avoid undue suspense, the answer that I favor is that perceptual states become conscious when and only when the perceiver is attending. (shrink)

Prototype theory emerged out of two main sources. First, research on perceptual category learning suggested that people spontaneously abstract representations of the statistical central tendency when they are exposed to a range of similar images. The abstracted representation corresponds to the average or prototype for a range of training images and can be used to classify future examples. The second source was philosophical. On some versions, the prototype features are organized into structured lists, which divide into such subheadings as physical (...) attributes, means of locomotion, and perhaps diet. In a connectionist framework, a prototype might be a collection of weighted feature-representing nodes, or, more graphically, points in a multidimensional space, whose dimensions correspond to nodes in the network. On an empiricist approach, prototype features might be interpreted as components of structured mental images, and imagistic simulations of prototype activities. (shrink)

Our soft survey reveals that the assumption underlying much of the business ethics literature -- that the conduct of business can and ought to support the social good -- is not accepted within the workplace. This paper considers an apparent dichotomy, with companies investing in ethical programs whose worth their employees and managers question. We examine the relationship between work, bureaucracy and "the market" and conclude that employees often question the existence of business ethics because there is no good and (...) bad between which to choose. The choice is between success and failure. A common view of success and the "good life" is one determined by hard work in a well-organised company operating in a free market. Analysing the three aspects of this view (the free market, hard work, bureaucracy) we suggest these are mere fictions. A major problem we identify in business is that organisations are designed as profit making mechanisms and have no interest in the good of society. The challenge is to convince such organisations that a direct benefit accrues to them through their own ethical behaviour. In order to do this organisations must first be shown the importance of long termism. Executives, managers and other employees can be expected to attain high ethical standards only when they feel they are a integral part of an organisation and the organisation itself respects those standards. One of the keys to unravelling the undesirable situation of a perceived absence of ethics in business is in encouraging a greater identity community, company and workforce. We provide some examples of ways companies can meet the challenge of encouraging more ethical, long-sighted behaviour. In addition, we highlight ways in which the expectations of the organisations of the organisation can be communicated more strongly through corporate structures that foster ethical action that benefits the long term interests of the individual and the organisation. Overall implementing a successful ethical program is shown to parallel that of the implementation of a quality program. (shrink)