This paper reports the results of a survey study examining the knowledge, motivations and concerns of egg-share donors and recipients, and assesses the clinical and policy implications of these findings. The survey, combining quantitative and qualitative items, was completed by 48 donors and 38 recipients who took part in an egg-sharing scheme at the London Women's Clinic between 2007 and 2009. Although the most important motivation for all egg-sharers was to have a baby, both donors and recipients displayed multiple motivations, (...) including elements of self-interest and altruism. Many viewed egg-sharing as a reciprocal process in which two women with different needs help one another. The results are reassuring from an ethical and policy perspective: they suggest that if information about egg-sharing was more widely available (especially through general practitioners), more women may consider becoming egg-share donors, gaining swift access to their own treatment and reducing the UK's egg donor shortage. (shrink)

Northoff provides a compelling argument supporting a kind of “double dissociation” of Parkinson's disease and catatonia. We discuss a related form of akinetic mutism linked to mesodiencephalic injuries and suggest an alternative to the proposed “horizontal” versus “vertical” modulation distinction. Rather than a “directional” difference in patterned neuronal activity, we propose that both disorders reflect hypersynchrony within typically interdependent but segregated networks facilitated by a common thalamic gating mechanism.

Industries of production and scientific research rely on the use of nonhuman animals and plants, remaking environments, populations, and even genetic information to suit human designs. This issue of _Social Text_ considers the radical implications of questioning the exceptional status of humans among the planet’s species. Responding to growing interest in animal studies and posthumanism, the contributors draw on racial, feminist, queer, postcolonial, and disability theories to probe the diversity of human relationships with other forms of biosocial life. “Interspecies” queries (...) the politics of traditional species taxonomy and examines the ways humans use the material characteristics of other species to pursue their economic, political, and social aims. This collection goes beyond companionate species to examine less charismatic life forms: viruses, vermin, transgenic pigs, and commodified plants. Bringing together prominent scholars and artists from a range of fields, the issue examines the histories of species collection and display. In the context of current public health challenges, including the swine flu epidemic and the scarcity of donor organs, the contributors explore the limits of transgressing species boundaries that arise when human bodies contain other species, such as viruses or transplanted organs from genetically customized pigs. “Interspecies” analyzes the use of nonhuman species in the biopolitics of warfare and torture and examines how interspecies relationships shape conditions of colonialism, imprisonment, and violence. The issue also complicates romanticized narratives of human/nonhuman animal dynamics without resorting to oversimplified portrayals of human exploitation of animal and plant life. _Julie Livingston _is Associate Professor of History at Rutgers University. _Jasbir Puar _is Associate Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at Rutgers University. She is the author of _Terrorist Assemblages: Homonationalism in Queer Times_. _Contributors: _Neel Ahuja, Suzanne Anker, Ed Cohen, James Delbourgo, Sarah Franklin, Carla Freccero, Alphonso Lingis, Julie Livingston, Chakanetsa Clapperton Mavhunga, Jasbir Puar, Kingsley Rothwell, Lesley Sharp. (shrink)

The data mining field in computer science specializes in extracting implicit information that is distributed across the stored data records and/or exists as associations among groups of records. Criminal databases contain information on the crimes themselves, the offenders, the victims as well as the vehicles that were involved in the crime. Among these records lie groups of crimes that can be attributed to serial criminals who are responsible for multiple criminal offenses and usually exhibit patterns in their operations, by specializing (...) in a particular crime category (i.e., rape, murder, robbery, etc.), and applying a specific method for implementing their crimes. Discovering serial criminal patterns in crime databases is, in general, a clustering activity in the area of data mining that is concerned with detecting trends in the data by classifying and grouping similar records. In this paper, we report on the different statistical and neural network approaches to the clustering problem in data mining in general, and as it applies to our crime domain in particular. We discuss our approach of using a cascaded network of Kohonen neural networks followed by heuristic processing of the networks outputs that best simulated the experts in the field. We address the issues in this project and the reasoning behind this approach, including: the choice of neural networks, in general, over statistical algorithms as the main tool, and the use of Kohonen networks in particular, the choice for the cascaded approach instead of the direct approach, and the choice of a heuristics subsystem as a back-end subsystem to the neural networks. We also report on the advantages of this approach over both the traditional approach of using a single neural network to accommodate all the attributes, and that of applying a single clustering algorithm on all the data attributes. (shrink)

Recognizing the immense purchasing power of children, marketing researchers often gather information from them. Given the vulnerability of these children as research subjects, this paper explores the different ethical standards that marketing researchers could adopt in their research efforts. The Paternalistic Ethical Standard and the Limited Paternalistic Ethical Standard are discussed and the ethical quandary known as the Pontius Pilate Plight is identified in the context of the latter standard. An enhanced version of the Limited Paternalistic Standard is suggested as (...) an ethical guide for marketing researchers. Based on interviews with professional marketing researchers to gauge the applicability of the proposed standard, managerial implications are identified. (shrink)

Millions of children in conflict-affected countries are deprived of their fundamental rights to education. Using the qualitative exploratory research method, this study aims to explore ways of providing education to such children, and to identify the challenges facing their implementation. It also presents two short case studies conducted on Palestinian and Syrian refugees residing in Malaysia to explore their perceptions towards their education in their current situation and future orientation. The results show that despite the educational programmes initiated by various (...) organizations, the affected community continue to face numerous political, financial, psychological, economic, administrative, or institutional challenges. The analysis of the interviews data revealed several categories and themes, among them related to the participants’ current situation, educational needs, roles of different members of the community involved, and the challenges. The study recommends increasing efforts to meet the educational demands of the huge number of children out of schools. (shrink)

As information technologies have become synonymous with progress in modern society, several ethical concerns have surfaced about their societal implications. In the past few decades, information technologies have had a value-laden impact on social evolution. However, there is limited agreement on the responsibility of businesses and innovators concerning the ethical aspects of information technologies. There is a need to understand the role of business incentives and attitudes in driving technological progress and to understand how they steer the ethics discourse on (...) technology. In the information technology industry, there is an observed trivialization of ethics supported by a business driven and technology-centric approach to ethics. This trivialization rests on hardened beliefs, ideologies, and arguments which hint at reduced accountability for business and tend to individualize social responsibility. The phenomenon of ethics trivialization needs to be duly addressed to resolve the tensions between business needs and ethical concerns. This paper has identified from literature and conceptually analyzed the beliefs and ideologies underlying ethics trivialization which undermine ethics in business contexts. The paper has attempted to address the business concerns indicated by this phenomenon as well as highlight the weaknesses of its assumptions, rhetoric, and justifications. The aim of this paper is to systematically present the justifications in favor of and against the practice of ethics trivialization in the information technology domain, thereby highlighting the need to develop frameworks for assessment of ethical responsibility, accountability, and democratization of the value trade-offs involved in the design of technologies. (shrink)

Advances in science and technology have allowed for incredible improvements in healthcare. Additionally, the digital revolution in healthcare provides new ways of collecting and storing large volum...

Should the regulation of production and distribution in a socialist society be based on the law of value? In this article we ask (1) Is this question not based on an ontological understanding of labour, on a rational and therefore conceptual understanding of abstract labour and, ultimately, a transhistorical understanding of value and the so-called ‘law of value’?; (2) is it not precisely this deception and power of the fetishism of commodities that, by eternalising value and the ‘law of value’, (...) limits the horizon and perspective of ‘realistic politics’ (Realpolitik)?; and (3) whether this question does not treat socialism as a political situation where the solution to its ‘economic’ problem is unrelated to its very identity? In order to answer these questions, we provide a novel understanding of Marx’s fundamental category of value, its substance, form and magnitude, with the help of the German expression Formgehalt, translated as form-content. (shrink)

Concept of self in Indic philosophy; based on Mahābhārata, Hindu epic.

El presente artículo ofrece una traducción anotada del _Tratado acerca de las reglas del arte de los poetas_ (_Qawānīn fī ṣināʿat al-_ _šuʿarāʾ_) de Abū Naṣr al-Fārābī. Acompañamos esta traducción de una introducción dividida en tres partes. En primer lugar, se ofrece un contexto general acerca del lugar del _Qawānīn_ en la obra de al-Fārābī y en la tradición filosófica árabe. En segundo, se plantea una posible división temática del texto. Y finalmente, en tercer lugar, se especifican las peculiaridades de (...) la traducción, referente al texto tomado como base y las principales decisiones de traducción. (shrink)

El presente artículo se centra en explorar una cuestión fundamental del pensamiento de al-Fārābī, específicamente su comprensión de la potencia de la poesía y su papel político y social en el contexto del mundo árabe clásico. La lectura de este filósofo implica una reinterpretación innovadora de la Poética y la Retórica de Aristóteles, destacando el carácter productivo de la imaginación en términos de evocación de imágenes y creación de semejanzas. Se explora, asimismo, la influencia de la filosofía de al-Fārābī en (...) otros filósofos árabes e islámicos, como Avicena y Averroes, quienes se convirtieron en principales referentes en la reivindicación de la filosofía en este contexto cultural. (shrink)

On the contribution of Akalaṅkadeva, 8th cent, Jaina logician; reserach papers presented in national seminar.

This paper argues that existing food security and food sovereignty approaches are inadequate to fully understand contradictory human development, nutrition, and productivity trends in Nepalese small-scale agriculture. In an attempt to bridge this gap, we developed a new food wellbeing approach that combines insights from food security, food sovereignty, and social wellbeing perspectives. We used the approach to frame 65 semi-structured interviews in a cluster of villages in Kaski district in the mid-hills of Nepal on various aspects of food security, (...) agriculture, off-farm livelihood opportunities, and women’s wellbeing. Our results indicate that context-specific subjective and social relational factors highlighted by the food wellbeing approach are key to understanding a paradox of increased food security, yet decreasing sustainability of small-scale agriculture. Increased levels of male out-migration and opportunities for local off-farm work have increased local capacity to purchase food. The positive consequences for food security are indicated by evidence that households with non-farm income sources had better food sufficiency, absorption capacity, nutritional quality, and stability of food supply. These off-farm employment opportunities have also led to the greater involvement of low caste groups and women in small-scale agriculture. This has been empowering for both groups and led to an increase in wellbeing, particularly for those women who have become de facto heads of household. Yet, small landholdings, persistent patterns of unequal and absentee land ownership, sharecropping, women’s overwork, and the aspirations of low caste farmers and women away from agriculture are simultaneously driving the erosion of local small-scale agricultural productivity and ecological sustainability. (shrink)

Dark patterns have received significant attention in literature as interface design practices which undermine users’ autonomy by coercing, misleading or manipulating their decision making and behavior. Individual autonomy has been argued to be one of the normative lenses for the evaluation of dark patterns. However, theoretical perspectives on autonomy have not been sufficiently adapted in literature to identify the ethical concerns raised by dark patterns. The aim of this paper is to conceptualize user autonomy within the context of dark patterns. (...) In this paper, we systematically review 151 dark patterns from 16 taxonomies to understand how dark patterns threaten users’ autonomy. We demonstrate through this analysis that implications for autonomy arise along four dimensions, because autonomy itself can be understood as subsuming several distinguishable concepts. These are agency, freedom of choice, control and independence. We argue that an assessment of whether a design pattern qualifies as ‘dark’ should account for the sense in which autonomy is threatened, as individuals’ rights and expectations of autonomy vary in various contexts and depend upon the interpretation of autonomy. This paper aims to contribute to the development of the normative lens of individual autonomy for the evaluation of dark patterns, as well as for persuasive design more broadly. (shrink)

Freedom of association for trade union has been generally accepted as part of basic human rights in Islam. Freedom of association, which include the right to join and participate in trade union activities, can be susceptible to disputes between employers and employees as well as trade unions. Islam provides freedom of association in labour relations and also mechanisms to settle disputes pertaining to such freedom. Conciliation (sulh) and arbitration (tahkim) are both used methods in the inception of Islam, which have (...) similarities with the modern sense. We shall discuss in this article the right to dispute resolution between employers and trade unions in the context of freedom of association in labour relations as based on Shari’ah law and using modern legal systems of Islamic countries such as Iran, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia as examples. (shrink)

The well-known classifier support vector machine has many parameters associated with its various kernel functions. The radial basis function kernel, being the most preferred kernel, has two parameters to be optimized. The problem of optimizing these parameter values is called model selection in the literature, and its results strongly influence the performance of the classifier. Another factor that affects the classification performance of a classifier is the feature subset. Both these factors are interdependent and must be dealt with simultaneously. Following (...) the multiobjective definition of feature selection, we have applied a multiobjective genetic algorithm, NSGA II, to optimize the feature subset and model parameters simultaneously. Comparison of the proposed approach with the grid algorithm and GA-based method suggests that the MOGA-based approach performs better than the grid algorithm and is as good as the GA-based approach. Moreover, it provides multiple solutions instead of a single solution. The users can prefer one feature subset over the other as per their requirement and available resources. (shrink)

How (Not) to Be Secular is what Jamie Smith calls "your hitchhiker's guide to the present" -- it is both a reading guide to Charles Taylor's monumental work A Secular Age and philosophical guidance on how we might learn to live in our times. Taylor's landmark book A Secular Age (2007) provides a monumental, incisive analysis of what it means to live in the post-Christian present -- a pluralist world of competing beliefs and growing unbelief. Jamie Smith's book is a (...) compact field guide to Taylor's insightful study of the secular, making that very significant but daunting work accessible to a wide array of readers. Even more, though, Smith's How (Not) to Be Secular is a practical philosophical guidebook, a kind of how-to manual on how to live in our secular age. It ultimately offers us an adventure in self-understanding and maps out a way to get our bearings in today's secular culture, no matter who "we" are -- whether believers or skeptics, devout or doubting, self-assured or puzzled and confused. This is a book for any thinking person to chew on. (shrink)

Purpose Along with their immense benefit, online channels of communication and information-sharing also present a myriad set of challenges. The unauthorized downloading and sharing of copyrighted content such as music and movies is one such issue. This study aims to examine the factors related to the unauthorized downloading of content amongst young internet users in an emerging market. Design/methodology/approach An online structured questionnaire was used to collect primary data from 219 internet users between 17 and 24 years of age. The (...) partial least squares structural equation modelling was used to analyse the primary data. Findings The study findings report that monetary savings and social influence are the main drivers underlying the propensity to engage in unauthorized downloading amongst young adults. Perceptions of harm caused to artists and producers appear to be a deterrent. Though the respondents perceive the quality of content downloaded from unauthorized sites to be less than desirable, and there is also a higher perceived threat from viruses, this does not appear to deter unauthorized downloading behaviour amongst this segment of consumers. Research limitations/implications Combating unauthorized downloading and other forms of questionable online behaviours is a challenge for multiple stakeholders. Consumption of unauthorized digital content is examined in the context of online consumers whose demographic profile is often associated with this category of questionable behaviour. The study adds to the extant understanding of the aetiology of what are often considered online unethical and illegal behaviours and makes both practical and theoretical contributions to the subject field. Originality/value The study examines an important aspect of rapidly evolving internet technologies. The internet provides a veil to individuals engaging in unethical online activities. Despite the existence of laws declaring these activities to be illegal, instances of copyright violations of music and movies abound. The insights regarding the drivers and deterrents of a form of online unauthorized activity are used to present a set of strategies aimed at addressing such behaviours. (shrink)

Purpose The internet has provided a gamut of benefits to consumers. The digital world, however, also provides space for various illegal or unethical consumer activities. Consumers may not always be fully aware of the unethical or illegal nature of some of the online activities that they engage in. This study aims to examine the questionable side of online consumer behaviour in an emerging market where internet penetration and smart phone accessibility is rapidly expanding. Using a third-person technique, this study attempts (...) to empirically capture the perceptions of Indian adults regarding the prevalence of various questionable online activities such as unauthorized downloading of digital content, spreading fake news/misinformation and fraudulent returns and to understand the extent to which these respondents believe that such actions are acceptable or illegal and unethical. Design/methodology/approach An online questionnaire was used to collect primary data from 212 consumers. Non-probability convenience and snowball sampling was used for the purpose. Findings Unauthorized watching or downloading of online content is reported to be the most prevalent among the various types of questionable behaviours examined. However, it is behaviours such as fraudulent returns and spreading misinformation through online channels which are considered to be the most unethical or illegal. Certain behaviours which may be deemed to be unethical and illegal nevertheless are seen as acceptable. Significant differences between demographics in the case of several of the unethical activities are reported. Research limitations/implications This study examines the grey and dark side of online behaviours among consumers in an emerging market and points to the need for action on several fronts to increase consumer awareness and sensitivity about the unethical or illegal nature of some of their online activities and the implications for multiple stakeholders. Based on the findings of this study, recommendations directed at consumers, marketers and policymakers are discussed. Originality/value Although the benefits of online communication channels have been extensively studied, their ability to facilitate certain unethical and even illegal activities is an under-researched area. The inclination to engage in these types of questionable behaviours may have been exacerbated by the restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. This study highlights the importance of research on various grey consumer activities in the digital space and paves the way for further investigations by identifying online actions which are considered as most prevalent and/or unethical and illegal. (shrink)

This paper is about human rights and policing in Bangladesh, with special focus on the role of National Human Rights Commission. The protection and promotion of human rights in Bangladesh has become difficult as the law enforcement agencies, particularly the police and the Rapid Action Battalion, are involved in human rights violations. An overall culture of impunity for human rights violations exists in Bangladesh. The National Human Rights Commission appears to have failed to break the culture of impunity in Bangladeshi (...) politics. This paper explains the reasons why the National Human Rights Commission in Bangladesh largely fails to make the political system in particular law enforcement agencies accountable. (shrink)

This paper is about human rights and policing in Bangladesh, with special focus on the role of National Human Rights Commission. The protection and promotion of human rights in Bangladesh has become difficult as the law enforcement agencies, particularly the police and the Rapid Action Battalion, are involved in human rights violations. An overall culture of impunity for human rights violations exists in Bangladesh. The National Human Rights Commission appears to have failed to break the culture of impunity in Bangladeshi (...) politics. This paper explains the reasons why the National Human Rights Commission in Bangladesh largely fails to make the political system in particular law enforcement agencies accountable. (shrink)

In this article, the main definitions and differentiation concepts of neutrosophic fuzzy environment will be reviewed. This article will introduce an analytical methodology for solving the second-order linear ordinary differential problem with neutrosophic fuzzy boundary values, this analysis will be under generalized Hukuhara differentiability to show the analytical solutions from a different point of view for the uncertain system, some of these solutions may be decreasing in uncertainty or maybe reflecting the behavior of some real-world systems better. Some applications and (...) numeral examples will be solved to show the behavior of the solution. (shrink)

Sabzawari is one of the greatest Muslim philosophers of the nineteenth century. He belongs to Sadrian Existentialism, which became a dominant philosophical tradition during the Qajar dynasty in Iran. This paper critically analyses Sabzawari’s ontological discussion on the dichotomy of existence and quiddity and the relation between existence and non-existence. It argues against Sabzawari by advocating the idea that ‘Existence’ rather than quiddity is the ground for identity as well as for diversity, and that non-existence, like existence, is able to (...) produce an effect. (shrink)

On the doctrine of recognition (Patyabhijñā philosophy) in Kashmir Saivism.