Funding organizations around the world are adopting open science policies, resulting in a pressing need for open science programs. In response to the 2011 decadal survey, NASA sought to expand and accelerate omics research, releasing its GeneLab Strategic Plan in 2014. GeneLab is an open science data repository and analysis portal for spaceflight and space-relevant omics data. GeneLab’s output has been outstanding, but its full potential as a way to transform space biology has not yet been achieved. NASA should pursue (...) the development of GeneLab as an open science platorm in earnest. (shrink)

This study examines the linguistic construal and cognitive representation of time and viewpoint in the genre of news narratives. We present a model of mental spaces that involves a News Space in which the deictic center is construed of the news actors at the time the newsworthy events took place, and a Reality Space in which the deictic here-and-now center of journalist and reader is construed. This model explains how the dynamic representation of narrative news discourse, characterized by shifts in (...) time and viewpoint, is steered by linguistic devices. An analysis of Dutch news narratives shows that temporal adverbs such as yesterdayand shifts from present tense to past tense may signal a moveforwardin narrative time, to a viewpoint in the future relative to the narrative now-point, rather thanbackward. These atypical time shifts can be accounted for by presupposing an Intermediate Space located at a point in time between the News Space and the Reality Space where the progression of narrative time comes to a halt and experiences are rather relived than reported. The salience of the Intermediate Space may be signaled by quotative conditionals reflecting the viewpoints of implicitly quoted sources. These results clarify how tense and temporal deixis steer the linguistic construal of time and viewpoint in news narratives, demonstrating that time and viewpoint are closely linked in the cognitive representation of these narratives. (shrink)

There is an important but underappreciated ambiguity in Hobbes’ concept of personhood. In one sense, persons are representatives or actors. In the other sense, persons are representees or characters. An estate agent is a person in the first sense; her client is a person in the second. This ambiguity is crucial for understanding Hobbes’ claim that the state is a person. Most scholars follow the first sense of ‘person’, which suggests that the state is a kind of actor – in (...) modern terms, a ‘corporate agent’. I argue that Hobbes’ state is a person only in the second sense: a character rather than an actor. If there are any primitive corporate agents in Hobbes’ political thought, they are representative assemblies, not states or corporations. Contemporary political theorists and philosophers tend to miss what is unique and valuable about Hobbes’ idea of state personality because they project the idea of corporate agency onto it. (shrink)

I argue that the most promising approach to understanding J.J. Gibson's "affordances" takes affordances themselves as ontological primitives, instead of treating them as dispositional properties of more primitive things, events, surfaces, or substances. These latter are best treated as coalescences of affordances present in the environment (or "coalescences of use-potential," as in Sanders (1994) and Hilditch (1995)). On this view, even the ecological approach's stress on the complementary organism/environment pair is seen as expressing a particular affordance relation between the (...) world and the analyst. That the world is parsed in any way among events and objects, perceivers and worlds, etc., reflects equally features of certain real or possible perspectives on the world and features of the world itself. In section 1, I begin by contending that, contrary to the apparent expectations of some in the field, the bare existence of affordances is surely quite uncontroversial. In section 2, I argue that the most reasonable approach to foundational ontology is a relativistic one. In section 3, I address the claim that affordances must be ontologically complemented by effectivities for the sake of completeness, and I shall argue against that claim on grounds that I take to reflect some of Gibson's most important insights. This work will help to clarify the way affordances are to be used in the fourth and final section, where I argue that ontological work, even within special sciences, should not be merely "regional," and that the most attractive general approach to ontological questions is one that is based on affordances, rather than upon things, events, surfaces, and the like. (shrink)

In his remarkable paper Formalism 64, Robinson defends his eponymous position concerning the foundations of mathematics, as follows:Any mention of infinite totalities is literally meaningless.We should act as if infinite totalities really existed. Being the originator of Nonstandard Analysis, it stands to reason that Robinson would have often been faced with the opposing position that ‘some infinite totalities are more meaningful than others’, the textbook example being that of infinitesimals. For instance, Bishop and Connes have made such claims regarding infinitesimals, (...) and Nonstandard Analysis in general, going as far as calling the latter respectively a debasement of meaning and virtual, while accepting as meaningful other infinite totalities and the associated mathematical framework. We shall study the critique of Nonstandard Analysis by Bishop and Connes, and observe that these authors equate ‘meaning’ and ‘computational content’, though their interpretations of said content vary. As we will see, Bishop and Connes claim that the presence of ideal objects in Nonstandard Analysis yields the absence of meaning. We will debunk the Bishop–Connes critique by establishing the contrary, namely that the presence of ideal objects in Nonstandard Analysis yields the ubiquitous presence of computational content. In particular, infinitesimals provide an elegant shorthand for expressing computational content. To this end, we introduce a direct translation between a large class of theorems of Nonstandard Analysis and theorems rich in computational content, similar to the ‘reversals’ from the foundational program Reverse Mathematics. The latter also plays an important role in gauging the scope of this translation. (shrink)

Reverse mathematics is a program in the foundations of mathematics founded by Friedman and developed extensively by Simpson and others. The aim of RM is to find the minimal axioms needed to prove a theorem of ordinary, that is, non-set-theoretic, mathematics. As suggested by the title, this paper deals with two RM-phenomena, namely, splittings and disjunctions. As to splittings, there are some examples in RM of theorems A, B, C such that A↔, that is, A can be split into two (...) independent parts B and C. As to disjunctions, there are examples in RM of theorems D, E, F such that D↔, that is, D can be written as the disjunction of two independent parts E and F. By contrast, we show in this paper that there is a plethora of splittings and disjunctions in Kohlenbach’s higher-order RM. (shrink)

The current status of localization and related concepts, especially localized statevectors and position operators, within Lorentz-invariant Quantum Theory (LIQT) is ambiguous and controversial.1 Ever since the early work of Newton & Wigner (1949), and the subsequent extensions of their work, particularly by Hegerfeldt (1974, 1985), it has seemed impossible to identify localized statevectors or position operators in LIQT that were not counterintuitive—strange—in one way or another; the most striking strange property being the superluminal propagation of the localized states. The ambiguous (...) and controversial status of these concepts arises from the varied reactions that workers have to the strange properties. Some regard them, particularly the superluminal propagation, as utterly unacceptable, and conclude that no precise concepts of localized statevectors and position operators exist in LIQT (Wigner 1973, p. 325-327; 1983, pp. 310-313; Malament 1996). Others downplay the whole issue, on the grounds that current theoretical and experimental practice has no need of sharply formulated concepts of localization, localized states etc. (Birrell & Davies 1984, pp. 48-59; Haag 1992, p. 34). Still others, including ourselves, believe that the superluminal propagation does not lead to causal contradictions, and is not in conflict with available empirical data: so that it should not be ruled out. We also believe that the other strange properties are merely unfamiliar novelties of LIQT which we must simply learn to accept. (Like the superluminal propagation, they do not lead to causal contradictions, nor conflict with available data.) So in this paper, we aim to help remove the ambiguous and controversial status of localization concepts in LIQT. Overall, our strategy will be to assess a number of localization concepts, and thereby clarify the often complex relationships among them. (shrink)

The popular media has repeatedly pointed to pride as one of the key factors motivating leaders to behave unethically. However, given the devastating consequences that leader unethical behavior may have, a more scientific account of the role of pride is warranted. The present study differentiates between authentic and hubristic pride and assesses its impact on leader ethical behavior, while taking into consideration the extent to which leaders find it important to their self-concept to be a moral person. In two experiments (...) we found that with higher levels of moral identity, authentically proud leaders are more likely to engage in ethical behavior than hubristically proud leaders, and that this effect is mediated by leaders’ motivation to act selflessly. A field survey among organizational leaders corroborated that moral identity may bring the positive effect of authentic pride and the negative effect of hubristic pride on leader ethical behavior to the forefront. (shrink)

The standard approach to the core phenomenology of thought insertion characterizes it in terms of a normal sense of thought ownership coupled with an abnormal sense of thought agency. Recently, Fernández (2010) has argued that there are crucial problems with this approach and has proposed instead that what goes wrong fundamentally in such a phenomenology is a sense of thought commitment, characterized in terms of thought endorsement. In this paper, we argue that even though Fernández raises new issues that enrich (...) the topic, his proposal cannot rival the version of the standard approach we shall defend. (shrink)

Envy and Jealousy in Classical Athens examines the sensation, expression, and literary representation of envy and jealousy in Classical Athens.

This study examines how audiovisual brand stories both invite and enable consumers to enact heroic archetypes. Integrating research on the archetypal structure of narratives with research on the event structure of narratives, we distinguish singular plot stories (i.e. stories that show a Hero’s Journey) from embedded plot stories (i.e. stories that not only show but also tell one or more Hero’s Journeys) and develop a conceptual and narratological framework to analyze their structural elements. Application of the framework to 20 brand (...) stories representing 8 different brands reveals meaningful variation in elements between the singular plot stories and embedded plot stories. Differences in the expression of archetypes and event structure are argued to evoke different types of Hero enactment which in turn result in different outcomes. We specifically hypothesize that the enactment of heroic archetypes in singular plot stories primarily results in catharsis (pleasure), whereas the enactment of heroic archetypes in embedded plot stories primarily results in an outcome we describe as phronesis: a form of moral sense making of the self that advances one’s practical wisdom and prudence. The final section of the paper discusses how cathartic and phronetic outcomes of hero enactment may foster the psychological bonding between brand and consumer, and invite consumers to align their moral values with the values that are reflected by heroic character traits. The central aims of the analysis presented are to provide an exploration of narrative phenomena in a reasonably broad range of brand story videos and foremost to provide a conceptual framework with an applicable instrument suited to analyze relevant categories in these brand stories. The present study is interdisciplinary in its approach to a contemporary, developing marketing phenomenon, applying psychological modeling of archetypes and heroic values with narratological insights on perspective-taking and story structure. Its contribution is to systemize, from a narratological viewpoint, how various narrative archetypes in brand video stories may contribute to the development of brand-consumer relations. (shrink)

This study examines the linguistic construal and cognitive representation of time and viewpoint in the genre of news narratives. We present a model of mental spaces that involves a News Space in which the deictic center is construed of the news actors at the time the newsworthy events took place, and a Reality Space in which the deictic here-and-now center of journalist and reader is construed. This model explains how the dynamic representation of narrative news discourse, characterized by shifts in (...) time and viewpoint, is steered by linguistic devices. An analysis of Dutch news narratives shows that temporal adverbs such as yesterdayand shifts from present tense to past tense may signal a moveforwardin narrative time, to a viewpoint in the future relative to the narrative now-point, rather thanbackward. These atypical time shifts can be accounted for by presupposing an Intermediate Space located at a point in time between the News Space and the Reality Space where the progression of narrative time comes to a halt and experiences are rather relived than reported. The salience of the Intermediate Space may be signaled by quotative conditionals reflecting the viewpoints of implicitly quoted sources. These results clarify how tense and temporal deixis steer the linguistic construal of time and viewpoint in news narratives, demonstrating that time and viewpoint are closely linked in the cognitive representation of these narratives. (shrink)

The Reeh-Schlieder theorem asserts the vacuum and certain other states to be spacelike superentangled relative to local fields. This motivates an inquiry into the physical status of various concepts of localization. It is argued that a covariant generalization of Newton-Wigner localization is a physically illuminating concept. When analyzed in terms of nonlocally covariant quantum fields, creating and annihilating quanta in Newton-Wigner localized states, the vacuum is seen to not possess the spacelike superentanglement that the Reeh-Schlieder theorem displays relative to local (...) fields, and to be locally empty as well as globally empty. Newton-Wigner localization is then shown to be physically interpretable in terms of a covariant generalization of the center of energy, the two localizations being identical if the system has no internal angular momentum. Finally, some of the counterintuitive features of Newton-Wigner localization are shown to have close analogues in classical special relativity. (shrink)

Research suggests that metacognitive monitoring ability does not decline with age. For example, judgments-of-learning accuracy is roughly equivalent between younger and older adults. But few studies have asked whether younger and older adults’ metacognitive ability varies across different types of memory processes. The current study tested the relationship between memory and post-decision confidence ratings at the trial level on item and associative memory recognition tests. As predicted, younger and older adults had similarmetacognitive efficiency, when using meta-d’/d’, a measure derived from (...) Signal Detection Theory, despite a significant age effect favoring younger adults on memory performance. This result is consistent with previous work showing age-equivalent metacognitive efficiency in the memory domain. We also found that metacognitive efficiency was higher for associative memory than for item memory across age groups, even though associative and item recognition memory were statistically equivalent. Higher accuracy on post-test decision confidence ratings for associative recognition relative to item recognition on resolution accuracy itself and when corrected for performance differences are novel findings. Implications for associative metacognition are discussed. (shrink)

Clinical ethics records offer bioethics researchers a rich source of cases that clinicians have identified as ethically complex. In this paper, we suggest that clinical ethics records can be used to point to types of cases that lack attention in the current bioethics literature, identifying new areas in need of more detailed bioethical work. We conducted an analysis of the clinical ethics records of one paediatric hospital in Australia, focusing specifically on conflicts between parents and health professionals about a child’s (...) medical treatment. We identified, analysed, and compared cases of this type from the clinical ethics records with cases of this type discussed in bioethics journals. While the cases from journals tended to describe situations involving imminent risk to the child’s life, a significant proportion of the clinical ethics records cases involved different stakes for the child involved. These included distress, poorer functional outcome, poorer psychosocial outcome, or increased risk of surgical complications. Our analysis suggests that one type of case that warrants more detailed ethics research is parental refusal of recommended treatment, where the refusal does not endanger the child’s life but rather some other aspect of the child’s well-being. (shrink)

This paper examines a legal case arising from a workplace grievance that progressed to being heard at the UK’s Supreme Court. The case of Doogan and Wood versus Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board concerned two senior midwives in Scotland, both practicing Roman Catholics, who exercised their perceived rights in accordance with section 4 of the Abortion Act not to participate in the treatment of women undergoing abortions. The key question raised by this case was: “Is Greater Glasgow and Clyde (...) Health Board entitled to require the midwives to delegate, supervise and support staff in the treatment of patients undergoing termination of pregnancy?” The ethical issues concerning conscientious objection to abortion have been much debated although the academic literature is mainly concerned with the position of medical practitioners rather than what the World Health Organization terms “mid-level professionals” such as midwives. This paper examines the arguments put forward by the midwives to justify their refusal to carry out tasks they felt contravened their legal right to make a conscientious objection. We then consider professional codes, UK legislation and church legislation. While the former are given strong weighting the latter was been ignored in this case, although cases in other European countries have been prevented from escalating to such a high level by the intervention of prominent church figures. The paper concludes by stating that the question put to the courts remains as yet unanswered but offers some recommendations for future policy making and research. (shrink)

This introduction to a special Tradition and Discovery issue on Polanyi’s realism summarizes, and comments on the views of Jha, Gulick, Mullins, Cannon, Puddefoot, Meek and Sanders. All agree that Polanyi advocated a scientific realism hanging on the theses that reality is independent of human conceptualizations and that it is partially and fallibly knowable. Major differences concern its scope. All agree that it is comprehensive, pertaining not only to common sense and science but to intrinsic and ultimate values, and (...) perhaps the divine realities as well. Whereas Jha and Gulick argue a more limited scope, others defend a Polanyian position by drawing in various ways on the personal and social coefficients of the practice of inquiry. The debates show clearly that the relationship between Polanyi’s epistemology, axiology and hermeneutics deserve further scrutiny. (shrink)

György Lukacs was a Hungarian Marxist philosopher, writer, and literary critic who shaped mainstream European Communist thought. _Soul and Form_ was his first book, published in 1910, and it established his reputation, treating questions of linguistic expressivity and literary style in the works of Plato, Kierkegaard, Novalis, Sterne, and others. By isolating the formal techniques these thinkers developed, Lukács laid the groundwork for his later work in Marxist aesthetics, a field that introduced the historical and political implications of text. For (...) this centennial edition, John T. Sanders and Katie Terezakis add a dialogue entitled "On Poverty of Spirit," which Lukács wrote at the time of _Soul and Form_, and an introduction by Judith Butler, which compares Lukács's key claims to his later work and subsequent movements in literary theory and criticism. In an afterword, Terezakis continues to trace the Lukácsian system within his writing and other fields. These essays explore problems of alienation and isolation and the curative quality of aesthetic form, which communicates both individuality and a shared human condition. They investigate the elements that give rise to form, the history that form implies, and the historicity that form embodies. Taken together, they showcase the breakdown, in modern times, of an objective aesthetics, and the rise of a new art born from lived experience. (shrink)

Solar radiation management is a form of geoengineering that involves the intentional manipulation of solar radiation with the aim of reducing global average temperature. This paper explores what precaution implies about the status of solar radiation management. It is argued that any form of solar radiation management that poses threats of catastrophe cannot constitute an appropriate precautionary measure against another threat of catastrophe, namely climate change. Research of solar radiation management is appropriate on a precautionary view only insofar as such (...) research aims to identify whether any forms of solar radiation management could be implemented without creating new or exacerbating existing threats of catastrophe. (shrink)

Neo‐Aristotelian virtue ethics makes essential reference to the notion of a stable, robust character‐trait. It also claims to be constrained by at least a minimal degree of psychological realism. Recent developments in empirical psychology have drawn into question the evidence for the existence of such robust traits, arguing that it rests on what has been called a ‘fundamental attribution error’. Virtue ethics has thus seemingly been made vulnerable to criticisms that it is essentially dependent on an erroneous, folk‐psychological, notion of (...) character and, so, must either abandon their characteristic notion of virtue or forego any pretensions to psychological realism. I develop a two‐pronged response to this objection. First, I argue that there is reason to question much of the empirical evidence and that such evidence as does exist can easily be accommodated by virtue ethics. Next, I argue that even if we allow that neo‐Aristotelian virtue ethical theories does sometimes presuppose a stronger conception of character‐traits than is warranted by the evidence, this does not significantly undermine the virtue ethicist's project. (shrink)

Non-naturalists claim that the nature of normativity precludes the possibility of normative naturalism. In particular, they think that normative reduction amounts to normative elimination. This is because it always leaves out the normative. In this paper, I examine the force that the normativity objection has against Humean reductionism. I argue that the normativity objection has no argumentative force against reductionism. When it is presented as a bare intuition, it begs the question against reduction. A more interesting reading of the argument (...) claims that the normative cannot be explained in terms of the natural because the natural is arbitrary. Yet, this version of the argument fails as well because the natural is not arbitrary in the relevant sense. The natural is contingent, so what has value is contingent. That is not an elimination of the normative though, because contingent reasons are still reasons. (shrink)

Agricultural diversification in the Midwestern Corn Belt has the potential to improve socioeconomic and environmental outcomes by buffering farmers from environmental and economic shocks and improving soil, water, and air quality. However, complex barriers related to agricultural markets, individual behavior, social norms, and government policy constrain diversification in this region. This study examines farmer perspectives regarding the challenges and opportunities for both corn and soybean production and agricultural diversification strategies. We analyze data from 20 focus groups with 100 participants conducted (...) in Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa through a combined inductive and deductive approach, drawing upon interpretive grounded theory. Our results suggest that when identifying challenges and opportunities, participants center economics and market considerations, particularly income, productivity, and market access. These themes are emphasized both as benefits of the current corn-soybean system, as well as challenges for diversification. Additionally, logistical, resource and behavioral hurdles– including the comparative difficulty and time required to diversify, and constraints in accessing land, labor, and technical support– are emphasized by participants as key barriers to diversification. Agricultural policies shape these challenges, enhancing the comparative advantage and decreasing the risk of producing corn and soybeans as compared to diversified products. Meanwhile, alternative marketing arrangements, farmer networks, family relationships, and improved soil health are highlighted as important opportunities for diversification. We contextualize our findings within the theories of reasoned action and diffusion of innovation, and explore their implications for farmer engagement, markets, and agricultural policy, and the development of additional resources for business and technical support. (shrink)

A multi-method, multi-informant method was used to collect data from diverse stakeholders about school climate to inform school improvement efforts as part of the Positive Behaviour Intervention Supports framework. Teachers, administrators, school staff and students completed surveys and parents participated in focus groups to gather perspectives about school climate. Respondents identified safety as a strength at the school, staff and student results suggested interpersonal relationships as an area for improvement and staff identified parent involvement as an area for growth. Both (...) positive and negative perceptions of school climate emerged from the parent focus group. While there are limitations to the generalisability of the results, this case study provides a useful approach for schools to assess their school climate and establish goals for improvement. (shrink)

This is a print on demand book and is therefore non- returnable. An exceptional, comprehensive work on the long- standing and much-debated question regarding the ultimate destiny of those who die without hearing the gospel. Sanders thoroughly examines the major positions that Christians throughout history have formulated, the spectrum ranging from restrictivism to universalism and including several in- between ("wider hope") views. The discussion of each major view includes key biblical texts, theological considerations, leading defenders, an evaluation, and a (...) historical bibliography. Foreword by Clark H. Pinnock. (shrink)

My objective is to offer at least a rough sketch of a new model for understanding time. Since many people are quite content with the model they have, I will try to show why a new model might be desirable or necessary. The exposition will be broken down into three parts. In the first part, I’ll try to show that no one has ever experienced time as such. In the second part, I shall argue that one good reason for this (...) is that there is no such thing as time as such. Finally, in the third part, I’ll try to reassemble what’s left of the conception of time after all this demolition, and I’ll offer a positive model (albeit rather vague) of what I prefer to call “temporality”. The exposition will follow lines familiar to contemporary students of time, but will, I hope, lead to conclusions that are at least modestly novel. (shrink)

The problem with reductionism in biology is not the reduction, but the implicit attitude of determinism that usually accompanies it. Methodological reductionism is supported by deterministic beliefs, but making such a connection is problematic when it is based on an idea of determinism as fixed predictability. Conflating determinism with predictability gives rise to inaccurate models that overlook the dynamic complexity of our world, as well as ignore our epistemic limitations when we try to model it. Furthermore, the assumption of a (...) strictly deterministic framework is unnecessarily hindering to biology. By removing the dogma of determinism, biological methods, including reductive methods, can be expanded to include stochastic models and probabilistic interpretations. Thus, the dogma of reductionism can be saved once its ties with determinism are severed. In this paper, I analyze two problems that have faced molecular biology for the last 50 years—protein folding and cancer. Both cases demonstrate the long influence of reductionism and determinism on molecular biology, as well as how abandoning determinism has opened the door to more probabilistic and unconstrained reductive methods in biology. (shrink)

Kammerer and Frankish (this issue) propose an exciting new research programme on the computational form of introspective systems. Pursuing this goal requires measures that can isolate introspective capacity from response biases and first-order processes. I suggest that metacognitive psychophysics is well placed to meet this challenge, allowing the mapping of introspective architectures in humans, animals, and artificial systems.

The physiological constraints of our neuro-sensory instrumentation limit the information we receive and from which we fashion our impressions. These limitations precede the psychological issues of data generation and analysis described by Ioannidis [1]. Scientific models widely accepted for at least 50 years [2,3] suggest that the peripheral and central nervous systems do not provide direct information about phenomena as they exist in nature. Instead, perceptible phenomena stimulate sense organs to produce nerve impulses. Sensory nerve impulses are not replicas of (...) the phenomena stimulating their production. The brain, by obscure mechanisms, then fabricates personal experience from the sensory nerve impulses. The relationship of phenomena to the brain's experiential construct is unknown. Since evidence is produced by sense organs and the brain (neither of which incorporates bona fide replicas of phenomena), all scientific conclusions are likely false in the sense that they are not based on direct knowledge of phenomena as they exist in nature. (shrink)

Hans Blumenberg’s work is characterized by a seemingly insatiable predilection for anecdotes — about Thales and Pyrrhus, Goethe and Fontane, Husserl and Wittgenstein, Polgar and Jünger. This essay explores the theoretical status of anecdotes by juxtaposing Carl Linnaeus’s Nemesis Divina with Blumenberg’s Care Crosses the River, both read alongside Aristotle’s notion of exemplarity and Joel Fineman’s delineation of the anecdote as the literary-historical form for expressing contingency. As a mode of thought at the nexus of literature and experience, anecdotes immediately (...) pose the question of evidence. Even if true, an anecdote opens the issue of whether it is the exception or the norm, whether it only speaks for itself or assumes exemplary force, and what such exemplarity might mean. By juxtaposing two theorists qua anecdotists — Carl Linnaeus and Hans Blumenberg — this essay aims to show the inextricable relation between anecdote and example, and thus between anecdote and rhetoric, a counterpart and supplement to the poetics of metaphor within what one can call with Blumenberg a theory of nonconceptuality. (shrink)

Elementary Recursive Nonstandard Analysis, in short ERNA, is a constructive system of nonstandard analysis with a PRA consistency proof, proposed around 1995 by Patrick Suppes and Richard Sommer. Recently, the author showed the consistency of ERNA with several transfer principles and proved results of nonstandard analysis in the resulting theories (see [12] and [13]). Here, we show that Weak König's lemma (WKL) and many of its equivalent formulations over RCA₀ from Reverse Mathematics (see [21] and [22]) can be 'pushed down' (...) into the weak theory ERNA, while preserving the equivalences, but at the price of replacing equality with equality 'up to infinitesimals'. It turns out that ERNA plays the role of RCA₀ and that transfer for universal formulas corresponds to WKL. (shrink)

In this paper, we reflect upon shame and humiliation as threats to personal and professional integrity and moral agency within contemporary health care. A personal narrative, written by a nurse about a particular shift in a British National Health Service Accident and Emergency Department, is provided as a case study. This is critically reflected and commented upon in dialogue with insights into the nature of shame and humiliation. It is suggested that Accident and Emergency is a locus that is latently (...) prone to dynamics of shame and humiliation, a potential exacerbated within a culture subject to externally‐determined time targets that are enforced by a top‐down system of surveillance and management. The result is that nurses may lose their sense of professional competence and responsibility, moral agency, and integrity, to their own personal detriment, as well as to the detriment of patients with whom they work. Insofar as examining a small part of a whole may suggest insights into the operation and ethos of a very large system, this very particular case study narrative/reflection has some important implications and lessons for the wider organization and provision of health care in Britain and beyond. (shrink)

What happens at the end of a clinical trial for an investigational neural implant? It may be surprising to learn how difficult it is to answer this question. While new trials are initiated with increasing regularity, relatively little consensus exists on how best to conduct them, and even less on how to ethically end them. The landscape of recent neural implant trials demonstrates wide variability of what happens to research participants after an neural implant trial ends. Some former research participants (...) continue to receive support for their devices (e.g., battery and component replacements, software updates, etc.). Others, when safe, have their neural implants removed through surgical explantation. Still others continue to live with a deactivated neural implant embedded in their body. In the United States, there are no uniform requirements to provide services, of any kind, after an neural implant study ends, and other nations are similarly facing this challenge. The existence of a post-trial gap in an expanding neural implant research ecosystem invites obvious questions: What is owed to neural implant research participants post-trial, and why has providing it been so difficult to accomplish in practice? To take a step forward on this difficult issue, we assembled one group of stakeholders – researchers funded for neuroethics grants by the National Institutes of Health – to explore possible starting points on one topic: ethical guidance for post-trial care of research participants in neural implant trials. Based on shared concerns discussed in the expert workshop the current paper is a call to action. It reports the key areas of convergence from the meeting and highlights important next steps towards developing much needed guidance. (shrink)

This study examines the outcomes of a four-year faculty learning community (FLC) that aimed to transform departmental ethics curriculum by supporting Earth Sciences faculty members as they ethically inquired into their teaching of ethics and refined existing courses in alignment with an Integrated Community-Engaged Learning and Ethical Reflection (ICELER) framework. We present ethnographic case studies that unpack processes through which three faculty members transformed undergraduate courses. We assembled case studies by triangulating interview data, course artifacts, and faculty reflections. We examine (...) how faculty (1) built awareness around teaching ethics, (2) took responsibility for and made judgments about teaching ethics, (3) experimented by designing and implementing ICELER-inspired courses, and (4) interrogated the outcomes of their ethics teaching, utilizing findings to enhance awareness and revise courses. The paper closes by introducing a model detailing how instructors inquire into ethics teaching and how model components might inspire future educational practice and research. (shrink)

This is the first of two papers responding to ‘recent’ commentary on various aspects of hyperplane dependence by several authors. In this paper I focus on the issues of the relations of HD to state reduction and unitary evolution. The authors who’s comments I address here are Maudlin and Myrvold. In the second paper of this set I focus on HD dynamical variables and localizable properties and measurements and address comments of de Koning, Halvorson, Clifton and Wallace. Each paper ends (...) with some reflections on the implications of HD for the ontology of Minkowski space-time. To set the stage for my responses, I begin this paper with some general position statements designed to correct what seem to be widespread and erroneous construals of some of my views. Two central points are argued for in this first paper. First, dynamical evolution occurs not only within foliations of Minkowski space-time. Rather the transition from the physical state of affairs on any one hyperplane to any other, whether the hyperplanes intersect or are parallel, is always an instance of dynamical evolution between them, generated by some active combination of boost-like transformations and/or time-like translations and/or state reductions and ‘reconstructions’. This point gives rise to a generalized conception of a history of dynamical evolution, allowing for the use of parameterized families of hyperplanes that multiply cover some portions of space-time. Nevertheless, and this is the second central point, for any two generalized histories, H and H’, the quantum states for a system on all the hyperplanes of H from the asymptotic past up to some hyperplane, h, determine the quantum states for the system on all the hyperplanes of H’ from the asymptotic past up to any hyperplane, h’, such that h’ lies to the past of all those state reduction regions that lie to the future of all hyperplanes of H that are ‘earlier’ than h. Consideration of these results should defuse concerns that have been voiced about the coherence and consistency of HD. A position closely related to the second point has already been argued for by Myrvold. (shrink)