Engineering ethics can be divided into three spheres, namely the technical, the professional, and the social. Ideally, engineering students should engage with all three spheres of ethics, but the literature suggests that this might not be the case. How do engineering students engage with the three spheres of engineering ethics during a global pandemic? The COVID-19 pandemic represents a dramatic and ongoing real-world challenge affecting many students personally. This research explores the extent to which engineering students engage with each sphere (...) of engineering ethics by examining how engineering students understand their roles in addressing the pandemic and its implications. We conducted a survey with undergraduate engineering students (n = 410) at a university in the Midwest. Qualitative analysis suggests that there was low engagement with both social ethics and professional ethics among respondents, while there was higher engagement with technical ethics. Quantitative analysis suggests that non-conservative engineering students from less wealthy families in our study show higher engagement with technical ethics as compared to conservative engineering students from less wealthy families. Non-conservative engineering students from wealthy families, however, show similar engagement with technical ethics as compared to conservative engineering students from wealthy families. In addition, engineering students from both wealthy and less wealthy families show higher engagement with technical ethics if they reside in urban areas as compared to engineering students from both wealthy and less wealthy families in non-urban areas. In addition, the difference in terms of engagement with technical ethics between non-urban engineering students from less wealthy families and urban engineering students from less wealthy families is larger than the difference in terms of engagement with technical ethics between non-urban engineering students from wealthy families and urban engineering students from wealthy families. Further investigation will be needed to explain these findings. However, qualitative results confirm that, despite the potential for the pandemic to encourage engagement with all three spheres of ethics, there continues to be low engagement with ethics beyond the technical level. (shrink)

O presente ensaio tem por objetivo fazer apontamentos ontológicos acerca dos fundamentos da educação. Para tal, seguiremos a via do pensamento de Martin Heidegger, adentrando no âmbito da questão do ser. Para cumprir tal tarefa, subdividiremos o trabalho em três momentos distintos. Primeiramente, apresentaremos algumas críticas à educação como transmissão de conhecimento, como ensino humanista e como educação técnica. Após, apresentaremos alguns elementos basilares do pensamento heideggeriano. Por fim, faremos algumas reflexões e indicações de ordem hermenêutica e de ordem prática (...) sobre a educação afim de pensarmos a sua essência como um perpétuo exercício de espanto. (shrink)

This article compares the ‘enfranchisement lottery’, a novel method for allocating the right to vote, with universal suffrage. The comparison is conducted exclusively on the basis of the expected consequences of the two systems. Each scheme seems to have a relative advantage. On the one hand, the enfranchisement lottery would create a better informed electorate and thus improve the quality of electoral outcomes. On the other hand, universal suffrage is more likely to ensure that elections are seen to be fair, (...) which is important for political stability. This article concludes that, on balance, universal suffrage is prima facie superior to the enfranchisement lottery. Yet the analysis shows that the instrumental case for the ‘one person, one vote’ principle is less conclusive than democratic theorists usually suppose. (shrink)

On November 7, 1594, an Assembly was held in the Monastery of St. Mary in Mat, and was attended by “Governors and General Guardians of the Macedonian and Albanian Kingdoms”. The Assembly was attended by leaders representing the Albanian provinces, such as: Gjergj Skura from Rodoni, Gjek Lalësi from Dukagjini, Vlash Koreshi from Kruja, Domenik Jonima from Mati, Jeronim Mamëli from Elbasan, and bishops of Stefaniakë and Sapas etc. A detailed project was drafted for the liberation of the country from (...) the Ottoman invaders, addressed to the Western nations, to the Pope, the Kingdom of Naples etc. in order to seek material and military support. The action plan and the demands examined during the assembly meeting were entrusted to Tomë Plezha as the almighty delegate of the Pope to the king of Spain and other European princes. It was thought that he had authority over the peoples of these parts. (shrink)

The denial of voting rights to certain types of persons continues to be a moral problem of practical significance. The disenfranchisement of persons with mental impairments, minors, noncitizen residents, nonresident citizens, and criminal offenders is a matter of controversy. This book makes a contribution to this largely neglected yet key topic.

Borrowed from metallurgy, the concept of fusion casting is a method in the study of the humanities. In light of fusion-casting, this paper reviews the longstanding weakness of comparative studies and the limitations of its naming. Because of the superficiality and farfetchedness in comparative studies, fusion-casting studies are imperative remedies so as to break the bondage of empiricism and analogies. In the trend of globalization, comparative studies will continue to play a role, but the inherent weakness, excessive use and the (...) low quality of such studies must be overcome. The case of fusion-casting studies is not intended to get rid of comparative studies. Rather, it is intended to increase the depth of the latter so that there shall be ground-breaking progresses and innovations. (shrink)

In this paper we present some algorithms for computing minimal conflicts. First of all we discuss the relationship between minimal conflicts and minimally inconsistent subsets. Then we introduce an algorithm for computing all minimally inconsistent subsets, which is applied to generating all minimal conflicts. Furthermore, an algorithm for computing all minimal conflicts using structured description is introduced, and its correctness is proved; its time complexity is also shown. The algorithm using structured description terminates in polynomial time for some special system, (...) such as the tree–structured systems. The algorithms are also complared with related works. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Phenomenology of Superstition or a Phenomenological Superstition?Elena Ibáñez-Guerra (bio)KeywordsBehaviorism, constructionism, intentionality, operant behaviorWhen the editors of Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology asked me to make some brief comments on two articles for the special issue edited by Pérez-Álvarez and Sass, I was delighted to accept, thinking that the task would be a straightforward one, and that I could easily meet the agreed deadline. But nothing could be further (...) from the truth. The articles were of such density and their content of such profundity that it took months of interpretation and study, and of bringing my own knowledge up to date, before I was in a position to understand the concepts, adjust my beliefs, and make some comments. I could certainly have delivered some kind of eulogy about the brilliance of their content; I might have countered with my own article. However, what seemed most coherent to me was to meet their arguments head on and deal with what I consider to be their principal weaknesses, leaving the bouquets for the end.The articles set out, as I understand them and within the clinical context, to relate phenomenology, in its most traditional form, with the most current form of Skinnerian behaviorism, situating themselves in a contextualism that is, at the same time, close to and removed from the most radical type of social constructionism.But let us begin by looking more closely at “Phenomenology and Behaviorism.” It is novel for me, though Professor Pérez-Álvarez had already proposed it several years ago (Pérez-Álvarez 1992), to view operant behavior as intentionality, or at least as involving final causality according to the Aristotelian classification. It is a surprising contention, not least because, as I recall, Skinner lived in a time and a context (historical reason) in which the basic goal of psychology was to convert itself into a natural science, comparable in all respects to physics, which it took as a model, focusing therefore on efficient causality (also according to Aristotle’s terminology), so that behavior was considered as the immediate consequence of a stimulus, and the stimulus–response association became the cornerstone of the discipline. It is true that the operant behavior concept refers to the functional relationship between behavior and reinforcement, but it is no less true that Skinner’s definition of reinforcement is totally empirical—“all that which increases or decreases the probability”—meaning that reinforcement can be considered neither as a motive nor as a reason for behavior, unless it be in the eyes of the observer. [End Page 251]Furthermore, even though Yela (1987) refers to Ortega y Gasset’s formula “I am myself and my circumstances” as a Skinnerian approach, the truth is that Yela himself argues that it is precisely the self that constitutes personality, such that I have a personality because I am me, and not vice versa, as Skinner would appear to argue. In this regard, Ortega’s celebrated formula has generally been interpreted, from the most personalist perspectives, as “the circumstances are myself”—to highlight the denial of the psychological subject by radical behaviorism (Mischel’s [1968] criticism of the concept of personality is relevant here). On top of this, Skinner’s rejection of all that was not directly observable, or at least, that could not be operationalized, calls into question the admissibility of anything called final cause or intentionality of behavior. In his philosophy, all the indications are that contingencies are what determine behavior; and that there would be no room for a structural causality, as Althusser would argue, or of a reciprocal determinism, in Bandura’s terms, or even of an interaction between subject and environment, as modern interactionists would maintain. “I am myself and my circumstances” seems in Skinner to become “the circumstances are me”, and indeed, the reinforcement history – which in the article in question is considered as something akin to the Sartrian idea of “life project” – is for Skinner nothing more than a continuous association of events. In my view, Ortega’s perspectivism would perhaps be closer to the sociology of the American action theorists, Merton, Parsons, etc., than to Skinnerian behaviorism, since “action”—as the action theorists... (shrink)

Teoricamente, busca-se expor os pressupostos, quanto às concepções voltadas para o âmbito educacional, de Jacques Derrida. Investiga-se, em seus escritos, se há um liame que permite separar e definir o que faz parte do mundo natural em contrapartida ao mundo cultural e vice-versa, quando nos reportamos ao estudo do homem e de suas ações, porque esta dualidade natureza/cultura é fundamental para saber da possibilidade de modificação do ser humano, pressuposto este, absoluto para a educação. Conclui-se que Derrida, ao defender a (...) não existência da ontologia antropológica, com seus resultados, invalida os seus próprios pressupostos, os quais estão assentados em um sujeito enunciador. (shrink)

This article compares the ‘enfranchisement lottery’, a novel method for allocating the right to vote, with universal suffrage. The comparison is conducted exclusively on the basis of the expected consequences of the two systems. Each scheme seems to have a relative advantage. On the one hand, the enfranchisement lottery would create a better informed electorate and thus improve the quality of electoral outcomes. On the other hand, universal suffrage is more likely to ensure that elections are seen to be fair, (...) which is important for political stability. This article concludes that, on balance, universal suffrage is prima facie superior to the enfranchisement lottery. Yet the analysis shows that the instrumental case for the ‘one person, one vote’ principle is less conclusive than democratic theorists usually suppose. (shrink)

This paper presents a synthesis of the methodology used when doing historical research from a positivist standpoint. It points out that the efforts of the historian to strictly imitate the scientific method is a fruitless effort which stems from the mechanistic worldview of the 17th century. In the ..

Um sistema para a economia -- Uma constituição para Portugal -- Uma organização para o ensino.

Traditional engineering courses typically approach teaching and problem solving by focusing on the physical dimensions of those problems without consideration of dynamic social and ethical dimensions. As such, projects can fail to consider human rights, community questions and concerns, broader impacts upon society, or otherwise result in inequitable outcomes. And, despite the fact that students in engineering receive training on the Professional Code of Ethics for Engineers, to which they are expected to adhere in practice, many students are unable to (...) recognize and analyze real-life ethical challenges as they arise. Indeed, research has found that students are typically less engaged with ethics—defined as the sensitivity and judgment of microethics and macroethics, sensitivity to diversity, and interest in promoting organizational ethical culture—at the end of their engineering studies than they were at the beginning. As such, many studies have focused on developing and improving the curriculum surrounding ethics through, for instance, exposing students to ethics case studies. However, such ethics courses often present a narrow and simplified view of ethics that students may struggle to integrate with their broader experience as engineers. Thus, there is a critical need to unpack the complexity of ethical behavior amongst engineering students in order to determine how to better foster ethical judgment and behavior. Promoting ethical behavior among engineering students and developing a culture of ethical behavior within institutions have become goals of many engineering programs. Towards this goal, we would like to present an overview of the current scholarship of engineering ethics and propose a theoretical framework of ethical behavior using a review of articles related to engineering ethics from 1997-2020. The review engages in theories across disciplines including philosophy, education, and psychology. In this work-in-progress paper, we present a subset of initial results based on a review of the first 50 articles out of the systematically selected 409 articles from Springer, Engineering Village, and EBSCO-Education Full Text. Preliminary results identify two major kinds of drivers of ethical behavior, namely individual level ethical behavior drivers and institutional drivers. Our preliminary results indicate that a sensitivity to both microethics and macroethics as well as the implicit and explicit understanding of ethics are essential in promoting ethical behavior amongst students. Furthermore, while drivers of ethical behavior at the individual level is important, one should not ignore the roles of the drivers of ethical behavior at the institutional level in promoting a collective ethical culture within organizations. The review also points to a need to focus on increasing students’ macroethical sensitivity to topics such as sustainability and protection of human rights. This research thus addresses the need, driven by existing scholarship, 2 to identify a conceptual framework for explaining how ethical judgment and behavior in engineering can be further promoted. (shrink)

The question of how we should engage with a philosopher’s racial thought is of particular importance when considering Kant, who can be viewed as particularly representative of Enlightenment philosophy. In this article I argue that we should take a stance of deep acknowledgment when considering Kant’s work both inside and outside the classroom. Taking a stance of deep acknowledgment should be understood as 1) taking Kant’s racial thought to be reflective of his moral character, 2) Kant being accountable for his (...) racial thought and 3) being willing to consider the possibility that Kant’s racial thought is consistent with and inextricable from his moral philosophy. Alternative forms of engaging with Kant’s racial work have either moral or pedagogical failings, which range from simply teaching the history of philosophy uncritically to outright deception. A stance of deep acknowledgement will allow philosophers to understand how Kant’s racial thought interacts with his moral philosophy and allow instructors to teach philosophy in a historically contextualized approach so as to not alienate students whose demographic was disparaged by Kant. (shrink)

Scholars have paid so much academic attention to UPB in the past decade. However, there is lacking a quantitative review to uncover the relationship between UPB and its antecedents. To address this, we make a meta-analytic review about UPB. Specifically, we propose a theoretical framework of antecedents of UPB and test it using meta-analysis technology (k = 67, n = 20,957). We found moral disengagement, organizational identification, identification with supervisors, leader UPB, ethical judgments, psychological entitlement, transformational leadership, and job satisfaction (...) are positively related to UPB. Moral identity and taking responsibility are negatively related to UPB. Besides, ethical leadership, abusive supervision, and authoritarian leadership have double-edged sword effects on UPB. For ethical leadership, it increases UPB via LMX, on the other hand, it decreases UPB via moral disengagement. For abusive supervision and authoritarian leadership, they increase UPB via moral disengagement and decrease UPB via LMX meanwhile. We discuss the results of the current meta-analysis and put some future research directions. (shrink)

Even thought the emancipating feat of Cuba obteined always the support of people this continent, los lack of governmental recognition on the Latin American countries during tl~ew ar of 1895, joined to the virtual English acceptance of North American hegemony in the region, it maked easy the idea of the U.S.A to take part in the conflict Hispanic- Cuban in 1898.

It is well known that the computational complexity of propositional knowledge base revision is at the second level of polynomial hierarchy. A way to solve this kind of problems is to introduce approximate algorithms. In this paper, an approximate approach is introduced for belief change. Operators, which satisfy the AGM rational postulates, are defined to change belief sets or belief bases. Furthermore, approximate algorithms to implement the revision of finite belief bases are presented. The time complexities of the approximate algorithms (...) shown in this paper are at lower level than the time complexities of the existed approaches in literatures, although they may not generate the optimal solution, and this is meaningful from the theoretical point of view. (shrink)

This paper describes the investigations performed to better understand two-stage rotor speed matching in a contrarotating fan. In addition, this study develops a comprehensive measuring and communication system for a contrarotating fan using ZigBee network. The investigation method is based on three-dimensional RANS simulations; the RANS equations are solved by the numerical method in conjunction with a SST turbulence model. A wireless measurement system using big data method is first designed, and then a comparison is done with experimental measurements to (...) outline the capacity of the numerical method. The results show that when contrarotating fan worked under designed speed, performance of two-stages rotors could not be matched as the designed working condition was deviated. Rotor 1 had huge influences on flow rate characteristics of a contrarotating fan. Rotor 2 was influenced by flow rates significantly. Under large flow rate condition, the power capability of rotor 2 became very weak; under working small flow rate condition, overloading would take place to class II motor. In order to solve the performance mismatch between two stages of CRF under nondesigned working conditions, under small flow rate condition, the priority shall be given to increase of the speed of rotor 1, while the speed of rotor 2 shall be reduced appropriately; under large flow rate condition, the speed of rotor 1 shall be reduced and the speed of rotor 2 shall be increased at the same time. (shrink)

RESUMO O presente artigo tem por objetivo caracterizar a “metafísica prática ” em Schopenhauer. Segundo essa caracterização, a metafísica prática corresponde ao correlato prático da “metafísica teórica” e, desse modo, ao correlato empírico do discurso filosófico. Para Schopenhauer, isto equivale a afirmar a possibilidade de comprovação, via experiencia, da tese metafísica fundante de “O mundo como vontade e como representação”, a saber, da identidade metafísica da vontade subjacente aoplano da multiplicidade aparente. Por funcionar como uma espécie de prova empírica desta (...) tese metafísica, a metafísica prática é também Experimentalmetaphysik, isto é, “metafísica experimental”. ABSTRACT This article aims to characterize the “practicalmetaphysics” in Schopenhauer. According to this characterization, the practical metaphysics corresponds to the practical correlate of the “theoretical metaphysics” and thus to the empirical correlate of the philosophical discourse. For Schopenhauer, this is equivalent to affirm the possibility of proving, via experience, the metaphysical founding thesis of “The World as Will and Representation”, namely, the metaphysical identity of the will underlying the plane of apparent multiplicity. Due to the fact that itfunctions as a kind of empirical proof of this metaphysical thesis, the practical metaphysics is also Experimentalmetaphysik, that is, “experimental metaphysics”. (shrink)

Resumo: Arthur Schopenhauer possui uma concepção acerca da natureza do conceito que atravessa o seu pensamento, desde o início de sua produção filosófica. Inicialmente abordado a partir de sua acepção racional abstrata, em O mundo como vontade e como representação, o conceito adquire traços mais profundos em função do sentimento. O conceito “não-conceito” sentimento determinará os rumos da filosofia de Schopenhauer, ao evidenciar os limites da linguagem. A linguagem filosófica, por consequência, exprime um paradoxo, pois pretende expressar em linguagem abstrata (...) um conteúdo concreto cuja natureza não pode ser por ela determinado. Por ser um construto conceitual abstrato, a linguagem filosófica possui um estatuto ontológico secundário e, portanto, incompleto, em relação ao conteúdo da realidade concreta. Este artigo pretende mostrar que os sentimentos são, nesse sentido, o meio não conceitual que esclarece a própria natureza dos conceitos e, por consequência, a via não-filosófica que paradoxalmente melhor expressa o conteúdo da filosofia. No registro do sentimento, Schopenhauer reconhece na linguagem musical o âmbito de justificação adequado da linguagem filosófica.: Arthur Schopenhauer has a notion about the nature of the concept that runs through his thinking since the beginning of his philosophical production. Initially approached from its abstract rational meaning, in The world as will and representation, the concept acquires deeper traces from sentiment. The “non-concept” concept of sentiment will determine the direction of Schopenhauer”s philosophy by highlighting the limits of language. The philosophical language, therefore, expresses a paradox, since it intends to manifest, in abstract language, a concrete content, whose nature cannot be determined by it. As an abstract conceptual construct, philosophical language has a secondary and, thus, incomplete ontological status in relation to the content of concrete reality. Sentiments are the non-conceptual medium that clarifies the nature of concepts itself, and, consequently, the non-philosophical way that paradoxically best expresses the content of philosophy. In the recording of sentiment, Schopenhauer recognizes in musical language the proper justification scope of philosophical language. (shrink)

In Technology and the Lifeworld, Don Ihde advances what he calls “formalisms” for the ways in which we experience or relate to technology. In this article, I seek to clarify the grammar of Ihde’s formalisms. Ihde’s formalisms have not been the focus of scrutiny. Rather, they have largely been received in the literature as merely aphoristic or epigrammatical devices serving to clarify what can be explained in prose. My hypothesis is that Ihde’s formalisms do not merely serve an epigrammatical function (...) but rather admit of a generative grammar that extends his postphenomenological framework. I propose a notation that adheres to six rules of syntax that can be derived from Ihde’s framework. I show that the proposed notation makes explicit the inter-relations among hidden dimensions of human–technology relations. Relying on my notation, I also suggest that the so-called cyborg turn is actually a turn away from the unharnessed syntax of Ihde’s formalisms. (shrink)

The paper is intended to focus on peculiarities of nanomedicine and the importance of social concerns implicated, in order to understand if existing regulations are appropriate to maintain its safety or if a new ad hoc regulatory framework is needed. Consideration of social challenges will underline the crucial role of medical ethics in regulatory discussion.

The following article aims to present and develop Martin Heidegger's criticism of Aesthetics from the essay The Origin of the Work of Art. For Heideggerian thinking, Aesthetics, as an heir to the metaphysical paradigms, kills what is essential in the art by taking it fundamentally as an object capable of provoking and impacting the sensitivity of the contemplating subject. As will be shown Heidegger traces the origin of such a conception in the first Western philosophical systems with Plato and Aristotle, (...) and its development in the initial moments of modernity with Descartes and the other heirs of his thinking. Since we are already at the heart of historical sedimentation when conceiving works of art, it is necessary to dive into such sedimentation to develop the sleeping potentialities. This is the invitation that Heidegger offers us and that we also offer the reader here. (shrink)