Ratio Juris, Volume 35, Issue 1, Page 3-20, March 2022.

We present an elementary three-pass algorithm for computing addition in Ostrowski numeration systems. When a is quadratic, addition in the Ostrowski numeration system based on a is recognizable by a finite automaton. We deduce that a subset of X⊆Nn is definable in, where Va is the function that maps a natural number x to the smallest denominator of a convergent of a that appears in the Ostrowski representation based on a of x with a nonzero coefficient if (...) and only if the set of Ostrowski representations of elements of X is recognizable by a finite automaton. The decidability of the theory of follows. (shrink)

This article discusses the triage response to the COVID-19 delta variant surge of 2021. One issue that distinguishes the delta wave from earlier surges is that by the time it became the predominant strain in the USA in July 2021, safe and effective vaccines against COVID-19 had been available for all US adults for several months. We consider whether healthcare professionals and triage committees would have been justified in prioritising patients with COVID-19 who are vaccinated above those who are unvaccinated (...) in first-order or second-order triage. Given that lack of evidence for a correlation between short-term survival and vaccination, we argue that using vaccination status during first-order triage would be inconsistent with accepted triage standards. We then turn to notions of procedural fairness, equity and desert to argue that that there is also a lack of justification for using vaccination status in second-order triage. In planning for future surges, we recommend that medical institutions base their triage decisions on principles meant to save the most lives, minimise inequity and protect the public’s trust, which for the time being would not be served by the inclusion of vaccination status. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, EarlyView.

Although undergraduate engineering ethics courses often include the development of moral sensitivity as a learning objective and the use of active learning techniques, teaching centers on the transmission of cognitive knowledge. This article describes a complementary assignment asking students to perform an ethics “experiment” on themselves that has a potential to enhance affective learning and moral imagination. The article argues that the focus on cognitive learning may not promote, and may even impair, our efforts to foster moral sensitivity. In contrast, (...) the active learning assignments and exercises, like the ethics “experiment” discussed, offer great potential to expand the scope of instruction in engineering ethics to include ethical behavior as well as knowledge. Engineering ethics education needs to extend beyond the narrow range of human action associated with the technical work of the engineer and explore ways to draw on broader lifeworld experiences to enrich professional practice and identity. (shrink)

Se presenta el reporte de una intervención docente para la enseñanza de la ética en la Educación Media Superior a través del enfoque por competencias. Primero, se contextualiza y problematiza sobre la Reforma Integral de la Educación Media Superior que tuvo lugar en México en el 2008, para observar los cambios curriculares y señalar el lugar de la ética como asignatura en este subsistema y los retos de los profesores frente a estos cambios. Segundo, se presentan los principios teóricos del (...) enfoque por competencias, así como una perspectiva filosófica sobre la enseñanza de la ética basada en la phrónesis, que desde una perspectiva aristotélica es traducida como prudencia, como modelo de ser ético. Tercero, se expone el diseño didáctico, así como los resultados que muestran las experiencias del docente en el aula, el trabajo de los alumnos y los resultados de los procesos de aprendizaje. En la conclusión se analiza el impacto del enfoque por competencias en la enseñanza de la ética, señalando las dificultades y limitaciones, pero también sus posibilidades para el trabajo docente al vincularse con concepciones filosóficas más amplias. (shrink)

In Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language, Saul Kripke articulates a form of scepticism about meaning. Even though there is considerable disagreement among critics about the reasoning in which the sceptic engages, there is little doubt that he seeks to offer constraints for an adequate account of the facts that constitute the meaningfulness of expressions. Many of the sceptic's remarks concern the nature of the guidance involved in a speaker's meaningful uses of expressions. I propose that we understand those remarks (...) as seeking to give shape to the idea that to use an expression under the guidance of one's understanding is to have a reason for that use, which one's understanding allows one to discern and act on. Any philosophical elucidation of meaning must adequately capture the rational nature of our linguistic acts. (shrink)

According to the sceptic Saul Kripke envisages in his celebrated book on Wittgenstein on rules and private language, there are no facts about an individual that determine what she means by any given expression. If there are no such facts, the question then is, what justifies the claim that she does use expressions meaningfully? Kripke’s answer, in a nutshell, is that she by and large uses her expressions in conformity with the linguistic standards of the community she belongs to. While (...) Kripke’s sceptical problem has gripped philosophers for over three decades, few, if any, have been satisfied by his proposed solution, and many have struggled to come up with one of their own. The purpose of this paper is to show that a more satisfactory answer to Kripke’s challenge can be developed on the basis of Donald Davidson’s writings on triangulation, the idea of two individuals interacting simultaneously with each other and the world they share. It follows from the triangulation argument that the facts that can be regarded as determining meaning are irreducible. Yet, contra Kripke, they are not mysterious, for the argument does spell out what is needed for an individual’s expressions to be meaningful. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Volume 104, Issue 1, Page 50-65, January 2022.

Background: Spasticity following a stroke occurs in about 30% of patients. The mechanisms underlying this disorder, however, are not well understood. Method: This review aims to define spasticity, describe hypotheses explaining its development after a stroke, give an overview of related neuroimaging studies as well as a description of the most common scales used to quantify the degree of spasticity and finally explore which treatments are currently being used to treat this disorder.

This paper examines Hannah Ginsborg's attempt to address the challenge raised by Saul Kripke's meaning sceptic. I start by identifying the two constraints that the sceptic claims must be met by a satisfactory answer. Then I try to show that Ginsborg's proposal faces a dilemma. In the first instance, I argue that it is able to meet the second constraint, but not the first. I then amend the proposal in order to make room for the first constraint. I go on (...) to argue that, under this new interpretation, it cannot meet the second constraint. (shrink)

Controlled Human Infection Model (CHIM) research involves the infection of otherwise healthy participants with disease often for the sake of vaccine development. The COVID-19 pandemic has emphasised the urgency of enhancing CHIM research capability and the importance of having clear ethical guidance for their conduct. The payment of CHIM participants is a controversial issue involving stakeholders across ethics, medicine and policymaking with allegations circulating suggesting exploitation, coercion and other violations of ethical principles. There are multiple approaches to payment: reimbursement, wage (...) payment and unlimited payment. We introduce a new Payment for Risk Model, which involves paying for time, pain and inconvenience and for risk associated with participation. We give philosophical arguments based on utility, fairness and avoidance of exploitation to support this. We also examine a cross-section of the UK public and CHIM experts. We found that CHIM participants are currently paid variable amounts. A representative sample of the UK public believes CHIM participants should be paid approximately triple the UK minimum wage and should be paid for the risk they endure throughout participation. CHIM experts believe CHIM participants should be paid more than double the UK minimum wage but are divided on the payment for risk. The Payment for Risk Model allows risk and pain to be accounted for in payment and could be used to determine ethically justifiable payment for CHIM participants.Although many research guidelines warn against paying large amounts or paying for risk, our empirical findings provide empirical support to the growing number of ethical arguments challenging this status quo. We close by suggesting two ways (value of statistical life or consistency with risk in other employment) by which payment for risk could be calculated. (shrink)

Are there limits to what it is morally okay to imagine? More particularly, is imaginatively inhabiting morally suspect perspectives something that is off-limits for truly virtuous people? In this paper, I investigate the surprisingly fraught relation between virtue and a familiar form of imaginative perspective taking I call empathy. I draw out a puzzle about the relation between empathy and virtuousness. First, I present an argument to the effect that empathy with vicious attitudes is not, in fact, something that the (...) fully virtuous person can indulge in. At least one prominent way of thinking about the psychology of the virtuous person excludes the possibility that the virtuous could emotionally apprehend the world in a less than virtuous way, and empathizing with vicious outlooks does seem to run afoul of that restriction. Then, I develop an argument that runs in the contrary direction: virtue in fact requires empathy with vicious outlooks, at least in some situations. There is reason to think that a crucial part of being virtuous is ministering effectively to others’ needs, and there is also reason to think that other people may need to be empathized with, even if their emotional outlooks are at least minorly vicious. Finally, I outline two different solutions to this puzzle. Both solutions hold some promise, but they also bring new challenges in their train. (shrink)

Background:Nursing as an ethical practice requires courage to be moral, taking tough stands for what is right, and living by one’s moral values. Nurses need moral courage in all areas and at all levels of nursing. Along with new interest in virtue ethics in healthcare, interest in moral courage as a virtue and a valued element of human morality has increased. Nevertheless, what the concept of moral courage means in nursing contexts remains ambiguous.Objective:This article is an analysis of the concept (...) of moral courage in nursing.Design:Rodgers’ evolutionary method of concept analysis provided the framework to conduct the analysis.Data sources:The literature search was carried out in September 2015 in six databases: PubMed, CINAHL, Scopus, Web of Science, PsycINFO, and The Philosopher’s Index. The following key words were used: “moral” OR “ethical” AND “courage” OR “strength” AND “nurs*” with no time limit. After applying inclusion and exclusion criteria, 31 studies were included in the final analysis.Ethical considerations:This study was conducted according to good scientific guidelines.Results:Seven core attributes of moral courage were identified: true presence, moral integrity, responsibility, honesty, advocacy, commitment and perseverance, and personal risk. Antecedents were ethical sensitivity, conscience, and experience. Consequences included personal and professional development and empowerment.Discussion and conclusion:This preliminary clarification warrants further exploring through theoretical and philosophical literature, expert opinions, and empirical research to gain validity and reliability for its application in nursing practice. (shrink)

Our collective enthusiasm for empathy reflects a sense that it is deeply valuable. I show that empathy bears a complex and surprisingly problematic relation to another social epistemic phenomenon that we have reason to value, namely testimonial trust. My discussion focuses on empathy with and trust in people who are members of one or more oppressed groups. Empathy for oppressed people can be a powerful tool for engendering a certain form of testimonial trust, because there is a tight connection between (...) empathy and a approval of another's outlook. I then argue that the qualities of empathy that make it such a powerful tool for bridging differences and building trust also have a problematic upshot: they make it the case that reliance on empathy will sometimes have a distorting effect upon the ways we extend testimonial trust. (shrink)

The reality-virtuality continuum encompasses a multitude of objects, events and environments ranging from real-world multisensory inputs to interactive multisensory virtual simulators, in which sensory integration can involve very different combinations of both physical and digital inputs. These different ways of stimulating the senses can affect the consumer’s consciousness, potentially altering their judgements and behaviours. In this perspective paper, we explore how technologies such as Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality can, by generating and modifying the human sensorium, act on consumer consciousness. (...) We discuss the potential impact of this altered consciousness for consumer behaviour while, at the same time, considering how it may pave the way for further research. (shrink)

Marija Velinov, Foucault/Derrida Fifty Years later: The Futures of Genealogy, Deconstruction, and Politics, Columbia University Press, New York, 2016).

A sensibility is, on a rough first pass, an emotional orientation to the world. It shapes how things appear to us, evaluatively speaking. By transfiguring things’ evaluative appearances, a change in sensibility can profoundly alter one’s overall experience of the world. I argue that some forms of sensibility change entail (1) risking one’s knowledge of what experiences imbued with one’s prior sensibility were like, and (2) surrendering one’s grasp on the intelligibility of one’s prior emotional apprehensions. These costs have consequences (...) for Laurie Paul’s ‘problem of transformative experience.’ Paul has argued that when we are poised to become someone new, our inexperience generates problems for authentic choice about our own futures. By reckoning with the epistemic losses involved in sensibility change, I show that this problem must not be confined to novel transformations. Prior experience does not guarantee the knowledge or understanding necessary for choosing authentically (in Paul’s sense). If the problem Paul highlights is indeed a problem _at all,_ then, it is a still more pervasive and intractable one than it has been taken to be. (shrink)

Against the background of a deeply uneven package of work–family reconciliation measures and an increasing focus on engaging men in unpaid care work, in this article I discuss the extension of the Irish discrimination law framework to provide protection against family status discrimination to workers who are engaged in certain care relationships. While this development of the law to recognize a relational understanding of inequality is welcome, its confined definition of family status fails to capture the range of workers’ caring (...) relationships and networks. Adopting a contextualized assessment of 12 years of litigation generated under the ‘family status’ ground, with reference to complainants’ gender and work status, the study considers the types of experiences being litigated as ‘family status’ discrimination. The study show how much of the nature and forms of inequality presented before the tribunals are beyond the conceptual boundaries of the principle of equal treatment that depends upon a sameness of treatment model with the ‘care-less’ comparator. Despite its potential to question the neutrality of workplace structures predicated upon the division between paid work and unpaid care, the principle of indirect family status discrimination has been under utilised as a litigation strategy. The most successful dimension of family status discrimination protection has been in respect of its ability to capture the negative stereotyping of worker–carers who continue to perform as ideal workers. I suggest that this extension of a limited negative rights framework, when considered alongside the state’s extremely poor support for workcare reconciliation more broadly, places negligible obligations on employers, and that the gender neutrality implicit in its provisions have yet to impact on gender equality as regards work–care reconciliation. (shrink)

Background:Moral courage is required at all levels of nursing. However, there is a need for development of instruments to measure nurses’ moral courage.Objectives:The objective of this study is to develop a scale to measure nurses’ self-assessed moral courage, to evaluate the scale’s psychometric properties, and to briefly describe the current level of nurses’ self-assessed moral courage and associated socio-demographic factors.Research design:In this methodological study, non-experimental, cross-sectional exploratory design was applied. The data were collected using Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale and analysed (...) statistically.Participants and research context:The data were collected from a convenience sample of 482 nurses from four different clinical fields in a major university hospital in Finland for the final testing of the scale. The pilot comprised a convenience sample of 129 nurses.Ethical considerations:The study followed good scientific inquiry guidelines. Ethical approval was obtained from the university ethics committee and permission to conduct the study from the participating hospital.Findings:Psychometric evaluation showed that the 4-sub-scale, 21-item Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale demonstrates good reliability and validity at its current state of development showing a good level of internal consistency for a new scale, the internal consistency values ranging from 0.73 to 0.82 for sub-scales and 0.93 for the total scale, thus well exceeding the recommended Cronbach’s alpha value of >0.7. Principal component analysis and confirmatory factor analysis supported the theoretical construct of Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale. Face validity and expert panel assessments markedly contributed to the relevance of items in establishing content validity.Discussion and conclusion:Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale provides a new generic instrument intended for measuring nurses’ self-assessed moral courage. Recognizing the importance of moral courage as a part of nurses’ moral competence and its assessment offers possibilities to develop interventions and educational programs for enhancement of moral courage. Research should focus on further validation measures of Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale in international contexts. (shrink)

In this article, the authors assess the still limited literature on domestic violence among immigrant women in major receiving countries so as to begin delineating a framework to explain how immigrant-specific factors exacerbate the already vulnerable position—as dictated by class, gender, and race—of immigrant women in domestic violence situations. First, a review of this scholarship shows that the incidence of domestic violence is not higher than it is in the native population but rather that the experiences of immigrant women in (...) domestic violence situations are often exacerbated by their specific position as immigrants, such as limited host-language skills, isolation from and contact with family and community, lack of access to dignified jobs, uncertain legal statuses, and experiences with authorities in their origin countries. The authors then examine the various responses at the national and local community levels to this issue in receiving countries. (shrink)

Staff reported paranormal experiences in connection with the outpatient Medical Assistance in Dying room at the hospital. This case study reports on staff experiences and illustrates how the Ethics team’s role expanded to deal with this novel situation by facilitating an interdisciplinary response.

Memory consolidation is the process in which memory traces are strengthened over time for later retrieval. Although some theories hold that consolidation can only occur during sleep, accumulating evidence suggests that brief periods of wakeful rest may also facilitate consolidation. Interestingly, however, Varma and colleagues reported that a demanding 2-back task following encoding produced a similar performance to a wakeful reset condition. We tested whether participants’ recall would be best following a wakeful rest condition as compared to other distractor conditions, (...) consistent with the extant wakeful rest literature, or whether we would replicate the finding by Varma and colleagues such that participants’ memory benefitted from both a rest and a 2-back task following encoding. Across two experiments, we used similar and the same encoding material as used the one by Varma and colleagues, employed a wakeful rest condition adapted for online testing, and compared participants’ recall across post-encoding conditions. In the first experiment, we used a between-subjects design and compared participants’ cued recall performance following a period of wakeful rest, a 2-back task, or a rest + sounds condition. The second experiment more closely replicated the experimental design used by Varma and colleagues using a within-subjects manipulation. Ultimately, our findings more consistently aligned with the canonical wakeful rest finding, such that recall was better following the rest condition than all other post-encoding conditions. These results support the notion that wakeful rest may allow for consolidation by protecting recently encoded information from interference, thereby improving memory performance. (shrink)

This major essay collection takes a fresh look at how differences among people matter for music and musical thought.

In this article, it will be concluded that the major automotive racing league, Formula 1, is failing in its efforts to be a truly unisex sport. In the current Formula 1 series, there are no female drivers. Although women have never been officially prohibited from competing in Formula 1, there have been fewer than 10 female drivers since its inception. This inquiry focuses on why women drivers have been prevented from securing professional driving positions in Formula 1 and racing on (...) equal terms with men. I argue that there are five major barriers which perpetuate women’s exclusion from this league: historical and current attitudes, assumed physical and mental inferiority, sexualisation, money, and representation and visibility. In this cultural examination, I demonstrate that the situation for women in Formula 1 appears to be bleaker than in other sports that are making progress in their quest for gender equality. However, I also suggest that, despite ethical issues, W Series – a new, women-only, single-seater car racing championship – could potentially motivates positive change for women’s car racing by promoting gender equity through a new league which enables women to improve themselves in a protected category. This article also considers the impact of sex in Formula 1, which is pertinent to the discussion surrounding alleged biological differences. The discussion employs Simone de Beauvoir’s conceptualisation of ‘Otherness’, as well as Helmut Pflugfelder’s account of female embodiment in motorsport. The overall findings are that more focused research is required for gender issues in Formula 1 to be accurately addressed. (shrink)

This article provides a map of the UBI debate, structured into the main themes that guide and group the arguments on both sides. It finds that UBI’s supporters and opponents both draw on core principles of justice and freedom, focusing on need and poverty, discrimination and inequality, growth, social opportunity, individuality, and self-development. From an economic perspective, they both appeal to business concerns about efficiency, risk, flexibility, and consumption, as well as labour interests on work fulfilment, working conditions, remuneration, and (...) bargaining. Likewise, they focus on political questions around welfare state reforms, redistribution, taxation and funding sources, democratic citizenship, and the prospects for cross-party policy coalitions. By providing an overview of the thematic pillars of the UBI debate, this article helps researchers and activists locate and orient themselves within the wider spectrum of opinion on UBI. (shrink)

Although the topic of value congruence has attracted considerable attention from researchers and practitioners, evidence for the link between person–supervisor value congruence and followers’ reactions is less robust than often assumed. This study addresses three central issues in our understanding of person–supervisor value congruence by assessing the impact of objective person–supervisor value congruence rather than subjective value congruence, by examining the differential effects of value congruence in strongly versus moderately held values, and by exploring perceived empowerment as a central mediating (...) mechanism. Results of a multi-source study comprising 116 person–supervisor dyads reveal that objective value congruence relates to followers’ job satisfaction and affective commitment and that this link can be explained by followers’ perceived empowerment. Moreover, polynomial regression and response surface analyses reveal that congruence effects vary with the importance that leaders and followers ascribe to a certain value: Congruency in strongly held values have more robust relations with followers’ outcomes than congruence in moderately held values. (shrink)

This chapter weighs a challenge to the attractive notion that by enabling empathy, fiction affords wide-ranging knowledge of what others’ experiences are like. It is commonly held that ‘seeing the world through others’ eyes’ often requires the empathizer to undergo an imaginative shift in sensibility, and we might naturally think that fiction helps us to effect that shift. However, some recent work on empathy and imagination encourages the conclusion that we are actually rigidly restricted to our own sensibilities even in (...) the wildest flights of imagination great literature can inspire. Drawing on the work of the novelist Zadie Smith, the chapter argues that while our imaginative capacities are not entirely unconstrained by our sensibilities, fiction can still help us to learn about a wide range of human experiences, including the experiences of people whose sensibilities substantially diverge from our own. Notably, fiction can work on our patterns of attention in such a way that we become temporarily ‘not ourselves.’. (shrink)

The moral acceptability of anonymous gamete donation remains contested. Although the view that the value of parent–child relationships should not depend on genetic ties is “nearly axiomatic” among philosophers and bioethicists, one well-known dissenter remains: David Velleman. I argue that most rebuttals to Velleman have simply talked past him because they have failed to understand his fundamental point—that donor conception is a violation of human dignity and as such is wrong even if it does not harm individuals. I challenge Velleman (...) on his own terms by endorsing his metaphysical picture before showing that donor conception is not necessarily a violation of human dignity. I show this by arguing that gamete donation is held to a double standard of self-knowledge. I develop an account of the self that recognizes that certain kinds of challenges to one's flourishing can contribute to an individual's strength and self-knowledge. I defend my view against objections that genetic knowledge is categorically different from other ways of knowing oneself and I show that donor conception can respect human dignity as long as it meets certain conditions. (shrink)

A considerable body of evidence now documents, beyond reasonable doubt, biological and health risk factors for crime and violence. Nevertheless, intervention and prevention efforts with offenders have avoided biological interventions, in part due to past misuses of biological research and the challenges that biological predispositions to crime raise. This article reviews the empirical literature on two biological intervention approaches, omega-3 supplementation and transcranial direct current stimulation. Emerging research on these relatively benign interventions suggests that increased omega-3 intake through dietary intervention (...) and prefrontal upregulation using non-invasive brain stimulation may show some initial promise in reducing antisocial behavior. The ethical issues related to mandated and offered biological interventions within the criminal justice system are discussed. (shrink)