We report on the deliberations of an interdisciplinary group of experts in science, law, and philosophy who convened to discuss novel ethical and policy challenges in stem cell research. In this report we discuss the ethical and policy implications of safety concerns in the transition from basic laboratory research to clinical applications of cell-based therapies derived from stem cells. Although many features of this transition from lab to clinic are common to other therapies, three aspects of stem cell biology pose (...) unique challenges. First, tension regarding the use of human embryos may complicate the scientific development of safe and effective cell lines. Second, because human stem cells were not developed in the laboratory until 1998, few safety questions relating to human applications have been addressed in animal research. Third, preclinical and clinical testing of biologic agents, particularly those as inherently complex as mammalian cells, present formidable challenges, such as the need to develop suitable standardized assays and the difficulty of selecting appropriate patient populations for early phase trials. We recommend that scientists, policy makers, and the public discuss these issues responsibly, and further, that a national advisory committee to oversee human trials of cell therapies be established. **NB we did not reccommend a NAC, we think it might be appropriate**. (shrink)

If stem cell-based therapies are developed, we will likely confront a difficult problem of justice: for biological reasons alone, the new therapies might benefit only a limited range of patients. In fact, they might benefit primarily white Americans, thereby exacerbating long-standing differences in health and health care.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia, and there is currently no cure. The “β‐amyloid cascade hypothesis” of AD is the basis of current understanding of AD pathogenesis and drug discovery. However, no AD models have fully validated this hypothesis. We recently developed a human stem cell culture model of AD by cultivating genetically modified human neural stem cells in a three‐dimensional (3D) cell culture system. These cells were able to recapitulate key events of AD pathology including (...) β‐amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles. In this review, we will discuss the progress and current limitations of AD mouse models and human stem cell models as well as explore the breakthroughs of 3D cell culture systems. We will also share our perspective on the potential of dish models of neurodegenerative diseases for studying pathogenic cascades and therapeutic drug discovery. (shrink)

Subjects and Simulations presents essays focused on suffering and sublimity, representation and subjectivity, and the relation of truth and appearance through engagement with the legacies of Jean Baudrillard and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe.

The coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) has caused shortages of life-sustaining medical resources, and future waves of the virus may cause further scarcity. The Yale New Haven Health System developed a triage protocol to allocate scarce medical resources during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the primary goal of saving the most lives possible, and a secondary goal of making triage assessments and decisions consistent, transparent, and fair. We outline the process of developing the protocol, summarize the protocol, and discuss the major ethical challenges (...) encountered, along with our answers to the challenges. These challenges include (1) the role of age and chronic comorbidities; (2) evaluating children and pregnant patients; (3) racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic disparities in health; (4) prioritization of healthcare workers; and (5) balancing clinical judgment versus protocolized assessments.We conclude with a review of the limitations of our protocol and the lessons learned. We hope that a robust public discussion of such protocols and the ethical challenges they raise will result in the fairest possible processes, less need for triage, and more lives saved during future waves of the pandemic and similar public health emergencies. (shrink)

There is a fine line in business negotiations between being perceived as corrupt and having proper engagement with the natural tension and excitement of the business bargaining process. Combining literature review and experiential observation we provide a framework that will assist global business managers to more successfully negotiate cross-cultural business transactions. We identify some archetypal underpinnings of bargaining in a business context and question the established perceptions of corruption in intercultural business dealings. We conclude that different cultural systems produce variations (...) of negotiating behaviour that need to be judged with a deeper local knowledge to avoid simply transferring inappropriate labels.
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High-spin states in the odd-odd N = Z nucleus Co-54 have been investigated by the fusion-evaporation reaction Si-28(S-32,1 alpha 1p1n)Co-54. Gamma-ray information gathered with the Ge detector array Gammasphere was correlated with evaporated particles detected in the charged particle detector system Microball and a 1 pi neutron detector array. A significantly extended excitation scheme of Co-54 is presented, which includes a candidate for the isospin T = 1, 6(+) state of the 1f(7/2)(-2) multiplet. The results are compared to large-scale shell-model (...) calculations in the fp shell. Effective interactions with and without isospin-breaking terms have been used to probe isospin symmetry and isospin mixing. A quest for deformed high-spin rotational cascades proved negative. This feature is discussed by means of cranking calculations. (shrink)

Two rotational bands have been identified and characterized in the proton-magic N = Z + 1 nucleus Ni-57. These bands complete the systematics of well-and superdeformed rotational bands in the light nickel isotopes starting from doubly magic Ni-56 to Ni-60. High-spin states in Ni-57 have been produced in the fusion-evaporation reaction Si-28(S-32, 2p1n)Ni-57 and studied with the gamma-ray detection array GAMMASPHERE operated in conjunction with detectors for evaporated light charged particles and neutrons. The features of the rotational bands in Ni-57 (...) are compared to those of neighbouring isotopes and interpreted by means of configuration-dependent cranked Nilsson-Strutinsky calculations. The two observed high-spin bands are considered signature partners and assigned to configurations with one 1g(9/2) proton and one 1g(9/2) neutron, resulting in an unambiguous understanding of the energetically favoured signature alpha = -1/2 band but a somewhat less satisfactory description of the signature alpha = +1/2 band. (shrink)

In biscuit conditionals (BCs) such as If you’re hungry, there’s pizza in the fridge, the if clause appears to apply to the illocutionary act performed in uttering the main clause, rather than to its propositional content. Accordingly, previous analyses of BCs have focused on illocutionary acts, and, this, I argue, leads them to yield incorrect paraphrases. I propose, instead, that BCs involve existential quantification over potential literal acts such as assertions, questions, commands, and exclamations, the semantic objects associated with declarative, (...) interrogative, imperative, and exclamative sentences, respectively. Such an existential interpretation of BCs requires only that we add potential literal acts to our inventory of individuals, and it produces reasonable paraphrases in which if has its normal meaning: If you’re hungry,[there’s a (relevant/salient) assertion that] there’s pizza in the fridge. These potential literal act variables are introduced into semantic interpretations and then undergo Existential Closure. Hence, we would expect to see similar interpretations in contexts other than BCs, that is, with other if constructions, with connectives other than if, with potential literal acts other than assertion, and in root sentences. This prediction is borne out, along with the parallel prediction that we cannot quantify over purely illocutionary acts like offers, but only over potential literal acts, those conventionally associated with a particular morphosyntactic shape. (shrink)

The facts aboutsuch, then, indicate not just thatsuch is a pro-adjective, but also that binding conditions apply broadly to pro-ADJs and pro-CNs, as well as to a wide range of pro-arguments. If this is true, the CN binding process accomplished by rules (40) and (41) might better be expressed in a system that uses a Cooper (1979) store mechanism. In fact, Stump (p. 144) notes that this could easily be done. Meanings of the type of∨ P n could be stored, (...) just as NP meanings are, until an appropriate binding CN phrase was encountered. Binding conditions would simply require that a∨ P n meaning not come out of storage until the derivation had emerged from its governing category. The behavior of the pro-adjectivesuch suggests that an expression of any category, if it is legitimately translatable as a variable, may be a fullfledged proform; many principles and mechanisms described to account for the widely studied pronouns in fact apply to nonargument categories. (shrink)

We examine when and how police officers may avoid costly errors under stress by leveraging theoretical and empirical work on the biopsychosocial (BPS) model of challenge and threat. According to the BPS model, in motivated performance contexts (e.g., test taking, athletics), the evaluation of situational and task demands in relation to one’s perceived resources available to cope with those demands engenders distinct patterns of peripheral physiological responding. Individuals experience more challenge-like states in which blood circulates more efficiently in the periphery (...) when they evaluate their coping resources as meeting or exceeding the task demands. Conversely, individuals experience more threat-like states in which blood circulates less efficiently in the periphery when they view the situation or task demands as exceeding their coping resources. Patterns of response consistent with challenge and threat states have been shown to predict important performance and decision-making outcomes in stressful contexts, and repeated experiences of threat-like patterns of physiological activity are thought to have detrimental effects on long-term cardiovascular health. To date, however, research has not used the biopsychosocial model to understand police decision-making under stress. Here, we review relevant empirical work from the perspective of the BPS model concerning how minority status and power can shape challenge and threat responding and contribute to decision making under stress. We then detail a research agenda aimed at improving the translational value of research being conducted within the BPS model for understanding complex performance and decision making in the real world, including among law enforcement personnel. (shrink)

L'article adopte un point de vue plus systématique qu'historique sur la métaphysique de Christian Wolff et, en particulier, sur sa théorie de la conscience. Il s'intéresse à des écrits de controverse de l'époque, impliquant Lange, Ludovici et un certain Bequignole, officier dans l'armée prussienne. Ce dernier, bien qu'il ne fût pas un philosophe professionnel, a relevé dans la Métaphysique allemande quelques défauts graves de la théorie wolffienne de la conscience. En refusant d'attribuer la raison aux bêtes et en décrivant la (...) mémoire du chien en termes très proches de la mémoire de soi propre aux personnes, le philosophe de Halle n'a pas pu éviter de se contredire. The paper adopts a more systematic than historical point of view on Christian Wolff's metaphysics and, in particular, on his theory of consciousness. It is interested in controversial writings of those days with reference e.g. to Lange, Ludovici and an officer of the Prussian army so-called Bequignole ; the latter, though he tvas no professional philosopher, found a few serious defects of Wolff's theory of consciousness in the latter's German Metaphysics. By refusing to grant reason to animals and by describing the dog's memory in terms very close to the self memory specific to persons, Wolff couldn't avoid contradicting himself. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering involves revising our concepts. It can be pursued as a specific philosophical methodology, but is also common in ordinary, non-philosophical, contexts. How does our capacity for conceptual engineering fit into human cognitive life more broadly? I hold that conceptual engineering is best understood alongside practices of conceptual exploration, examples of which include conceptual supposition (i.e., suppositional reasoning about alternative concepts), and conceptual comparison (i.e., comparisons between possible concept choices). Whereas in conceptual engineering we aim to change the concepts (...) we use, in conceptual exploration, we reason about conceptual possibilities. I approach conceptual exploration via the linguistic tools we use to communicate about concepts, using metalinguistic negotiation, convention-shifting conditionals, and metalinguistic comparatives as my key examples. I present a linguistic framework incorporating conventions that can account for this communication in a unified way. Furthermore, I argue that conceptual exploration helps undermine skepticism about conceptual engineering itself. (shrink)

Na primeira parte, fazemos um levantamento das ocorrências de pithanon (‘persuasivo’) e termos afins em textos e fragmentos do estoicismo antigo referentes à persuasão de asseríveis e argumentos e em textos e fragmentos em que a lógica estoica se apresenta como ferramenta para evitar a persuasão dos sofismas e o sábio estoico como aquele que capaz de vencer essa persuasão por sua perícia em dialética. Feito isso, consideramos criticamente as teses de Chiaradona, Sedley e Tieleman, para quem Crisipo está interessado (...) em formas extralógicas de discurso. Avaliaremos também a tese de Tieleman segundo a qual Crisipo usa premissas persuasivas para fins construtivos. Em nossas conclusões, descartamos a tese sobre o reconhecimento de verdades extralógicas por Crisipo com base no ideal do sábio estoico. Concluímos que, no estoicismo, (1) pithanon refere-se principalmente a falsas afirmações, argumentos e representações e (2) que o sábio estoico não pode ser persuadido, mas pode persuadir seus ouvintes a fim de preparar suas almas para receber as doutrinas estoicas. (shrink)

Some assertions give rise to the acquaintance inference: the inference that the speaker is acquainted with some individual. Discussion of the acquaintance inference has previously focused on assertions about aesthetic matters and personal tastes (e.g. 'The cake is tasty'), but it also arises with reports about how things seem (e.g. 'Tom seems like he's cooking'). 'Seem'-reports give rise to puzzling acquaintance behavior, with no analogue in the previously-discussed domains. In particular, these reports call for a distinction between the specific acquaintance (...) inference (that the speaker is acquainted with a specific individual) and the general acquaintance inference (that the speaker is acquainted with something or other of relevance). We frame a novel empirical generalization -- the specific with stage-level generalization -- that systematizes the observed behavior, in terms of the semantics of the embedded 'like'-clause. We present supporting experimental work, and explain why the generalization makes sense given the evidential role of 'seem'-reports. Finally, we discuss the relevance of this result for extant proposals about the semantics of 'seem'-reports. More modestly, it fills a gap in previous theories by identifying which reports get which of two possible interpretations; more radically, it suggests a revision of the kind of explanation that should be given for the acquaintance behavior in question. (shrink)

This is the first book to offer the best essays, articles, and speeches on ethics and intelligence that demonstrate the complex moral dilemmas in intelligence collection, analysis, and operations. Some are recently declassified and never before published, and all are written by authors whose backgrounds are as varied as their insights, including Robert M. Gates, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; John P. Langan, the Joseph Cardinal Bernardin Professor of Catholic Social Thought at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Georgetown (...) University; and Loch K. Johnson, Regents Professor of Political Science at the University of Georgia and recipient of the Owens Award for contributions to the understanding of U.S. intelligence activities. Creating the foundation for the study of ethics and intelligence by filling in the gap between warfare and philosophy, this is a valuable collection of literature for building an ethical code that is not dependent on any specific agency, department, or country. (shrink)

Virtue epistemology is among the dominant influences in mainstream epistemology today. An important commitment of one strand of virtue epistemology – responsibilist virtue epistemology (e.g., Montmarquet 1993; Zagzebski 1996; Battaly 2006; Baehr 2011) – is that it must provide regulative normative guidance for good thinking. Recently, a number of virtue epistemologists (most notably Baehr, 2013) have held that virtue epistemology not only can provide regulative normative guidance, but moreover that we should reconceive the primary epistemic aim of all education as (...) the inculcation of the intellectual virtues. Baehr’s picture contrasts with another well-known position – that the primary aim of education is the promotion of critical thinking (Scheffler 1989; Siegel 1988; 1997; 2017). In this paper – that we hold makes a contribution to both philosophy of education and epistemology and, a fortiori, epistemology of education – we challenge this picture. We outline three criteria that any putative aim of education must meet and hold that it is the aim of critical thinking, rather than the aim of instilling intellectual virtue, that best meets these criteria. On this basis, we propose a new challenge for intellectual virtue epistemology, next to the well-known empirically-driven ‘situationist challenge’. What we call the ‘pedagogical challenge’ maintains that the intellectual virtues approach does not have available a suitably effective pedagogy to qualify the acquisition of intellectual virtue as the primary aim of education. This is because the pedagogic model of the intellectual virtues approach (borrowed largely from exemplarist thinking) is not properly action-guiding. Instead, we hold that, without much further development in virtue-based theory, logic and critical thinking must still play the primary role in the epistemology of education. (shrink)

Wissen, so lautet die unausgesprochene Maxime der Humanisten und Polyhistoren der Frühen Neuzeit, kann man nie genug erwerben. Riesige Bibliotheken und Kunstkammern sowie voluminöse Abhandlungen, Geschichtswerke und Enzyklopädien geben noch heute eindrucksvoll Rechenschaft von dieser Leidenschaft. Doch wächst mit der Größe jeder Sammlung auch die Notwendigkeit ihrer Ordnung. Es ist daher kein Zufall, dass ›Ordnung‹ zum Schlüsselbegriff des humanistischen Enzyklopädismus aufgestiegen und zum Gegenstand hartnäckiger Auseinandersetzungen unter den Gelehrten geworden ist. In Steffen Siegels Untersuchung werden die vielfältigen philosophischen Versuche, die (...) Fülle des Wissens systematisch zu ordnen, nicht allein anhand der Überlieferung von Texten rekonstruiert. Im Zentrum dieser reich illustrierten Studie, die bei mittelalterlichen Wissenspraktiken ihren Ausgang nimmt, sich insbesondere den vielschichtigen Bildkulturen des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts widmet und einen Ausblick auf moderne Visualisierungstechniken bietet, steht die faszinierende Vielfalt jener Bilder, die Ordnungen des Wissens als sichtbare Figuren vor Augen rückten. Die Bedeutung von Schautafeln und Bildallegorien, von wissenschaftlichen Illustrationen und Karten wird, mit Blick auf die Frage nach möglichen Ordnungen des Wissens, in diesem Buch zum ersten Mal übergreifend analysiert. Ein Akzent der Untersuchungen liegt auf der bislang nur wenig erforschten Geschichte des Diagramms in der Frühen Neuzeit. In der Mitte zwischen den Darstellungsmöglichkeiten von Bildern und Texten, standen insbesondere diagrammatische Schemata im Dienst der Konstruktion und der Beglaubigung von Ordnungen des Wissens. Anhand der reichen Tradition frühneuzeitlicher Diagramme lassen sich in hervorragender Weise die Potentiale, aber auch die Probleme eines Zusammenspiels von Wissens-, Ideen- und Mediengeschichte in der Zeit um 1600 ablesen und profilieren. Mit den im Jahr 1587 in Paris publizierten Tableaux legte Montaignes Zeitgenosse Christophe de Savigny eines der erstaunlichsten und reichsten Zeugnisse frühneuzeitlicher Kunst im Dienst einer solchen Wissensgeschichte vor. Das Tafelwerk steht daher im Mittelpunkt der Untersuchungen zu den Figuren enzyklopädischer Wissensordnungen. Erstmals seit seiner Publikation vor über fünfhundert Jahren wird dieses sehr selten gewordene, für die Gelehrtenkultur des 16. Jahrhunderts äußerst repräsentative Werk hier vollständig und in einer farbigen Reproduktion wieder zum Druck gebracht. Die komplexen Strategien, mit Hilfe von Bildern, Diagrammen und Texten für eine bestimmte Wissensordnung zu argumentieren, lassen sich auf diese Weise an einer bedeutenden Quelle der vormodernen Gelehrtengeschichte minutiös nachvollziehen. Die Fülle des Wissens und die Möglichkeiten seiner Ordnung werden dabei als Herausforderungen sichtbar, die in gleicher Weise das Interesse der Kunstgeschichte und der Kulturwissenschaft, der Wissenschafts- und Pädagogikgeschichte und der Philosophie berühren. (shrink)

This study empirically examined the views of Certified Internal Auditors (CIAs) concerning the role of Code of Ethics for members of the Institute of Internal Auditors. It is a continuation of an earlier study which examined the usefulness of the Code to CIAs. Among the questions asked were what is the primary reason for the Code of Ethics, how useful is it, have you used it, should more enforcement actions be taken against members who violate the Code, and what are (...) the legal and moral responsibilities of the CIA to report serious ethical violations, e.g., environmental pollution, to outsiders when top management and the board of directors are aware of the matter but are not doing anything to correct it. The results indicate strong support for the Code, its enforcement, and use as an instrument to encourage the internal flow of ethical behavior by embers and others. (shrink)

R. Emmett Tyrrell, the editor of the neo-conservative monthly The American Spectator, has been justly denounced as a “mean-spirited punk” by fellow writers from The Nation and The New Republic. Tyrrell, a knock-down version of H.L. Mencken, writing without the master's verve or wit, is indeed a pretentious and thoroughly unpleasant fellow whose book The Liberal Crack-Up is given over to a nuke-the-whales humor, i.e., an extended and generally senseless tirade against feminists, peaceniks, environmentalists, etc. It is all the more (...) disturbing, then, to see that in one lucid moment, the chapter on “Whatever Happened to Liberalism,” Tyrrell makes some worthwhile points. (shrink)