This book studies the US Supreme Court and its current common law approach to judicial decision making from a national and transnational perspective. The Supreme Court's approach appears detached from and inconsistent with the underlying fundamental principles that ought to guide it, which often leads to unfair and inefficient results. This book suggests the adoption of a judicial decision-making model that proceeds from principles and rules, using them as premises for developing consistent unitary theories to meet current social conditions. This (...) model requires that judicial opinions be informed by a wide range of considerations, including established legal standards, the insights derived from deductive and inductive reasoning, the lessons learned from history and custom, and an examination of the social and economic consequences of the decision. (shrink)

A new theory about the origins of consciousness that finds learning to be the driving force in the evolutionary transition to basic consciousness. What marked the evolutionary transition from organisms that lacked consciousness to those with consciousness—to minimal subjective experiencing, or, as Aristotle described it, “the sensitive soul”? In this book, Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jablonka propose a new theory about the origin of consciousness that finds learning to be the driving force in the transition to basic consciousness. Using (...) a methodology similar to that used by scientists when they identified the transition from non-life to life, Ginsburg and Jablonka suggest a set of criteria, identify a marker for the transition to minimal consciousness, and explore the far-reaching biological, psychological, and philosophical implications. After presenting the historical, neurobiological, and philosophical foundations of their analysis, Ginsburg and Jablonka propose that the evolutionary marker of basic or minimal consciousness is a complex form of associative learning, which they term unlimited associative learning (UAL). UAL enables an organism to ascribe motivational value to a novel, compound, non-reflex-inducing stimulus or action, and use it as the basis for future learning. Associative learning, Ginsburg and Jablonka argue, drove the Cambrian explosion and its massive diversification of organisms. Finally, Ginsburg and Jablonka propose symbolic language as a similar type of marker for the evolutionary transition to human rationality—to Aristotle's “rational soul.”. (shrink)

As long as we care about suffering in the world, says political philosopher Simona Forti, we are compelled to inquire into the question of evil. But is the concept of evil still useful in a postmodern landscape where absolute values have been leveled and relativized by a historicist perspective? Given our current unwillingness to judge others, what signposts remain to guide our ethical behavior? Surveying the nineteenth- and twentieth-century Western philosophical debates on evil, Forti concludes that it is time (...) to leave behind what she calls "the Dostoevsky paradigm": the dualistic vision of an omnipotent monster pitted against absolute, helpless victims. No longer capable of grasping the normalization of evil in today's world—whose structures of power have been transformed—this paradigm has exhausted its explanatory force. In its place, Forti offers a different genealogy of the relationship between evil and power, one that finally calls into question power's recurrent link to transgression. At the center of contemporary evil she posits the passive attitude towards rule-following, the need for normalcy, and the desire for obedience nurtured by our contemporary mass democracies. In our times, she contends, evil must be explored in tandem with our stubborn desire to stay alive at all costs as much as with our deep need for recognition: the new modern absolutes. A courageous book, New Demons extends an original, inspiring call to ethical living in a biopolitical age. (shrink)

Pulvermüller's Hebbian model implies that an impairment in the word form system will affect phonological articulation and phonological comprehension, because there is only a single representation. Clinical evidence from patients with word-form deafness demonstrates a dissociation between input and output phonologies. These data suggest that auditory comprehension and articulatory production depend on discrete phonological representations localized in different cortical networks.

BackgroundThe aim of this study is to explore the association of family socioeconomic status and internal and external schoolwork support with adolescents’ school satisfaction and whether schoolwork support modifies these associations.MethodsData come from the cross-sectional Health Behavior in School-aged Children study collected in 2018 from Slovak 15-year-olds. SES was measured by Family Affluence Scale. School satisfaction was measured via school engagement and attitudes toward education. Schoolwork support was measured regarding two groups of sources inside and outside the family, separately. Logistic (...) regression models were used to explore the associations of SES and schoolwork support with school satisfaction as well as the moderating effect of schoolwork support.ResultsAdolescents with low SES were more likely to feel indifferent toward school and education, and similarly, adolescents who did not have schoolwork support inside or outside the family. Schoolwork support moderated the associations of SES with school satisfaction. Adolescents with low and middle SES without support inside or outside the family were more likely to feel indifferent than satisfied.ConclusionAdolescents from low and middle SES without schoolwork support inside or outside the family are more likely to feel indifferent toward school and education. (shrink)

I argue that disposition ascriptions—claims like ‘the glass is fragile’—are semantically equivalent to possibility claims: they are true when the given object manifests the disposition in at least one of the relevant possible worlds.

As long as we care about suffering in the world, says political philosopher Simona Forti, we are compelled to inquire into the question of evil. But is the concept of evil still useful in a postmodern landscape where absolute values have been leveled and relativized by a historicist perspective? Given our current unwillingness to judge others, what signposts remain to guide our ethical behavior? Surveying the nineteenth- and twentieth-century Western philosophical debates on evil, Forti concludes that it is time (...) to leave behind what she calls "the Dostoevsky paradigm": the dualistic vision of an omnipotent monster pitted against absolute, helpless victims. No longer capable of grasping the normalization of evil in today's world—whose structures of power have been transformed—this paradigm has exhausted its explanatory force. In its place, Forti offers a different genealogy of the relationship between evil and power, one that finally calls into question power's recurrent link to transgression. At the center of contemporary evil she posits the passive attitude towards rule-following, the need for normalcy, and the desire for obedience nurtured by our contemporary mass democracies. In our times, she contends, evil must be explored in tandem with our stubborn desire to stay alive at all costs as much as with our deep need for recognition: the new modern absolutes. A courageous book, New Demons extends an original, inspiring call to ethical living in a biopolitical age. (shrink)

Rural community organisations (RCOs) are part of a non-governmental organisations network, an effective tool for tackling local problems and reducing growing territorial exclusion. Despite their significance, it is not fully clear how many of these organisations exist in Lithuania. This is due to several reasons: the typology of settlements in the national law (more specifically, the definition of rural areas) no longer reflects the demographic reality, and the definitions contained in the sub-legislation are ‘manipulated’. In the context of the activities (...) of RCO, this is a flawed practice as it slows down the empowerment of the existing potential of organisations. The article presents the issue of the RCO network as well as addresses the problem of the typology of the settlement system itself. Adapting the research practice opens a scientific debate to launch a search for answers to emerging problems. (shrink)

Fairness is one of the most prominent values in the Ethics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) debate and, specifically, in the discussion on algorithmic decision-making (ADM). However, while the need for fairness in ADM is widely acknowledged, the very concept of fairness has not been sufficiently explored so far. Our paper aims to fill this gap and claims that an ethically informed re-definition of fairness is needed to adequately investigate fairness in ADM. To achieve our goal, after an introductory section aimed (...) at clarifying the aim and structure of the paper, in section “Fairness in algorithmic decision-making” we provide an overview of the state of the art of the discussion on fairness in ADM and show its shortcomings; in section “Fairness as an ethical value”, we pursue an ethical inquiry into the concept of fairness, drawing insights from accounts of fairness developed in moral philosophy, and define fairness as an ethical value. In particular, we argue that fairness is articulated in a distributive and socio-relational dimension; it comprises three main components: fair equality of opportunity, equal right to justification, and fair equality of relationship; these components are grounded in the need to respect persons both as persons and as particular individuals. In section “Fairness in algorithmic decision-making revised”, we analyze the implications of our redefinition of fairness as an ethical value on the discussion of fairness in ADM and show that each component of fairness has profound effects on the criteria that ADM ought to meet. Finally, in section “Concluding remarks”, we sketch some broader implications and conclude. (shrink)

A listing is given of the published writings of the logician and philosopher Hao Wang (1921—1995), which includes all items known to the authors, including writings in Chinese and translations into other languages.

1024x768 Na sociedade da informação as Tecnologias da Informação e do Conhecimento podem contribuir para o aumento da distância social entre quem detém as informações e o domínio das tecnologias e, aqueles que estão a margem da sociedade tecnológica que são considerados os excluídos digitais, revelando a exclusão sociodigital. Por conseguinte, a eliminação da exclusão social encontra-se conectada a inclusão digital. Portanto, a importância dos programas de inclusão sociodigital, destacando-se o Programa Nacional de Tecnologias na Educação, enquanto política pública para (...) a inclusão sociodigital, que foi implantado em 1997 pelo governo federal em âmbito nacional, por meio da parceira União/Estado/Municípios. Neste contexto, o objetivo desta pesquisa foi investigar a implantação do Proinfo em Minas Gerais, especificamente na região metropolitana de Belo Horizonte onde estão localizados seis Núcleos de Tecnologias Educacionais, os quais têm a função de promover as capacitações dos agentes educacionais. Para tal, foi escolhida como metodologia a pesquisa descritiva tendo como estratégias adotadas as pesquisas bibliográfica e documental. Concluiu-se que mesmo enfrentando vários problemas, a capacitação dos agentes educacionais vem sendo realizada em todos os Núcleos Tecnológicos Educacionais, através de cursos sugeridos pelo Proinfo, que disponibiliza os materiais didáticos através da Secretaria de Educação Básica. São ofertadas, também, oficinas de curta duração sobre o uso de softwares na educação. Assim, a implantação do Proinfo em Minas Gerais constitui-se de um elemento gerador de mudanças educacionais e sociais, promotor da inclusão sociodigital, podendo ser considerada uma política pública inovadora, que tem nos NTEs e NTMs a sua garantia de desenvolvimento e execução. Palavras-chave: Inclusão sociodigital. Proinfo. Capacitação de agentes educacionais. Normal 0 21 false false false PT-BR X-NONE X-NONE. (shrink)

Health Recommender Systems are promising Articial-Intelligence-based tools endowing healthy lifestyles and therapy adherence in healthcare and medicine. Among the most supported areas, it is worth mentioning active aging. However, current HRS supporting AA raise ethical challenges that still need to be properly formalized and explored. This study proposes to rethink HRS for AA through an autonomy-based ethical analysis. In particular, a brief overview of the HRS’ technical aspects allows us to shed light on the ethical risks and challenges they might (...) raise on individuals’ well-being as they age. Moreover, the study proposes a categorization, understanding, and possible preventive/mitigation actions for the elicited risks and challenges through rethinking the AI ethics core principle of autonomy. Finally, elaborating on autonomy-related ethical theories, the paper proposes an autonomy-based ethical framework and how it can foster the development of autonomy-enabling HRS for AA. (shrink)

We discuss the evolutionary transition from animals with limited experiencing to animals with unlimited experiencing and basic consciousness. This transition was, we suggest, intimately linked with the evolution of associative learning and with flexible reward systems based on, and modifiable by, learning. During associative learning, new pathways relating stimuli and effects are formed within a highly integrated and continuously active nervous system. We argue that the memory traces left by such new stimulus-effect relations form dynamic, flexible, and varied global sensory (...) states, which we call categorizing sensory states . These CSSs acquired a function: they came to act as internal “evaluators” and led to positive and negative reinforcement of new behavior. They are therefore the simplest, distinct, first-person motivational states that an animal can have. They constitute what we call basic consciousness, and are the hallmark of animals that can experience. Since associative learning has been found in many invertebrate taxa that first appeared during the Cambrian era, we propose that the processes underlying basic consciousness are phylogenetically ancient, and that their emergence may have fueled the Cambrian explosion. (shrink)

This is the first of two papers in which we propose an evolutionary route for the transition from sensory processing to unlimited experiencing, or basic consciousness. We argue that although an evolutionary analysis does not provide a formal definition and set of sufficient conditions for consciousness, it can identify crucial factors and suggest what evolutionary changes enabled the transition. We believe that the raw material from which feelings were molded by natural selection was a global sensory state that we call (...) overall sensation, which is a by-product of the incessant activity of the highly interconnected nervous systems that characterize all neural animals. We argue that global sensory states generated limited experiencing once they became coupled to the simplest kinds of nervous-system-mediated learning, a coupling that occurred in the most ancient taxa of neural animals, which were similar to present-day cnidarians and ctenophores. In such animals, limited experiencing involves a small number of persistent global sensory states. These sensory states, however, do not have a function and do not act as motivational states. As we argue in the next paper, with the evolution of associative learning they evolved into systems that gave animals basic consciousness. (shrink)

The Birth of the Philologist from the Spirit of Schopenhauer’s Philosophy. Nietzsche’s Inaugural Lecture On the Personality of Homer. This essay highlights Schopenhauer’s decisive and unexplored role in Nietzsche’s Über die Persönlichkeit Homers. Following Schopenhauer’s negative assessment of the study of history, Nietzsche criticizes F. A. Wolf’s organic systematization of the sciences of antiquity and foregrounds the aesthetic dimension of philology. Contrary to Wolf, Nietzsche believes that historical investigation is subordinate to the essential pedagogical function of philology; and only through (...) its aesthetic component can philology establish which literary works of antiquity are to be considered truly “classical.” The debate on the Homeric question after the publication of Wolf’s Prolegomena ad Homerum illustrates that philologists have paradoxically become opponents and “destroyers” of the ideal of antiquity. Nietzsche shows how a methodological approach inspired by Schopenhauer’s philosophy can revive the relationship between philology and art. Nietzsche’s arguments to counter Wolf’s thesis about the problem of Homer’s personality implicitly rest on Schopenhauer’s aesthetics. In particular, through Schopenhauer’s conception of genius, Nietzsche rehabilitates the individuality of the poetic author of the Iliad and Odyssey, even though this poet does not correspond to the one referred to as “Homer” in antiquity. (shrink)

This article proposes a systematic application of recent developments in the logic of preference to a number of topics in deontic logic. The key junction is the well‐known Hansson conditional for dyadic obligations. These conditionals are generalized by pairing them with reasoning about syntactic priority structures. The resulting two‐level approach to obligations is tested first against standard scenarios of contrary‐to‐duty obligations, leading also to a generalization for the Kanger‐Anderson reduction of deontic logic. Next, the priority framework is applied to model (...) two intuitively different sorts of deontic dynamics of obligations, based on information changes and on genuine normative events. In this two‐level setting, we also offer novel takes on vexed issues such as the Chisholm paradox and modelling strong permission. Finally, the priority framework is shown to provide a unifying setting for the study of operations on norms as such, in particular, adding or deleting individual norms, and even merging whole norm systems in different manners. (shrink)

Dans l’Italie médiévale et moderne, les femmes qui sont exclues de la citoyenneté politique participent à diverses formes de construction du lien d’appartenance à un lieu particulier. La mobilité conditionne par ailleurs les statuts individuels, non seulement en raison des diverses manières de définir citoyens et étrangers, mais aussi du fait que les contenus du droit municipal ne se ressemblent pas d’un endroit à l’autre, surtout en matière de droits et de capacités des femmes. Cet essai illustre les principales thématiques (...) sous-tendant la citoyenneté féminine et examine ensuite les réactions des femmes et des hommes à la multiplicité des normes locales et à leurs différences. (shrink)

Understanding Eating Disorders is an original contribution to the field of healthcare ethics. It develops a new theory concerning the moral basis of eating disorders, and places such disorders for the first time at the centre of philosophical discourse. The book explores the relationship that people have with food and their own body by looking at genetics and neuro-physiology, sociology and family studies, clinical psychology and psychiatry, and frames abnormal eating at the extreme of a spectrum of normal behaviours, directed (...) by moral values. Giordano argues that abnormal eating is not a psycho-pathological phenomenon, but the coherent implementation of ordinary moral values with a long tradition in Western culture. The book also contains a detailed analysis of UK legislation, accompanied by a timely critique of the law on treatment of mental disorders in general and of eating disorders in particular. (shrink)

The introduction of Linear Logic extends the Curry-Howard Isomorphism to intensional aspects of the typed functional programming. In particular, every formula of Linear Logic tells whether the term it is a type for, can be either erased/duplicated or not, during a computation. So, Linear Logic can be seen as a model of a computational environment with an explicit control about the management of resources.This paper introduces a typed functional language ! and a categorical model for it.

Corporate social responsibility research has focused often on the business returns of corporate social initiatives but less on their possible social returns. We study an actual company–consumer partnership CSR initiative promoting ecologically correct and conscious consumption of bottled mineral water. We conduct a survey on adult consumers to test the hypotheses that consumer skepticism toward the company–consumer partnership CSR initiative and the moral emotion of elevation mediate the relationship between company CSR motives perceived by consumers and consumer behavioral responses following (...) this CSR initiative. Favorable consumer behavioral responses, in turn, relate positively to consumer support of other green products. The results provide scholars and managers with means of improving their understanding and handling of company–consumer partnership CSR initiatives. (shrink)

A large part of the debate around the right to refuse life-prolonging treatment of anorexia nervosa sufferers centers on the issue of competence. Whether or not the anorexic should be allowed to refuse life-saving treatment does not depend solely or primarily on competence. It also depends on whether the anorexic’s suffering is bearable or tractable, and on the degree of involvement of the family in the therapeutic process. Anorexics could be competent to refuse lifesaving treatment (Giordano 2008). However, the anorexic’s (...) refusal of life-saving treatment should not be respected purely because it is a competent decision. In fact, anorexia has two characteristics that weaken the strength of the principle .. (shrink)

The Exclusion Problem for mental causation suggests that there is a tension between the claim that the mental causes physical effects, and the claim that the mental does not overdetermine its physical effects. In response, Karen Bennett puts forward an extra necessary condition for overdetermination : if one candidate cause were to occur but the other were not to occur, the effect would still occur. She thus denies one of the assumptions of EP, the assumption that if an effect has (...) two sufficient causes, it is overdetermined. If sound, her argument does two things: it solves EP, and it shows how to use counterfactuals in order to make the notion of overdetermination precise. However, the argument is not sound. (shrink)

El artículo habla del uso que de las citas de Ambrosio de Milán hicieron Agustín y Juliano de Eclana, tal y como queda reflejado en "Contra Iulianum opus imperfectum". Se señalan algunas cuestiones implicadas en este asunto, por ejemplo, la acusación de maniqueísmo hecha a Agustín y la diversa comprensión de la Tradición y de las Sagradas Escrituras, que tienen ambos autores.

This note highlights the difficulties of reading the vocabulary of the De civitate Dei and makes annotations to the introduction of the new Italian translation of the De civitate, edited by Domenico Marafioti with an extensive introduction and notes: Sant’Agostino, La città di Dio, a cura di Domenico Marafioti, Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, Milano 2011 (Oscar Grandi Classici), 1632 pagine. ISBN 978-88-04-60888-2.

Magazines, leaflets, weblogs, and a variety of other media incessantly spread messages advising us on how to achieve or maintain our health or well-being. In such messages, the iconic representation of the face is predominant, and reveals an interesting phenomenon: the “face of health” seems to be unattainable as such, and is generally represented in a differential way, that is to say, by making reference to its opposite – the “face of illness”, or at least of malaise. In fact, the (...) face is crucial in the medical domain: since ancient times, face observation has played an essential role in diagnostic practices, both in Western medicine (which resorts to the concept of facies, intended as the distinctive facial expression or appearance associated with a specific medical condition, for the description of pathological states) and Eastern preventive and healing techniques (within which the so-called Mian Xiang, or ‘face reading’, is fundamental, and connects the medical sphere with other aspects such as personality, talents, and dispositions). Drawing on the semiotic analysis of relevant case studies extending from classical iconography to present-day digital mediascapes, this paper investigates the representation of the face of health (and illness) across time and space, specifically focusing on the analogies and differences between the Western and the Eastern semiosphere. To this purpose, it relies on both literature concerning the representation and understanding of the face and studies on medical sign systems and discourses. (shrink)

Different methods are available in clinical ethics consultation. In our experience as ethics consultants, certain individual methods have proven insufficient, and so we use a combination of methods. Based on these considerations, we first critically analyze the pros and cons of two well-known methods in the working field of clinical ethics, namely Beauchamp and Childress’s four-principle approach and Jonsen, Siegler, and Winslade’s four-box method. We then present the circle method, which we have used and refined during several clinical ethics consultations (...) in the hospital setting. (shrink)

The scientific study of consciousness or subjective experiencing is a rapidly expanding research program engaging philosophers of mind, psychologists, cognitive scientists, neurobiologists, evolutionary biologists and biosemioticians. Here we outline an evolutionary approach that we have developed over the last two decades, focusing on the evolutionary transition from non-conscious to minimally conscious, subjectively experiencing organisms. We propose that the evolution of subjective experiencing was driven by the evolution of learning and we identify an open-ended, representational, generative and recursive form of associative (...) learning, which we call Unlimited Associative Learning (UAL), as an evolutionary transition marker of minimal consciousness. This evolutionary marker provides evidence that the evolutionary transition to consciousness has gone to completion and allows reverse-engineering from this learning capacity to the system that enables it – making possible the construction of a toy model of UAL. The model allows us to identify some of the key processes and structures that constitute minimal consciousness, points its taxonomic distribution and the ecological context in which it first emerged, highlights its function and suggests a framework for exploring developmental and evolutionary modifications of consciousness. We point to ways of experimentally testing the relationship between UAL and consciousness in human and in non-human animals and discuss the theoretical and ethical implications of our approach. The framework we offer allows the exploration of the evolutionary changes in agency, value systems, selective processes and goals that were involved in the transition to subjective experiencing from a perspective that resonates with the approaches of bio-semioticians. (shrink)

Hegel’s philosophy had a decisive role in the development of Eugen Fink’s thought, by suggesting the conceptual means to elaborate a third phenomenological paradigm beyond Husserl and Heidegger. In particular, this applies to the cosmological ontology that Fink developed after World War II, aimed at overcoming metaphysics while combining ontology with the rigorous method of phenomenology and a cosmological interpretation of being. In this regard, Hegel appeared to Fink as the first Western philosopher who had conceived the ground of beings (...) without basing on ontic models, that is, as dynamical genesis of the structure of the world and human experience. The aim of the paper is to deepen Fink’s interpretation of Hegel’s philosophy and to show how (and to what extent) Hegel is not a metaphysical thinker in this perspective. What is Hegel’s conception of being? Fink’s work Sein und Mensch provides responses to this question. (shrink)

Today, the persistence of infantile attitudes into adulthood seems to have become a way of life associated with enjoyment and the renunciation of social obligations. Contemporary society, crossed by the emotional culture of Social Media, favors the example of parents who are friends with their children, of teachers who are enemies of their parents and of young people who are far from authority and traditional morality. Distances between parents and children and between teachers and pupils are eliminated. Today's adolescent is (...) represented with the image of Narcissus because within the affective family he grows up with the idea that success is the goal for achieving happiness and personal satisfaction. What future prospects can you imagine for young people? How to tackle adult frailty? The pedagogical debate could reflect on new educational systems that concern the affective and relational dimension of young people and the orientation skills of adults. By accepting the new needs of young people, adults could carry out that progressive process of affectivity, the acceptance of new educational, affective and relational functions. (shrink)

A demographic revolution is taking place in Europe and worldwide. According to World Health Organization estimates, the number of people aged 60 and over is growing faster than any other age group. This change in the population structure affects disease patterns and is deemed to cause an increase in the demands on healthcare systems. This raises concerns about the ethics of healthcare delivery . What criteria should direct healthcare distribution? Is it right to meet the demands of an ageing population, (...) to the detriment of the younger strata of population? a. (shrink)

A new trend in the production technology of solid biof uels has appeared. There is a wide consensus that most solid biofuels will be produced according to the new production methods within a few years. Numerous samples were manufactured from agro-residues according to conventional methods as well as new methods. Robust analyses that reviewed the hygienic, environmental, financial and ethical aspects were performed. The hygienic and environmental aspect was assessed by robust chemical and technical analyses. The financial aspect was assessed (...) by energy cost breakdown. The ethical point of view was built on the above stated findings, the survey questionnaire and critical discussion with the literature. It is concluded that the new production methods are significantly favourable from both the hygienic and environmental points of view. Financial indicators do not allow the expressing of any preference. Regarding the ethical aspect, it is concluded that the new methods are beneficial in terms of environmental responsibility. However, it showed that most of the customers that took part in the survey are price oriented and therefore they tend to prefer the cheaper—conventional alternative. In the long term it can be assumed that expansion of the new technology and competition among manufacturers will reduce the costs. (shrink)