No progress has been made over the past decade in improving equity of access to higher education for young people from low socio-economic backgrounds. New evidence indicates that both family income and cultural factors explain this situation. The cultural factor is particularly strong for boys from blue collar backgrounds. Current Government equity policy ignores these findings.

This book provides practical and research-based chapters that offer greater clarity about the particular kinds of teacher reflection that matter and avoids talking about teacher reflection generically, which implies that all kinds of reflection are of equal value.

From the time of Reid through Coleridge to T. H. Green, Hume was interpreted as a sceptic and as a wholly negative philosopher. And from their perspective such an interpretation no doubt makes some sense, given the vested interest in religion and the absolute of the idealists: from that perspective it is an essential part of a positive position that it take one beyond the realm of ordinary objects known by sense experience to a realm of entities that transcend that (...) world of everyday life. That interpretation lingers on, like bad jokes, to retail in Philosophy 100 classes. On the other hand, in an age where the demand that one have access to a transcendent entity is less insistent, it has become possible to challenge the orthodox reading of Hume. The first to do this was Norman Kemp Smith, who argued that, while Hume was a sceptic, he in fact also had a positive view, not to be sure that of Reid & Co., but that of anaturalist, that is, one who holds that our beliefs, and our moral commitments, are none of them rational, none of them products of reason, but rather are products of our instinctive and passionate natures. This interpretation continues to have important defenders such as Popkin and Stroud. More recently, however, some scholars have gone further and argued that there are good senses in which Hume is not a sceptic, and that he constructs a case that our instinctual beliefs are not only natural but also rational. Major works defending this reading of Hume as a naturalized epistemologist are those of Livingston and Jones. The Kemp Smith interpretation has, however, found a major new defender in John Wright'sThe Sceptical Realism of David Hume. (shrink)

This article constructively retrieves St. Anselm of Canterbury’s theory of retributive justice and provides a defense of what can be called the retributive model of hell. In the first part of this article, we develop the place of retributive punishment in Anselm’s thinking and discuss how and when retributive punishment is a good thing. In the second part, we apply Anselm’s thinking on retributive justice to the problem of hell and provide a defense of how hell, defined as a state (...) of receiving retributive, damnatory, and irreversible punishment, is good. We then address a series of objections. Despite some criticism that both Anselm and the retributive model of hell receive in the contemporary literature, Anselm’s account of retributive justice can make unique and constructive contributions to the contemporary discussion of hell; by retrieving and applying Anselm’s thought to the problem of hell, we intend to kill two birds with one stone. (shrink)

The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the perceptions related to ethics and cheating among a representative sample of primarily female undergraduate students, compared to trends reported in the literature. Focus groups were organized to discuss nine scripted questions. Transcripts and audiotapes were analyzed and four main themes emerged: demographics of those who cheat, students’ perceptions of cheating, the role of technology in cheating, and consequences of cheating, including students’ attitudes and behaviors related to reporting cheating incidents. Bandura’s (...) Social Cognitive Theory served as the theoretical framework to understand students’ varying perceptions of and justification for cheating, as well as the dynamics of honor code violations, via group discussion. Viewpoints on cheating were regularly discussed and contradictory views were identified related to frequency and justification for cheating. Utilizing the constant comparative method, students mentioned time limitations, and pressure from peers, parents, and professors as reasons to cheat. They also discussed pressures to achieve high grades for acceptance into graduate programs. Students were also reluctant to report their classmates for cheating incidents. Repeated and comprehensive education on ethical behavior is warranted. (shrink)

A wide range of ecological and evolutionary models predict variety in phenotype or behavior when a population is at equilibrium. This heterogeneity can be realized in different ways. For example, it can be realized through a complex population of individuals exhibiting different simple behaviors, or through a simple population of individuals exhibiting complex, varying behaviors. In some theoretical frameworks these different realizations are treated as equivalent, but natural selection distinguishes between these two alternatives in subtle ways. By investigating an increasingly (...) complex series of models, from a simple fluctuating selection model up to a finite population hawk/dove game, we explore the selective pressures which discriminate between pure strategists, mixed at the population level, and individual mixed strategists. Our analysis reveals some important limitations to the ESS framework often employed to investigate the evolution of complex behavior. (shrink)

In this paper, we defend Socratic studies as a research programme against several recent attacks, including at least one recently published in Polis . Critics have argued that the study of Socrates, based upon evidence mostly or entirely derived from some set of Plato's dialogues, is founded upon faulty and indefensible historical or hermeneutical technique. We begin by identifying what we believe are the foundational principles of Socratic studies, as the field has been pursued in recent years, and we then (...) show how the research programme that derives from accepting these principles is not defeated by any of the most common recent criticisms of it. Specifically, we argue that challenges to sorting Plato's dialogues by date, more general challenges to historicist interpretations of Plato's dialogues, as well as recent literary criticisms of Socratic studies all fail to undermine the research programme. We conclude with some thoughts about how and why Socratic studies has proved itself a valuable and fruitful research programme. (shrink)

This book contains a collection of selected papers from the 2017 Farm-to-Plate: Uniting for a Just and Sustainable Food System conference in Ithaca, New York, which explored what different advocates, stakeholders, growers, and community members today prioritize when it comes to justice, action, and transformation in the agri-food system. The research presented at this symposium shows the diverse range of approaches scientists have taken to investigate this aforementioned question. The papers represent a combined effort to creatively educate, share, and connect (...) work being done by stakeholders on food system transformation. Previously published in Agriculture and Human Values Volume 36, issue 4, December 2019. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BLACK-ON-BLACK VIOLENCE: THE INTRAMEDIATION OF DESIRE AND THE SEARCH FOR A SCAPEGOAT Fred Smith Emory University René Girard's mimetic hypothesis provides a means of interpreting texts in terms of a systematic understanding ofcultural formations such as ritual, prohibition, and myth. It is based on an anthropology which accepts that most cultural texts are generated by an agency that does not appear explicitly or thematically within the texts (...) themselves. That generative agency is the scapegoat mechanism which I will discuss extensively in this essay as it concerns black-on-black violence in American society. With some modification, Girard's ideas account for the effects of the pathogenic educational environment to which black boys are exposed and which results in such violence. What we are witnessing in black-on-black violence may be understood in part as the consequence ofscapegoating which is driven by interdividual dynamics of desire analyzed in Girard's observations of mimetic behavior among humans. Mimetic desire is the starting point ofGirard's theory. Desire is mimetic in the sense that it imitates the desire of another. One's desire copies the other's desire for an object. Such desire is potentially violent because it can and often does lead to the rivalry of desires for the very same object. When mimetic desire is acquisitive, it produces violence at its most fundamental level. It is not that all mimetic desires "produce" violence, only acquisitive desire that becomes rivalrous or conflictual. I. The Triangle of Desire "Mimetic" comes from the same root as "mime" and "imitate." An acquisitive mimetic desire in Girard's theory involves the "desire to have" which imitates another person's desire for the possession or enjoyment ofan Fred Smith33 object. The object of desire may be a person or a thing; it can be a nonmaterial or metaphysical object like prestige, honor or "face" (pride). It is another who serves as the model for desiring a particular object. The greater the model's desire for the object, the greater the mimetic desire it inspires. The results are jealousy and covetousness over the possessions, positions or prestige, desired or enjoyed by the model of our desires. Desire is imitative because it is attracted to the object(s) belonging to another; furthermore, it is activated by the desire ofthe other, who may be a single person or an entire group. This imitative process requires that the subject have access to, or be able to appropriate and dispose of, the model's objects or possessions. Thus desire is triangular in its structure, being comprised ofthe subject, the other as model of desire, and the model's objects. Distance between the subject and model is an important factor in this structure. It does not necessarily denote physical space, for it can also function in terms ofpsychosocial space (i.e., race, socioeconomic position, cultural standing, etc.) (Redekop 7). Not only individuals, but society as a whole can serve as the model of desire. One also learns what is desirable from the aggregate of others that is society (Hamerton-Kelly 3). Acquisitive mimetic desire necessitates the ability of individuals to see themselves in the position ofthe model of desire. Ifthey are not able to see themselves in the place ofthe model, then the potential for the development of mimetic desire is minimal. This is why there is greater rivalry and jealously among slaves than between slave and master; among workers, rivalry is greater than between bosses and workers among siblings it is greater than between parents and children. This is the primary reason why violence is intraracial rather than interracial. II. Internal Mediation of Desire Mimetic desire is often reciprocal. Two people can be models ofdesire for each other, each one imitating the desire of the other for a common object. Acquisitive mimetic desire not only involves a desire to have, but includes the desire to be like, or even to be the other. This is why mimetic desire often evolves into love/hate relationships. An individual wants to be like the other, and simultaneously hates the other because he or she cannot be that other. The frustration of not being able to be another person or to have... (shrink)

This series will include monographs and collections of studies devoted to the investigation and exploration of knowledge, information, and data-processing systems of all kinds, no matter whether human, (other) animal, or machine. Its scope is intended to span the full range of interests from classical problems in the philosophy of mind and philosophical psychology through issues in cognitive psychology and sociobiology (concerning the mental capabilities of other species) to ideas related to artificial intelligence and computer science. While primary emphasis will (...) be placed upon theoretical, conceptual, and epistemological aspects of these problems and domains, empirical, experimental, and methodological studies will also appear from time to time. While most philosophers and psychologists tend to believe that the rise of cognitive psychology has occurred concomitant with the decline of operant psychology, Terry L. Smith contends that nothing could be further from the truth. He maintains that operant psychology has discovered (and continues to discover) reasonably well-confirmed causal principles of intentional behavior, which go beyond what cognitive psychology can provide, while cognitive psychology, in tum, has the potential to supply analyses (and explanations) that account for them. Smith thus advances a surprising but nonetheless illuminating perspective for appreciating the place of operant conditioning within the discipline of psychology in this rich and fascinating work. J. H. F. (shrink)

Fragmented regions face a range of collective action problems on issues ranging from transportation to affordable housing. Specifically, within regions, free-rider and race-to-the-bottom problems both abound. This Article offers theoretical lenses to clarify the sources of, and barriers to solving, these problems. First, it introduces the concept of concentricity to better understand the region. The municipality and the region represent coexisting, concentric communities and nodes of competition. The geographically based identity that one espouses may toggle between the local and the (...) regional across different contexts. Second, this Article describes a community-competitor feedback loop. Drawing on social science literature, the Article shows how encouraging deep identification with a community can inspire competition with other communities. And encouraging competition between communities can deepen community identity. The Article then applies these theories to practical considerations. Given the persistent nature of hyperlocal identity, intraregional competition, and the resultant feedback loop, mandatory regional solutions may often be politically unattainable, even when they are the optimal solution. Accordingly, this Article presents two voluntary, cooperative regionalist solutions that embrace and potentially exploit regions’ concentric identities, instead of doing the more costly work of dislodging local identity. (shrink)

Collaboration between the arts and health sectors is gaining momentum. Artists are contributing significantly to public health efforts such as vaccine confidence campaigns. Artists and the arts are well positioned to contribute to the social conditions needed to build trust in the health sector. Health professionals, organizations, and institutions should recognize not only the power that can be derived from the insights, artefacts, and expertise of artists and the arts to create the conditions that make trust possible. The health sector (...) must also recognize that, while it can gain much from partnership with artists, artists risk much—namely, the public's trust—when they are in such partnerships. This essay unpacks these claims and considers the care and ethical considerations that must be brought to these partnerships to yield constructive pathways for ethical collaboration as well as for both establishing public trust and continuing to hold the health care profession accountable for becoming more trustworthy. (shrink)

Championed by Whitehead (1979), a process metaphysics has been forwarded as one way of conceptualizing the fundamental nature of our existence. On an applied level, we might use the notion of process within the framework of scientific method to advance our knowledge of how we might take steps to create particular outcomes or states that we desire within organizations. We discuss both forward and backward looking approaches to developing process theory. Ultimately, though, in this paper, we present discussion of the (...) limits of Mohr’s (1982) conceptualization of process theory and show (1) how his discussion focuses on a subset or limited view of process (and would render invisible other alternatives) and (2) how such limitation of view retards the accumulation of knowledge regarding individuals and organizations as a storehouse of process approaches toward achieving specified results. (shrink)

Health care in the United States, being a microcosm of the broader society in which it developed, possesses a sordid legacy concerning racial prejudices, biases, and the perpetuation of health and...

Sensations can occur in the absence of perception and yet be experienced ‘as if’ seen, heard, tasted, or otherwise perceived. Two concepts used to investigate types of these sensory-like mental phenomena (SLMP) are mental imagery and hallucinations. Mental imagery is used as a concept for investigating those SLMP that merely resemble perception in some way. Meanwhile, the concept of hallucinations is used to investigate those SLMP that are, in some sense, compellingly like perception. This may be a difference of degree. (...) Attempts to reliably differentiate between instances of each type of SLMP remain unresolved. Despite this, the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations are each routinely used independently of the other. These uses are especially interesting in those published accounts of experiments where equivalent findings about the neuroanatomical correlates of SLMP are reported in support of diverging knowledge-claims about the role of SLMP in neurocognitive processes. This practice presents a puzzle. To examine one aspect of this puzzle, I compare the uses of these two scientific concepts in three ways: examining their roles in differentiating between types of SLMP; exploring how their respective historical developments intersect; and analysing their contributions in neuroimaging experiments. In presenting this series of comparative analyses, I will draw on three themes from historical, philosophical, and social studies of scientific practices: interest in material contributions to knowledge; accounts of how concepts are used in experiments; and explorations of the historical conditions within which current practices emerge. Building on this literature, my comparative analyses supports five related claims. My first claim is that the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations are each used as independent tools in neuroimaging experiments. My second claim is that, as experimental tools, the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations are each used for investigating discrete epistemic goals. My third claim is that there are implicit interdependent associations that structure the uses of these two concepts as tools for independently investigating these discrete epistemic goals in neuroimaging experiments. This third claim rests on my analyses of both past and present uses of each concept. Firstly, as seen in their intersecting histories, there are disciplined performances of using the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations that carry-along shared associations about the mediating role of SLMP in thought. Secondly, these interdependent ‘mediator-view’ associations continue to structure the independent uses of each concept as a tool for investigating SLMP in pursuit of specific goals. Taking this further, my fourth claim is that recognising the structured uses of the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations can help to account for how equivalent SLMP-neuro-correlates are generated in support of diverging knowledge-claims. Finally, my fifth claim is that the structured uses of these concepts as tools can contribute to experiments in ways analogous to, yet not equivalent with, the active contributions of material instruments. Bringing these claims together, I argue that the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations operate as structured tools that can actively contribute to the knowledge generated by neuroimaging experiments. In presenting this argument I seek to demonstrate that examining the structured uses of concepts as tools can complement existing approaches to studying how the heterogeneous dynamics of experimental practices can come to contribute to scientific knowledge in unintended ways. (shrink)

© 2015, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.Genetic studies have identified single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with the risk of prostate cancer. It remains unclear whether such genetic variants are associated with disease aggressiveness. The NCI-SPORE Genetics Working Group retrospectively collected clinicopathologic information and genotype data for 36 SNPs which at the time had been validated to be associated with PC risk from 25,674 cases with PC. Cases were grouped according to race, Gleason score and aggressiveness. Statistical analyses were used to compare the frequency (...) of the SNPs between different disease cohorts. After adjusting for multiple testing, only PC-risk SNP rs2735839 was significantly and inversely associated with aggressive and high-grade disease in European men. Similar associations with aggressive and high-grade disease were documented in African-American subjects. The G allele of rs2735839 was associated with disease aggressiveness even at low PSA levels in both European and African-American men. Our results provide further support that a PC-risk SNP rs2735839 near the KLK3 gene on chromosome 19q13 may be associated with aggressive and high-grade PC. Future prospectively designed, case-case GWAS are needed to identify additional SNPs associated with PC aggressiveness. (shrink)

This is a personal account of an intersection of the schools of research in foundations of geometry founded by Alfred Tarski and Friedrich Bachmann. Their academic lineages and the origins of the schools are also described, as well as the mathematics that resulted from this intersection.

This Legal Solutions in Health Reform paper discusses the role that tax law can play in the implementation of health reform. The tax code has served as the primary vehicle for subsidizing health care in the U.S. for most of the last century and will likely play a role in any future reform efforts. However, the interplay between tax law and health policy presents a series of critical design and implementation challenges with which any health care reform package — be (...) they liberal or conservative — must grapple. This paper considers some of the most pressing of these issues. While it does not prescribe a particular outcome, it will attempt to identify potential tax solutions that might receive broad support and to observe the policy and administrative design questions that any discussion of these solutions should take into account. (shrink)

Spatial attention and eye-movements are tightly coupled, but the precise nature of this coupling is controversial. The influential but controversial Premotor theory of attention makes four specific predictions about the relationship between motor preparation and spatial attention. Firstly, spatial attention and motor preparation use the same neural substrates. Secondly, spatial attention is functionally equivalent to planning goal directed actions such as eye-movements (i.e. planning an action is both necessary and sufficient for a shift of spatial attention). Thirdly, planning a goal (...) directed action with any effector system is sufficient to trigger a shift of spatial attention. Fourthly, the eye-movement system has a privileged role in orienting visual spatial attention. This article reviews empirical studies that have tested these predictions. Contrary to predictions one and two there is evidence of anatomical and functional dissociations between endogenous spatial attention and motor preparation. However, there is compelling evidence that exogenous attention is reliant on activation of the oculomotor system. With respect to the third prediction, there is correlational evidence that spatial attention is directed to the endpoint of goal-directed actions but no direct evidence that this attention shift is dependent on motor preparation. The few studies to have directly tested the fourth prediction have produced conflicting results, so the extent to which the oculomotor system has a privileged role in spatial attention remains unclear. Overall, the evidence is not consistent with the view that spatial attention is functionally equivalent to motor preparation so the Premotor theory should be rejected, although a limited version of the Premotor theory in which only exogenous attention is dependent on motor preparation may still be tenable. A plausible alternative account is that activity in the motor system contributes to biased competition between different sensory representations with the winner of the competition becoming the attended item. (shrink)

The scientific concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations are each used independently of the other; uses that simultaneously evoke and obscure their historical connections. In this paper, I aim to illustrate the relevance of examining one of these historical connections for studying the current uses of these two concepts in neuroimaging experiments. To this end, I will highlight interdependent associations within the histories of each of the concepts that continue to contribute to their independent uses.That mental imagery and hallucinations are (...) used independently of each other is evident in the way that each concept influences investigations in isolation of the other. Within the neurosciences, mental imagery is... (shrink)

Taking an abductive, mixed-methods approach, we explore the content of people’s moral deliberations. In Study 1, we gather qualitative data from small groups of graduate business students discussing moral dilemmas. We analyze their conversations with a focus on how participants perceive others’ thoughts, opinions, and evaluations about the dilemmas and incorporate them into their reasoning. Ascribing such capacities to think and feel to others—i.e., mind perception—is central to morality. We use the conversations in Study 1 to identify whose minds participants (...) perceive. Study 1 also identifies how particular elements of deliberation—including the exploration of consequences, acknowledging ambivalence, seeking alternative options, the development of deep feelings, and the search for a moral compass—are linked to these perceptions of others’ minds. In Study 2 (an exploratory, online experiment with 378 participants), we find that priming individuals with specific forms of mind perception can influence the elements of moral reasoning they employ, and we find evidence that the presence of elements of reasoning are linked to participants’ final choices in a business-related ethical dilemma. (shrink)

For Viennese artist Florian Pumhösl »abstraction is a method«, not a category. Or rather, if abstraction is the defining category of modernism, the objective is to reproduce modernism's problems and limits and exploit relationships among its parts. Considering what Pumhösl calls the »textile complex« of modernism, this essay examines the artist's work in parallel with Charles Sanders Peirce's diagram concept and Gottfried Semper's use of textile diagrams throughout Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts.

Tennenbaum's Theorem yields an elegant characterisation of the standard model of arithmetic. Several authors have recently claimed that this result has important philosophical consequences: in particular, it offers us a way of responding to model-theoretic worries about how we manage to grasp the standard model. We disagree. If there ever was such a problem about how we come to grasp the standard model, then Tennenbaum's Theorem does not help. We show this by examining a parallel argument, from a simpler model-theoretic (...) result. (shrink)

Hastings Center Report, Volume 52, Issue S1, Page S50-S56, March‐April 2022.

Examining the historical development of scientific concepts is important for understanding the structured routines within which these concepts are currently used as goal-directed tools in experiments. To illustrate this claim, I will outline how the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations each draw on an older interdependent set of associations that, although nominally-discarded, continues to structure their current independent uses for pursuing discrete experimental goals. In doing so, I will highlight how three strands of literature offer mutually instructive insights for (...) understanding how the uses of our current scientific concepts contribute to experimental practices. The first strand of literature includes recent scholarship examining how the uses of scientific concepts can enable scientific practices (e.g., Boon 2012; Brigandt 2012; Feest 2010; Steinle 2012). In this context, scientific concepts have been described as tools that function in ways that contribute to empirical knowledge; contributions that extend beyond their traditionally recognized roles in mental and linguistic representation. The second strand of literature can be glimpsed within the technoscientific studies focus on non-human agency; a focus that supports an account of the disciplined routines within which concepts are used as acting in analogous ways to the routinized participation of machines in experiments (Pickering 1995). The third strand of the literature draws attention to how the functions of concepts are grounded by the set of historically-contingent experimental practices (e.g., Canguilhem 2008; Tiles 1984). Although maintaining valuable differences, the focus of these three strands of literature are mutually instructive. Together, they offer a view of the uses of concepts as taken-for-granted tools that function within networks of subterranean associations; associations that are grounded by historically contingent experimental practices that structure how they act (in concert with human and material participants) within the temporally dynamic processes of scientific practice. Through examples drawn from a comparison of the concepts of mental imagery and hallucinations, I aim to demonstrate the value that the converging insights of these three strands of literature offer for studying the role of scientific concepts in experimental practices. (shrink)