ABSTRACT This article is written in the field of the philosophy of science. The aim is to express how painting and drawing can be used as part of a phenomenological research method. The painter or drawer is a visual researcher in the process of capturing a holistic and truthful experience of a cultural phenomenon. We will highlight the visual researcher process and how the experience of truth is known throughout this process. The paining and sketches, which we present in this (...) article, are part of a book, together with written narratives and pedagogical theory – on teaching as a phenomenon – called Lærerpraksis og Pedagogisk teori. The paintings and drawings present teaching in a way that complements and expands the written text. The sketches and painting of teaching attempt to establish the truth as unconcealment of a phenomenon. Our argumentation is based on the theories of Gadamer, Cassirer, Panofsky and Heidegger. Gadamer connects humanistic research with artistry and the experience of truth. Cassirer argues that the perception of a cultural phenomenon begins as a holistic understanding to bring forth the symbolic form or essence of the phenomenon. Panofsky transfers the theory of Cassirer into the field of painting. The concept of synthetic intuition is the intrinsic knowing of a painting, which corresponds to Cassirer’s concept of symbolic forms. Heidegger’s theory explores how art unfolds and preserves the truth. We will argue that the connection between art and truth could bring forth important perspectives on phenomenological science and turn the research activity closer to an artistic form. (shrink)

Abstract:Since the birth of autism as a psychiatric category, autistic individuals have been described as preoccupied with the world of objects and detached from the world of subjects, thus marking a distinction between the “social” and the “non-social” still prevalent in autism research and diagnostic criteria. The aim of this article is to question this distinction by examining the role of things in autistic forms of social interaction. Drawing on qualitative data from an ongoing qualitative and phenomenological study on social (...) interaction among youth with autism, I argue that material things enjoy a sustaining and facilitating role in autistic social interaction for two reasons: First, by being sensible things open to tactile, auditory, and visual engagement, and second, by being things that incorporate normative practices. This relation between the material and the social in which the latter is mediated by the former, is beneficial to individuals with autism because it exploits a particular relation to materiality to consolidate a shaky attunement to the social world. I propose a materially mediated mode of interaction guided by the approaches to perception, embodiment, and materiality developed by Maurice Merleau-Ponty and James Gibson. This account puts pressure on the phenomenological emphasis on the face-to-face encounter and brings intersubjectivity into view as a many-faceted phenomenon realizable not only through interbodily dynamics but also through the material landscapes situating social encounters. (shrink)

The article develops a methodological and empirical approach for gauging the ways Big Data can be collected and distributed through mobile apps. This approach focuses on the infrastructural components that condition the disclosure of smartphone users’ data – namely the permissions that apps request and the third-party corporations they work with. We explore the surveillance ecology of mobile apps and thereby the privacy implications of everyday smartphone use through three analytical perspectives: The first focuses on the ‘appscapes’ of individual smartphone (...) users and investigates the consequences of which and how many mobile apps users download on their phones; the second compares different types of apps in order to study the app ecology and the relationships between app and third-party service providers; and the third focuses on a particular app category and discusses the functional as well as the commercial incentives for permissions and third-party collaborations. Thereby, the article advances an interdisciplinary dialogue between critical data studies, political economy and app studies, and pushes an empirical and critical perspective on mobile communication, app ecologies and data economies. (shrink)

Autism research has recently witnessed an embodied turn. In response to the cognitivist approaches dominating the field, phenomenological scholars have suggested a reconceptualization of autism as a disorder of embodied intersubjectivity. Part of this interest in autistic embodiment concerns the role of sensory differences, which have recently been added to the diagnostic criteria of autism. While research suggests that sensory differences are implicated in a wide array of autistic social difficulties, it has not yet been explored how sensory and social (...) experience in autism relate on a phenomenological level. Given the importance of the sensory dimension of social encounters in phenomenological analyses of autism, this question must be considered crucial. This article investigates the role played by sensory differences in autistic social experience. Through a phenomenological analysis informed primarily by the philosophy of Maurice Merleau-Ponty with particular emphasis on the relation between intersubjectivity and perception, I argue that sensory differences affect the way other people appear in autistic experience on a pre-reflective level. By drawing on autistic young adults’ experiential descriptions of social encounters, this article identifies three aspects of how sensory differences affect social experiences in autism. First, social encounters manifested as sensorially disturbing, chaotic, and unpredictable events. Second, the embodied expressions of others appeared unfamiliar, threatening, and promoted a sense of detachment from the social world. Third, deliberate practices were employed to actively seek perceptual and social meaning in these disorienting social encounters. This analysis stresses the importance of understanding embodied intersubjectivity through its sensory dimensions. In addition, it indicates an important avenue for future research in exploring the potential role of practice in maintaining an intuitive grip on social meaning. By approaching social encounters as sensory and perceptual events, I emphasize how social difficulties in autism are inherently world-involving phenomena rather than a cognitive deficit reducible to the autistic person. (shrink)

There is an ongoing discussion concerning personal vs. impersonal considerations in professional care. In this article, three different positions within the ethics of closeness will be discussed. These are: (a) reserving the ethics of closeness for close experienced others, ‘including the experienced Other’, which is Nortvedt's position; (b) trying to bring the distant, non‐experienced others closer, ‘including the Third’; and (c) finally, an examination of whether a perspective of closeness may lead to the exclusion of various groups in need of (...) help, ‘including the Other at the expense of the Third’. These positions are discussed with a view to clarifying some of the challenges that the ethics of closeness faces when it maintains that greater ethical obligation is associated with personal than with impersonal relations, without discussing the terms on which the obligation is based. Key questions that arise for a nurse or other health professional are: If our primary moral responsibility is for those that are close to us, the experienced others, who is to be responsible for those that are outside the established health services, the non‐experienced others? Is it evident that favouring the experienced others is based on legitimate needs? Can a discussion on the legitimate basis of nursing be avoided in questions relating to closeness and priorities? This discussion touches the heart of our discipline. Is a one‐sided perspective of closeness, rejecting moral responsibility for those with whom we have no relationship, a defensible ethical position? (shrink)

Autistic difficulties with social interaction have primarily been understood as expressions of underlying impairment of the ability to ‘mindread.’ Although this understanding of autism and social interaction has raised controversy in the phenomenological community for decades, the phenomenological criticism remains largely on a philosophical level. This article helps fill this gap by discussing how phenomenology can contribute to empirical methodologies for studying social interaction in autism. By drawing on the phenomenology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty and qualitative data from an ongoing study (...) on social interaction in autism, I discuss how qualitative interviews and participant observation can yield phenomenologically salient data on social interaction. Both, I argue, enjoy their phenomenological promise through facilitating attention to the social-spatial-material fields in and through which social interactions and experiences arise. By developing phenomenologically sound approaches to studying social interaction, this article helps resolve the deficiency of knowledge concerning experiential dimensions of social interaction in autism. (shrink)

The explosive emergence of net-based learning in higher education brings with it new possibilities and constraints in teaching and learning environments. This edited collection considers how the concept of Academic Bildung - a term suggesting a personal educational process beyond actual educational learning - can be applied to net-based higher education, drawing on Scandinavian research to address the topic from both a theoretical and practical standpoint. Chapters explore the facilitation of online courses and argue how and why universities should involve (...) dimensions of Academic Bildung on both a strategic and technological pedagogical content level.The book is structured in three parts: Part I frames the current state of net-based learning and introduces Bildung as a concept; Part II contains a set of 4 case studies in Norway, Sweden and Denmark, also including a fifth study that looks at Scandinavian approaches to teaching and learning in comparison with data from USA, UK, Australia and Canada; Part III provides a synthesis of theories and cases to examine whether a Scandinavian orientation can be discerned. Contributions suggest that in order to address one of the fundamental functions of higher education, the ability to produce new knowledge, the Academic Bildung of the students has to be in focus. Grounded in theoretical and empirical discussion, this book will appeal to researchers and academics in the field of higher education as well as personnel who work with teaching and learning with technology, and academics interested in the question of Academic Bildung. (shrink)

Background:Nurses working within acute psychiatric settings often face multifaceted moral dilemmas and incompatible demands.Methods:Qualitative individual and focus group interviews were conducted.Ethical considerations:Approval was received from the Norwegian Social Science Data Services. Ethical Research Guidelines were followed.Participants and research context:Thirty nurses working within acute psychiatric wards in two mental health hospitals.Results:Various coping strategies were used: mentally sorting through their ethical dilemmas or bringing them to the leadership, not ‘bringing problems home’ after work or loyally doing as told and trying to make (...) oneself immune. Colleagues and work climate were important for choice of coping strategies.Discussion:Nurses’ coping strategies may influence both their clinical practice and their private life. Not facing their moral distress seemed to come at a high price.Conclusions:It seems essential for nurses working in acute psychiatric settings to come to terms with distressing events and identify and address the moral issues they face. As moral distress to a great extent is an organisational problem experienced at a personal level, it is important that a work climate is developed that is open for ethical discussions and nourishes adaptive coping strategies and moral resilience. (shrink)

Although compassion in healthcare differs in important ways from compassion in everyday life, it provides a key, applied microcosm in which the science of compassion can be applied. Compassion is among the most important virtues in medicine, expected from medical professionals and anticipated by patients. Yet, despite evidence of its centrality to effective clinical care, research has focused on compassion fatigue or barriers to compassion and neglected to study the fact that most healthcare professionals maintain compassion for their patients. In (...) contributing to this understudied area, the present report provides an exploratory investigation into how healthcare professionals report trying to maintain compassion. In the study, 151 professionals were asked questions about how they maintained compassion for their patients. Text responses were coded, with a complex mixture of internal vs. external, self vs. patient, and immediate vs. general strategies being reported. Exploratory analyses revealed reliable individual differences in the tendency to report strategies of particular types but no consistent age-related differences between older and younger practitioners emerged. Overall, these data suggest that while a range of compassion-maintaining strategies were reported, strategies were typically concentrated in particular areas and most professionals seek to maintain care using internal strategies. A preliminary typology of compassion maintaining strategies is proposed, study limitations and future directions are discussed, and implications for the study of how compassion is maintained are considered. (shrink)

With the point of departure in the ongoing discussion of the professional and moral responsibility for those who are not equally included in the established health services, the question of how to include individuals and groups facing marginalisation is one of the major challenges within the ethics of care. This makes marginalisation a core concept in our time, which is challenged by, among other things, differentness with respect to ethnicity and social status as well as breach with norms and laws. (...) The representation of individuals and groups facing marginalisation is not merely an intellectual question, however, but an epistemological one with political, practical and ethical implications. This article discusses a pilot project exploring what we can do within nursing education to sensitise students to professional and moral responsibility for individuals and groups facing marginalisation. A dialogical approach to knowledge, including cooperation with voluntary organisations and low-threshold facilities with a long tradition of trying to prevent people from falling through the net', was chosen to highlight the professional challenges and the ethical dilemmas that arise in the interface between closeness and distance, caring and marginalisation. Evaluation of data indicated that such an approach to knowledge seems to benefit the students' learning. (shrink)

The paper focuses on Albert Borgmann’s philosophy of technology. We argue in support of Borgmann’s “Churchill principle” (“we shape our buildings, and afterwards they shape us”) as presented in Real American Ethics (RAE) (2006) by comparing it to findings within behavioral economics in general and to the “libertarian paternalism” of Cass R. Sunstein and Richard H. Thaler in particular. According to our interpretation of it, the Churchill principle implies that because our material environment in fact influences our choices, this environment (...) can and should be rearranged so that we “automatically” will tend to make better decisions. Having defended the Churchill principle, we go on to discuss how this principle is related to Borgmann’s approach in Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life (TCCL) (1984). In this earlier work, Borgmann suggests we reform technology by making room for focal practices, that is, meaningful practices in which we develop our skills and excellences. We argue that while these two works have different basic approaches—rearranging the material environment in RAE and developing certain skills and excellences in TCCL—they can and ought to be seen, not as mutually excluding, but as supplementing one another. Together they form a highly salient critique of technology that takes into consideration questions of the good life without becoming overly paternalistic. (shrink)

The paper focuses on Albert Borgmann’s philosophy of technology. We argue in support of Borgmann’s “Churchill principle” as presented in Real American Ethics by comparing it to findings within behavioral economics in general and to the “libertarian paternalism” of Cass R. Sunstein and Richard H. Thaler in particular. According to our interpretation of it, the Churchill principle implies that because our material environment in fact influences our choices, this environment can and should be rearranged so that we “automatically” will tend (...) to make better decisions. Having defended the Churchill principle, we go on to discuss how this principle is related to Borgmann’s approach in Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life. In this earlier work, Borgmann suggests we reform technology by making room for focal practices, that is, meaningful practices in which we develop our skills and excellences. We argue that while these two works have different basic approaches—rearranging the material environment in RAE and developing certain skills and excellences in TCCL—they can and ought to be seen, not as mutually excluding, but as supplementing one another. Together they form a highly salient critique of technology that takes into consideration questions of the good life without becoming overly paternalistic. (shrink)

BackgroundIn this article, the sources and features of moral distress as experienced by acute psychiatric care nurses are explored.Research designA qualitative design with 16 individual in-depth interviews was chosen. Braun and Clarke’s six analytic phases were used.Ethical considerationsApproval was obtained from the Norwegian Social Science Data Services. Participation was confidential and voluntary.FindingsBased on findings, a somewhat wider definition of moral distress is introduced where nurses experiencing being morally constrained, facing moral dilemmas or moral doubt are included. Coercive administration of medicines, (...) coercion that might be avoided and resistance to the use of coercion are all morally stressful situations. Insufficient resources, mentally poorer patients and quicker discharges lead to superficial treatment. Few staff on evening shifts/weekends make nurses worry when follow-up of the most ill patients, often suicidal, in need of seclusion or with heightened risk of violence, must be done by untrained personnel. Provision of good care when exposed to violence is morally challenging. Feelings of inadequacy, being squeezed between ideals and clinical reality, and failing the patients create moral distress. Moral distress causes bad conscience and feelings of guilt, frustration, anger, sadness, inadequacy, mental tiredness, emotional numbness and being fragmented. Others feel emotionally ‘flat’, cold and empty, and develop high blood pressure and problems sleeping. Even so, some nurses find that moral stress hones their ethical awareness.ConclusionMoral distress in acute psychiatric care may be caused by multiple reasons and cause a variety of reactions. Multifaceted ethical dilemmas, incompatible demands and proximity to patients’ suffering make nurses exposed to moral distress. Moral distress may lead to reduced quality care, which again may lead to bad conscience and cause moral distress. It is particularly problematic if moral distress results in nurses distancing and disconnecting themselves from the patients and their inner selves. (shrink)

In this article, we discuss the practice of conducting research in one's own field, in this case, from a position as a researcher with a nursing background doing fieldwork in a hospital and in one's own organization, an orthopedic surgical department. We show how an “insider” researcher position paves the way for analytical insights about sleep as an institutional phenomenon in the orthopedic surgical infrastructure and how acute and elective patient trajectories differ but build on the same logic, creating the (...) same dynamics of inclusion and exclusion. Through a situated and sociomaterial perspective, we analyze different clinical interactions in which we follow the hospital bed as an example of a central relational element that co‐creates sleep as an institutional phenomenon. Inspired by Karen Barad, we demonstrate how to move diffractively when doing and analyzing fieldwork and argue how moving diffractively as a researcher doing fieldwork “at home” is productive and challenges the concept and demand of “distance” as the phenomenological exercise in fieldwork. (shrink)

I denne artikkelen drøfter vi hvordan norske forbrukeres holdninger til genmodifisert mat har endret seg gjennom årene. Allerede da genteknologi ble etablert som et eget forskningsfelt og utviklingsområde på 1980-tallet, viste den norske opinionen stor skepsis. Den norske lovgivningen tidlig på 1990-tallet utmerket seg også som den mest restriktive i Europa. Dette bildet endret seg ikke mye i løpet av 1990-tallet, mens opinionen i mange europeiske land i disse årene kom mer på linje med den norske. I hele denne perioden (...) var både forbrukeropinionen og lovgivningen i USA langt mer aksepterende enn i Europa, noe som ga seg utslag i en handelskonflikt som toppet seg med EU sitt moratorium for utsetting av genmodifiserte planter i 1999. I denne artikkelen stiller vi spørsmålet om norske forbrukeres holdninger til genmodifisert mat har endret seg de siste årene. Artikkelen viser at mellom 2002 og 2007 er det en voksende gruppe av forbrukere som ser ut til å akseptere genmodifiserte matvarer hvis det fører til en helse- eller miljøgevinst. Men til tross for dette så er nordmenn fremdeles skeptiske til genmodifisert mat. Det kan tolkes slik at genmodifisert mat ikke har ført til den nytten som ansees nødvendig for å ta den risikoen det innebærer å gjøre et betydelig skifte i matseddel. Matpatriotisme og en kulturell konservatisme når det gjelder skifte i matvaner bidrar også til å forklare den dominerende vente-og-se-holdningen. (shrink)

This article examines one practice for challenging a co-participant, the use of polar interrogatives that are unanswerable. These are questions that are designed to receive a confirming answer of the same polarity as the question, so-called `Same Polarity Questions'. Speakers accomplish this bias by formatting the question in accordance with their state of knowledge. Based on the recipient's prior turns at talk, a speaker can infer what the recipient's stance towards some matter is and use a `Same Polarity Question' to (...) assert this inference and invite the recipient to confirm the stance. However, the sequential context in which these questions are produced means that with a confirming answer the recipient is heard to be in disagreement with the speaker and can subsequently be held accountable for this disagreement. Neither is a disconfirming response a real alternative, because this would contrast with the information provided by the recipient in prior talk. As this information is what leads the speaker to convey a certain belief about the recipient, the recipient is accountable for having misled the speaker. Because both confirming and disconfirming answers are accountable and hence problematic, recipients treat this type of question as unanswerable and instead orient to it as a challenge. (shrink)

Research has shown the importance of engaging in networking behaviors for employees’ career success. Networking behaviors can be seen as a proactive way of creating access to career-related social resources and we argue that this type of proactive career behaviors might be particularly relevant for freelancers who cannot depend on an organizational career system supporting their further development, yet whose careers are characterized by high levels of uncertainty and unpredictability. To date, however, our understanding of how freelancers, being a category (...) of workers that are deprived of an organizational context of support for career development, can safeguard their employability, is limited. Therefore, this study addresses this gap and investigates whether freelancers’ networking behaviors are positively associated with career outcomes, through the mediating role of the need for relatedness fulfillment and employability-enhancing competencies. Hypotheses are tested via Structural Equation Modelling using a sample of 1,874 freelancers from Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. The results generally support our hypotheses, providing evidence for a significant association between networking behaviors and need for relatedness fulfillment, and between networking behaviors and employability-enhancing competencies. Moreover, we found a significant association between need for relatedness fulfillment and employability-enhancing competencies, being the mediators in our research model and the outcomes of career satisfaction and future career opportunities. Implications for career development in the contemporary workplace are discussed, with particular attention for need for relatedness fulfillment, employability, and sustainable careers of freelance workers. (shrink)

This article takes the failure to grasp fully the paradigmatic case of European security after the Cold War as an example of how International Relations (IR) would benefit from reformulating not only its empirical research questions but also several of its central conceptual building blocks with the aid of Bourdieusian sociology. The separation between theory and practice and the overemphasis on military power and state actors blind IR from seeing the power struggles that reshaped European security. Instead, a Bourdieusian reformulation (...) adds new types of agency, focuses on the social production of forms of power, and stresses the processual rather than the substantive character of social reality. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:What, Exactly, Does the Madperson Lack?Sofie Jeppsson, PhD (bio)Justin garson has already received well-earned recognition for his Madness: A philosophical exploration (2022), in which he distinguishes the view of madness as a dysfunction from madness as a strategy—a distinction that cuts across traditional distinctions between, for example, biological/neurological and psychological/social views. On the dysfunction view, going mad might be comparable to something like having an asthma attack or, (...) more long-term, developing type 1 diabetes. If the trachea closes up and prevents air from passing through, that is a dysfunction in the breathing apparatus. If the islets of Langerhans in the pancreas cease to produce insulin, making the person dependent on insulin shots to stay alive, that is a dysfunction. On the strategy view, going mad is rather like getting a fever when already infected with some pathogen. Given that you have the pathogen reproducing inside you, a rising body temperature provides a strategy (although not, of course, something the ill person chose) to keep the reproduction rate down, thus giving the immune system a better chance at vanquishing the infection. That does not mean that fevers are harmless—if a fever becomes high enough, it might itself do damage to the body. Still, it is a strategy, not a mere dysfunction. Analogously, on the Madness as strategy view, going mad might help a person deal with old traumas or an ongoing terrible situation, even as the madness may also be damaging in itself.In this paper, Garson introduces us to another interesting distinction: between seeing madness as a lack of reason, or as a perversion of or difference in reason. Garson writes that present-day psychiatry tends to see madness as a lack, whereas the late modern thinkers conceived of it as a perversion of reason. The late moderns clearly saw madness as something negative, but if we retain something like their basic view, merely change our evaluation from the negative perversion to the more neutral difference, we have a better basis for regarding Madness as a complicated and problematic but still cherished identity, and for Mad Pride.This is another interesting distinction well worth calling attention to. I’m uncertain how well the J.C.A. Heinroth example works—the text cited seems to show that he had a Madness as strategy view, but is it a Madness as a different kind of reason view?—but the other examples work better. Nevertheless, I want to push back a little against the claim that present-day psychiatry and philosophy of psychiatry tend to regard madness as a lack of something whereas the early moderns saw it as a difference. (Just a friendly little push, mind you, but still.)Arthur Wigan’s description of two brains, one functional and one dysfunctional, still seems to posit a lack of proper function in one of them. Sure, he does not say that the madperson lacks as much as the [End Page 313] idiot, who has two dysfunctional brains whereas the madperson has one functional and one dysfunctional. Still, there’s a lack. This two-brain picture also has its modern analogues: It brings to mind (albeit in a less biologically concrete and reified form) much psycho-educational material on, for example, how to live with bipolar disorder, according to which a supposed sane and rational part of the psychiatric patient’s mind should learn to handle and control the other, mad part (e.g., Miklowitz, 2012).According to John Locke, madpeople reason just fine, but they start from false premises. Is not this, too, something that madpeople are supposed to lack? Correct and realistic premises to start from? Locke writes that madpeople have “taken their fancies for realities,” but “make right deductions from them.” Moreover, Locke’s theory is reminiscent of modern bottom-up theories like Brendan Maher’s (1999)—madpeople have bizarre experiences on the basis of which they form bizarre beliefs, but we need not postulate that they suffer from any problems with, for example, reasoning and drawing inferences to explain why they believe what they do. Theorists who instead argue for a top-down or two-factor account of why madpeople stick... (shrink)

På et fotballag i overgangen mellom barne- og ungdomsfotballen er spilletid på fotballbanen under kamp både en knapp ressurs og en kilde til diskusjoner om fordeling. Spørsmålet som er utgangspunkt for denne artikkelen, er hvilke hensyn som bør tas når trener og lagleder skal fordele samlet spilletid på enkeltspillere. Er det viktigst å vinne fotballkampen, eller har det størst betydning å fordele spilletiden mest mulig likt mellom spillerne? Skal det tas hensyn til guttenes evner, motivasjon og preferanser? Er deres familiebakgrunn (...) og personlighet av betydning? Diskusjonen baserer seg på en gjennomgang av ulike politiske rettferdighetsteorier for fordeling av knappe goder.Nøkkelord: rettferdighet, practice, fordelingsrettferdighet, diskursetikk, idrettsetikkEnglish summary: Minutes of justice: Distribution of time during football matches in a boys' teamDuring a football match, time for playing can be considered as a limited good. In this article the point of departure is the redistribution of time in a boys' football team in the transition phase between children and youth football. The questions are how and under which conditions time for playing should be distributed among the players. Is winning the game more important than trying to let every player play for an equal amount of time? Should the boys' talents, motivation, and preferences be considered while distributing time, or are family background and personality of importance? Different theories of political justice for the distribution of limited goods underpin the discussion of how to distribute the minutes of playing time during a football match. (shrink)

Norway is often presented as a model country when it comes to gender equality, for its achievements in combining high birth rates with a high level of female work participation. This article investigates the relations between gender equality and childcare policy since the 1970s from a grassroots perspective. Generally initiatives in respect of childcare arrangements have come from women’s movements but there have been major disagreements regarding the issue. Publicly funded daycare and a part of the parental leave scheme reserved (...) for fathers are two arrangements that relate childcare to gender equality and that have provoked political controversies between traditional equal value oriented women’s associations, on one hand, and equal rights and women’s liberation organizations, on the other. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to continue the discussion about factors of importance for an including ethics of care. A further polarization between partiality and impartiality does not seem a relevant approach. What is important is to direct attention both to the other and to the third person, which requires an acknowledgement of responsibility that extends beyond established relationships. Thus, we need to draw attention not only to the vulnerability existing within every seriously ill or injured person, but to (...) factors of importance for marginalization of groups like refugees, people suffering from serious mental illness, and substance misusers, to mention some in the Western world. Marginalized groups are groups experiencing a discrepancy between need of health care and care given. They are not given proper priority in the distribution of resources, and they may experience ignorance when they first meet the healthcare system as patients.Efforts to understand what circumstances can lead to inadequate inclusion indicate that the elements of differentness and extensive losses of life contexts which may be causing feelings of hopelessness and helplessness in the health professionals, are key factors posing challenges to empathy both within and beyond established relationships, besides geographical distance. Groups of people who have suffered extensive loss in their life contexts may be threatening for us, as they reflect our own fears, and remind us of our own vulnerability.I raise the question: How can we contribute to meeting the need for an ethics of care that extends beyond the familiar to the unfamiliar both in established and non‐established relationships? (shrink)

In Ecowomanism at the Panamá Canal: Black Women, Labor, and Environmental Ethics, Sofía Betancourt constructs environmental ethics at the intersection of the global North and global South. Betancourt explores transnational environmental justice through the lived experience of women from the African Diaspora who migrated to Panamá to work on the Canal.

New techniques for modifying the genomes of agricultural organisms create difficult ethical challenges. We provide a novel framework to replace worn-out ethical lenses relying on ‘naturalness’ and ‘crossing species lines.’ Thinking of agricultural intervention as a ‘negotiation’ of ‘integrity’ and ‘agency’ provides a flexible framework for considering techniques such as genome editing with CRISPR/Cas systems. We lay out the framework by highlighting some existing uses of integrity in environmental ethics. We also provide an example of our lens at work by (...) looking at the creation of ‘cisgenic’ potatoes to resist late potato blight. We conclude by highlighting three distinct advantages offered by the integrity framework. These include a more fitting way to look at the practice of scientific researchers, a more inclusive way to consider ethics around agriculture, and a more flexible way to provide the ethical grounds for regulation in different cultural contexts. (shrink)

Long-term potentiation is one of the most extensively studied forms of neuroplasticity and is considered the strongest candidate mechanism for memory and learning. The use of event-related potentials and sensory stimulation paradigms has allowed for the translation from animal studies to non-invasive studies of LTP-like synaptic plasticity in humans. Accumulating evidence suggests that synaptic plasticity as measured by stimulus-specific response modulation is reduced in neuropsychiatric disorders such as major depressive disorder, bipolar disorders and schizophrenia, suggesting that impaired synaptic plasticity plays (...) a part in the underlying pathophysiology of these disorders. This is in line with the neuroplasticity hypothesis of depression, which postulate that deficits in neuroplasticity might be a common pathway underlying depressive disorders. The current study aims to replicate and confirm earlier reports that visual stimulus-specific response modulation is a viable probe into LTP-like synaptic plasticity in a large sample of healthy adults. Further, this study explores whether impairments in LTP-like synaptic plasticity is associated with self-reported subclinical depressive symptoms and stress in a healthy population. Consistent with prior research, the current study replicated and confirmed reports demonstrating significant modulation of visual evoked potentials following visual high-frequency stimulation. Current results further indicate that reduced LTP-like synaptic plasticity is associated with higher levels of self-reported symptoms of depression and perceived stress. This indicate that LTP-like plasticity is sensitive to sub-clinical levels of psychological distress, and might represent a vulnerability marker for the development of depressive symptoms. (shrink)

BackgroundDementia care is essential to promote the well-being of patients but remains a difficult task prone to ethical issues. These issues include questions like whether manipulating a person with dementia is ethically permissible if it promotes her best interest or how to engage with a person who is unwilling to recognize that she has dementia. To help people living with dementia and their carers manage ethical issues in dementia care, we developed the CARE intervention. This is an intervention focused on (...) promoting the ethical self-efficacy of people living with dementia and carers, i.e., their confidence that they can manage ethical issues when they occur. The purpose of this paper is to explain and discuss how we have developed the CARE intervention to promote the ethical self-efficacy of people living with dementia, their family, and professional carers through a specific and, we believe, new use of literary texts.MethodsThe CARE intervention has been developed in two phases: First, we conducted a needs assessment of the occurrence of ethical issues in dementia care and the need for an intervention to support people living with dementia and their carers in managing such issues. Second, in a design phase, we developed the CARE intervention to meet identified needs.ResultsTo address identified ethical issues in dementia care we designed the CARE intervention as a workshop format where people living with dementia and carers can meet, discuss literary texts, and deliberate on how to solve such issues. The workshop is structured by the following elements: An agenda of ethical issues, a collection of literary cases exemplifying ethical issues, a moderator with an understanding of dementia care, and an overview of the ethical principles relevant to the discussion of ethical issues. >This workshop concept is operationalized in three applications tailored to meet the specific ethical issues of each of the study´s three target groups: people living with dementia and family carers, professional and family carers, and professional carers.ConclusionWe conclude the paper by stating that it is possible to develop an intervention that promotes the ethical self-efficacy of people living with dementia and family and professional carers. (shrink)

Autism is a highly heterogeneous phenomenon. Not only is it difficult to understand the various and diverse aspects of autism, their relation to each other is also complex and still poorly understood. In my article, “Material encounters. A phenomenological account of social interaction in autism,” I have addressed this heterogeneity by presenting an understanding of how social features of autism relate to behavioral features. Straddling this divide between the social and the non-social that still pervades much thinking in philosophy, psychiatry, (...) and psychology is crucial for understanding the diverse experiences of autistic persons and... (shrink)

As part of the roundtable “International Institutions and Peaceful Change,” this essay focuses on the role of institutions as agents of peaceful change from a perspective that emphasizes the importance of a wide spectrum of human emotions to better understand the less quantifiable but nevertheless important conditions for being able to sustain initiatives for peaceful change. It aims to throw light on the often overlooked psychological and emotional hurdles standing in the way of agents’ ability to undertake and sustain action (...) designed to lead to peaceful change. To do so, the essay returns to the pioneering work of Ernst Haas and his important concept of “spillover.” The essay shows that the neofunctional understanding of spillover was a theoretically important innovation, but that it was missing three essential elements: an understanding of the need for positive emotions and ontological security; an understanding of the link between values and identity; and a realization of the importance of a shared vision for the “good life.” To illustrate the problems with Haas's version of spillover, but also to highlight the significant potential of the theory, the essay turns to the crisis of the liberal international order as an example of a forum where the agency to undertake peaceful change seems to be faltering. The essay concludes that the ability of the liberal order to effect peaceful change is currently hampered because the order is characterized by negative emotions, contested values, and a vision of the good life that is seen as mainly a benefit for the cosmopolitan elite. (shrink)

Dit jaarboek van het 'Studium Generale' van de Hogeschool Gent bevat essays van de sprekers die tijdens het academiejaar 2012-2013 een lezing hebben gehouden over het jaarthema ‘Normaal!? Waar is de norm?’. In deze bundel wordt stilgestaan bij de vraag hoe de tweedeling normaal/abnormaal aan de orde is in de maatschappij, in de kunsten en in de (medische) wetenschappen.0Deze lezingenreeks werd samengesteld door Sofie Vandamme en georganiseerd i.s.m. Jeroen Cluckers. Het boek bevat bijdragen van Sofie Vandamme, Charlotte Mutsaers, (...) Peter Hinssen, Dirk De Wachter, Maartje Schermer, Piet Hoebeke, Kristien Hemmerechts, Patrick Allegaert en Bart Marius, Stijn Vanheule, Paul De Grauwe, Hilde Van den Bulck, Jens Franssen en Dieter Ceustermans. Ook de beste paper van de deelnemende studenten werd mee opgenomen. (shrink)

Dit jaarboek van het Studium Generale van de Hogeschool Gent bevat essays van de sprekers die tijdens het academiejaar 2013-2014 een lezing hebben gehouden over het jaarthema "Tijd? Altijd!". In deze bundel wordt stilgestaan bij de vraag hoe allerlei vormen van en opvattingen over tijd aan de orde zijn in de maatschappij, in de kunsten en in het wetenschappelijk onderzoek.0Deze lezingenreeks werd samengesteld en georganiseerd door Sofie Vandamme i.s.m. Jeroen Cluckers. Het boek bevat bijdragen van Sofie Vandamme, Benno (...) Barnard, Mark Fisher, Pedro De Bruyckere, Els Stuyven, Joke J. Hermsen, Marli Huijer, Dieter Ceustermans, Carl Devos, Petra Van Brabandt en Lisaboa Houbrechts"--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

Reduplication is a phenomenon that can be applied to various linguistic units. In this article, I determine what action the reduplication of the Danish change-of-state token nå accomplishes in interaction. Following previous research on reduplication and using the method of Conversation Analysis, I show that reduplicated nå serves to register that the previous turn at talk implemented a larger course of action, namely that of revision.

In this paper, we identify and describe a new practice for responding to unfinished requests, which we call telescoping responses, due to their being designed for telescoping the request sequence forward in the face of troubles with progressivity and in producing the request. Considering cases from an American shoe repair shop, we demonstrate that telescoping responses serve to telescope request sequences exactly because they are neither syntactically, prosodically or pragmatically fitted to the unfinished requests that they respond to.

It is timely and important that new developments in conversation analysis become the subject of principled debate. John Heritage’s recent papers on the role of epistemics constitute one such development, and by re-analysing excerpts from this work, the articles in this Special Issue reveal some significant problems with a programmatic approach to epistemics. This commentary agrees with the critics that there are dangers in an overemphasis on epistemics and in using isolated utterances and proposing abstract scales and terms. But the (...) commentary also warns against totally rejecting epistemics as a domain of inquiry in CA and points to places where the critics exaggerate their criticisms in a way that makes them unnecessarily hostile. (shrink)

The Languedoc region between the Rh.ne River and the Pyrenees is renowned for its medieval history. Or rather, its special version of medievalism. This article seeks to explain how and why the Albigensian Crusade (1209-1229) and the heretical Cathars came to be intertwined with myths about the Holy Grail after World War I by examining three different definitions of medievalism by Eco, Gentry & Müller, and Matthews. The theories approach medievalisms from different perspectives, but they all pay special attention to (...) the political usage of medievalisms, which can be detected in all corners of the Albigensian Crusade historiography and fictional literature. This shows that a special Occitanian medievalism-hybrid has been created, which is constantly being developed and highlighted by both literature, myths and the region’s tourism industry. Finally, the article argues that the perceptions of medieval Languedoc and the myths surrounding the area reflects the challenges and political reality of the authors’ own time and experiences. (shrink)

Indoor radon is a natural radioactive gas that enters homes through cracks in the foundations. It is one of the leading causes of lung cancer. Although radon can be detected with an indoor radon test and can be mitigated by means of either ventilation or professional measures, testing and mitigating rates of the at-risk population remain insufficient. The objective of this study is to systematically review the current level of evidence regarding the design and effectiveness of mass media campaigns to (...) address the health risks of indoor radon to homeowners. The results show that informative tone of voices prevailed, other components, such as emotional or social components, were often not included. Furthermore, the focus was mostly on intention and less on behavior itself, and on testing instead of mitigation. Further research is needed to test effective and innovative communication strategies to increase protective behavior concerning indoor radon. (shrink)

This paper explores trans poetics as a way of doing trans philosophy. I begin by giving an overview of the current state of trans philosophy. I then give examples of other literatures wherein poetics is taken to be philosophically robust. After giving a brief history of trans poetics, I turn to the poetics statements and poetry of three trans poets—D'Lo, Ching-In Chen, and micha cárdenas—featured in the 2013 anthology Troubling the Line. I show how poetry is often uniquely able to (...) capture the ambiguity of the WTF of trans experience in ways that differ from philosophical argumentation. I conclude by suggesting that poetics might move us away from a potential politics of suffering in trans philosophy to a politics of liberation. (shrink)

In historiography there is a tendency to see the Great War as marking the end of scientific optimism and the period that followed the war as a time of discord. Connecting to current (inter)national historiographical debate on the question of whether the First World War meant a disruption from the pre-war period or not, this article strives to prove that faith in scientific progress still prevailed in the 1920s. This is shown through the use of Belgium as a case study, (...) which suggests that the generally adopted cultural pessimism in the post-war years did not apply to the public rhetoric of science in this country. Diverse actors—scientists, industrialists, politicians, the public opinion and the military staff—declared a confidence in science, enhanced by wartime results. Furthermore, belief in science in Belgium was not affected by public outcry over the use of mustard gas, unlike in the former belligerent countries where the gas became an unpleasant reminder of how science was used during the war. Even German science with its industrial applications remained the norm after 1918. In fact, the faith in science exhibited during the pre-war years continued to exist, at least until the 1920s, despite anti-German sentiments being voiced by many sections of Belgian society in the immediate aftermath of the war. (shrink)