Oppressive ideology regularly misrepresents features of structural injustice as normal or appropriate. Resisting such injustice therefore requires critical examination of the evaluative judgments encoded in shared concepts. In this paper, I diagnose a mechanism of ideological misevaluation, which I call "hermeneutical misfit." Hermeneutical misfit occurs when thick concepts, or concepts which both describe and evaluate, mobilize ideologically warped evaluative judgments which do not fit the facts (e.g. "slutty"). These ill-fitted thick concepts in turn are regularly deployed as if they merely (...) describe--a phenomenon I call "descriptive masquerade." I argue that, via descriptive masquerade, ill-fitted thick concepts smuggle in warped evaluative judgments alongside apparently value-neutral ‘mere facts’, a process which both reinforces those judgments and increases the difficulty of critique. I investigate the concept "obesity" as an example: scientists and medical practitioners will deploy this concept as if it "merely" describes, enabling the smuggling of a host of warped evaluative judgments. I suggest that, to resist this process, we should develop collective consciousness and articulate "meta-hermeneutical resources," or thick concepts which encode critique of other, ill-fitted concepts (e.g. "slut-shaming" or "fat-shaming"). (shrink)

Despite an abundance of research on inter-organizational trust, researchers are only beginning to understand the process of trust deterioration as an inter-organizational phenomenon. This paper presents a case study examining the deteriorating relationship between two international high-tech firms. We surveyed respondents from the supplier firm to identify major elements that reduced the supplier's trust in its customer, using the dimensions of trust identified by Mayer et al. (1995). While violations of ability, integrity, and benevolence all contributed to trust reduction, (...) early violations of trustee benevolence contributed importantly to trust deterioration. Over time, the relationship became "sensitive," and respondents reported many incidents of trust violation. Managers reported primarily integrity- and benevolence-related incidents, while no pattern emerged among operations personnel. We examine the results in light of Hosmer's (1995) ethically-based trust principles. The supplier and customer would likely differ in their opinion of whether the customer was acting "ethically." This suggests that scholars need to examine how many principles can be violated before trust is eliminated, and whether any of the principles are particularly salient in business relationships. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:On the NoseDavid F. Bell (bio)I recently underwent a COVID test. As the technician inserted the rather ominous cotton-tipped probe into my nostril, she told me that it was going to feel as if she were tickling my brain. Indeed… This experience, shared by many during the past three years, and likely multiple times, prompted me to think about my nose. Not since cocaine reentered American mainstream culture (...) in the 1970s and '80s—and found its way into countless movies that reflect the trend—has the nose been so central to a certain state of public life. It's difficult to find a film dealing with American culture from that period and beyond, from Scarface to The Wolf of Wall Street, in which there is not a scene depicting characters snorting the obligatory line or spoon of cocaine. Yes, snorting, sniffing, sneezing, ingesting the line through the nose and finishing leftover dust by collecting it with a moist finger, rubbing it lovingly against the front gum of the mouth. Freud's "Über Coca" looms ominously in the background, the work of a phase in Freud's professional career complicated by his obscure relationships with Parke-Davis (now a subsidiary of Pfizer) and Merck, pharmaceutical companies that supplied him with early samples to tickle his nose (Freud; Merkel). The Sacklers of the moment. In our day, Pfizer wants to transform our noses into defenses against the virus rather than conduits toward mind-altering dreams. In the wake of the Freud and William Halsted cocaine addictions chronicled by Howard Merkel, the irony of the contemporary link between Pfizer and the nose is patent.The nose: that orifice through which the virus creeps, the first stage in breathing, the first filter for air-borne pollutants. Recently, important immunological analyses of COVID have focused on the question of viral load, how much virus is necessary to overcome the nose's filtering function and reach the deeper airways leading to the lungs. The processes triggered by any of the major vaccines prepare antibody blueprints and actual antibodies that can be dispatched to the linings of the nose to counter the virus as soon as the body detects its presence. The Delta, Omicron, and subsequent variants remind us that the virus has mechanisms to challenge this response, namely, increased viral load that intensifies transmissibility and the potential to overwhelm antibodies. It seems, however, that [End Page 231] so-called breakthrough infections are still well controlled by the body's vaccinated immune system. Hysteria about the dangers of such incursions is partially a product of biased and often incorrect or incomplete media coverage of the COVID vaccine, which has terrified the vaccinated and fueled the skepticism of the unvaccinated.The virus tries to overpower and confuse the filtering nose in another way, more immediately apparent to our conscious selves. As many as eighty-five percent of COVID infections result in the loss of smell, generally recovered in about two to three weeks in sickened people who overcome the infection. About five percent of COVID victims, however, have not recovered their sense of smell six months or more after they have shed the virus.1 What might it mean to lose one's sense of smell? In our vision-oriented culture, both sound (the ear) and smell (the nose) have been less recognized as primary defense mechanisms than in other cultures. When one hears a sound, the first reaction is to prepare for a threat, before the sonic source is seen or understood. Orientation in the world, knowing from which direction the sound emanates, is key to preparing the body for an encounter with an unknown phenomenon: "To sound (an alarm) means to warn. Isn't any emerging sound understood as a warning? Any unexpected sonic occurrence is seen as an indication of something that is to come and that must be clarified rapidly" (Deshays 34). By the same token, to sample surroundings by sniffing what is in the air signals whether one should inhale or somehow try to hold one's breath in search of cleaner, more palatable air. Without olfaction, we are at potentially heightened risk of asphyxiation. We are more likely to... (shrink)

In recent work Mary Kate McGowan presents an account of oppressive speech inspired by David Lewis's analysis of conversational kinematics. Speech can effect identity-based oppression, she argues, by altering 'the conversational score', which is to say, roughly, that it can introduce presuppositions and expectations into a conversation, and thus determine what sort of subsequent conversational 'moves' are apt, correct, felicitous, etc., in a manner that oppresses members of a certain group (e.g. because the suppositions and expectations derogate or demean members (...) of that group). In keeping with the Lewisian picture, McGowan stresses the asymmetric pliability of conversational scores. She argues that it is easier to introduce (for example) sexist presuppositions and expectations into a conversation than it is to remove them. Responding to a sexist remark, she thus suggests, is like trying to "unring a bell". I begin by situating McGowan's work in the wider literature on speech and social hierarchy, and explaining how her account of oppressive speech improves upon the work of others in its explication of the relationship between individuals' verbal conduct and structurally oppressive social arrangements. I then propose an explanation and supportive elaboration of McGowan's claims about the asymmetric pliability of conversations involving identity-oppressive speech. Rather than regarding such asymmetry as a sui generis phenomenon, I show how we can understand it as a consequence of a more general asymmetry between making things salient and un-salient in speech, and I show how this asymmetry also operates in various cases that interested Lewis. (shrink)

Initially motivated by their relevance in foundations of quantum mechanics and more recently by their applications in different contexts of quantum information science, violations of Bell inequalities have been extensively studied during the last years. In particular, an important effort has been made in order to quantify such Bell violations. Probabilistic techniques have been heavily used in this context with two different purposes. First, to quantify how common the phenomenon of Bell violations is; and second, to (...) find large Bell violations in order to better understand the possibilities and limitations of this phenomenon. However, the strong mathematical content of these results has discouraged some of the potentially interested readers. The aim of the present work is to review some of the recent results in this direction by focusing on the main ideas and removing most of the technical details, to make the previous study more accessible to a wide audience. (shrink)

Husserl's idea of a self-enclosed region of pure consciousness, a transcendental subjectivity that is at once absolute being and a sense-giving synthesis of experience, has enjoyed few, if any, enthusiastic defenders. In a recent book on Husserl, David Bell struggles in vain to find anything of worth in Husserl's "transcendental ontology. ''1 To be sure, Bell is reading Husserl with Fregean eyes; yet much dissatisfaction can be found among continental thinkers as well. Jacques Derrida, for example, argues that (...) the self-presence requisite for conceiving of transcendental subjectivity as both origin and absolute being is in the end undermined by the results of phenomenological analysis itself, especially the reflections on the nature of time. Jan Pato~ka, the Czech philosopher, railed against what he saw to be Husserl's "prejudice" of subjectivism in the demand for a world-constituting activity on the part of subjectivity. One can find similar objections in the work of Roman Ingarden and Jean-Paul Sartre - that is, in the work of those who, one could say, benefited the most from Husserl's phenomenology. 2 So many have said so much, and in a multitude of convincing ways, that perhaps someone interested in Husserl can finally be content to focus on those aspects and achievements that are more or less independent of the claim that phenomenology is a "transcendental idealism," a rigorous science the region of investigation of which is an "absolutely functioning transcendental subjectivity.". (shrink)

A trenchant defense of hierarchy in different spheres of our lives, from the personal to the political All complex and large-scale societies are organized along certain hierarchies, but the concept of hierarchy has become almost taboo in the modern world. Just Hierarchy contends that this stigma is a mistake. In fact, as Daniel Bell and Wang Pei show, it is neither possible nor advisable to do away with social hierarchies. Drawing their arguments from Chinese thought and culture as well (...) as other philosophies and traditions, Bell and Wang ask which forms of hierarchy are justified and how these can serve morally desirable goals. They look at ways of promoting just forms of hierarchy while minimizing the influence of unjust ones, such as those based on race, sex, or caste. Which hierarchical relations are morally justified and why? Bell and Wang argue that it depends on the nature of the social relation and context. Different hierarchical principles ought to govern different kinds of social relations: what justifies hierarchy among intimates is different from what justifies hierarchy among citizens, countries, humans and animals, and humans and intelligent machines. Morally justified hierarchies can and should govern different spheres of our social lives, though these will be very different from the unjust hierarchies that have governed us in the past. A vigorous, systematic defense of hierarchy in the modern world, Just Hierarchy examines how hierarchical social relations can have a useful purpose, not only in personal domains but also in larger political realms. (shrink)

Early discussions of ?climate justice? have been dominated by economists rather than political philosophers. More recently, analytical liberal political philosophers have joined the debate. However, the philosophical discussion of climate justice remains in its early stages. This paper considers one promising approach based on human rights, which has been advocated recently by several theorists, including Simon Caney, Henry Shue and Tim Hayward. A basic argument supporting the claim that anthropogenic climate change violates human rights is presented. Four objections to this (...) argument are examined: the ?future persons? objection; the ?risk? objection; the ?collective causation? objection; and the ?demandingness? objection. This critical examination leads to a more detailed specification and defence of the claim that anthropogenic climate change violates human rights. (shrink)

In his profound and deeply personal new book, New York Times bestselling author Rob Bell explores the endless dynamic questions and connections that have shaped his life to provide powerful insight into understanding your purpose and place in the world. Our home is a universe of endless dynamic connections that never stop inviting us to participate in the great mysterious love at the heart of it all. Everything is Spiritual is a brief history of how these ideas about creation, (...) love, and connection shaped the author--and can shape every one of us. In this book, Rob Bell explores the concept that what people really want, more than anything, is to understand their purpose here--so much so that it gives them an abiding sense of awe and wonder. And when you embrace where and who you come from and your wounds and pains and regrets, you will discover that there's an invitation lurking there in the mess of life: an invitation to expand just like the universe has been doing for 13 billions years. There is a space beyond all the parts and divisions and differences and polarization where you see that it's all one connected whole and it's all rigged in favor of your growth, expansion, and joy. (shrink)

Liberalism and ecologism are widely regarded as incompatible. Liberalism and (anthropocentric) environmentalism might be compatible but liberalism and (non-anthropocentric) ecologism are not. A liberal state cannot promote policies for ecological or ecocentric reasons. An individual cannot be both a liberal and a committed advocate of ecologism. This paper challenges these claims. It is argued that Rawls’s ‘political liberalism’ is compatible with ecologism and, in particular, the idea of ‘ecological justice’. A Rawlsian state can promote ecological justice. A committed political liberal (...) can also be a committed advocate of ecological justice. The argument is developed through a close textual examination of Rawls’s brief discussion of our duties to ‘animals and the rest of nature’. Rawls leaves far more scope for liberal ecologism than his critics have suggested. The proposed version of liberal ecologism is defended against charges of substantive and procedural bias toward humans and against nonhuman nature. Liberal ecologism may not be enough for some ecologists-especially ‘ecological constitutionalists’ seeking constitutional protection for nonhuman nature-but it is a serious and defensible political and moral theory. (shrink)

Introduction -- 1. Problem of the New -- 2. Problem of Relations -- 3. Problem of Emergence -- 4. Problem of One and Many -- 5. Plato and the Third Man Argument -- 6. Bradley and the Problem of Relations -- 7. Moore, Russell and the Birth of Analytic Philosophy -- 8. Russell and Deleuze on Leibniz -- 9. On Problematic Fields -- 10. Kant and Problematic Ideas -- 11. Armstrong and Lewis on the Problem of One and Many -- (...) 12. Determinables and Determinates -- 13. The Limits of Representational Thought -- 14. Learning from a Cup of Coffee -- 15. Carnap and the Fate of Metaphysics -- 16. Truth and Relevance -- Conclusion. (shrink)

This issue of Philosophical Papers assembles eight essays that are part of the larger conversation on African philosophy and the analytic tradition. Several leading philosophers have contributed to this issue with provocative remarks, beginning with a three-way debate on the nature of philosophy itself as understood and practiced in the African context. It continues with essays on consensual democracy, authoritarianism, race and cultural identity, the cosmopolitan ideal, and belief and witchcraft.

Communitarian thinkers have argued that liberalism devalues community in modern societies. This essay assesses the three main strands of the contemporary debate betweeen communitarianism and liberalism: (1) the communitarian critique of the liberal universalism, (2) the communitarian critique of liberal individualism, and (3) the communitarian critique of liberal politics. In each case, it is argued that the debate has moved from fairly abstract philosophical controversies to more concrete engagement with political disputes in Western as well as East Asian societies.

According to a rights forfeiture theory of punishment, liability to punishment hinges upon the notion that criminals forfeit their rights against hard treatment. In this paper, I assume the success of rights forfeiture theory in establishing the permissibility of punishment but aim to develop the view by considering how forfeited rights might be reclaimed. Built into the very notion of proportionate punishment is the idea that forfeited rights can be recovered. The interesting question is whether punishment is the sole means (...) for reclaiming forfeited rights. I argue for a pluralistic theory of rights reclamation, according to which, there are multiple ways by which a wrongdoer can recapture her forfeited rights. In particular, I argue that offering remorseful compensation is a valid means by which a wrongdoer might partially, or fully, reclaim her right against punishment. (shrink)

In 1967, after a talk Deleuze gave to the Society of French Philosophy, Ferdinand Alquiéé expressed concern during the question and answer session that perhaps Deleuze was relying too heavily upon science and not giving adequate attention to questions and problems that Alquiéé took to be distinctively philosophical. Deleuze responded by agreeing with Alquiéé; moreover, he argued that his primary interest was precisely in the metaphysics science needs rather than in the science philosophy needs. This metaphysics, Deleuze argues, is to (...) be done ‘‘in the style of Whitehead’’ rather than the style of Kant, and in developing this metaphysics Deleuze draws heavily on Spinoza. The present essay examines this Deleuzian-Spinozist metaphysics done in the style of Whitehead, the ‘‘metaphysics science needs’’, drawing on the writings of David Hume and Bruno Latour in the process. This discussion will in turn enable us to situate Deleuze's metaphysics in relation to contemporary debates concerning speculative realism and correlationism, and especially Quentin Meillassoux's critique of the latter. Our conclusion will be that the kind of metaphysics Deleuze pursues is neither correlationist nor straightforwardly realist, but rather charts a course between realism and anti-realism. (shrink)

Previous research has shown a source memory advantage for faces presented in negative contexts. As yet it remains unclear whether participants remember the specific type of context in which the faces were presented or whether they can only remember that the face was associated with negative valence. In the present study, participants saw faces together with descriptions of two different types of negative behaviour and neutral behaviour. In Experiment 1, we examined whether the participants were able to discriminate between two (...) types of other-relevant negative context information (cheating and disgusting behaviour) in a source memory test. In Experiment 2, we assessed source memory for other-relevant negative (threatening) context information (other-aggressive behaviour) and self-relevant negative context information (self-aggressive behaviour). A multinomial source memory model was used to separately assess partial source memory for the negative valence of the behaviour and specific source memory for the particular type of negative context the face was associated with. In Experiment 1, source memory was specific for the particular type of negative context presented (i.e., cheating or disgusting behaviour). Experiment 2 showed that source memory for other-relevant negative information was more specific than source memory for self-relevant information. Thus, emotional source memory may vary in specificity depending on the degree to which the negative emotional context is perceived as threatening. (shrink)

Introduction -- Making sense of life -- communication problems -- Making sense of politics -- Stop making sense -- Towards a critical existentialism.

Research on the nature of science and science education enjoys a longhistory, with its origins in Ernst Mach's work in the late nineteenthcentury and John Dewey's at the beginning of the twentieth century.As early as 1909 the Central Association for Science and MathematicsTeachers published an article – ‘A Consideration of the Principles thatShould Determine the Courses in Biology in Secondary Schools’ – inSchool Science and Mathematics that reflected foundational concernsabout science and how school curricula should be informed by them. Sincethen (...) a large body of literature has developed related to the teaching andlearning about nature of science – see, for example, the Lederman and Meichtry reviews cited below. As well there has been intensephilosophical, historical and philosophical debate about the nature of scienceitself, culminating in the much-publicised ‘Science Wars’ of recent time. Thereferences listed here primarily focus on the empirical research related to thenature of science as an educational goal; along with a few influential philosophicalworks by such authors as Kuhn, Popper, Laudan, Lakatos, and others. Whilenot exhaustive, the list should prove useful to educators, and scholars in otherfields, interested in the nature of science and how its understanding can berealised as a goal of science instruction. The authors welcome correspondenceregarding omissions from the list, and on-going additions that can be made to it. (shrink)

The project “Artificial and Artistic Vision. Computer Vision and Art History in Practical-Methodical Cooperation” is interdisciplinary by definition and also in its personnel composition and combines the humanities, engineering, and natural sciences. Together, prototypes and methodological approaches to an automatic vision that assists art history are being developed in the form of basic research.

Uses specific yoga poses that help prepare the body for meditation.

Using the Q representation, we study the disagreement between quantum optical formalism and local realism and we show that the phenomenon of enhancement, first revealed by the local realist analysis, could receive a simple explanation if we use this particular version of the quantum formalism. Nevertheless, some fundamental difficulties remain.

In Setting Limits, Daniel Callahan advances the provocative thesis that age be a limiting factor in decisions to allocate certain kinds of health services to the elderly. However, when one looks at available data, one discovers that there are many more elderly women than there are elderly men, and these older women are poorer, more apt to live alone, and less likely to have informal social and personal supports than their male counterparts. Older women, therefore, will make the heaviest demand (...) on health care resources. If age were to become a limiting factor, as Dr. Callahan suggests it should, the limits that will be set are limits that will affect women more drastically than they affect men. This review essay examines the implications of Callahan's thesis for elderly women. (shrink)

Bell argues that the dialogue that emanate from the aesthetic realm cannot be understood through a solely art-historical approach; instead, they must be understood as part of a collective endeavour. In this sense, the 'art' of post-dictatorship is not something that belongs to art or the artists themselves, but is about how the subjectivities and imaginations of new generations engage with questions of response, ethics and justice; and, in so doing, re-align themselves in relation to the past and to (...) the future. This book provides a valuable resource for those interested in the law, politics, art and sociology of contemporary Argentina. It will be of immense use to those studying in these areas and to those concerned more widely with transitional justice and memory politics. (shrink)

A collaboration between distinguished physicists and philosophers of physics, this important anthology surveys the deep implications of Bell's nonlocality theorem.