The information explosion and digital modes of learning often combine to inform the quest for the best ways of transforming information in digital form for pedagogical purposes. This quest has become more urgent and pervasive with the ‘turn’ to online learning in the context of COVID-19. This can result in linear, asynchronous, transmission-based modes of teaching and learning which commodify, package and deliver knowledge for individual ‘customers’. The primary concerns in such models are often technical and economic – technology (...) as a cost-effective ‘solution’ to educational challenges. In this paper I argue for the importance of dialogic learning space in teaching and learning by means of Information and Communication Technologies, whether in the form of fully online learning, blended learning or face-to-face encounters using ICT affordances. Although the 20th Century theorists Mikhail Bakhtin (1895–1975) and Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) produced their seminal works before the advent of ICTs, they were both concerned with the quality and authenticity of human engagement with texts and with other persons and contexts. Besides a shared interest in dialogue as an ontological feature of human life and being, they both used spatiotemporal concepts for understanding and interpreting texts. The article draws on Gadamer’s notions of dialogue and horizon, and Bakhtin’s notions of dialogue and chronotope, to conceptualize dialogic possibilities for online education. Its purpose is to provide a framework, grounded in Bakhtin’s and Gadamer’s ideas, for a dialogic approach to online teaching and learning in higher education. (shrink)

To support their claim for technical reasoning skills rather than imitation as the key for cumulative technological culture, Osiurak and Reynaud argue that chimpanzees can imitate mechanical actions, but do not have CTC. They also state that an increase in working memory in human evolution could not have been a key driver of CTC. We discuss why we disagree with these claims.

The aim of this article is to contribute to a philosophy of technics by proposing an answer to the following question: what is the nature of the human body as an element of technical systems? The argument focuses on an examination of the phenomenon of bodily technics. This examination is guided by the conviction that Pierre Bourdieu's social theory can be read as contributing significantly to an answer to the above question. However, since Bourdieu's project is not directly aimed (...) at enhancing our understanding of the technicity of the human body, a reading of Marcel Mauss's seminal essay on bodily technics is also discussed to set the stage for an examination of the technicity of the body and to justify the manner in which Bourdieu's theory is read here. Through a careful study of the key notions of habitus, field, practice, time and rule, Bourdieu's social theory is systematically presented and explored for its contribution to an understanding of the question raised in this article. In conclusion, a number of remarks are made on how the relation between Mauss and Bourdieu is to be understood and on the argumentative strength of Bourdieu's work. (shrink)

The best way to conceive semiotical spaces that are not identical to single buildings, such as a cityscape, is to define the place in terms of the activities occurring there. This conception originated in the proxemics of E. T. Hall and was later generalized in the spatial semiotics of Manar Hammad. It can be given a more secure grounding in terms of time geography, which is involved with trajectories in space and time. We add to this a qualitative dimension which (...) is properly semiotic, and which derives from the notion of border, itself a result of the primary semiotic operation of segmentation. Borders, in this sense, are more or less permeable to different kinds of activities, such as gaze, touch, and movement, where the latter are often not physically defined, but characterized in terms of norms. Norms must be understood along the lines of the Prague school, which delineates as scale going from laws in the legal sense to simple rules of thumb. Such considerations have permitted us to define a number of semio-spatial objects as, most notably, the boulevard, considered as an intermediate level of public space, located between the village square and the coffee house presiding over what Habermas called the public sphere. Urbanity originates as a scene on which the gaze, well before the word, mediates between the sexes, the classes, the cultures, and other avatars of otherness. However, this scenario is seriously upset but the emergence of the cell phone and other technical devices, as well as by the movement of populations. (shrink)

In Zielonka (1981a, 1989), I found an axiomatics for the product-free calculus L of Lambek whose only rule is the cut rule. Following Buszkowski (1987), we shall call such an axiomatics linear. It was proved that there is no finite axiomatics of that kind. In Lambek's original version of the calculus (cf. Lambek, 1958), sequent antecedents are non empty. By dropping this restriction, we obtain the variant L0 of L. This modification, introduced in the early 1980s (see, e.g., Buszkowski, 1985; (...) Zielonka, 1981b), did not gain much popularity initially; a more common use of L0 has only occurred within the last few years (cf. Roorda, 1991: 29). In Zielonka (1988), I established analogous results for the restriction of L0 to sequents without left (or, equivalently, right) division. Here, I present a similar (cut-rule) axiomatics for the whole of L0.This paper is an extended, corrected, and completed version of Zielonka (1997). Unlike in Zielonka (1997), the notion of rank of an axiom is introduced which, although inessential for the results given below, may be useful for the expected non-finite-axiomatizability proof.The paper follows the same way of subject exposition as Zielonka (2000) but it is technically much less complicated. I restrict myself to giving bare results; all the ideological background is exactly the same as in case of the non-associative calculusNL0 and those who are interested in it are requested to consult the introductory section of Zielonka (2000). (shrink)

The idea of technocracy has been widely criticized in Western literature in the philosophy and sociology of technology. A common critique of technocracy is that it represents an “antidemocratic” and “dehumanizing” ideology. This paper invites Western scholars to reconsider their oppositions to technocracy by drawing on resources from Confucian ethics. In doing so, this paper synthesizes the major ethical challenges of technocracy mainly concerned by Western scholars in philosophy, political theories, sociology, and policy studies. This paper argues that incorporating Confucian (...) resources such as the rule of virtue into technocracy may be helpful for reexamining these ethical challenges to technocracy that are deeply rooted in Western liberal democratic ideologies. The Confucian rule of virtue means that social policies should be made by the virtuous and capable and these policies need to have impacts on the moral progress of the society. Confucian values provide ethical guidance for technocrats in assessing the moral quality of the sociotechnical systems they build. From the Confucian perspective, sociotechnical systems are often assessed based on the criterion whether and how these sociotechnical systems contribute to a process of harmonization. This paper will introduce some practical cases that demonstrate how technical experts and expertise contribute to organizational and social management. In these cases, virtues and the rule of virtue do play a crucial role: virtues either determine the selection of technocrats and the legitimization of their political power or are embedded in engineering design and affect human behavior in the use context. (shrink)

It is commonly accepted that the golden rule—most often formulated as "do unto others as you would have them do unto you"—is a unifying element between many diverse religious traditions, both Eastern and Western. Its influence also extends beyond such traditions, since many non-religious individuals hold up the golden rule as central to their lives. Yet, while it is extraordinarily important and widespread, the golden rule is often dismissed by scholars as a vague proverb that quickly leads to absurdities when (...) one attempts to formulate it in clear terms. In this book, Harry J. Gensler defends the golden rule and addresses all of the major philosophic objections, pointing out several common misunderstanding and misapplications. Gensler first discusses golden-rule reasoning and how to avoid the main pitfalls. He then relates the golden rule to world religions and history, and to areas like moral education, egoism, evolution, society, racism, business, and medicine. The book ends with a discussion of theoretical issues . Ethics and the Golden Rule offers two introductory chapters, the first is simpler and the second more technical; a reader may start with either or both. One can then read any combination of further chapters, in any order, depending on one’s interests; but Chapters 13 and 14 are technical and assume one has read Chapter 2. This is "a golden-rule book for everyone," accessible to a wide readership. (shrink)

The 1830s and 1840s are the formative years of modern public health in Britain, when the poor law bureaucrat Edwin Chadwick conceived his vision of public health through public works and began the campaign for the construction of the kinds of water and sewerage works that ultimately became the standard components of urban infrastructure throughout the developed world. This book first explores that vision and campaign against the backdrop of the great "condition-of-England" questions of the period, of what rights and (...) expectations working people could justifiably have in regard to political participation, food, shelter and conditions of work. It examines the ways Chadwick's sanitarianism fit the political needs of the much-hated Poor Law Commission and of Whig and Tory governments, each seeking some antidote to revolutionary Charitism. It then reviews the Chadwickians' efforts to solve the host of problems they met in trying to implement the sanitary idea: of what responsibilities central and local units of government, and private contractors, were to have; of how townspeople could be persuaded to embark on untried public technologies; of where the new public health experts were to come from; and of how elegant technical designs were to be fitted to the unique social, political and geographic circumstances of individual towns. Rejecting the view that Chadwick's program was a simple response to an obvious urban problem Professor Hamlin argues that at the time a "public health" focusing narrowly on sanitary public works represented a retreat of public medicine from involvement with the great social issues of the Industrial Revolution. In exploring the views of medical men who were critical of Chadwick, Hamlin suggests the parameters of a public health that might have been, in which concern for health and well-being becomes the foundation of a public medicine that is a principal guarantor of social justice. This book offers modern public heatlh professionals elements of a forgotten professional heritage that might be useful in responding to the bewildering range of health problems we now confront. (shrink)

Novel, as a literary genre, is described as the expression of events and emotions by using unconventional methods and techniques; beyond this, novek is also a subject of sociology. For this reason, writers have used the art of the novel as a way of expressing the pain experienced by the individual and its social dimensions. One of these writers is Mourid Barghouti (d. 2021), who was born in Palestine in 1944 and studied English Language and Literature at Cairo University. Banned (...) from entering Palestine in 1967 when he graduated from the university, and exiled from Egypt for criticizing Anwar al-Sādāt's (d. 1981) visit to Israel, Barghouti lived in exile for 17 years in various Arab and European countries away from his wife and child. Barghouti, who returned to Palestine 30 years after his departure, wrote a novel called I Saw Ramallah. This novel was first published in 1997, and he expressed his homesickness and the experiences of the Palestinian people after the occupation. Divided into nine chapters, consisting of 220 pages and translated into many languages, the novel shows the drama of many Palestinians who entered the British mandate after World War I, whose lands were occupied with the establishment of Israel in 1948, and who was forced to leave their homeland. In this sense, the novel I Saw Ramallah reflects both the expatriation of Palestine and the author. In this study, the work named I Saw Ramallah was elaborated in terms of technique in order to determine to what extent the author used the rules of the art of the novel, and thematically which subjects were handled in the novel. It is understood that the name of the novel was chosen to reflect the content by making use of the symbolic value of the place. This novel is seen as an autobiographical novel type, due to the author’s narrator technique used and the author tells his own life. The author's entry into Palestine is used as the objective tense of the novel; the author, with recollections and connotations in objective time, conveyed his experiences by using the flashback method. Events that contain enough sadness have been tried to be conveyed as they happened by mentioning time, place and individuals in order to awake the reader's feelings. Although the events in the novel are listed non-chronologically, when the whole novel is examined, it is seen that the author writes his experiences within the framework of the days he spent in Ramallah and the memories that they remind him of, and in the order in which they come to mind. In almost all of the novel, classical Arabic is preferred. The novel has avoided as much forced expressions and literary expressions that enlarge or reduce events as possible. Although it is impossible to claim that he is completely impartial as a Palestinian, it is seen that the author describes the events with the simplicity of a Palestinian citizen, away from political conflicts as much as possible and in a natural language. It is possible to say that the dominant use of critical style in the novel as the experiences of a writer suffered living abroad throughout his life, shaped his perspective on life and its reflection on the novel. The main topic of the novel is the absence from home. In addition, those killed far away from their homeland, Jewish settlement, the effect of Jewish occupation on the social life, the Oslo Agreement and the role of the phone in the life of the expat are handled as sub-themes. Although the novel named I Saw Ramallah is mostly close to daily or commemorative works and does not fully fit in the definitions of novel art as it emerged in the West, it includes the style of novel art at a certain level. It is seen that the novel has an important place in terms of raising awareness on the Palestinian issue in the Arab and Islamic world. The novel I Saw Ramallah, which was awarded The Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature by the American University in Cairo in 1997, is likely to have received this award because of its thematic aspect rather than its stylistic aspect. Considering this award that the novel won against its peers and the considerations we mentioned during the technical and stylistic analysis we made about the novel, it is seen that the art of the novel in Arabic literature is still in the development stage. (shrink)

The elements which every schoolboy learns on beginning Latin Verse Composition include a number of rules which seem arbitrarily designed to make the game harder. In hexameters, he is told, he must have a masculine caesura either in the third foot or in the second and fourth, and end normally with a disyllabic or a trisyllable; in pentameters he must end with a disyllabic; and in neither line may a single monosyllable stand at the end. Rarely, in my experience, (...) is any reason given him by way of redress, and he will search for one in vain in most of the school text-books, in introductions like Postgate's to Tibullus and Propertius, and in histories of Latin literature like Wight Duff's and Mackail's. This reticence may be due to the dissensions of experts on this subject and on the subject of Latin accentuation in general, but the theory that predominates in England, among those who hold a theory at all, explains so many of the phenomena that it deserves to be more widely and precisely known. The most detailed exposition of it is by E. H. Sturtevant, who summed up his analyses in a pair of articles in the Transactions of the American Philological Association in 1923–4. While his careful work is invaluable as marshalling the statistics and evidence, it errs on the side of excessive minuteness, and leaves room not merely for some additions, but for a different kind of treatment concerned less with bare statistics and more with poetic principles and historical development. Since Latin Verse Composition plays such an important part in English higher classical education, it seems desirable that a less technical and more accessible account should be available for English readers. Such an account I attempt to give here, keeping separate as far as possible the exposition and the consideration of the criticisms and rival theories that have been advanced. (shrink)

Epistemic scoring rules are the en vogue tool for justifications of the probability norm and further norms of rational belief formation. They are different in kind and application from statistical scoring rules from which they arose. In the first part of the paper I argue that statistical scoring rules, properly understood, are in principle better suited to justify the probability norm than their epistemic brethren. Furthermore, I give a justification of the probability norm applying statistical scoring (...) class='Hi'>rules. In the second part of the paper I give a variety of justifications of norms for rational belief formation employing statistical scoring rules. Furthermore, general properties of statistical scoring rules are investigated. Epistemic scoring rules feature as a useful technical tool for constructing statistical scoring rules. (shrink)

The present article proceeds from the observation that the therapeutic relationship is basically unequal. This inequality essentially concerns the respective situation of the patient and his or her doctor vis-à-vis medical knowledge. A strict professionalism guarantees that this inequality remains factual and without essential value. Yet, if both partners unreflectively allow affectivity excessively to intrude into their relationship, their behaviour may then be inspired by subconscious, rather than rational, motives. In that case, the unverifiable allegations of philanthropy or paternalism may (...) be used to rationalise a kind of 'medical sadism' which attempts to justify the will to humiliate the patient by means of the constraints inherent in medical care. The concept of ethical form is introduced as a non-verbal criterion of ethical reliability. It is mainly a way of training the will through the application of rationally justified rules of behaviour. In this context, it is suggested that an effort to remain constantly within the limits of professionalism represents a method of training for the achievement of some degree of ethical credibility in the therapeutic relationship. In the long term, such abstinence could constitute a sort of catharsis, and thereby help to reveal the non-rational motives in medical behaviour. Contrary to the belief prevailing in modern society, the established limits of medical knowledge are not so broad. The application of these limits would probably be the best method of preventing emotions from interfering undesirably in the therapeutic relationship. (shrink)

In this paper, we will develop an algebraic study of substructural propositional logics over FLew, i.e. the logic which is obtained from intuitionistic logics by eliminating the contraction rule. Our main technical tool is to use residuated lattices as the algebraic semantics for them. This enables us to study different kinds of nonclassical logics, including intermediate logics, BCK-logics, Lukasiewicz’s many-valued logics and fuzzy logics, within a uniform framework.

Technologies of “artificial intelligence” and machine learning are increasingly presented as solutions to key problems of our societies. Companies are developing, investing in, and deploying machine learning applications at scale in order to filter and organize content, mediate transactions, and make sense of massive sets of data. At the same time, social and legal expectations are ambiguous, and the technical challenges are substantial. This is the introductory article to a special theme that addresses this turn to AI as a (...) technical, discursive and political phenomena. The opening article contextualizes this theme by unfolding this multi-layered nature of the turn to AI. It argues that, whereas public and economic discourses position the widespread deployment of AI and automation in the governance of digital communication as a technical turn with a narrative of revolutionary breakthrough-moments and of technological progress, this development is at least similarly dependent on a parallel discursive and political turn to AI. The article positions the current turn to AI in the longstanding motif of the “technological fix” in the relationship between technology and society, and identifies a discursive turn to responsibility in platform governance as a key driver for AI and automation. In addition, a political turn to more demanding liability rules for platforms further incentivizes platforms to automatically screen their content for possibly infringing or violating content, and position AI as a solution to complex social problems. (shrink)

This article proposes an innovative methodology for enhancing the technical validation, legal alignment and interdisciplinarity of attempts to encode legislation. In the context of an experiment that examines how different legally trained participants convert select provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Cth) into machine-executable code, we find that a combination of manual and automated methods for coding validation, which focus on formal adherence to programming languages and conventions, can significantly increase the similarity of encoded rules between coders. (...) Participants nonetheless encountered various interpretive difficulties, including syntactic ambiguity, and intra- and intertextuality, which necessitated legal evaluation, as distinct from and in addition to coding validation. Many of these difficulties can be resolved through what we call a process of ‘legal alignment’ that aims to enhance the congruence between encoded provisions and the true meaning of a statute as determined by the courts. However, some difficulties cannot be overcome in advance, such as factual indeterminacy. Given the inherently interdisciplinary nature of encoding legislation, we argue that it is desirable for ‘rules as code’ (‘RaC’) initiatives to have, at a minimum, legal subject matter, statutory interpretation and technical programming expertise. Overall, we contend that technical validation, legal alignment and interdisciplinary teamwork are integral to the success of attempts to encode legislation. While legal alignment processes will vary depending on jurisdictionally-specific principles and practices of statutory interpretation, the technical and interdisciplinary components of our methodology are transferable across regulatory contexts, bodies of law and Commonwealth and other jurisdictions. (shrink)

My goal in this article is to explore the extent to which the conception of rule-following which emerges from Wittgenstein’s later works can also yield important insights concerning the nature of technological practices. In particular, this article aims to examine how two interrelated themes of Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations can be applied in the philosophical analysis of technology. Our first theme concerns linguistic practice; broadly construed, it is the claim that the use of language cannot be understood as determined by a (...) system of context independent rules. The second, interrelated theme emerges as a consequence of the first; that the meaning of language is rendered indeterminate when analyzed in isolation from contexts of practice. Following the common tendency in the sociology of technology to draw analogies between language and technology, I aim to show how the arguments that Wittgenstein makes for these two claims concerning language can also help us to understand the relation between technical artifacts and technological practices. For, similar to Wittgenstein’s account of rules, it will be shown how artifacts cannot be adequately understood in isolation from a wider background of skillful practice and interpretation. To illustrate this idea, we will examine the case of the Geiger counter, with a view towards illustrating how important aspects of the function of the device are rendered indeterminate when assessed on the basis of physical design alone. (shrink)

The main technical errors are in the literature survey. On pages 44, 93-94, 131 and 133 I claim that Fitting's and/or Rautenberg's systems are incomplete because they omit contraction. The claim is wrong because contraction is implicit in their set notation. Their systems are complete because they allow contraction on any formula whereas the systems in this technical report explicitly build contraction into certain rules, allowing contraction only on certain types of formulae. Please accept my apologies for (...) any confusion this causes you. (shrink)

William H.Whyte’s instructional film The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces (1979), which chronicles the findings of his decade-long study of people’s behavior in small urban spaces in New York City in the 1970s, offers a precise analysis of the rules of attraction that draw people into places and that keep them attached. By combining direct observation with complex technical arrangements and new forms of movement studies, Whyte’s study advocates a quintessentially process-oriented understanding of ‘placemaking’ that shaped a (...) new bottom-up approach to urban design in the 1970s. (shrink)

There has been considerable discussion in the past about the assumptions and basis of different ethical rules. For instance, it is commonplace to say that ethical rules are defaults rules, which means that they tolerate exceptions. Some authors argue that morality can only be grounded in particular cases while others defend the existence of general principles related to ethical rules. Our purpose here is not to justify either position, but to try to model general ethical (...) class='Hi'>rules with artificial intelligence formalisms and to compute logical consequences of different ethical theories. More precisely, this is an attempt to show that progress in non-monotonic logics, which simulates default reasoning, could provide a way to formalize different ethical conceptions. From a technical point of view, the model developed in this paper makes use of the Answer Set Programming (ASP) formalism. It is applied comparatively to different ethical systems with respect to their attitude towards lying. The advantages of such formalization are two-fold: firstly, to clarify ideas and assumptions, and, secondly, to use solvers to derive consequences of different ethical conceptions automatically, which can help in a rigorous comparison of ethical theories. (shrink)

Recent scientific advances have indicated that it may be technically feasible to sustain human embryos in vitro beyond 14 days. Research beyond this stage is currently restricted by a guideline known as the 14-day rule. Since the advances in embryo culturing there have been calls to extend the current limit. Much of the current debate concerning an extension has regarded the 14-day rule as a political compromise and has, therefore, focused on policy concerns rather than assessing the philosophical foundations of (...) the limit. While there are relevant political considerations, I maintain that the success of extension arguments will ultimately depend on the strength of the justifications supporting the current 14-day limit. I argue that the strongest and most prevalent justifications for the 14-day rule—an appeal to individuation and neural development—do not provide adequate support for the limit of 14 days. I instead suggest that an alternative justification based on sentience would constitute a more defensible basis for embryo protection and that a consideration of such grounds appears to support an amendment to the current limit, rather than the retention of it. While these conclusions do not establish conclusively that the current limit should be extended; they do suggest that an extension may be warranted and permissible. As such, this paper offers grounds on which a reassessment of the 14-day rule may be justified. (shrink)

We introduce two novel frameworks for choice under complete uncertainty. These frameworks employ intervals to represent uncertain utility attaching to outcomes. In the first framework, utility intervals arising from one act with multiple possible outcomes are aggregated via a set-based approach. In the second framework the aggregation of utility intervals employs multi-sets. On the aggregated utility intervals, we then introduce min–max decision rules and lexicographic refinements thereof. The main technical results are axiomatic characterizations of these min–max decision (...) class='Hi'>rules and these refinements. We also briefly touch on the independence of introduced axioms. Furthermore, we show that such characterizations give rise to novel axiomatic characterizations of the well-known min–max decision rule?mnx?mnx in the classical framework of choice under complete uncertainty. (shrink)

Employing Searle’s views, I begin by arguing that students of Mathematics behave similarly to machines that manage symbols using a set of rules. I then consider two types of Mathematics, which I call Cognitive Mathematics and Technical Mathematics respectively. The former type relates to concepts and meanings, logic and sense, whilst the latter relates to algorithms, heuristics, rules and application of various techniques. I claim that an upgrade in the school teaching of Cognitive Mathematics is necessary. The (...) aim is to change the current mentality of the stakeholders so as to compensate for the undue value presently attached to Technical Mathematics, due to advances in technology and its applications, and thus render the two sides of Mathematics equal. Furthermore, I suggest a reorganization/systematization of School Mathematics into a cognitive network to facilitate students’ understanding of the subject. The final goal is the transition from mechanical execution of rules to better understanding and in-depth knowledge of Mathematics. (shrink)

Technical artifacts do not seem particularly continuous with institutional statuses. If statuses are defined in terms of their constitutive rules, as Searle maintains, then disassociation is always possible – someone or something can satisfy those rules without being able to realize the functional effects that are associated with that status. The gap between technical artifacts and Searlean statuses suggests the possibility of an additional social kind, which I call, following Muhammad Ali Khalidi, a ‘real social kind’. (...) However, the placement of real social kinds between technical artifacts and statuses recommends a reconfiguration of Khalidi’s most abstract characterization of the notion. This reconfiguration also lends support to his surprising claim that money is a real social kind. (shrink)

This article calls into question the simplistic identification of modern technology with quantitative efficiency in order to develop three main themes. First, I establish that technology, broadly construed, is the use of knowledge and resources to meet specific human needs. Accordingly, dominant technical practice that favors efficiency and numerical criteria and discriminates against other technologies should more appropriately be called “technology of technology.” Second, I delineate how dominant practice in engineering is an exemplar of technology of technology, when it (...) becomes socially ambitious while remaining technically provincial and bears upon our personal and institutional life. Third, I illustrate what I call the “subjugated technical practice,” which exists under the rule of the dominant technical practice. Recognizing the importance of subjugated technical practices to engineering, I propose the concept of “critical technology of technology,” which is intended to advance technological alternatives and make critique an essential part of our technological world. (shrink)

The reach of markets and market-based forms of valuation is never unlimited in any society, which invites empirical and political questions regarding how limits to markets are instituted, justified and enforced. Under neoliberalism, the state performs a key role in expanding the reach of markets and associated principles and techniques of valuation, using law and governmental techniques. But this then poses a question of the relationship between the neoliberal state and the market that it endorses and enforces: is the state (...) internal or external to the market order that it helps to construct? European Union state aid rules provide an empirical entry point to consider such questions, providing a combination of normative, technical and sovereign principles, via which the division between state and market can be justified, tested and enacted. The article identifies three separate though overlapping logics within state aid documents, each of which offers the state a justification for suspending the competitive market order: exemptions, in which non-market values are upheld, externalities, in which markets are shown to be technically inefficient, and exceptions – such as the 2008 financial crisis – in which the state abandons the market to save the market. (shrink)

Recent discussions of experimental tests of the Sum Rule have been carried out in the context of the special circumstances attending the Cross-Ramsey experiment. A more general analysis of possible tests is presented. A technical mistake of Fine and Glymour concerned with a misunderstanding of the physics of the Cross-Ramsey experiment is explained and a detailed analysis of a thought experiment based on the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen wave function is given. It is concluded, in agreement with Fine, that scattering experiments do (...) not test the Sum Rule as a principle which supplements standard quantum mechanics. (shrink)

This article focuses on the location of the duty of loyalty—a unique legal norm in Common Law jurisdictions—both actual and desirable, on the continuum between rules and standards. A rule is a relatively ‘closed’ technical norm, at a high level of specificity; it requires little judicial discretion. A standard is an ‘open’ norm, with a greater degree of flexibility, that requires the exercise of discretion. The insights from this jurisprudential perspective are used to reveal the preferred way for (...) further developing the duty of loyalty. The article explains that ‘loyalty,’ intuitively classified as a ‘pure’ standard, has been reconstructed over time as more specific rules. Moreover, it suggests that, ideally, this movement should continue; namely, when applying loyalty to a specific case, courts should include informative content that would promote predictability. It then illustrates that, unfortunately, this road is not always taken by the courts. A decision to retain loyalty as an ad hoc standard, or an inverse attempt to delineate the boundaries of this norm, has implications on the certainty, consistency, and ethical content of the law. Considering that this duty spreads across different legal fields, personal and commercial, the significance of this discussion becomes all the more evident. (shrink)

The Babylonian Talmud, compiled from the 2nd to 7th centuries C.E., is the primary source for all subsequent Jewish laws. It is not written in apodeictic style, but rather as a discursive record of (real or imagined) legal (and other) arguments crossing a wide range of technical topics. Thus, it is not a simple matter to infer general methodological principles underlying the Talmudic approach to legal reasoning. Nevertheless, in this article, we propose a general principle that we believe helps (...) to explain the variety of methods used by the Rabbis of the Talmud for resolving uncertainty in matters of Jewish Law (henceforth: Halakhah). Such uncertainty might arise either if the facts of a case are clear but the relevant law is debatable or if the facts themselves are unclear. (shrink)

Five countries now permit organ donation after euthanasia, on the basis of respecting donor autonomy. Some now openly consider performing euthanasia itself via organ extraction to better preserve organ viability, albeit in violation of the dead donor rule. Proponents argue that respect for patient autonomy requires this option; the dead donor rule is inapplicable since it fulfills donors’ wishes. Other ethical arguments, not addressed herein, explore issues including dying at home, impact on clinicians, and societal faith in donation enterprise, but (...) these concerns are not insurmountable. This paper instead solely critiques proponents’ oversimplified understanding of autonomy with an autonomy‐based argument against any linkage of organ donation and euthanasia, regardless of its timing. Respect for patient autonomy does not unilaterally require fulfilling patients' every wish. Moreover, the very possibility of organ donation with euthanasia limits donor autonomy qualitatively and quantitatively substantially more than by offering it. In fact, organ donation after euthanasia violates the purpose of the dead donor rule, even if not its technicalities. (shrink)

The obligation to provide reasons may appear rather a simple and straightforward, but in actual practice—as the mutually antagonistic Weiss rulings of the CJEU and the German Bundesverfassungsgericht amply demonstrate—is fraught with constitutional complication. On the one side, there lies the concern with a deeply intrusive form of judicial review which substitutes judicially determined “good” reasons for those of the reviewee decisionmaker—legislatures, administrative agencies, or, as in Weiss, the European Central Bank. On the other side lies the concern with judicial (...) abdication in the face of technical expertise, uncertainty and complexity, turning the reason-giving requirement into a mere façade thereby placing democratic accountability in the modern administrative state beyond law’s remit. Either way, normatively and conceptually, we seem left with a half-way house only. Drawing on the recent US administrative law discourse—the neo-Fullerian concept of an “internal morality of law” and democratic experimentalism —this paper explores the concept of process review as tertium datur. Process review responds to concerns over the rule of law and administrative discretion through indirect, procedural safeguards, by imposing requirements of reasoned justification, rather than through wholesale invalidation or aggressive substantive review. (shrink)

A considerable literature exists regarding the moral obligation to keep one's promises. Several authors have focused on the exceptional circumstances which may or should excuse this moral duty. Less frequently discussed is the question of how this general moral obligation and its possible exceptions play out in the context of negotiable written promises to pay money, i.e., so-called "commercial paper." This paper focuses on the application of the legal rules governing commercial paper, and on the ethical implications involved in (...) the application of those rules. More specifically, it asks whether the assertion of the technical doctrine known as "holder in due course," and the denial of that status in some cases, promotes ethical behavior in the marketplace. By examining the circumstances of one case, involving a substantial investment and a large bank, I hope to shed some light on how the legal and ethical rules do in fact "intersect.". (shrink)

The topic of asymmetry between the semantic and the phono-morphological levels of language emerges very early in Indian technical and speculative reflections as it also does in pre-socratic Greek thought. A well established relation between words and the objects they denote seems to have been presupposed for each analysis of the signification long before its earliest statement. The present paper aims at shedding light on two different patterns of tackling the mentioned problem. The first approach sees asymmetry as an (...) exception to the regular correspondence between language and reality, whereas the second approach considers language in itself as a conceptualisation which does not faithfully represent reality. In the latter case, asymmetry is no longer an exception, but the rule. (shrink)

Several recent formulations of Rule Consequentialism (RC) have broken with the consensus that RC should be formulated in terms of codeacceptance, claiming instead that RC should focus on the consequences of codes' beingtaught. I begin this article with an examination of the standard case for acceptance formulations. In addition to depending on the mistaken assumption thatcomplianceandacceptanceformulations are the only options, the standard case claims advantages for acceptance formulations that, upon closer examination, favor teaching formulations. In the remainder of the article, (...) I defend this new teaching-centered approach against some recent criticisms. I argue that preoccupation with the somewhat technical problem of identifying the best criterion for making choices under conditions of uncertainty has distracted rule consequentialists from paying more careful attention to the advantages and disadvantages that result from decisions concerning where they locate RC's stipulated assumptions within the theory. (shrink)

Rarely do we come across a book that has the force and cogency to provoke us to reevaluate the most fundamental tenets of psychoanalysis. One of the most brilliant psychoanalytic scholars of our time, M. Guy Thompson revolutionizes our understanding of the axiomatic principles upon which psychoanalysis is based. Through a careful exegesis of Freud's texts, he persuasively shows how the fundamental rule of psychoanalysis is not merely a vehicle for free association but, more importantly, a pledge to honesty. Contextualized (...) in the subjective lived experience each analyst faces, Thompson demonstrates how Freud's technical mandates are nothing less than ethical imperatives by which to live, authentically. This fascinating exploration into the philosophical dimensions of psychoanalysis offers a compelling contribution to the clinical application of psychoanalytic doctrine that will be of interest to psychoanalytic practitioners of all persuasions. (Jon Mills). (shrink)

The text Jié tuō dào lùn, or Chinese translation of *Vimuttimagga mentions the Avīci Hell all of a sudden in the section on the cognitive process. The problematic phrase wújiān shēng Āpídìyù has been interpreted in different ways by several scholars. Japanese scholars tend to skip the phrase, or regard the term Āpídìyù as a typographic error. Given that we do not have an original text, however, the phrase needs to be understood as it is. In contrast, the English translation (...) interprets the term wújiān as a name of hell, and considers it as a synonym of Āpídìyù, namely the Avīci Hell. Even though the Chinese term wújiān itself is usually understood as the Avīci Hell, namely, Wújiāndìyù or Āpídìyù, of which the corresponding Pāli is Avīci-niraya, it is not the case here since a hell as such has nothing to do with the cognitive process. Assuming that the term Āpídìyù is not a typographic error, I propose to understand this problematic phrase as the simile in the sentence ‘seven mind-moments [immediately proceed just as one who has performed] the Five Sins is reborn into the Avīci Hell [as soon as he dies]’. The term wújiān meaning ‘no-gap’ in the cognitive process section conveys that there is not any intermission between the successive mind-moments. In Pāli perspectives, it implies that the successive mind-moments are in the proximity condition. The Jié tuō dào lùn was likely to use a metaphor in order to set a rule for governing the cognitive process rather than making a specific technical term. (shrink)

A considerable literature exists regard-ing the moral obligation to keep one's promises. Several authors have focused on the exceptional circumstances which may or should excuse this moral duty. Less frequently discussed is the question of how this general moral obligation and its possible exceptions play out in the context of negotiable written promises to pay money, i.e., so-called "commercial paper."This paper focuses on the application of the legal rules governing commercial paper, and on the ethical implications involved in the (...) application of those rules. More specifically, it asks whether the assertion of the technical doctrine known as "holder in due course," and the denial of that status in some cases, promotes ethical behavior in the marketplace. By examining the circumstances of one case, involving a substantial investment and a large bank, I hope to shed some light on how the legal and ethical rules do in fact "intersect.". (shrink)

Given the close relationship between the modern arms industry and the military, engineers and other professionals who work in the arms industry should be held accountable to the principles of just war theory. While they do not deploy weapons on the battlefield and are not in the military chain of command, technical professionals nonetheless have a moral duty to abide by principles of jus ad bellum and jus in bello. They are morally responsible both for choosing the companies that (...) employ them (and to whom these companies sell arms) and a well as what types of arms they develop. (shrink)

In this paper, author deals with Heidegger's account of the modern age as the epoch based on Western metaphysics. In the first part of the paper, he shows that, according to Heidegger, modern interpretation of the reality as the world picture, is essentially determined by Descartes' philosophy. Then, author exposes Heidegger's interpretation of the turn which already took place in Plato's metaphysics and which made possible Descartes' metaphysics and modern epoch. In the second part of the paper, author explores Heidegger's (...) interpretation of science and technology as shoots of very metaphysics. Heidegger emphasizes that the essence of technology corresponds to the essence of subjectivity and shows how the metaphysics of subjectivity subsequently finds its end in Nietzsche's metaphysics of the will to power, as the last word of Western philosophy. In the concluding part, author argues that the contemporary processes of globalization can be just understood as processes of completion of metaphysics. They can be identified as a global rule of the essence of technology. On the basis of Heidegger's vision of overcoming metaphysics, author concludes that it opens the possibility of a philosophy of finitude which points to dialogue with the Other as a way of resolving the key practical issues of the contemporary world. U ovom clanku autor se bavi Hajdegerovim shvatanjem moderne kao epohe zasnovane na zapadnjackoj metafizici. U prvom delu rada, autor pokazuje da je, prema Hajdegeru, novovekovno shvatanje stvarnosti kao slike sveta sustinski odredjeno Dekartovom filozofijom. Potom izlaze Hajdegerovu interpretaciju preokreta koji se vec dogodio u Platonovoj metafizici a koji je omogucio Dekartovo utemeljenje moderne filozofije i moderne epohe. U drugom delu rada, autor istrazuje Hajdegerovu interpretaciju nauke i tehnike kao izdanke same metafizike. Hajdeger pokazuje da sustina moderne tehnike odgovara sustini modernog subjekta i pokazuje kako se metafizika subjektivnosti konsekventno dovrsava u Niceovoj metafizici volje za moc, kao poslednjoj reci zapadnjacke filozofije. U poslednjem delu rada, autor ukazuje na to da se savremeni procesi globalizacije mogu razumeti upravo kao procesi dovrsavanja metafizike. Oni se mogu prepoznati kao planetarna vladavina sustine tehnike. Na osnovu Hajdegerovog vidjenja prevladavanja metafizike, autor zakljucuje da ono otvara mogucnost za jednu filozofiju konacnosti koja upucuje na dijalog sa Drugim kao nacin resavanja kljucnih prakticnih pitanja savremenosti. (shrink)

The implementation of transnational standards — in codes of conduct, certification, and monitoring initiatives — necessarily intertwines with domestic law and other types of rules. Yet much of the existing literature overlooks or obscures this fundamental point. Indeed, scholars often err either by treating private regulatory standards as transcendent or by viewing implementation as fundamentally a technical problem. This Article argues that understanding the operation of transnational private regulation requires attention to the layering of multiple rules in (...) a given location. It develops a framework for examining this layering and illustrates it by briefly looking at two major issues—community rights in sustainable forestry standards and freedom of association in fair labor standards — and their implementation in Indonesia. In various ways, these domains illustrate how conflict and complementarity between public and private standards structure the practice of private regulation. (shrink)

What is the likelihood of controlling technology by means of the law? In traditional societies, the law was deeply embedded in, and dependent on, culture (the totality of human creations for making sense of and living in the world). Industrialization required a complete restructuring of both technology and society, thus engulfing all traditions in a flood of new situations for which there were no precedents. This necessitated a growing reliance on reason at the expense of culture, thereby creating a rational (...) and technical order that evolved with less and less reference to sense (i.e. experience and culture). It is within this context that recent legal transformations must be understood as participating in an order of non-sense. This bodes ill for protecting and helping to ensure a livable, sustainable human future. (shrink)

We clarify the role of the Born rule in the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics by deriving it from Bohr's doctrine of classical concepts, translated into the following mathematical statement: a quantum system described by a noncommutative C*-algebra of observables is empirically accessible only through associated commutative C*-algebras. The Born probabilities emerge as the relative frequencies of outcomes in long runs of measurements on a quantum system; it is not necessary to adopt the frequency interpretation of single-case probabilities (which will (...) be the subject of a sequel paper). Our derivation of the Born rule uses ideas from a program begun by Finkelstein (1965) and Hartle (1968), intending to remove the Born rule as a separate postulate of quantum mechanics. Mathematically speaking, our approach refines previous elaborations of this program - notably the one due to Farhi, Goldstone, and Gutmann (1989) as completed by Van Wesep (2006) - in replacing infinite tensor products of Hilbert spaces by continuous fields of C*-algebras. In combination with our interpretational context, this technical improvement circumvents valid criticisms that earlier derivations of the Born rule have provoked, especially to the effect that such derivations were mathematically flawed as well as circular. Furthermore, instead of relying on the controversial eigenvector-eigenvalue link in quantum theory, our derivation just assumes that pure states in classical physics have the usual interpretation as truthmakers that assign sharp values to observables. (shrink)

The paper examines Kant’s self-criticism to the account of hypothetical imperatives given in the "Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals". Following his corrections in the introductions to the third "Critique", the paper traces the consequences of that change in his later writings, specifically with regard to the status of prudence. I argue that the revision of the account of hypothetical imperatives leads to differentiate, and ultimately separate, two functions in prudence: the setting of ends through maxims, and the pragmatic (...) class='Hi'>rules establishing means to reach those ends. Accordingly, I furthermore argue, there is ultimately no genuine structural distinction between the rules of prudence and skill. The only difference lies in the domain in which prudence unfolds, that is, the field of human relations, and in the relevant cognitions. (shrink)

In this paper we make some observations about Natural Deduction derivations [Prawitz, 1965, van Dalen, 1986, Bell and Machover, 1977]. We assume the reader is familiar with it and with proof-theory in general. Our development will be simple, even simple-minded, and concrete. However, it will also be evident that general ideas motivate our examples, and we think both our specific examples and the ideas behind them are interesting and may be useful to some readers. In a sentence, the bare (...) class='Hi'>technical content of this paper is: Extending natural deduction with global well-formedness conditions can neatly and cheaply capture classical and intermediate logics. The interest here is in the ‘neatly’ and ‘cheaply’. By ‘neatly’ we mean ‘preserving proof-normalisation’,1 and ‘maintaining the subformula property’, and by ‘cheaply’ we mean ‘preserving the formal structure of deductions’ (so that a deduction in the original system is still, formally, a deduction in the extended system, and in particular it requires no extra effort to write just because it is in the extended system). To illustrate what we have in mind consider intuitionistic first-order logic (FOL) [van Dalen, 1986] as a paradigmatic example of a formal notion of deduction. A natural deduction derivation (or deduction) is an inductively defined tree structure where each node contains an instance of a formula. A deduction is valid when each successive node follows from its predecessors in accordance with some predetermined inference rules. A particular attraction of Natural Deduction is its clean and economical presentation. Here for example are deduction (fragments) proving A ∧ B from A and B, and ∀x. (P (x) ∧ Q(x)) from ∀x. P (x) and ∀x. Q(x): ∀x. P (x) (∀E). (shrink)

Language sciences have long maintained a close and supposedly necessary coupling between the infinite productivity of the human language faculty and recursive grammars. Because of the formal equivalence between recursion and non-recursive iteration; recursion, in the technical sense, is never a necessary component of a generative grammar. Contrary to some assertions this equivalence extends to both center-embedded relative clauses and hierarchical parse trees. Inspection of language usage suggests that recursive rule components in fact contribute very little, and likely nothing (...) significant, to linguistic creativity. Further than this, if the productivity of human language is considered as not rigidly bound, but not infinite, then the need for any sort of iteration in generative grammars vanishes and can be replaced with a Non-iterative Explicit Alternatives Rule grammar. The knock-on effects of dispensing with recursive grammar components are: that language diversity can simply be based on rule and lexicon combinatorics with no potentially infinite dimensions derived from recursive or iterative components of rules; the oddity of a vast, multiply-infinite competence set of ‘grammatical but unacceptable’ productions is gone; and the development of a language faculty based on rules that eschew iterative rule components avoids any need for explaining ‘special’ mechanisms. On the broader front of searching for the mechanisms of mind, our analysis can be similarly applied to the proposals for a recursive basis for mind as an explanation for humanity’s great leap forward. (shrink)

The often-emphasized tension between the singularity of the patient and technical–scientific reproducibility in medicine cannot be resolved without a discussion of the epistemological and methodological status of the human sciences. On the one hand, the rules concerning human action are analogous to the scientific laws of nature. They are de facto sufficiently stable to allow predictions and explanations similar to those of experimental sciences. From this point of view, it is only a trivial truth, but still a methodological irrelevancy, (...) that the patient and the doctor–patient relationship represent an ontologically irreproducible reality. On the other hand, however, one can never exclude that one can fail in the application of "laws" of the human sciences to the individual patient, for such laws are by no means wholly separated from a patient's personal-hermeneutic mediation, and can at any time be revoked by becoming aware of them. This requires a synergistic collaboration of clinical and statistical methods, and shows a methodologically relevant sense in which one cannot disregard the singularity of the patient. The reason for the crucial role of the patient's singularity in medicine is every individual patient's capacity to revoke, in principle, routines and quasi-automatisms, even though the personal mediation by the patient's consciousness de facto changes them in such a small degree that predictions and explanations modeled in experimental science remain possible. (shrink)

The Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights enforces Section 504 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act. OCR works through complaint investigations and compliance reviews, as well as outreach, technical assistance, and public education to promote voluntary compliance. In the Olmstead decision of June 1999, the Supreme Court held that the ADA’s “integration regulation” requires state and local government to administer services, programs, and activities in the most integrated (...) setting appropriate to the needs of qualified individuals with disabilities. The decision changed the focus from whether a right to more integrated services exists, to under what circumstances and how services will be provided. The New Freedom Initiative announced by President Bush in February 2001 is a broadbased initiative to remove barriers to community living for people with disabilities and promote swift implementation of the Olmstead decision. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to philosophy and have not received professional training, but are engaged in professional ethics teaching university teachers teach to share my personal views of professional ethics. Basically, the professional ethics courses, each of us is being in the study. My idea is to敎good this course, we must first increase the individual's moral experience, and the introduction of the professional conduct of the consideration; Second, to strengthen their own for the professional in the most optimal (...) technology knowledge for professional societies code or the industry standard to be familiar with, discuss and reach a consensus, in addition, it should gradually increase their knowledge of the basic ethics. Among them, the benefits on to deontology, virtue theory by the obligation on the layers to turn into, should be more clearly identified, as well as any professional conduct, can be used to preserve, develop, free will, excellence and harmony criterion, training moral judgments, to implement in practice behavior. This is an essay on what university professors, not philosophically trained, should do when teaching professional ethics. Initially, they should employ ethical reflection toward their professional behavior. They should also familiarize themselves with optimal technical rules and professional ethical codes. Through these ethical values , they could then transform technical rules and codes of behavior into ethical rules. These rules could not be properly called ethical unless they brought these codes up to the level of ethical theory and ethical criteria. In this essay we will examine ethical theories such as utilitarianism , obligation ethics and virtue. We will then discuss five criteria derived from the theories: conservation, development, free will, excellence and harmony. In summation, we will refer them to concrete applications in professional ethics. (shrink)

The new scientific acquisitions are numerous and even more are their future promises. The debate on bio-technologies involves the fundamental rights of the individual and the advancements in research must merge with the supremacy of the human being on the interests both of the ‘science’ and of society at large. In the attempt to combine ‘democracy’ with techno-scientific issues, Law has turned from pure technical rules (meant to reflect, without any critique, some knowledge) into a tool meant to (...) fill cognitive gaps and its role is showing to be not only crucial, but also innovative for legal professionals themselves. (shrink)

This paper covers the home-made bombing used at the 2013 Boston Marathon annual races even though we knew before the trial began that the verdict will have to be 'guilty' because the people of Boston demanded that verdict and received the first lap of the verdict on 8 April 2015. Neither beautiful technical rulings nor breaches of prosecution disclosure rules nor metadata queries nor tampered evidence would have held sway at this trial.