Acculturation is the process through which an individual's cultural behaviors and values change via contact with a majority or host culture. Although some individuals accomplish acculturation smoothly, most experience psychological stress during the acculturation process. When psychologists encounter individuals struggling to acculturate, they are mandated by ethical guidelines and principles to help through several steps: (a) recognize their own biases, beliefs, and attitudes that may influence their work with the acculturating individual; (b) develop competence to work with individuals whose cultural (...) beliefs and practices differ from their own; (c) counsel the acculturating individual using scientifically supported techniques; and (d) intervene without discrimination or disrespect. Two case studies are presented to illustrate how psychologists can ethically and effectively encourage mentally healthy acculturation. Keywords: acculturation, ethics, cultural differences. (shrink)

This paper argues that if motivation by rightness de re is praiseworthy, then so is motivation by rightness de dicto. I argue that these two types of moral motivation have been unfairly compared, in light of a widespread failure to appreciate the structural similarities between them. These structural similarities become clear when we think more carefully about the nature of motivation and about moral metaphysics. I then argue that the two types of moral motivation are on a par by discussing (...) a series of minimal pairs. I argue that in good cases, in which the agent succeeds in doing what she is motivated to do, both motivations seem praiseworthy, and that bad cases, in which the agent fails, arise for motivation by rightness de re in precisely the same way as they do for motivation by rightness de dicto. I then offer a way to evaluate the unsuccessful agents, according to which someone's motivations can still be praiseworthy even if her actions and moral beliefs are both blameworthy, and someone can have certain praiseworthy motivations while lacking others. On my view, most of us are deeply flawed agents who nonetheless have some redeeming features—including our moral motivations. (shrink)

My thesis is that moral ignorance does not imply a failure to care adequately about what is in fact morally significant. I offer three cases: one in which someone is ignorant of the precise nature of what she cares about; one in which someone does not reflect on the significance of what she cares about in a particular set of circumstances, and one in which someone cares deeply about two morally significant considerations while being mistaken about their relative significance. I (...) argue that these agents all clearly care at least “adequately” about everything morally significant, including the very considerations that in fact make their acts wrong. This creates theoretical room for a way of thinking about culpable moral ignorance that respects the key concerns of those in the voluntarist tradition who have held that moral ignorance is typically blameless, within an approach to thinking about moral responsibility according to which we are blameworthy for that which manifests poor quality of will; caring adequately does not require moral omniscience, but motivated moral ignorance and moral ignorance that reflects indifference to things that matter morally are still blameworthy. My thesis also suggests a fruitful change of direction for quality-of-will theorists: we should articulate the nature and structure of the standards for adequate caring, i.e. those that specify what it is to care “adequately”. I close by offering an initial proposal as to what these standards might look like and identifying four promising avenues for further research on this topic. (shrink)

With most states now making sex offender registration information available to the public, journalists must balance their obligation to inform the public about potential dangers with respect for individuals' rights. This article examines the problems journalists face in truth telling and minimizing harm and offers suggestions for covering community notification. At minimum, we suggest journalists verify the accuracy of information received from police, make independent judgments about whether or not publication of sex offender registration information is warranted, and provide background (...) information on the scope and effectiveness of community notification in their areas. (shrink)

As we move our social institutions from paper and ink based operations to the electronic medium, we invisibly create a type of surveillance society, a panopticon society. It is not the traditional surveillance society in which government officials follow citizens around because they are concerned about threats to the political order. Instead it is piecemeal surveillance by public and private organizations. Piecemeal though it is, It creates the potential for the old kind of surveillance on an even grander scale. The (...) panopticon is the prison environment described by Foucault in which prison cells are arranged in a large circle with the side facing the inside of the circle open to view. The guard tower is placed in the middle of the circle so that guards can see everything that goes on in every cell. When we contemplate all the electronic data that is now gathered about each of us as we move through our everyday lives --- intelligent highway systems, consumer transactions, traffic patterns on the internet, medical records, financial records, and so on --- there seems little doubt that we are moving into a panopticon. The social issues that arise from this are too numerous to detail here, but data retention is an important part of it. In the paper-and-ink world, documents are filed, files are boxed, boxes are put away or thrown away. The capacity for data retrieval and manipulation is, thereby, limited by the sheer difficulty and cost of storing, finding, searching, and manipulating large numbers of paper files. This inconvenience functions as a mechanism whereby the system forgets past information, not unlike the way we ourselves forget. However, the story is very different in the digital world; digital information is easy to store, easy to search and manipulate, and inexpensive to keep over extensive periods of time. Digitalized information systems tend, therefore, to collect extensive ancillary information and to retain this information indefinitely. Such lack of forgetfulness is likely to hamper the ability of individuals to shed their past, and start over with a clean slate. Concerns about data retention were expressed in the early literature on the social impact of computing, but for the most part the issue has dropped from sight. Rarely, has the social good of discarding accumulated personal data been addressed. In this paper, we want to make the case by examining diverse cases in which retention of information by either business or governmental institutions hinders the ability of individuals to start over or to act autonomously. We hope our argument for the good of forgetfulness will challenge the standard framework in which such issues have traditionally been debated. The privacy debate exemplifies the traditional framework insofar as it has been characterized as involving an inherent tension between, on the one hand, the needs of organizations and institutions for more accurate and efficient information systems so as to further their goals and, on the other hand, the desire of individuals to have information about them kept private. Regan argues against this framing of the privacy issue in favor of one that recognizes the social importance of personal privacy. We will examine the non-forgetfulness of information systems as a problem threatening not just individual interests but social good as well. Cryptography is often cited as the technology that will give us privacy and mediate against surveillance. One of the uses of cryptography, encryption, will allow us, some hope, to create confidentiality and relationships of trust that will facilitate many of the social arrangements we now have and perhaps make them even more secure than they are now. Electronic cash, for example, could be created in such a form that it would have the anonymity associated now with hard cash Others are less optimistic of the potential for cryptography to re-create relationships of trust in the new medium. One important point that already seems clear is that even if encryption technology will protect the confidentiality and integrity of electronic transactions and data, it will NOT stop the observation of traffic patterns on networks. This seems an important distinction to put on the table. Our patterns of communication will continue to be available, no matter what is encrypted, and an amazing amount of information can be gleaned from this data. In a sense, it means content integrity but no anonymity. This will indubitably impact how we interact and with whom we interact. (shrink)

In this book, Bonnie Lander Johnson explores early modern ideas of chastity, demonstrating how crucial early Stuart thinking on chastity was to political, medical, theological and moral debates, and that it was also a virtue that governed the construction of different literary genres. Drawing on a range of materials, from prose to theatre, theological controversy to legal trials, and court ceremonies - including royal birthing rituals - Lander Johnson unearths previously unrecognised opinions about chastity. She reveals that early (...) Stuart theatrical and court ceremonies were part of the same political debate as prose pamphlets and religious sermons. The volume also offers new readings of Milton's Comus, Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, Henrietta Maria's queenship and John Ford's plays. It will appeal to scholars of early modern literature, theatre, political, medical and cultural history, and gender studies. (shrink)

The “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard of proof, currently used in criminal trials, is notoriously vague and undermotivated. This paper discusses two popular strategies for justifying our choice of a particular precise interpretation of the standard: the “ratio-to-standard strategy” identifies a desired ratio of trial outcomes and then argues that a certain standard is the one that we can expect to produce our desired ratio, while the “utilities-to-standard strategy” identifies utilities for trial outcomes and then argues that a certain standard (...) maximizes expected utility. I argue that both strategies fail on their own terms, by requiring us to perform calculations that we simply cannot perform. No version of either strategy can be performed by jurors or legislators in our actual epistemic position, in which, since we do not know which of the defendants in our trial system are genuinely innocent and which are genuinely guilty, we cannot determine the extent to which our trial system tends to produce evidence that misleadingly incriminates the innocent or misleadingly exonerates the guilty. But we would need to determine this in order to perform the calculations required by any possible version of the ratio-to-standard or utilities-to-standard strategies. I then suggest some empirical reasons to be pessimistic about the evidence produced by our actual trial system. The upshot is that the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard lacks a clear interpretation and rationale, nor do we have a promising way to identify an alternative. This is the trouble with standards of proof. (shrink)

John Rawls famously distinguishes between ideal and nonideal theory, according priority to the former. He depicts his own efforts to articulate the conception of justice as fairness as an instance of ideal theory. Subsequent political theorists have taken Rawls’s distinction as a template for how we should understand the tasks of political theory. Yet they also have struggled to clarify the underlying distinction with notable lack of success. We argue that Rawls himself does not abide by the distinction between ideal (...) and nonideal theory and that this affords a good reason to set the distinction aside as a distraction. (shrink)

From the New York Times-bestselling author of Where Good Ideas Come From and Everything Bad Is Good for You, a new look at the power and legacy of great ideas. In this illustrated volume, Steven Johnson explores the history of innovation over centuries, tracing facets of modern life (refrigeration, clocks, and eyeglass lenses, to name a few) from their creation by hobbyists, amateurs, and entrepreneurs to their unintended historical consequences. Filled with surprising stories of accidental genius and brilliant mistakes-from (...) the French publisher who invented the phonograph before Edison but forgot to include playback, to the Hollywood movie star who helped invent the technology behind Wi-Fi and Bluetooth-How We Got to Now investigates the secret history behind the everyday objects of contemporary life. In his trademark style, Johnson examines unexpected connections between seemingly unrelated fields: how the invention of air-conditioning enabled the largest migration of human beings in the history of the species-to cities such as Dubai or Phoenix, which would otherwise be virtually uninhabitable; how pendulum clocks helped trigger the industrial revolution; and how clean water made it possible to manufacture computer chips. Accompanied by a major six-part television series on PBS, How We Got to Now is the story of collaborative networks building the modern world, written in the provocative, informative, and engaging style that has earned Johnson fans around the globe. (shrink)

Buddhism-influenced essays, stories, and reviews by National Book Award winner Charles R. Johnson. This wide and varied collection of essays, reviews, and short stories by the renowned author Charles Johnson offers incisive views on politics, race, and Buddhism. Johnson notes that in his life the two activities that have anchored him and reinforce each other are creative production and spiritual practice. This book is a crystallization of what he has learned during his passage through American literature, the (...) visual arts, and the Buddha dharma. Essays include: "And if Peace Is Their Goal" on the principles of enlightened politics, "The King We Need" on the deep and sophisticated moral philosophy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and why King's teachings and example are important to all Americans, "Why Buddhists Should Vote"--Johnson posits that voting can be seen as a way to reduce suffering, "The Meaning of Barack Obama"--an appreciation of the man who became one of the most historic US presidents, even before his first 100 days were through, "Why Buddhism for Black America Now?"--what Buddhism can offer the African-American community in the post-MLK era. (shrink)

Knowledge of the law and its impact on health outcomes is increasingly important in public health practice. The CDC's Public Health Law Academy helps satisfy this need by providing online trainings, facilitator toolkits, and legal epidemiology tools to aid practitioners in learning about the law's role in promoting public health.

Seth MacFarlane’s space adventure, The Orville, is not “Family Guy in Space.” It is a social commentary of the most direct and compelling sort. Through satire, humor, and symbolism, The Orville explores the potential dangers of religion. It does so in individual episodes, such as “If the Stars Should Appear” and “Mad Idolatry,” as well as through the series as a whole in its depiction of how the Union resolves its political differences with the Krill and the Moclans. In this (...) chapter, we will look at how The Orville criticizes religion, both generally and specifically. We will see that while it is not a condemnation of all religious believers, it is a critique of religion itself, suggesting that it can become dangerous when it merges religious dogma with political power. (shrink)

We often describe actions as good, bad, right, wrong, fair, unkind, deserved, disrespectful, a bit much, and so on. This article asks: Do these terms describe facts about our actions? And do those facts tell us to perform certain actions and refrain from performing others? If so, what exactly does that mean? And, if not, what are we doing when we describe actions in these various ways?

Some philosophers think that if someone acts wrongly while falsely believing that her act is permissible, this moral mistake cannot excuse her wrongdoing. And some think that this is because it is morally blameworthy to fail to appreciate the moral significance of non‐moral facts of which one is aware, such that mistakenly believing that one's act is permissible when it is in fact wrong is itself morally blameworthy. Here I challenge the view that it is blameworthy to fail to appreciate (...) the moral significance of non‐moral facts of which one is aware. This view seems okay if we focus on examples of people mistakenly believing that their wrongful acts are permissible. But it is not remotely plausible when we consider other varieties of moral mistake – such as believing that one's action is required when it is in fact supererogatory, believing that one's action is wrong when it is in fact permissible, and believing false things about the moral properties of others’ actions and of merely possible actions. The upshot is that those who maintain that moral mistakes cannot excuse are sent back to the drawing board; we need a new explanation of why this would be the case. (shrink)

This chapter reflects on some of the major themes of this volume, as it takes up the question: is truth a value in political discourse? As a preliminary step, we evaluate a view of political discourse that answers this question negatively: the identity-expression view. According to this view, political claims function to express commitments central to an individual’s political self-conceptions, rather than to state truths in the political domain. While we often assess political claims as true or false, the identity-expression (...) view maintains that such assessments are nothing more than our way of affirming or rejecting such claims—assessments of truth in politics are themselves only ways of expressing the political identity of the assessor. We explore the implications of the identity-expression view for the analysis of political disagreement and argue that, while some political disagreements may be best modeled this way, it is not clear that all of them are: at least sometimes, political disagreements are clearly responsive to the exchange of truth-apt reasons. Indeed, the structure of political disagreements (and some cases of polarization) suggest that truth continues to play an important aspirational role in many political exchanges. This leads us to embrace a pluralist picture of the function of political discourse: political discourse performs multiple functions, including reaching political decisions based on a public exchange of truth-apt reasons, and motivating political action via expressions of identity-forming political commitments. We also draw some broader implications of this pluralist position about the function of political discourse for theories of truth. This includes deflationist approaches to truth making a good fit for expressive uses of political claims in disagreement in attitude, whereas substantive theories of truth appear better suited to explain factual political disagreements. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to determine after a one year program, the effects of Philosophy for Children on critical thinking skills of a select group of 22 second graders at Saginaw Elementary. These students have had no previous study in Philosophy for Children and met for 170 days, bi-weekly for at least 30-minutes with no more than three sessions missed. It was anticipated there would be a significant positive difference of critical thinking skills of second graders as observed (...) and noted by the teacher, in a recorded journal, prior, during and after the study. The teacher used Rebecca plus the teacher's manual for the basis of instruction. (shrink)