El interés por la investigación de los miedos en la infancia y la adolescencia ha adquirido una importancia creciente en las últimas décadas por tratarse de fenómenos muy frecuentes, asociados al desarrollo infantojuvenil, que pueden perturbar significativamente sus vidas provocándoles sufrimiento y siendo la causa de serios trastornos futuros.

In this article, we defend two claims about the precautionary principle. The first is that there is no ‘core’ precautionary principle that unifies all its different versions. It is more plausible to think of the different versions as being related to each other by way of family resemblances. So although precautionary principle x may have much in common with precautionary principle y, and y with z, there is no set of necessary and sufficient conditions that unify all versions of the (...) principle. Our second claim is that it is sometimes appropriate to think of the precautionary principle as a midlevel principle in the sense proposed by Beauchamp and Childress in their Principles of Biomedical Ethics, i.e. as a non-rigid moral principle. We argue that if the precautionary principle is conceived as a non-rigid principle that needs to be balanced against other principles before a moral verdict can be reached, then this enables us to address some standard objections to the principle. (shrink)

The precautionary principle is frequently invoked in environmental law and policy, and the debate around the principle indicates that there is little agreement on what 'taking precautions' means. The purpose of the present paper is to provide an improved conceptual foundation for this debate in the form of an explication of the concept of precaution. Distinctions between precaution and two related concepts, prevention and pessimism, are briefly discussed. The concept of precaution is analysed in terms of precautionary actions. It is (...) argued that precautionary actions are implicitly assumed to be precautionary with respect to something, and that this assumption should be made explicit. A definition of a precautionary action involving three necessary and jointly sufficient conditions (intentionality, uncertainty and reasonableness) is proposed, and the implications of this analysis for the debate on the precautionary principle are discussed. (shrink)

Anthropocentrism—the idea that humans are the most important beings there are—comes in many guises. One version of anthropocentrism states that only humans have full moral status. Those who argue for such a position (beyond merely assuming it) usually refer to some trait that confers moral status and that only humans have. Suggestions include linguistic ability, self-awareness or rationality. However, regardless of what trait one picks it will not track the line between Homo sapiens and other species. You will always be (...) able to find some non-human animal that possesses the trait to a greater degree than some human does— even potentially. Koplin and Wilkinson1 adopt a broadly sentientist position: moral status is conferred by some mental or cognitive function. They discuss two sources of moral uncertainty related to this. In cases of moral uncertainty of the first type, it is uncertain whether Property X confers (full) moral status. In cases of uncertainty of the second type, we assume it to be true that moral status is conferred by X, but it is uncertain whether a particular entity (such as a pig) possesses the property. There are reasons to believe …. (shrink)

The ethics of corporate crisis management is a seriously underdeveloped field. Among recent proposals in the area, two contributions stand out: Seeger and Ulmer’s (2001) virtue ethics approach to crisis management ethics and Simola’s (2003) ethics of care. In the first part of the paper, I argue that both contributions are problematic: Seeger and Ulmer focus on top management and propose virtues that lack substance and are in need of further development. Simola’s proposal is also fraught with difficulty, since it (...) seems to conceive of ethics of care as a course of action that can be chosen in a crisis, something which runs contrary to the idea of caring. In the second part of the paper, I argue that Simola and Seeger and Ulmer are nevertheless on the right track, and I propose some directions for further development of the ethics of corporate crisis management. I argue that the value of codes of conduct is limited. Furthermore, I propose a way of identifying relevant virtues for corporate crisis management and discuss a problem that is prevalent in crisis management ethics (the temptation of ad hoc utilitarianism). (shrink)

This paper discusses the application of the supreme emergency doctrine from just-war theory to non-antagonistic threats. Two versions of the doctrine are considered: Michael Walzer’s communitarian version and Brian Orend’s prudential one. I investigate first whether the doctrines are applicable to non-antagonistic threats, and second whether they are defensible. I argue that a version of Walzer’s doctrine seems to be applicable to non-antagonistic threats, but that it is very doubtful whether the doctrine is defensible. I also argue that Orend’s version (...) of the doctrine is applicable to non-antagonistic threats, but that his account is not defensible, regardless of whether the threats are antagonistic or not. (shrink)

The precautionary principle is frequently referred to in various momentous decisions affecting human health and the environment. It has been invoked in contexts as diverse as chemicals regulation, regulation of genetically modified organisms, and research into life-extending therapies. Precaution is not an unknown concept in medical contexts. One author even cites the Hippocratic Oath as a parallel to the precautionary principle.

The philosophical method of conceptual analysis has been criticised on the grounds that empirical psychological research has cast severe doubt on whether concepts exist in the form traditionally assumed, and that conceptual analysis therefore is doomed. This objection may be termed the Charge from Psychology. After a brief characterisation of conceptual analysis, I discuss the Charge from Psychology and argue that it is misdirected.

The purpose of the present thesis is to apply philosophical methods to the ongoing debate of the precautionary principle, in order to illuminate this debate. The thesis consists of an Introduction and five papers. Paper I con-cerns an objection to the method of conceptual analysis, the Charge from Psychology. After a brief characterisation of conceptual analysis, I argue that the Charge from Psychology is misdirected. In Paper II, the method of conceptual analysis is applied to the concept of precaution which (...) is ana-lysed in terms of precautionary actions. The purpose is explicatory. A definition involving three necessary and jointly sufficient conditions is proposed, and the implications of this analysis for the debate on the pre-cautionary principle are discussed. Paper III attempts to provide an ana-lytical apparatus which may be used for finding improved formulations of the precautionary principle. The approach is lexicographical. Several exist-ing and possible formulations of the precautionary principle are examined, and four common elements and a common structure of the precautionary principle are identified. It is suggested that the analytical apparatus pre-sented can be used in negotiations of the precautionary principle. Paper IV questions the soundness of some arguments against the precautionary prin-ciple. Five common arguments are discussed and rejected. In Paper V, two of these arguments are further discussed. I argue that an attempt at rejec-tion of the precautionary principle delivered by John Harris and Søren Holm is unwarranted, because their arguments against it are based on in-terpretations of the precautionary principle that ignore context. Paper VI deals with the idea of de minimis risk. After a discussion of the distinction between disregarding a risk and accepting it, I examine one way of deter-mining how small a risk ought to be in order to be disregarded, namely the use of natural risk levels as benchmarks. I argue that this approach fails, even if the distinction between what is natural and what is not natural can be upheld. (shrink)

The ethics of firefighting is a seriously underexplored field. This is unfortunate, since firefighting raises issues of great social importance and has the potential to inform moral theorizing. In the first part of this paper, I explore possible reasons why firefighting ethics has received so little academic attention and argue that it warrants study in its own right. I do so primarily by comparing firefighting ethics to medical ethics, demonstrating their close relationship yet pointing out important differences: firefighting is less (...) professionalized than medicine, the caregiver-patient relationship is not central in firefighting, firefighters need to concern themselves with other values than life and limb, they face greater and qualitatively different risks than medical personnel, and they have to make almost every operative decision under conditions of temporal stress. In the second part of the paper, I argue that some elements from medical ethics may be adapted for use in firefighting ethics. I illustrate this by applying four mid-level principles from mainstream medical ethics to firefighting – the principles of autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence, and justice. I argue that they are indeed applicable in firefighting ethics, but that they need modification and their relative weight is different. Respect for autonomy is of limited importance in firefighting. Non-maleficence is important, and beneficence is central. The special principle of beneficence for firefighters is best thought of as grounded in firefighters’ contractual obligations rather than in a general principle that one should help someone in peril. As regards the principle of justice, there is a case for applying a utilitarian principle of justice on the operative level and a principle of a decent minimum aid on the policy level. The latter can be brought about by comparatively simple and low-cost means, such as a volunteer fire service and subsidized fire equipment. (shrink)

In many voting systems, voters’ preferences on a set of candidates are represented by linear orderings. In this context, scoring rules are well-known procedures to aggregate the preferences of the voters. Under these rules, each candidate obtains a fixed number of points, sk\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$s_k$$\end{document}, each time he/she is ranked k\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$k$$\end{document}th by one voter and the candidates are ordered according to the total number of (...) points they receive. In order to identify the best scoring rule to use in each situation, we need to know which properties are met by each of these procedures. Although some properties have been analyzed extensively, there are other properties that have not been studied for all scoring rules. In this paper, we consider two desirable social choice properties, the Pareto-optimality and the immunity to the absolute loser paradox, and establish characterizations of the scoring rules that satisfy each of these specific axioms. Moreover, we also provide a proof of a result given by Saari and Barney, where the scoring rules meeting reversal symmetry are characterized. From the results of characterization, we establish some relationships among these properties. Finally, we give a characterization of the scoring rules satisfying the three properties. (shrink)

Citizen science (CS) is an umbrella term for research with a significant amount of contributions from volunteers. Those volunteers can occupy a hybrid role, being both ‘researcher’ and ‘subject’ at the same time. This has repercussions for questions about responsibility and credit, e.g. pertaining to the issue of authorship. In this paper, we first review some existing guidelines for authorship and their applicability to CS. Second, we assess the claim that the guidelines from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (...) (ICMJE), known as ‘the Vancouver guidelines’, may lead to exclusion of deserving citizen scientists as authors. We maintain that the idea of including citizen scientists as authors is supported by at least two arguments: transparency and fairness. Third, we argue that it might be plausible to include groups as authors in CS. Fourth and finally, we offer a heuristic list of seven recommendations to be considered when deciding about whom to include as an author of a CS publication. (shrink)

We study envy-free allocations in a many-to-many matching model with contracts in which agents on one side of the market (doctors) are endowed with substitutable choice functions and agents on the other side of the market (hospitals) are endowed with responsive preferences. Envy-freeness is a weakening of stability that allows blocking contracts involving a hospital with a vacant position and a doctor that does not envy any of the doctors that the hospital currently employs. We show that the set of (...) envy-free allocations has a lattice structure. Furthermore, we define a Tarski operator on this lattice and use it to model a vacancy chain dynamic process by which, starting from any envy-free allocation, a stable one is reached. (shrink)

Contracts play an important role in business management where relationships among different parties are dictated by legal rules. Electronic contracts have emerged mostly due to technological advances and electronic trading between companies and customers. New challenges have then arisen to guarantee reliability among the stakeholders in electronic negotiations. In this scenario, automatic verification of electronic contracts appeared as an imperative support, specially the conflict detection task of multi-party contracts. The problem of checking contracts has been largely addressed in the literature, (...) but there are few, if any, methods and practical tools that can deal with multi-party contracts using a contract language with deontic and dynamic aspects as well as relativizations, over the same formalism. In this work we present an automatic checker for finding conflicts on multi-party contracts modeled by an extended contract language with deontic operators and relativizations. Moreover a well-known case study of sales contract is modeled and automatically verified by our tool. Further, we performed practical experiments in order to evaluate the efficiency of our method and the practical tool. (shrink)

A country‘s development is bound to be influenced by external occurrences. This article analyses two astronomical examples in which Portuguese nationals used high visibility events in the international scientific community to press their own scientific interests upon the government, whether these interests were, or were not, directly linked to the events themselves.During the 1840s and 1850s the parallax, i.e. the distance, of Groombridge’s star 1830 was hotly debated. The astronomer Hervé Faye‘s suggestion at the Académie des Sciences de Paris that (...) observations be made in Lisbon due to its privileged location and the inadequacy of the Lisbon Navy Observatory to perform them rekindled the efforts to improve the Portuguese Navy observatory.In the 1850s and 1860s other Portuguese higher education institutions also wanted to upgrade their facilities or build new ones. Following accepted traditions, scientific field trips were considered a useful part of the acquisition planning for larger instruments, and therefore an important part of regeneration and renewal projects. The Portuguese scientists were, however, limited in their travels by government imposed budget constraints. The total solar eclipse of 18 July 1860 provided an extra argument to send Portuguese scientists abroad. The government support of the eclipse expedition led to an opportunity to travel through other countries and view their observatories and equipment.In the end, neither the Navy astronomers nor those from the Coimbra Astronomical observatory, the other significant site of Portuguese astronomical research, managed to fulfil their objectives, but the contacts initiated by some of the Portuguese travellers were important for the development of the Portuguese national Meteorological and Magnetic Observatories. (shrink)

Food is sometimes labeled as ‘100% natural’ or as containing ‘all natural ingredients’. There is however controversy on how to justify, design and implement such labelling. This paper argues that since naturalness is not one single concept, but several ones, and those concepts typically allow degrees, so that things can be more or less natural, thus, this complexity should be reflected in labelling of foods. There is no obvious way of presenting an aggregate measure of a particular food item’s naturalness, (...) and therefore a graphical representation that contains several axes, with the degree of naturalness represented on each axis, is considered. Such a mode of representation might however be too complex to be practical, and a possible compromise would be to settle for a small number of labels that represent some common combinations of degrees of naturalness along the axes. (shrink)

In risk management, de minimis risk is the idea that risks that are sufficiently small, in terms of probabilities, ought to be disregarded. In the context of the distinction between disregarding a risk and accepting it, this paper examines one suggested way of determining how small risks ought to be disregarded, specifically, the natural-occurrence view of de minimis, which has been proposed by Alvin M. Weinberg, among others. It is based on the idea that “natural” background levels of risk should (...) be used as benchmarks and de minimis levels should be derived from those levels. This approach fails even if the doubtful distinction between what is natural and what is not can be upheld. (shrink)

The symmetrical inter-displacements of corresponding blocks of text between strophes and antistrophes in lyrical odes, earlier proposed for A. Supp. 88–90 ∼ 93–95, 872–75 ∼ 882–84, and 906–7 ∼ 909–10, have affected all parts sung or spoken by the Egyptian herald in the amoibaion in Supp. 843–910. An ancestral text similar to a modern musical score, in which the corresponding lines of strophe and antistrophe run parallel with musical notation, could explain this type of corruption. Such a hypothetical ancestor in (...) the textual tradition would also explain apparent interpolations in Supp. 852 and 865 from 842 and 843. The corruptions may have arisen very early in the tradition, the hypothetical textual arrangement possibly being that of the author himself. (shrink)

Evaluation of other cultures is a strong force in a culture’s definition of itself. Cultures are formed in encounters that include domination, conflict, and dismissal as much as appreciation and smooth exchange. In this paper, the construction of cultural identity is discussed, with reference to a Scandinavian Theme Park proposal made in cooperation between American design consultants and a local Swedish team of planners and visionaries. The image production in this design proposal, which never came to be realised in architectural (...) production, shows that “Scandinavia” appears as a two-some dialogic construction that adopts stereotyped cultural identities, and that it was not brought to any wider public dialogue. In a semiotic account of this architectural decision-making, models of culture (Lotman. 1990.Universe of the mind: A semiotic theory of culture. London: Tauris.) are discussed in terms of the tripartition of culture into Ego-culture, Alter-culture and Alius-culture (Sonesson. 2000. Ego meets alter: The meaning of otherness in cultural semiotics.Semiotica128(3/4). 537–559.; Cabak Rédei, Anna. 2007.An inquiry into cultural semiotics: Germaine de Staël’s autobiographical travel accounts. Lund: Lund University Press.), considered as a basic abstracted backdrop of what is meant by cultural difference. In this paper it is suggested that this tripartite view on culture, can be further discussed in reflection of post-colonial studies, notably through terms such as “mimicry” (Bhabha. 1984. Of mimicry and man: The ambivalence of colonial discourse.October28. 125–133.) and “subalterity” (Spivak. 1988. Can the subaltern speak?. In Cary Nelson & Lawrence Grossberg (eds.),Marxism and the interpretation of culture, 271–313. Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press.). The model of culture can furthermore be discussed through Peirce’s distinction between different stages and carriers of representation, adding to the cultural model an understanding of what it means, over time, for a culture to relate to an admired as well as to a neglected other cultural actor. (shrink)

«La victoria del darwinismo ha sido tan completa que es un shock darse cuenta de cuan vacía es realmente la visión darwiniana de la vida». Esta rotunda frase no parece significar solamente la manifestación de una opinión personal. Pertenece a un editorial publicado en Nature y fïrmado por Henry Gee, uno de sus comentaristas sobre evolución. El motivo de que una revista científica de las más prestigiosas (que se pueden considerar como las mantenedoras de la ortodoxia), haga suyo ese comentario (...) es que las investigaciones más recientes (especialmente en el campo de la embriogénesis) han revelado unos fenómenos que han puesto de manifiesto su absoluta incompatibilidad con la teoría darwinista de la evolución. Las consecuencias de esto son obvias, y las precisa otro editorialista de Nature, Philip Ball, en un comentario sobre la secuenciación del Genoma humano: «Los biólogos van a tener que construir una nueva Biología». Tenemos por delante un duro y largo trabajo científico por realizar, pero también tenemos una tarea previa: depurar la Biología de la, tan arraigada, terminología darwinista, cargada de conceptos y prejuicios deformadores de los fenómenos biológicos. (shrink)

The philosophers of the Vienna circle once made quite a stir by proposing to show not merely that certain metaphysical propositions were false, but that metaphysical propositions as such were meaningless, except for a possible emotive or poetic significance. The manifesto of the group, the Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung der Wiener Kreis, published in 1929, had it that the task of the adherent of the scientific world–outlook was “to clear out of the way the metaphysical and theological debris of the centuries.” A (...) non–metaphysical view of the nature of philosophy was subsequently propounded by the members of the circle in such essays as Schlick’s “Die Wende der Philosophie,” published in the first number of Erkenntnis in 1930, Carnap’s “Die alte und die neue Logik,” also published in the first issue of Erkenntnis, and his “Überwindung der Metaphysik durch logische Analyse der Sprach,” published in Erkenntnis in 1931. Ayer picked up the theme in his “Demonstration of the Impossibility of Metaphysics,” published in Mind in 1934, and in his Language, Truth, and Logic, published in 1935. Such radical interpretations of the nature of traditional metaphysics were highly provocative in philosophical circles for a decade. (shrink)

It is commonly believed that people become selfish and turn to looting, price gouging, and other immoral behaviour in emergencies. This has been the basis for an argument justifying extraordinary measures in emergencies. It states that if emergencies are not curtailed, breakdown of moral norms threaten (‘the moral black hole’). Using the example of natural disasters, we argue that the validity of this argument in non-antagonistic situations, i.e. situations other than war and armed conflict, is highly questionable. Available evidence suggests (...) that people in such emergencies typically do not display panic reactions or exaggerated selfishness, and that phenomena such as looting and price gouging are rare. Furthermore, a version of the moral-black-hole argument based on the mere possibility of a moral black hole occurring runs into problems similar to those of Pascal’s Wager. We conclude that we should be wary against applying the moral-black-hole argument to non-antagonistic cases. (shrink)

In order to responsibly protect certain cherished values, for instance, human or environmental health, privacy, or ‘human dignity’, societies see a need for oversight, guidance and regulation of de...

In terms of output in the form of published work and attraction of resources, bioethics seems to be a more vibrant field than environmental ethics. In this commentary it is argued that bioethics is, in some respect, less humanistic than environmental ethics and that two factors––bioethics’ strong connection to a profession, and its access to an intellectual ‘killer app’––offer ways in which environmental ethicists might learn from the ‘success story’ of bioethics.

Technology, in particular large-scale applications of it, offers enormous benefits. However, it also poses considerable, sometimes potentially catastrophic risks. For complex technical systems, the risks are not always reliably predictable.

The most common argument against child pornography is that children are harmed in the process of producing it. This is the argument from abusive production. However, it does not apply to ‘virtual’ child pornography, i.e. child pornography produced using computer technology without involving real children. Autilitarian who wishes to condemn virtual child pornography cannot appeal to the argument from abusive production. I discuss three possible ways out of this: abandoning the intuition that virtual child pornography is wrong, abandoning utilitarianism, or (...) circumventing the problem. I propose a version of the third way out. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework that will help in understanding and evaluating, along social and ethical lines, the issue of killing day-old male chicks and two alternative directions of responsible innovations to solve this issue. The following research questions are addressed: Why is the killing of day-old chicks morally problematic? Are the proposed alternatives morally sound? To what extent do the alternatives lead to responsible innovation? The conceptual framework demonstrates clearly that there is a (...) moral “lock-in”, and why the killing of day-old chicks is indeed an issue. Furthermore, it is shown that both alternative directions address some important objections with regard to the killing of day-old chicks, but that they also raise new dilemmas. It also becomes clear that the framework enables and secures anticipation, reflection, deliberation with and responsiveness to stakeholders, the four dimensions of responsible innovation, in a structured way. (shrink)

The problem we face today is that there is a huge gap between our ethical judgments about the ecological crisis on the one hand and our ethical behavior according to these judgments on the other. In this article, we ask to what extent a phenomenology of the ecological crisis enables us to bridge this gap and display more ethical or pro-environmental behavior. To answer this question, our point of departure is the affordance theory of the American psychologist and founding father (...) of ecological psychology, James Gibson. There are two reasons for taking this approach. First of all, an ontological reading of Gibson’s affordance theory provides a concept of nature which is non-dualistic, non-anthropocentric and eco-centric, but is not seen as an ‘intrinsic value’ or product of ‘human valuation’. Secondly, the affordance ontology provides us with a concept of nature which in itself calls for certain action and behavior. If we indeed face a gap between ethical judgment and ethical behavior with regard to the current ecological crisis, an affordance of nature could bridge this gap. Based on our ontological reading of Gibson’s affordance theory, we open a radically new perspective on the current ecological crisis and the responsibility of mankind with regard to this crisis. (shrink)