In addition to the aim of mapping and sequencing one human's genome, the Human Genome Project also intends to characterise the genetic diversity of the world's peoples. The Human Genome Diversity Project raises political, economic and ethical issues. These intersect clearly when the genomes under study are those of indigenous peoples who are already subject to serious economic, legal and/or social disadvantage and discrimination. The fact that some individuals associated with the project have made dismissive comments about indigenous peoples has (...) confused rather than illuminated the deeper issues involved, as well as causing much antagonism among indigenous peoples. There are more serious ethical issues raised by the project for all geneticists, including those who are sympathetic to the problems of indigenous peoples. With particular attention to the history and attitudes of Australian indigenous peoples, we argue that the Human Genome Diversity Project can only proceed if those who further its objectives simultaneously: respect the cultural beliefs of indigenous peoples; publicly support the efforts of indigenous peoples to achieve respect and equality; express respect by a rigorous understanding of the meaning of equitable negotiation of consent, and ensure that both immediate and long term economic benefits from the research flow back to the groups taking part. (shrink)

In the short essay on theory and practice, Kant declares that the social contract differs from all other types of contracts in that agreement to its is obligatory and may be exacted through the use of force. In this paper, I examine Kant's justification of the moral necessity of civil society. Kant locates the ground of our obligation to enter into a civil union in the necessity of property for action and civil society as the necessary condition of the institution (...) of property. It is my contention that the idea of the social contract is central to this project in that it joins together both moral autonomy and political authority in a conceptual unity that establishes the legitimacy of civil society, or the juridical condition as the collective dimension of autonomy. (shrink)

Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a legal icon. In more than four decades as a lawyer, professor, appellate judge, and Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court, Ginsburg influenced the law and society in real and permanent ways. This book chronicles and evaluates the remarkable achievements Ruth Bader Ginsburg made over the last half-century. Including chapters written by prominent court-watchers and leading scholars from law, political science, and history, the book offers diverse perspectives on an array of doctrinal areas and different (...) periods in Ginsburg's career. Together, these perspectives document the impressive legacy of one of the most important figures in modern law. This updated second edition features a new foreword from Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer and a new introduction from the editor Scott Dodson. (shrink)

The eradication of fatness (referred to as “obesity”) is a longtime project of the medical establishment under the guise of health promotion. However, in spite of the large budgets, amount of studies done, and number of interventions tried over the years, the weights of the population still seem to be trending upward. Recent studies and research have been looking into frameworks aimed at combating fatness by reshaping the “obesogenic” environment as an approach that takes into account the social and physical (...) environment and its part in promoting fatness. On its face, this research direction looks as if the discourse is changing from seating the fault of fatness at the feet of the individual and placing it more into the social systems and factors surrounding them. In this paper, I will challenge the continued conversation around “solving” fatness by looking at the role of the environment as a causal factor and will instead highlight the need to focus more on the impacts of a fatphobic environment on the wellness of fat people. (shrink)

Knowledge of our own memory processes, whether driven by prior experiences or beliefs, is crucial in perceiving and interacting with our environment. This knowledge and awareness is metamemory, whi...

Kevin Murphy’s essay “Christians and the New Food Movement” (Autumn 2011) rightly warns about introducing non-Christian ideas associated with certain environmental movements into church practices. However, the essay embraces several errors that ultimately conflict with the Catholic faith. Catholic social doctrine, rooted in the universality of Christ’s salvific act, requires viewing food, agriculture, and the economy through a moral lens. A refusal to engage in such issues because they might bring the Church into contact with heterodoxy leads to a form (...) of protectionism that embraces a reductionist view of creation and, ultimately, the human person. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 12.2 (Summer 2012): 217–226. (shrink)

This essay examines the contested grounds of authorization for one important orientalist project in India during the nineteenth century scientificphilological practice. Indian Sanskrit scholars, however, rather than accepting such translations of the Veda, and the cultural characterizations they contained, instead engaged critically with them, reproducing a distinctive vision of Indian civilization through their own translations into English. Moreover, by examining the diverse ways in which key concepts, such as the of a translation, were negotiated by Europeans and Indians, this essay (...) also suggests that intellectual histories of the colonial encounter in South Asia should move beyond debates about colonial knowledge to more explicitly examine the contexts of knowledgeable practices. (shrink)

A coordinate-free formulation is established for (semi) classical particle-field interactions. The exterior language of spacetime chains and De-Rham currents enables the description to include extended strings and membranes besides point particles. Treating physical fields in terms of sections of particular bundles, a unified account of interactions is presented in terms of an intrinsic action principle on a bundle of jets over spacetime. The theory is illustrated by considering the specific model of point particles with intrinsic spin covariantly coupled to theU(1) (...) andSL(2, C) connections describing the electromagnetic and gravitational fields, respectively. The notion of dual spin is examined in this context and coupled equations for this particle-field system are explicitly derived in a local chart. Attention is drawn to the global implications of the theory. (shrink)

The topic of human free will has received more attention in the past several years due to the important discoveries of neuroscience but no consensus of opinion is evident in related disciplines. The traditional approach to understanding free will in philosophy employs conceptual analysis to determine whether humans have freedom of choice. Theology affirms that every person has free choice although God is somehow behind all human decisions. Evolutionary psychology points to human behavior as the product of biological processes and (...) antecedent events. And neuroethics attempts to define what it means to be a thinking moral agent by investigating how neurons in the brain and chemical interactions combine to produce conscious actions. An assessment and evaluation of these various positions is given in light of the evidence. The issue of whether a person can be held morally responsible for their actions hinges on whether those actions originate from free will or are the result of determinism. Theology makes assumptions of the existence of an absolute deity that has a hand in human decision making, but there is no agreement regarding the nature of that intervention. Recent scientific discoveries confront traditionally held religious beliefs and necessitate the creation of a new theology and articles of faith. (shrink)

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 have generated a number of responses by philosophers, perhaps the most controversial of which has been Ted Honderich’s book After the Terror. There Honderich inquires into the question of American responsibility for the events of September 11, 2001. Honderich argues that due to our acts of both commission and omission, we Americans bear partialresponsibility for the terrorist atrocities committed on that day. In this paper, I shall take issue with Honderich’s argument and propose (...) an alternative to it based on the concept of blowback. (shrink)

It is proposed that one musically interesting way to characterise and compare different performances or recordings of the same piece is by correlating them with different Schenkerian interpretations through the medium of grouping. This approach is demonstrated through an examination of four 'either/or' passages from the first movement of Beethoven's Piano Sonata in E Major, Op. 81a, passages in which at least two Schenkerian interpretations are possible. Schenker's own published and unpublished sketches, among others, are considered alongside recordings by Vladimir (...) Ashkenazy, Emil Gilels, Richard Goode, Murray Perahia and Artur Rubinstein. The approach is not meant to be self-sufficient, but rather to contribute a new set of tools to the emerging multidisciplinary field of performance studies. (shrink)

In the 1950s and 1960s, Conservatives themselves sought to distinguish an authentic conservatism from what Peter Viereck called “Reactionary Nationalism” and George Nash termed “The Radical Right.” In The National Review, William F. Buckley sought to expel the John Birch Society and Ayn Rand from the emerging Conservative movement. Perhaps most famously, the renowned historian Richard Hofstadter distinguished between Conservatism on the one hand and Pseudo-Conservatism on the other, which exhibited an opposition to the broad consensus of American society and (...) culture and what he famously identified as “the paranoid style” that was characterized by a Manichean outlook, an uncompromising political stance, a sense of betrayal, and a conspiratorial mindset. The project of this chapter is to outline the philosophical origins of this development, locating the roots of this debasement deep in the project of modernity itself in which conservatism developed in opposition to the universalism of rationality, science, and liberalism. (shrink)

In his latest book, the distinguished Vico scholar Donald Phillip Verene offers us a diagnosis of our current philosophical malaise and a prescription for its cure.

With this concise and tightly constructed account of Kant’s views on social welfare, Alexander Kaufman has filled a gap in the growing literature on Kant’s political philosophy. Kaufman’s purpose is two-fold: first, to explicate the philosophical basis of Kant’s views of social welfare; and second, to reconstruct Kant’s views on political judgment in order to link his abstract philosophical ideas to public policy.

This article contributes to carework scholarship by examining the nexus of gender, class, and race in long-term care facilities. We draw out a family ideology at work that promotes good care of residents and thus benefits nursing homes. We also found that careworkers value fictive kin relationships with residents, yet we uncover how the family model may be used to exploit these low-income careworkers. Reflecting a subordinate and racialized version of being “part of the family,” we call for an ethic (...) of reciprocity and for concrete change toward valuing equally the humanity of those who need and those who give care. (shrink)

This anthology in epistemology is a collection of essays and excerpts from seminal texts on ways of knowing in mathematics, the natural and social sciences and the liberal and fine arts and communication.