Human microbiome research makes causal connections between entire microbial communities and a wide array of traits that range from physiological diseases to psychological states. To evaluate these causal claims, we first examine a well-known single-microbe causal explanation: of Helicobacter pylori causing ulcers. This apparently straightforward causal explanation is not so simple, however. It does not achieve a key explanatory standard in microbiology, of Koch’s postulates, which rely on manipulations of single-microorganism cultures to infer causal relationships to disease. When Koch’s postulates (...) are framed by an interventionist causal framework, it is clearer what the H. pylori explanation achieves and where its explanatory strengths lie. After assessing this ‘simple’, single-microbe case, we apply the interventionist framework to two key areas of microbiome research, in which obesity and mental health states are purportedly explained by microbiomes. Despite the experimental data available, interventionist criteria for explanation show that many of the causal claims generated by microbiome research are weak or misleading. We focus on the stability, specificity and proportionality of proposed microbiome causal explanations, and evaluate how effectively these dimensions of causal explanation are achieved in some promising avenues of research. We suggest some conceptual and explanatory strategies to improve how causal claims about microbiomes are made. (shrink)

Happy people often fail to elaborate on persuasive arguments, while people in sad moods tend to scrutinise messages in greater detail. According to some motivational accounts, however, happy people will elaborate a message if they believe it might maintain their positive mood. The present research extends this reasoning by demonstrating that happy people will elaborate arguments from message presenters that convey positive hedonic attributes (i.e., source likeability). In a pilot study, we show that happy people believe persuasive messages from a (...) likeable source will be mood maintaining. The results of Study 1 demonstrate that these expectancies have important message-processing implications. In Study 1, sad participants elaborated arguments from both likeable and dislikeable sources, while happy participants only elaborated arguments from a likeable source. Consistent with motivational explanation of these effects, in Study 2, happy participants elaborated arguments from a likeable source when not distracted, but used likeability as a heuristic when distracted with a cognitive-load manipulation. Implications of these results for understanding the effects of mood on processing strategy, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed. (shrink)

This study assessed the knowledge and perception of human biological materials (HBM) and biorepositories among three study groups in South Korea. The relationship between the knowledge and the perception among different groups was also examined by using factor and regression analyses. In a self-reporting survey of 440 respondents, the expert group was found more likely to be knowledgeable and positively perceived than the others. Four factors emerged: Sale and Consent, Flexible Use, Self-Confidence, and Korean Bioethics and Biosafety Action restriction perception. (...) The results indicate that those who are well aware of the existence of biobanks were more positively inclined to receive the Sale and Consent perception. As a result of the need for high quality HBMs and the use of appropriate sampling procedures for every aspect of the collection and use process, the biorepository community should pay attention to ethical, legal, and policy issues. (shrink)

This volume grew out of work on Berkeley which was presented in a dissertation several years ago. Though now much revised and greatly expanded. particularly in respect of the theory of concepts, a good part of the present text rests on this earlier foundation. I therefore gladly take this opportunity to express my appreciation to my teachers both at Indiana University and at McGill, and especially to Professor Newton Stallknecht who directed my dissertation. For permission to quote from the Berkeley (...) manuscripts in their keeping, I have first to thank the Trustees of the British Museum, and the Board of Trinity College Dublin. I wish further to thank the Bodleian Library, Oxford for allowing me to quote from their collection of Locke manu scripts. Also I am grateful to the Editor of Filoso/ia for letting me use excerpts from an article that first appeared in the Stu'di Internazionali di Filoso/ia, and to George Allen and Unwin. Publishers, for permission to quote a long passage from Bertrand Russell's Analysis 0/ Mind. From thesis project to published book, my research on the Berkeley manuscripts has been made possible by the generous and timely support of the Canada Council. Finally. I wish to thank Mrs. Anne Hillier for preparing the manuscript with great patience and skill. (shrink)

This study assessed the knowledge and perception of human biological materials (HBM) and biorepositories among three study groups in South Korea. The relationship between the knowledge and the perception among different groups was also examined by using factor and regression analyses. In a self‐reporting survey of 440 respondents, the expert group was found more likely to be knowledgeable and positively perceived than the others. Four factors emerged: Sale and Consent, Flexible Use, Self‐Confidence, and Korean Bioethics and Biosafety Action restriction perception. (...) The results indicate that those who are well aware of the existence of biobanks were more positively inclined to receive the Sale and Consent perception. As a result of the need for high quality HBMs and the use of appropriate sampling procedures for every aspect of the collection and use process, the biorepository community should pay attention to ethical, legal, and policy issues. (shrink)

Abstractabstract:Birth certificates typically designate parents as "mothers" or "fathers," although some US states offer nongendered designations. The authors argue that gendered characterizations offer scant legal or moral value and that states should move to degender parental status on birth certificates but retain that information in registrations of birth. Registrations of birth identify the person giving birth to a child, when, and where, and they report demographic and health information useful for civic and public health purposes. Birth certificates typically report a (...) child's name, sex, date and location of birth, and parentage so far as known. As documents establishing parents' standing in relation to children and vice versa, as well as age and presumptive citizenship, birth certificates add no legal or moral value by gendering parents. Gendering parents on birth certificates obliges the state to rely on exclusionary criteria of "mother" and "father." By contrast, degendering parental status withdraws the need for such criteria and confers benefits on people with transgender and nonbinary identities, as well as undercutting any problematic presumption that parents have responsibilities to their children qua mother or qua father. (shrink)

This Korean study replicated a previously published American study. The conceptual framework and method combined ethical enquiry and phenomenology. The research questions were: (1) What is nursing students’ experience of ethical problems involving nursing practice? and, (2) What is nursing students’ experience of using an ethical decision-making model? The participants were 97 senior baccalaureate nursing students, each of whom described one ethical problem and chose to use one of five ethical decision-making models. From 97 ethical problems, five content categories emerged, (...) the largest being health professionals (69%). The basic nature of the ethical problems was the students’ experience of conflict, resolution and rationale. Using an ethical decision-making model helped 94% of the students. A comparison of the Korean and American results yields important implications for nursing ethics education, practice and research. (shrink)

Using a conceptual framework and method combining ethical enquiry and phenomenology, we asked 73 senior baccalaureate nursing students to answer two questions: (1) What is nursing students’ experience of an ethical problem involving nursing practice? and (2) What is nursing students’ experience of using an ethical decision-making model? Each student described one ethical problem, from which emerged five content categories, the largest being that involving health professionals (44%). The basic nature of the ethical problems consisted of the nursing students’ experience (...) of conflict, resolution and rationale; 85% of the students stated that using an ethical decision-making model was helpful. Although additional research is needed, these findings have important implications for nursing ethics education and practice. (shrink)

Personality disorder symptomatology (PD-Sx) can result in personal distress and impaired interpersonal functioning, even in the absence of a clinical diagnosis, and is frequently comorbid with psychiatric disorders such as substance use, mood, and anxiety disorders; however, they often remain untreated, and are not taken into account in clinical studies. To investigate brain morphological correlates of PD-Sx, we measured subcortical volume and shape, and cortical thickness/surface area, based on structural magnetic resonance images. We investigated 37 subjects who reported PD-Sx exceeding (...) DSM-IV Axis-II screening thresholds, and 35 age, sex, and smoking status-matched control subjects. Subjects reporting PD-Sx were then grouped into symptom-based clusters: N = 20 into Cluster B (reporting Antisocial, Borderline, Histrionic, or Narcissistic PD-Sx) and N = 28 into Cluster C (reporting Obsessive–Compulsive, Avoidant, or Dependent PD-Sx); N = 11 subjects reported PD-Sx from both clusters, and none reported Cluster A (Paranoid, Schizoid, or Schizotypal) PD-Sx. Compared to control, Cluster C PD-Sx was associated with greater striatal surface area localized to the caudate tail, smaller ventral striatum volumes, and greater cortical thickness in right prefrontal cortex. Both Cluster B and C PD-Sx groups also showed trends toward greater posterior caudate volumes and orbitofrontal surface area anomalies, but these findings did not survive correction for multiple comparisons. The results point to morphological abnormalities that could contribute to Cluster C PD-Sx. In addition, the observations parallel those in substance use disorders, pointing to the importance of considering PD-Sx when interpreting findings in often-comorbid psychiatric disorders. (shrink)

Collaboration requires agents to coordinate their behavior on the fly, sometimes cooperating to solve a single task together and other times dividing it up into sub‐tasks to work on in parallel. Underlying the human ability to collaborate is theory‐of‐mind (ToM), the ability to infer the hidden mental states that drive others to act. Here, we develop Bayesian Delegation, a decentralized multi‐agent learning mechanism with these abilities. Bayesian Delegation enables agents to rapidly infer the hidden intentions of others by inverse planning. (...) We test Bayesian Delegation in a suite of multi‐agent Markov decision processes inspired by cooking problems. On these tasks, agents with Bayesian Delegation coordinate both their high‐level plans (e.g., what sub‐task they should work on) and their low‐level actions (e.g., avoiding getting in each other's way). When matched with partners that act using the same algorithm, Bayesian Delegation outperforms alternatives. Bayesian Delegation is also a capable ad hoc collaborator and successfully coordinates with other agent types even in the absence of prior experience. Finally, in a behavioral experiment, we show that Bayesian Delegation makes inferences similar to human observers about the intent of others. Together, these results argue for the centrality of ToM for successful decentralized multi‐agent collaboration. (shrink)

Van de Vliert's findings fit nicely with our recent arguments implying that (1) differentiated selfhood is partly motivated by requirements of cultural groups, and (2) free will mainly exists within culture. Some cultural groups promote individual freedom, whereas others constrict it so as to maintain elites' power and privilege. Thus, freedom is, to a great extent, a creation of culture.

Birth certificates typically designate parents as ‘mothers’ or ‘fathers’ although some U.S. states offer non-gendered designations. We argue that gendered characterizations offer scant legal or moral value and that states should move to degender parental status on birth certificates but retain that information in registrations of birth. Registrations of birth identify the person giving birth to a child, when and where, and they report demographic and health information useful for civic and public health purposes. Birth certificates typically report a child’s (...) name, sex, date and location of birth, and parentage so far as known. As documents establishing parents’ standing in relation to children and vice versa, as well as age and presumptive citizenship, birth certificates add no legal or moral value by gendering parents. Degendering parents on birth certificates interferes with no social roles or identities. Gendering parents on birth certificates obliges the state to rely on exclusionary criteria of ‘mother’ and ‘father.’ By contrast, degendering parental status withdraws the need for such criteria and confers benefits on people with transgender and non-binary identities, as well as undercutting any problematic presumption that parents have responsibilities to their children qua mother or qua father. (shrink)

At the turn of the twentieth century, G.E. Moore contemptuously dismissed most previous 'ethical systems' for committing the 'Naturalistic Fallacy'. This fallacy – which has been variously understood, but has almost always been seen as something to avoid – was perhaps the greatest structuring force on subsequent ethical theorising. To a large extent, to understand the Fallacy is to understand contemporary ethics. This volume aims to provide that understanding. Its thematic chapters – written by a range of distinguished contributors – (...) introduce the history, text and philosophy behind Moore's charge of fallacy and its supporting 'open question' argument. They detail how the Fallacy influenced multiple traditions in ethics, its connections to supposed dichotomies between 'is'/'ought' and facts/values, and its continuing relevance to our understanding of normativity. Together, the chapters provide a historical and opinionated introduction to contemporary ethics that will be essential for students, teachers and researchers. (shrink)

The quantum theoretical concepts of modular momentum and dynamical non-locality, which were introduced four decades ago, have recently been used to explain single particle quantum interference phenomena. Although the non-local exchange of modular momentum associated with such phenomena cannot be directly observed, it has been suggested that effects induced by this exchange can be measured experimentally using weak measurements of pre- and post-selected ensembles of particles. This paper reports on such an optical experiment that yielded measured weak values that were (...) consistent with the theoretical prediction of an effect induced by a non-local exchange of modular momentum. (shrink)