Research in face recognition has tended to focus on discriminating between individuals, or “telling people apart.” It has recently become clear that it is also necessary to understand how images of the same person can vary, or “telling people together.” Learning a new face, and tracking its representation as it changes from unfamiliar to familiar, involves an abstraction of the variability in different images of that person's face. Here, we present an application of principal components analysis computed across different photos (...) of the same person. We demonstrate that people vary in systematic ways, and that this variability is idiosyncratic—the dimensions of variability in one face do not generalize well to another. Learning a new face therefore entails learning how that face varies. We present evidence for this proposal and suggest that it provides an explanation for various effects in face recognition. We conclude by making a number of testable predictions derived from this framework. (shrink)

Gwen Bradford presents the first systematic account of what achievements are, and why they are worth the effort. She argues that more things count as achievements than we might have thought, and offers a new perfectionist theory of value in which difficulty, perhaps surprisingly, plays a central part in characterizing achievements.

This article gives an account of what makes achievements valuable. Although the natural thought is that achievements are valuable because of the product, such as a cure for cancer or a work of art, I argue that the value of the product of an achievement is not sufficient to account for its overall value. Rather, I argue that achievements are valuable in virtue of their difficulty. I propose a new perfectionist theory of value that acknowledges the will as a characteristic (...) human capacity, and thus holds that the exercise of the will, and therefore difficulty, is intrinsically valuable. (shrink)

This study takes a systemic functional multimodal social semiotic approach to the analysis and discussion of image and text relations in two sets of data. First, patterns of contextualisation of images and text in the online magazines Dabiq and Rumiyah produced by the Islamic extremist organisation which refers to itself as Islamic State are examined. The second data set consists of a sample of texts from Western online news and blog sites which include recontextualisations of images found in the first (...) data set. A sample of examples of the use and re-use of images is discussed in order to identify patterns of similarity and difference when images and text are recontextualised. It is argued that the ISIS material tends to foreground the interpersonal metafunction in combination with the textual metafunction, while the other data set tends to foreground the ideational metafunction. These inferences indicate that further exploration of a larger data set is worth pursuing. Such studies would provide deeper insights helping to distinguish between online material which supports terrorism and that which opposes it, as well as facilitating the further development of multimodal social semiotic approaches to image and text relations. (shrink)

Using a 2×2×2 experimental design, the effects of situational and individual variables on individuals' intentions to act unethically were investigated. Specifically examined were three situational variables: (1) quality of the work experience (good versus poor), (2) peer influences (unethical versus ethical), and (3) managerial influences (unethical versus ethical), and three individual variables: (4) locus of control, (5) Machiavellianism, and (6) gender, on individuals' behavioral intentions in an ethically ambiguous dilemma in an work setting. Experiment 1 revealed main effects for quality (...) of work experience, Machiavellianism, locus of control, and an interaction effect for peer influences and managerial influences. Experiment 2 showed main effects for all three situational variables and Machiavellianism. Neither experiment supported gender differences. Limitations, future research, and implications for management are discussed. (shrink)

The obesity epidemic among children and adolescents in the United States continues to worsen. The most recent analysis of data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey showed that the prevalence of overweight among children and adolescents – defined as a Body Mass Index at or above the 95th percentile on gender-specific BMI-for-age growth charts developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – increased significantly between 1999-2000 and 2003-2004. Over this period, the prevalence of overweight among children (...) and adolescents aged 2-19 increased 23% – from 13.9% to 17.1%. In 2003-2004, 18.8% of children aged 6-11 and 17.4% of adolescents aged 12-19 were overweight. Roughly comparable proportions of each age group were considered to be at risk of becoming overweight. (shrink)

IntroductionAcademic integrity policy that is inaccessible, ambiguous or confusing is likely to result in inconsistent policy enactment. Additionally, policy analysis and development are often undertaken as top down processes requiring passive acceptance by users of policy that has been developed outside the context in which it is enacted. Both these factors can result in poor policy uptake, particularly where policy users are overworked, intellectually critical and capable, not prone to passive acceptance and hold valuable grass roots intelligence about policy enactment.Case (...) descriptionThe case study presented in this paper describes the actions of a community of practice at a regional Australian university to deconstruct and translate ambiguous academic integrity policy into a suite of accessible academic integrity resources that were intelligible to staff and students, and which assisted academic staff to consistently enact policy. The paper narrates the formation of the CoP, the tangible and intangible value it created, the social learning practices enacted by its members, its grassroots policy work and the material resources produced from that work.Discussion and evaluationAn evaluation of the CoP was conducted using a value creation framework to explore its immediate value, potential value, applied value, realised value, and reframing value. These values were considered at each stages of the CoP’s lifespan. The evaluation was a useful process that demonstrated the wide-ranging value created by the CoP. Six insights were drawn from the evaluation which promote understanding of the value created for a university by a CoP, particularly in contributing to academic integrity culture over a sustained period of time.ConclusionsThis paper contributes to a research gap on specific examples of discretion within rule-based systems. It illustrates how academics and members of the CoP used their discretion to interpret and enact academic integrity policy within a higher education setting. Drawing from the evaluation of the CoP we argue for greater understanding of the grass-roots contribution of academic and professional staff to academic integrity policy translation and enactment. (shrink)

IntroductionDeep brain stimulation (DBS) is increasingly used to treat the symptoms of various neurologic and psychiatric conditions. People can undergo the procedure during reproductive years but the safety of DBS in pregnancy remains relatively unknown given the paucity of published cases. We thus conducted a review of the literature to determine the state of current knowledge about DBS in pregnancy and to determine how eligibility criteria are approached in clinical trials with respect to pregnancy and the potential for pregnancy.MethodsA literature (...) review was conducted in EMBASE to identify articles involving DBS and pregnancy. Two reviewers independently analyzed the articles to confirm inclusion. Data extracted for analysis included conditions treated, complications at all stages of pregnancy, neonatal/pediatric outcomes, and DBS target. A second search was then conducted using www.clinicaltrials.gov. The same two reviewers then assessed whether each trial excluded pregnant individuals, lactating individuals, or persons of childbearing age planning to conceive. Also assessed was whether contraception had to be deemed adequate prior to enrollment.ResultsThe literature search returned 681 articles. Following independent analysis and agreement of two reviewers, 8 pregnancy related DBS articles were included for analysis. These articles described 27 subjects, 29 pregnancies (2 with subsequent pregnancies), and 31 infants (2 twin pregnancies). There was 1 preterm birth at 35 weeks, and 3 patients who experienced discomfort from the DBS battery (i.e., impulse generator) placement site. All 27 patients had a DBS device implanted before they became pregnant, which remained in use throughout their pregnancy. There was exclusion of pregnant individuals from 68% of 135 interventional trials involving DBS. Approximately 44% of these trials excluded persons of childbearing age not on “adequate contraception” or wishing to conceive in the coming years. Finally, 22% excluded breastfeeding persons.ConclusionThe data from 29 pregnancies receiving DBS treatment during pregnancy was not associated with unexpected pregnancy or post-partum complication patterns. Many clinical trials have excluded pregnant individuals. Documentation of outcomes in larger numbers of pregnancies will help clarify the safety profile and will help guide study designs that will safely include pregnant patients. (shrink)

PDZ (also called DHR or GLGF) domains are found in diverse membraneassociated proteins including members of the MAGUK family of guanylate kinase homologues, several protein phosphatases and kinases, neuronal nitric oxide synthase, and several dystrophin‐associated proteins, collectively known as syntrophins. Many PDZ domain‐containing proteins appear to be localised to highly specialised submembranous sites, suggesting their participation in cellular junction formation, receptor or channel clustering, and intracellular signalling events. PDZ domains of several MAGUKs interact with the C‐terminal polypeptides of a subset (...) of NMDA receptor subunits and/or with Shaker‐type K+ channels. Other PDZ domains have been shown to bind similar ligands of other transmembrane receptors. Recently, the crystal structures of PDZ domains, with and without ligand, have been determined. These demonstrate the mode of ligand‐binding and the structural bases for sequence conservation among diverse PDZ domains. (shrink)

"Annual dinner and act golden gavel competition." Ethos: Official Publication of the Law Society of the Australian Capital Territory, (194), pp. 18.

Many philosophers tacitly accept the View: consciousness is necessary for being a welfare subject. That is, in order to be an eligible bearer of welfare goods and bads, an entity must be capable of phenomenal consciousness. However, this paper argues that, in the absence of a compelling rationale, we are not licensed to accept the View, because doing so amounts to fallacious reasoning in theorizing about welfare: insisting on the View when consciousness is not in fact important for welfare value (...) in a systematic and significant way is objectionably “consciousist.” As a result, the View does not advance our understanding of the value of consciousness. The paper further diagnoses why we may be attracted to the View, and what we should accept instead. (shrink)

Why is pain bad? The most straightforward theory of pain's badness,dolorism, appeals to the phenomenal quality of displeasure. In spite of its explanatory appeal, the view is too straightforward to capture two central puzzles, namely pain that is enjoyed and pain that is not painful. These cases can be captured byconditionalism, which makes the badness of displeasure conditional on an agent's attitude. But conditionalism fails where dolorism succeeds with explanatory appeal. A new approach is proposed,reverse conditionalism, which maintains the explanatory (...) appeal of dolorism, but gives attitudes a value-defeating role. It is argued that this view does best in fulfilling the desiderata and capturing the cases. (shrink)

Pain, failure and false beliefs all make a life worse, or so it is plausible to think. These things and possibly others seem to be intrinsically bad—no matter what further good comes of them they make a life worse pro tanto. In spite of the obvious badness, this is difficult to explain. While there are many accounts of well-being, few are up to the challenge of a univocal explanation of ill-being. Perfectionism has particular difficulty. Otherwise, it is a theory that (...) has quite a lot in its favour. This paper proposes a new valuation scheme for perfectionism, the tripartite scheme, which affords perfectionism the resources to give a comprehensive account of robust bads and has further additional advantages for the view. (shrink)

In light of arguments that citizen science has the potential to make environmental knowledge and policy more robust and democratic, this article inquires into the factors that shape the ability of citizen science to actually influence scientists and decision makers. Using the case of community-based air toxics monitoring with ‘‘buckets,’’ it argues that citizen science’s effectiveness is significantly influenced by standards and standardized practices. It demonstrates that, on one hand, standards serve a boundary-bridging function that affords bucket monitoring data a (...) crucial measure of legitimacy among experts. On the other hand, standards simultaneously serve a boundary-policing function, allowing experts to dismiss bucket data as irrelevant to the central project of air quality assessment. The article thus calls attention to standard setting as an important site of intervention for citizen science-based efforts to democratize science and policy. (shrink)

Núñez and colleagues (2019) question whether cognitive science still exists “as a coherent academic field with a well‐defined and cohesive interdisciplinary research program.” This worry may be premature on two grounds. First, we are not convinced that the Lakatosian criterion of coalescence around a core framework is the best standard for judging whether a field is well‐defined and productive. Second, although we acknowledge that cognitive science is not as visible as we would like, we doubt that this low profile accurately (...) reflects the state of actual research and teaching programs based on the cognitive science approach. (shrink)

`Being sensitive' in nursing was explored using Schwartz-Barcott and Kim's hybrid model of concept development, producing a tentative definition of the concept. Three phases were employed: theoretical, empirical/fieldwork and analytical. An exploration of the literature identified where the common idea of `being sensitive' as a nurse was embedded and demonstrated that a theoretical development of this fundamental aspect of nursing was absent. The empirical phase was conducted using semistructured interviews with nine expert palliative care and cancer nurses. This method was (...) particularly useful for the exploration of this concept because of its firm grounding in practical example. A definition of what the concept `being sensitive' means in nursing, and subsequent clarification of `being insensitive', have been posed from the research process undertaken. The essential nature of this concept being integral to nursing practice is emphasized. Potential implications for the development of nursing practice through teaching of this concept were identified. (shrink)

What drives someone to commit an act of terrible violence? Drawing from her thirty years' experience in working with people who have committed serious offenses, Dr. Gwen Adshead provides fresh and surprising insights into violence and the mind. Through a collaboration with coauthor Eileen Horne, Dr. Adshead brings her extraordinary career to life in a series of unflinching portraits. In eleven vivid narratives based on decades of providing therapy to people in prisons and secure hospitals, an internationally renowned forensic (...) psychiatrist and psychotherapist demonstrates the remarkable human capacity for radical empathy, change, and redemption. Based on 30 years of experience working in prisons and secure psychiatric hospitals with people convicted of serious violent offenses, internationally renowned forensic psychiatrist Dr. Gwen Adshead presents an account of mental illness and the nature of evil in this compelling series of stories. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Commentary on“Psychopathy, Other-Regarding Moral Beliefs, and Responsibility”Gwen Adshead (bio)AbstractIn this commentary, I address two points raised by Fields: the origin of other-regarding beliefs, and the management of psychopaths, if they are not criminally responsible (as Fields suggests). I argue that the capacity to form affective bonds is necessary in order to hold other-regarding beliefs, and that a psychological developmental perspective may be helpful in understanding the moral understanding (...) of the psychopath. In response to Fields’s view that psychopaths should receive “treatment,” I suggest that most forensic psychiatrists do not agree.Keywordspersonality disorder, empathy, development, remorse, attachment theoryInsufficient attention has been paid to the problem posed by so-called “psychopaths.” Lloyd Fields’s paper is therefore welcome. Here I shall focus on two issues: the nature and acquisition of other-regarding beliefs, and the implications for managing those who do not have them.Fields argues that there is a subgroup of psychopaths, unable to form “other-regarding beliefs”; that such beliefs provide a motivation for acting in a particular way, and result in a “[disposition] to experience certain emotions and to have certain attitudes.”But it is arguable that the disposition to experience certain emotions and have certain attitudes towards others could be critical to acquiring the capacity to have other-regarding beliefs. If one asks what stops people from hurting others, a common answer is that it makes people feel bad. To quote Mencius (Legge, 1960): “All men have a mind which cannot bear to see the suffering of others.”The question then is, how does anyone acquire a notion of “the other,” such that failing to endorse other-regarding principles/beliefs has an adverse effect on the subject?Mencius’ “mind” implied “reciprocity,” and involved four components:i. The recognition of another’s distressii. Being moved by that distress (empathy)iii. Wishing to reduce that distress (sympathy)iv. Altruism (the sense of obligation to reduce distress, and guilt if one fails).By these criteria, (iv) resembles Fields’s “other-regarding” belief, in that the sense of obligation provides a reason for acting. I would argue that (iv) is a virtue, which requires (i), (ii) and (iii) as capacities—not necessarily separate, but different aspects of a broader “affective” capacity. It is this affective capacity which is arguably lacking in the psychopath.Some of these capacities have already been discussed in the literature of psychopathy. It is the [End Page 279] failure to recognize another’s distress which Cleckley describes in many of his cases (Cleckley 1964), and which he describes as a type of “agnosia.” This term implies some neuropathological deficit, and there is some evidence for such deficits in psychopaths, mainly in the autonomic nervous system. Blair (1995) has also suggested that psychopaths lack a (postulated) violence inhibitory mechanism (VIM).It could be argued, however, that such neuropathological hypotheses lead to circular arguments about psychopathy, as described by Barbara Wootton 1(Wootton 1959). A more fruitful account is offered by theories (such as attachment theory) which offer a developmental account which includes both psychological and neuropathological perspectives. Described and developed by Bowlby (1969), attachment theory draws on experimental work with non-human primates and emphasises the importance of relationships with significant others in infancy for the development of later social relationships (Harlow 1975; Ruppenthal et al 1976). Such attachment relationships are also important for the development of cortical neural networks, and the modulation of stress, which can itself be neurotoxic (Sapolsky 1994).How could attachment theory be relevant to acquiring an affective capacity? The earliest work on attachment behaviors showed that monkeys failing to make early attachments behaved recklessly with other monkeys, and could not make relationships (for example, to mate). Of particular relevance was the finding that such monkeys launched suicidal attacks on monkeys higher in the hierarchy; not dissimilar to those “self-defeating” behaviors which Cleckley described in human psychopaths.So much for possibly psychopathic monkeys; do humans with failed attachments lack affective capacity? There is evidence that substantial proportions of “psychopaths” have histories of failed attachments in childhood. The more severe the failure, the more severe the disturbance in adulthood, which might explain why there... (shrink)

The work of Jacques Ellul is useful in understanding and evaluating the implications of rapidly changing technologies for human values and democracy. Ellul developed three powerful theses about technology: technological autonomy, technological determinism, and technological bluff. In this essay, the authors explicate these views of technology, and place the work of Ellul in dialogue with the ides of other important theorists of technology. Ellul’s too-often overlooked theses about technology are relevant to our present technological society.

Concern about high-profile ethical lapses by business managers has led to an increasing emphasis on ethics instruction in business schools. Various pedagogical methods are used to expose business students to real-world ethical dilemmas, yet students may not readily grasp the linkages between ethical theories and dilemmas to identify possible ethical solutions. Venn diagrams are a valuable instructional tool in business ethics classes when used with other teaching methodologies such as case studies. We describe how the use of Venn diagrams assists (...) students in visualizing the key points of and the connections between ethical theories and dilemmas to shed light on possible ethical solutions. Examples of teaching exercises are provided along with ideas for future research in the use of Venn diagrams in activating moral imagination and improving ethical reasoning. Overall, positive student reactions to the introduction of Venn diagrams in business ethics classrooms support the use of this methodology. (shrink)

Perfectionism, broadly speaking, is the view that the development of certain characteristically human capacities is good. The view gains motivation in part from the intuitive pull of an objective approach to wellbeing, but dissatisfaction with objective list theory. According to objective list theory, goods such as knowledge, achievement, and friendship constitute good in a life. The objective list has terrific intuitive appeal – after all, it’s a list generated by reflecting on the good life. But as a theory, some find (...) it unsatisfying. What justifies presence on the list? On the traditional conception it is just a list and not much of a theory at all. Perfectionism captures the intuitive pull of the objective list and provides a unifying justification: the entries on the list share in common a special relationship to human nature. This essay gives an overview of perfectionism. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis study examines the types of verbal, pictorial, and multimodal metaphors in the genre of sex education picture books for young children in Mainland China. Although being an educational discourse genre that is essentially concerned with transmitting scientific facts, sex education picture books employ a range of metaphors that categorize and construe the biological knowledge of human reproduction in a way that not only facilitates young children’s understanding of scientific concepts but also instills in them particular values and moralities that (...) are socioculturally conditioned. An examination of the source domains from which the metaphors are drawn and the target domains onto which the metaphors are mapped reveals three types of metaphor, namely, personification, domestication, and cross-experience metaphors. The analysis of seven sex education picture books for pre-school children suggests that these types of metaphor are used purposefully for addressing pedagogical as well as ideological con... (shrink)

Uniqueness appears to enhance intrinsic value. A unique stamp sells for millions of dollars; Stradivarius violins are all the more precious because they are unlike any others. This observation has not gone overlooked in the value theory literature: uniqueness plays a starring role recalibrating the dominant Moorean understanding of the nature of intrinsic value. But the thesis that uniqueness enhances intrinsic value is in tension with another deeply plausible and widely held thesis, namely the thesis that there is a pro (...) tanto reason to promote the good. It is argued that there is a second, distinct type of uniqueness that plays a more interesting and important axiological role: uniqueness imparts irreplaceable value. This gives occasion to develop the surprisingly undertheorized notion of irreplaceable value. (shrink)

Subjectivists about practical normativity hold that an agent’s favoring and disfavoring attitudes give rise to practical reasons. On this view, an agent’s normative reason to choose vanilla over chocolate ice cream ultimately turns on facts about what appeals to her rather than facts about what her options are like attitude-independently. Objectivists—who ground reasons in the attitude-independent features of the things we aim at—owe us an explanation of why it is rational to choose what we favor, if not because favoring is (...) a source of reasons. My aim in this paper is to supply such a story. The proposal is roughly that when an agent cannot base her choices on her judgments about what she has most reason to do, structural rationality extends to her a license to choose something just because she favors it, without imbuing favoring with the authority of a normative reason. (shrink)

Procedural justice, or the ability of people affected by decisions to participate in making them, is widely recognized as an important aspect of environmental justice. Procedural justice, moreover, requires that affected people have a substantial understanding of the hazards that a particular decision would impose. While EJ scholars and activists point out a number of obstacles to ensuring substantial understanding—including industry’s nondisclosure of relevant information and technocratic problem framings—this article shows how key insights from Science and Technology Studies about the (...) nature of knowledge pose even more fundamental challenges for procedural justice. In particular, the knowledge necessary to inform participation in decision making is likely not to exist at the time of decision making, undermining the potential for people to give their informed consent to being exposed to an environmental hazard. In addition, much of the local knowledge important to understanding the consequences of hazards will develop only after decisions have been made, and technoscientific knowledge of environmental effects will inevitably change over the period during which people will be affected by a hazard. The changing landscape of knowledge calls into question the idea that consent or participation during one decision-making process can by itself constitute procedural justice. An STS-informed understanding of the nature of knowledge, this article argues, implies that procedural justice should include proactive knowledge production to fill in knowledge gaps, and ongoing opportunities for communities to consent to the presence of hazards as local knowledge emerges and scientific knowledge changes. (shrink)

Misophonia has been characterized as intense negative reactions to specific trigger sounds. However, recent research suggests high-level, contextual, and multisensory factors are also involved. We recently demonstrated that neurotypicals’ negative reactions to aversive sounds are attenuated when the sounds are synced with positive attributable video sources. To assess whether this effect generalizes to misophonic triggers, we developed a Sound-Swapped Video database for use in misophonia research. In Study 1, we created a set of 39 video clips depicting common trigger sounds (...) and a corresponding set of 39 PAVS temporally synchronized with the OVS videos. In Study 2, participants rated the 39 PAVS videos for their audiovisual match and pleasantness. We selected the 20 PAVS videos with best match scores for use in Study 3. In Study 3, a new group of participants observed the 20 selected PAVS and 20 corresponding OVS and judged the pleasantness or unpleasantness of each sound in the two contexts accompanying each video. Afterward, participants completed the Misophonia Questionnaire. The results of Study 3 show a robust attenuating effect of PAVS videos on the reported unpleasantness of trigger sounds: trigger sounds were rated as significantly less unpleasant when paired with PAVS with than OVS. Moreover, this attenuating effect was present in nearly every participant regardless of their score on the MQ. In fact, we found a moderate positive correlation between the PAVS-OVS difference and misophonia severity scores. Overall our results provide validation that the SSV database is a useful stimulus database to study how misophonic responses can be modulated by visual contexts. Here, we release the SSV database with the best 18 PAVS and 18 OVS videos used in Study 3 along with aggregate ratings of audio-video match and pleasantness. We also provide detailed instructions on how to produce these videos, with the hope that this database grows and improves through collaborations with the community of misophonia researchers. (shrink)

When forecasting events, multiple types of uncertainty are often inherently present in the modeling process. Various uncertainty typologies exist, and each type of uncertainty has different implications a scientist might want to convey. In this work, we focus on one type of distinction betweendirect quantitative uncertaintyandindirect qualitative uncertainty. Direct quantitative uncertainty describes uncertainty about facts, numbers, and hypotheses that can be communicated in absolute quantitative forms such as probability distributions or confidence intervals. Indirect qualitative uncertainty describes the quality of knowledge (...) concerning how effectively facts, numbers, or hypotheses represent reality, such as evidence confidence scales proposed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. A large body of research demonstrates that both experts and novices have difficulty reasoning with quantitative uncertainty, and visualizations of uncertainty can help with such traditionally challenging concepts. However, the question of if, and how, people may reason with multiple types of uncertainty associated with a forecast remains largely unexplored. In this series of studies, we seek to understand if individuals can integrate indirect uncertainty about how “good” a model is (operationalized as a qualitative expression of forecaster confidence) with quantified uncertainty in a prediction (operationalized as a quantile dotplot visualization of a predicted distribution). Our first study results suggest that participants utilize both direct quantitative uncertainty and indirect qualitative uncertainty when conveyed as quantile dotplots and forecaster confidence. In manipulations where forecasters were less sure about their prediction, participants made more conservative judgments. In our second study, we varied the amount of quantified uncertainty (in the form of the SD of the visualized distributions) to examine how participants’ decisions changed under different combinations of quantified uncertainty (variance) and qualitative uncertainty (low, medium, and high forecaster confidence). The second study results suggest that participants updated their judgments in the direction predicted by both qualitative confidence information (e.g., becoming more conservative when the forecaster confidence is low) and quantitative uncertainty (e.g., becoming more conservative when the variance is increased). Based on the findings from both experiments, we recommend that forecasters present qualitative expressions of model confidence whenever possible alongside quantified uncertainty. (shrink)

Government officials claim open data can improve internal and external communication and collaboration. These promises hinge on “data intermediaries”: extra-institutional actors that obtain, use, and translate data for the public. However, we know little about why these individuals might regard open data as a site of civic participation. In response, we draw on Ilana Gershon to conceptualize culturally situated and socially constructed perspectives on data, or “data ideologies.” This study employs mixed methodologies to examine why members of the public hold (...) particular data ideologies and how they vary. In late 2015 the authors engaged the public through a commission in a diverse city of approximately 500,000. Qualitative data was collected from three public focus groups with residents. Simultaneously, we obtained quantitative data from surveys. Participants’ data ideologies varied based on how they perceived data to be useful for collaboration, tasks, and translations. Bucking the “geek” stereotype, only a minority of those surveyed were professional software developers or engineers. Although only a nascent movement, we argue open data intermediaries have important roles to play in a new political landscape. (shrink)

Mobilizing Hope asks that we take the eradication of poverty as morally mandatory, that we pursue technological development, and that we act on the belief that it is possible to do both of those things at once. It resolutely does not ask that we redefine prosperity in other-than-economic terms, reconsider the binary between “human” and “nature,” question financialization, colonialism, or other root causes of global poverty, accept qualitatively different lifestyles, or endure painful transitions. While this may seem strategic, I argue (...) that bigger asks could be effective in inspiring action. (shrink)

"Margaret Cavendish's philosophical work is at last taking its rightful place in the history of seventeenth-century thought, but her writings are so voluminous and wide-ranging that introducing her work to students has been difficult—at least until this volume came along. This carefully edited abridgment of _Observations upon Experimental Philosophy_ will be indispensable for making Cavendish's fascinating ideas accessible to students. Marshall's Introduction provides a helpful overview of themes in Cavendish's natural philosophy, and the footnotes contain useful background information about some (...) of the texts and philosophers that Cavendish mentions. The additional selections from Descartes, Hobbes, Boyle, and Hooke also help contextualize Cavendish's views." —Deborah Boyle, _College of Charleston_. (shrink)

Agroecological transitions aim at developing sustainable farming and food systems, adapted to local contexts. Such transitions require the engagement of local actors and the consideration of their knowledge and reasoning as a whole, which encompasses different natures of knowledge (empirical, scientific, local, generic), related to different dimensions (economic, environmental, technical, social, political), as well as their values and perceived uncertainties. While these transitions are often problematized in relation to technical issues, this article's objective is to start from the way the (...) local actors consider these transitions in order to see what issues are actually involved. In this study, we analyzed the reasoning of diverse farming actors, including farmers and farm advisors. We conducted 30 cognitive mapping interviews, during which the local actors drew cognitive maps to explicit their reasoning concerning their agroecological transition with an open approach. Their reasoning revealed an emphasis on the human & social dimension of the process of agroecological transitions: (i) human and social considerations come first in the transition process, while technical solutions are viewed as secondary, (ii) use and development of human capacities, social interactions and human well-being are crucial to the conduct of agroecological transitions, (iii) human-scale farming appears as a condition for the use of human capacities, human well-being and rural development, (iv) agroecological transitions imply farming advisory transitions, and (v) rural development appears as a condition for agroecological transitions, implying transitions in society as a whole. (shrink)

Perfectionism, the view that well-being is a matter of developing characteristically human capacities, has relatively few defenders in the literature, but plenty of critics. This paper defends perfectionism against some recent formulations of classic objections, namely, the objection that perfectionism ignores the relevance of pleasure or preference for well-being, and a sophisticated version of the ‘wrong properties’ objection, according to which the intuitive plausibility of the perfectionist ideal is threatened by an absence of theoretical pressure to accept putative wrong properties (...) cases. The paper argues these objections are unsuccessful, but introduce a new worry, the Deep Problem: Perfectionism fails to offer a satisfying foundational justification for why developing the human essence is valuable. The paper responds to the deep problem, ultimately arguing that it is a puzzle put to all theories of well-being to provide a justification for their normative significance. (shrink)

If the Mona Lisa, the Sistine Chapel, the sarcophagus of Tutankhamun, or the Sword of Goujian were destroyed, nothing could replace them. New works of art that are even more impressive may be created, which may replenish the value in the world in quantity, but they would not fully replace the loss. Works of art and historical artifacts have irreplaceable value. But just what is irreplaceable value? This paper presents perhaps the first analysis. Irreplaceable value is a matter of intrinsic (...) value in virtue of unreinstantiable good-making properties, which give rise to reasons to preserve and protect. (shrink)