One recurring criticism of the best interests standard concerns its vagueness, and thus the inadequate guidance it offers to care providers. The lack of an agreed definition of ‘best interests’, together with the fact that several suggested considerations adopted in legislation or professional guidelines for doctors do not obviously apply across different groups of persons, result in decisions being made in murky waters. In response, bioethicists have attempted to specify the best interests standard, to reduce the indeterminacy surrounding medical decisions. (...) In this paper, we discuss the bioethicists’ response in relation to the state's possible role in clarifying the best interests standard. We identify and characterise two clarificatory strategies employed by bioethicists —elaborative and enumerative—and argue that the state should adopt the latter. Beyond the practical difficulties of the former strategy, a state adoption of it would inevitably be prejudicial in a pluralistic society. Given the gravity of best interests decisions, and the delicate task of respecting citizens with different understandings of best interests, only the enumerative strategy is viable. We argue that this does not commit the state to silence in providing guidance to and supporting healthcare providers, nor does it facilitate the abuse of the vulnerable. Finally, we address two methodological worries about adopting this approach at the state level. The adoption of the enumerative strategy is not defeatist in attitude, nor does it eventually collapse into (a form of) the elaborative strategy. (shrink)

In this rich and detailed study of early modern women's thought, Jacqueline Broad explores the complexity of women's responses to Cartesian philosophy and its intellectual legacy in England and Europe. She examines the work of thinkers such as Mary Astell, Elisabeth of Bohemia, Margaret Cavendish, Anne Conway and Damaris Masham, who were active participants in the intellectual life of their time and were also the respected colleagues of philosophers such as Descartes, Leibniz and Locke. She also illuminates the continuities (...) between early modern women's thought and the anti-dualism of more recent feminist thinkers. The result is a more gender-balanced account of early modern thought than has hitherto been available. Broad's clear and accessible exploration of this still-unfamiliar area will have a strong appeal to both students and scholars in the history of philosophy, women's studies and the history of ideas. (shrink)

There are approximately 60 codes of ethics developed by national and regional psychological associations around the world, and there is wide variability in their structures, formats, lengths, and d...

Jacqueline Taylor presents an original reconstruction of Hume's social theory, which examines the passions and imagination in relation to institutions such as government and the economy. She goes on to examine Hume's system of ethics, and argues that the principle of humanity is the central concept of Hume's Enlightenment philosophy.

Connectives and cue phrases are the most prototypical linguistic elements that signal coherence relations, but by limiting our attention to connectives, we are likely missing out on important other cues readers and listeners use when establishing coherence relations. However, defining the role of other types of linguistic elements in the signaling of coherence relations is not straightforward, and it is also not obvious why and how non-connective elements function as signals for coherence relations. In this paper, we aim to develop (...) a systematic way of categorizing segment-internal elements as signals of coherence relations on the basis of a literature review and evidence from parallel corpora. We propose a three-way distinction betweendivision of labor, agreement, andgeneral collocationto categorize the different ways in which elements inside discourse segments interact with connectives in the marking of coherence relations. In each type of interaction, segment-internal elements can function as signals for coherence relations, but the mechanism behind it is slightly different for each type. (shrink)

Jacqueline Rose argues for an expansion of the new boundaries of `English', and for the importance of psychoanalysis to the understanding of our literary and historical lives.

Do neurobiologists aim to discover natural kinds? I address this question in this chapter via a critical analysis of classification practices operative across the 43-year history of research on long-term potentiation. I suggest that this 43-year history supports the idea that the structure of scientific practice surrounding LTP research has remained an obstacle to the discovery of natural kinds as philosophers of science have traditionally conceived them.

This work is a collection of the philosophical correspondences of English women thinkers of the late seventeenth century. It includes letters to and from some of the most famous philosophers of the age, including Locke and Leibniz. Their letters range over a wide variety of philosophical subjects, from religion and ethics to knowledge and metaphysics. The introductory essays and annotations to this work make these women's ideas accessible and comprehensible to modern readers. Taken as a whole, the collection significantly enhances (...) our appreciation of women's involvement in the shaping and development of philosophy from 1650 to 1700. (shrink)

This anthology offers a comprehensive introduction to Pliny the Younger's Epistulae for intermediate and advanced Latin students, with the grammatical, lexical, and historical support to enable them to read quickly and fluidly. As the only selection of the letters with extensive commentary, it provides instructors with a unique and complete resource for students.ABOUT THE SERIESThe Oxford Greek and Latin College Commentaries is designed for students in intermediate or advanced Greek or Latin. Each volume includes a comprehensive introduction. The placement, on (...) the same page, of the ancient text, a running vocabulary, and succinct notes focusing on grammar, syntax, and distinctive features of style provides students with essential learning aids.Series Editors: Barbara Weiden Boyd, Bowdoin College, Stephen Esposito, Boston University, and Mary Lefkowitz, Wellesley CollegeAlso Available Ovid: Ars Amatoria, Book 3, Christopher M. Brunelle, St. Olaf CollegeForthcoming Latin VolumesSuetonius's Life of AugustusDarryl Phillips, Connecticut CollegeLucan's De Bello Civile, Book 5Jonathan Tracy, Massey University, New Zealand. (shrink)

Uma das questões mais interessantes do debate contemporâneo sobre a justiça, no âmbito da teoria política normativa, diz respeito sobre qual foco deveria ocupar a posição central de uma visão igualitarista: igualdade baseada em satisfação de necessidades básicas, bens primários como propõe Rawls, igualdade de recursos como defende Dworkin ou, como quer Amartya Sen, igualdade de capacidades? Com o que, afinal, os igualitaristas deveriam se preocupar? Este trabalho tem o objetivo de analisar criticamente essas três perspectivas.

In many animal species, the early development of the embryo follows a stereotypic pattern of cell cleavage, lineage allocation and generation of tissue asymmetry leading to delineation of the body plan with three primary embryonic axes. The mammalian embryo has been regarded as an exception and primary body axes of the mouse embryo were thought to develop after implantation. However, recent findings have challenged this view. Asymmetry in the fertilised oocyte, as defined by the position of the second polar body (...) and the sperm entry point, can be correlated with the orientation of the animal–vegetal and the embryonic–abembryonic axes in the preimplantation blastocyst. Studies of the pattern of morphogenetic movement of cells and genetic activity in the peri‐implantation embryo suggest that the animal–vegetal axis of the blastocyst might presage the orientation of the anterior–posterior axis of the gastrula. This suggests that the asymmetry of the zygote that is established at fertilisation and early cleavage has a lasting impact on the delineation of body axes during embryogenesis. BioEssays 23:508–517, 2001. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

The United Kingdom's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, introduced into Parliament on the 8th of November 2007 contains a number of controversial proposals inter alia expressly permitting the creation of inter-species embryos for research and destruction and increasing the scope for human cloning also for destructive research. It is supposed that there ought not to be a blanket ban on the creation of human clones, hybrids, cybrids and chimeras because these embryos are valuable for research purposes. The prohibition on the (...) gestation of non-permitted embryos and interspecies embryos is used to generate confidence that embryos with compromised origins would not be gestated and reared. The argument outlined here demonstrates how uncertain are any legal prohibitions on gestation. Accordingly, the practical import of the distinction between compromised embryos for research and the same for live birth is equally dubious. The legislation would not, on this analysis, supply effective controls over this reproductive technology. (shrink)

Warum und wie genau darf zu Hause oder auf einer Theaterbühne anders gehandelt werden, als im Büro; wie verändert sich die Bedeutung von Worten, je nachdem wo, von wem und wie sie gesagt werden? Warum und mit welchen Mitteln versuchen wir, höflich zu sein, und inwiefern sind wir von unangemessenem Verhalten anderer bedroht? Welches Weltwissen benötigen Beobachter, um beurteilen zu können, wann Verhalten als angemessen oder unangemessen einzustufen ist? Im vorliegenden Band untersuchen die Beitragenden das Phänomen sozialer Angemessenheit unter anderem (...) aus philosophischer, sozialpsychologischer, soziologischer, kulturtheoretischer, linguistischer und anthropologischer Perspektive. Dabei werden insbesondere Bedingungen und Auswirkungen, Merkmale sowie Wandlungs- und Entstehungsprozesse sozialer Angemessenheit thematisiert. Die Herausgebenden Jacqueline Bellon M.A. promoviert an der TU Darmstadt und arbeitet als Philosophin, Kultur- und Sozialwissenschaftlerin. Dr. Bruno Gransche ist Philosoph am Institut für Technikzukünfte (ITZ) des Karlsruher Instituts für Technologie (KIT). Sebastian Nähr-Wagener M.A. ist wiss. Mitarbeiter am Institut für Technikzukünfte (ITZ) des Karlsruher Instituts für Technologie (KIT). (shrink)

This ground-breaking book surveys the history of women's political thought in Europe from the late medieval period to the early modern era. The authors examine women's ideas about topics such as the basis of political authority, the best form of political organisation, justifications of obedience and resistance, and concepts of liberty, toleration, sociability, equality, and self-preservation. Women's ideas concerning relations between the sexes are discussed in tandem with their broader political outlooks; and the authors demonstrate that the development of a (...) distinctively sexual politics is reflected in women's critiques of marriage, the double standard, and women's exclusion from government. Women writers are also shown to be indebted to the ancient idea of political virtue, and to be acutely aware of being part of a long tradition of female political commentary. This work will be of tremendous interest to political philosophers, historians of ideas, and feminist scholars alike. (shrink)

What can contemporary machine learning (ML) models do? Given the proliferation of ML models in society, answering this question matters to a variety of stakeholders, both public and private. The evaluation of models' capabilities is rapidly emerging as a key subfield of modern ML, buoyed by regulatory attention and government grants. Despite this, the notion of an ML model possessing a capability has not been interrogated: what are we saying when we say that a model is able to do something? (...) And what sorts of evidence bear upon this question? -/- In this paper, we aim to answer these questions, using the capabilities of large language models (LLMs) as a running example. Drawing on the large philosophical literature on abilities, we develop an account of ML models' capabilities which can be usefully applied to the nascent science of model evaluation. Our core proposal is a conditional analysis of model abilities (CAMA): crudely, a machine learning model has a capability to X just when it would reliably succeed at doing X if it 'tried'. The main contribution of the paper is making this proposal precise in the context of ML, resulting in an operationalisation of CAMA applicable to LLMs. We then put CAMA to work, showing that it can help make sense of various features of ML model evaluation practice, as well as suggest procedures for performing fair inter-model comparisons. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article addresses the growing literature in critical race studies, which holds that racism is permanent or incurable, and that by adopting this pessimistic view of racism, we can enact improved and healthier racialized lives. I argue that the focus on curing anti-Black racism, and the failure to do so in the civil rights era and its aftermath has left people of all races, to varying degrees, stuck in pessimistic states of racialized anger, resentment, guilt, and shame. These pessimistic (...) states have brought about an additional level of oppression for targets of racialized oppression. I call it “meta-oppression,” and it is the oppression of being oppressed. I argue that this oppression has exacerbated the effects of the social disease of racism, and it has literally affected the physiologies of many African Americans. This article provides a diagnosis of these existential and physiological states of meta-oppression and a clarification of its characteristics. This diagnosis is an initial step in a larger project of formulating and enacting effective treatments for it. I then argue that meta-oppression is a helpful diagnostic tool for clarifying the characteristics and ramifications on Blacks of US systemic racism during the post–civil rights movement period. I aim to establish meta-oppression as an existential and physiological condition that requires attention so as to expand the social imaginations of people of color and to allow us to engage in more systemic joyful affirmations of our racialized lives while still living within racist conditions. (shrink)

Emancipatory practice development (ePD) is a practitioner‐led research methodology which enables workplace transformation. Underpinned by the critical paradigm, ePD works through facilitation and workplace learning, with people in their local context on practice issues that are significant to them. Its purpose is to embed safe, person‐centred learning cultures which transform individuals and workplaces. In this article, we critically reflect on a year‐long ePD study in an acute care hospital ward. We explore the challenges of practice change within systems, building collective (...) strength with frontline collaborations and leadership to sustain new learning cultures. Our work advances practice development dialogue through working closely with the underpinning theories. Our critique analyses how ePD can enact and sustain change within a complex system. We argue that ePD works to strengthen safety cultures by challenging antidemocratic practices through communicative action. By opening communicative spaces, ePD enables staff to collectively deliberate and reach consensus. Their raised awareness supports staff to resist ways of working which conspire against safe patient care. Sustainability of practice change is fostered by the co‐operative democracies created within the frontline team and meso level enablement. We conclude that the democratising potential of ePDt generates staff agency at the frontline. (shrink)

People with mental illness are treated, in research, as a ‘class’ or category who are vulnerable, without always being clear why they should be treated as such, not why an individual, rather than the class, is vulnerable. The two main reasons given are lack of competence and power imbalance. Competence issues include incapacity and legislation, assessment and the impact of the illness in decisions. Power issues cover the role of mental health legislation, coercion, protectiveness and paternalism, stigma and discrimination and (...) the ‘well’ and ‘ill’ self. These are examined within a framework of risk assessment, both to the patient and to others. Over-concern to protect the vulnerable can lead to gate-keepers preventing their inclusion in studies at various stages of the research. This denies such groups a voice in the research process. It is suggested that ethical scrutiny of research is not only to prevent harm to the vulnerable, but also to provide a framework to empower such people to take part in research. To do otherwise is to further stigmatize and marginalize them. One way forward is to look at the risk presented by different types of research, from clinical intervention trials to non-therapeutic, qualitative studies and to modify capacity and access requirements in the light of the risks presented. (shrink)

Ce texte étudie la réception et la postérité de deux anecdotes publiées par Cabanis. Celui-ci mettait en scène ses amis Franklin et Condillac comme des rêveurs croyant parfois en leurs productions nocturnes. Ces histoires furent citées très fréquemment au XIXe siècle et elles furent modifiées et « recréées » : on les présenta soit comme des exceptions soit comme des arguments contre un « matérialisme » de Cabanis. Plus généralement, ces histoires pouvaient apparaître comme anecdotiques ou avoir le statut plus (...) éminent d’exemples. (shrink)

The present work considers the communicative dimensions of intellectual practices in an effort to discern how these practices can take full account of their own placement within and accountability to the human communities and cultures they cultivate. The discussion is framed with a focus on intellectual communities who have struggled against the dominance of Euromodern epistemological orientations that have constructed their own cultures and intellectual practices as irrelevant or, at best inferior. This struggle is a decolonial praxis. The development of (...) communicology during the post-World War II period in the United States is taken up as an approach to theory construction that allows for the fullest possible examination of the very human condition in which thought and action emerge. Chicana and Latina phenomenology constitute a further development of this decolonial praxis consonant with the sensibilities of communicology. Chicana and Latina phenomenology is shown to advance our understanding of philosophy as an intellectual (i.e., communicative) practice that takes place in a world of other human beings to whom we are accountable. Theory construction as it relates to boundary conditions is taken as an important point that spans the all too common gap between the existential and the cultural and aids in constituting a theory construction project that is also a decolonial praxis. (shrink)

The circumstances of later Stuart monarchy provide the context of John Locke's politics in its simplest sense. This chapter surveys the politics of memory, the politics of religion, partisanship and the public sphere, British and Irish contexts, and European events. Some of these remained constant throughout Locke's life, but specific works were stimulated by particular events as well. The politics of memory were dwarfed by the politics of religion. One of the major reasons why later Stuart England was so obsessed (...) with the memory of its earlier troubles was the continuing problem of imposing religious uniformity on a population divided by faith. The chapter explores the milieu in which Locke's political writings might have been, and then actually were, published. The context of Locke's political thought involves not just political events, but also the political culture of partisanship, print, and the "public sphere". (shrink)

Despite its centrality in the philosophy of cognitive science, there has been little prior philosophical work engaging with the notion of representation in contemporary NLP practice. This paper attempts to fill that lacuna: drawing on ideas from cognitive science, I introduce a framework for evaluating the representational claims made about components of neural NLP models, proposing three criteria with which to evaluate whether a component of a model represents a property and operationalising these criteria using probing classifiers, a popular analysis (...) technique in NLP (and deep learning more broadly). The project of operationalising a philosophically-informed notion of representation should be of interest to both philosophers of science and NLP practitioners. It affords philosophers a novel testing-ground for claims about the nature of representation, and helps NLPers organise the large literature on probing experiments, suggesting novel avenues for empirical research. (shrink)

In a recent letter, Dillion et. al (2023) make various suggestions regarding the idea of artificially intelligent systems, such as large language models, replacing human subjects in empirical moral psychology. We argue that human subjects are in various ways indispensable.

Danièle-Djamila Minne-Amrane, née à Neuilly-sur-Seine le 13 août 1939, est décédée à Alger le 11 février dernier. Son père, Pierre Minne, professeur de philosophie, ancien résistant puis militant anticolonial au Sénégal, en est expulsé en 1947. Il s’installe alors en Algérie, dans la campagne de Tlemcen où sa femme, Jacqueline Netter, allait devenir institutrice. Après son divorce, cette dernière se remarie avec Abdelkader Guerroudj et tous deux militent au PCA (parti communiste algérien). Da...

The field of AI safety seeks to prevent or reduce the harms caused by AI systems. A simple and appealing account of what is distinctive of AI safety as a field holds that this feature is constitutive: a research project falls within the purview of AI safety just in case it aims to prevent or reduce the harms caused by AI systems. Call this appealingly simple account The Safety Conception of AI safety. Despite its simplicity and appeal, we argue that (...) The Safety Conception is in tension with at least two trends in the ways AI safety researchers and organizations think and talk about AI safety: first, a tendency to characterize the goal of AI safety research in terms of catastrophic risks from future systems; second, the increasingly popular idea that AI safety can be thought of as a branch of safety engineering. Adopting the methodology of conceptual engineering, we argue that these trends are unfortunate: when we consider what concept of AI safety it would be best to have, there are compelling reasons to think that The Safety Conception is the answer. Descriptively, The Safety Conception allows us to see how work on topics that have historically been treated as central to the field of AI safety is continuous with work on topics that have historically been treated as more marginal, like bias, misinformation, and privacy. Normatively, taking The Safety Conception seriously means approaching all efforts to prevent or mitigate harms from AI systems based on their merits rather than drawing arbitrary distinctions between them. (shrink)

Background: Personal genomic testing (PGT) offers individuals genetic information about relationships, wellness, sporting ability, and health. PGT is increasingly accessible online, including in emerging markets such as Australia. Little is known about what consumers expect from these tests and whether their reflections on testing resonate with bioethics concepts such as autonomy. Methods: We report findings from focus groups and semi-structured interviews that explored attitudes to and experiences of PGT. Focus group participants had little experience with PGT, while interview participants had (...) undergone testing. Recordings were transcribed and analyzed using thematic analysis. Findings were critically interpreted with reference to bioethics scholarship on autonomy. Results: Fifty-six members of the public participated in seven focus groups, and 40 individuals were interviewed separately. Both groups valued the choice of PGT, and believed that it could motivate relevant actions. Focus group themes centered on the perceived value of choices, knowledge enabling action and knowledge about the self. Interview themes suggest that participants reflexively engage with their PGT information to make meaning, and that some appreciate its shortcomings. Critical interpretation of findings shows that while consumers of PGT are able to exercise a degree of autonomy in choosing, they may not be able to achieve a substantive conceptualization of autonomy, one that promotes alignment with higher-order desires. Conclusions: PGT consumers can critically reason about testing. However, they may uncritically accept test results, may not appreciate drawbacks of increased choice, or may overestimate the potential for information to motivate behavioral change. While consumers appear to be capable of substantive autonomy, they do so without ongoing support from companies. PGT companies promote a problematic (“default”) account of autonomy, reliant on empowerment rhetoric. This leaves consumers vulnerable to making decisions inconsistent with their higher-order desires. As PGT expands, claims about its power and value need to be carefully drawn. (shrink)

Descriptive accounts of the nature of explanation in neuroscience and the global goals of such explanation have recently proliferated in the philosophy of neuroscience and with them new understandings of the experimental practices of neuroscientists have emerged. In this paper, I consider two models of such practices; one that takes them to be reductive; another that takes them to be integrative. I investigate those areas of the neuroscience of learning and memory from which the examples used to substantiate these models (...) are culled, and argue that the multiplicity of experimental protocols used in these research areas presents specific challenges for both models. In my view, these challenges have been overlooked largely because philosophers have hitherto failed to pay sufficient attention to fundamental features of experimental practice. I demonstrate that when we do pay attention to such features, evidence for reduction and integrative unity in neuroscience is simply not borne out. I end by suggesting some new directions for the philosophy of neuroscience that pertain to taking a closer look at the nature of neuroscientific experiments. (shrink)

The goal of this article is to describe the new experiences that close female family members of disappeared persons have after the enforced disappearance. These relatives experience rupture with their pre-disappearance lives. Their everyday routines cease and the search for the disappeared person takes over. Some relatives experience impoverishment and many lose their children or spouse to emigration. Parts or all of their extended family cut off ties, friendships end, and some neighbors avoid them. A local humanitarian or human rights (...) organization and an association of relatives of disappeared persons come to occupy a central place in relatives’ lives and become “like a second family.” Focusing on enforced disappearance during the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile, this research is based on interviews with relatives of people who disappeared, on a year’s participant observation with a group of these relatives, and on the examination of relatives’ denunciatory art. (shrink)

L’histoire de la dénomination des chaires de « psychologie », ou impliquant cette discipline, au Collège de France apparaît comme un révélateur particulier de l’évolution de celle-ci dans le champ des sciences humaines et sociales.