This highly multidisciplinary collection discusses an increasingly important topic among scholars in science and technology studies: objectivity in science. It features eleven essays on scientific objectivity from a variety of perspectives, including philosophy of science, history of science, and feminist philosophy. Topics addressed in the book include the nature and value of scientific objectivity, the history of objectivity, and objectivity in scientific journals and communities. Taken individually, the essays supply new methodological tools for theorizing what is valuable in the pursuit (...) of objective knowledge and for investigating its history. The essays offer many starting points, while suggesting new avenues of research. Taken collectively, the essays exemplify the very virtues of objectivity that they theorize—in reading them together, the reader can sense various anxieties about the dangerously subjective in our age and locate commonalities of concern as well as differences of approach. As a result, the volume offers an expansive vision of a research community seeking a communal understanding of its own methods and its own epistemic anxieties, struggling to enunciate the key problems of knowledge of our time and offer insight into how to overcome them. -/- (Contributors: Alex Csiszar, Scott Edgar, Peter Galison, Ian Hacking, Sandra Harding, Moira Howes, Paolo Savoia, Judy Segal, Joan Steigerwald, and Alison Wylie). (shrink)

To accept that cognition is embodied is to question many of the beliefs traditionally held by cognitive scientists. One key question regards the localization of cognitive faculties. Here we argue that for cognition to be embodied and sometimes embedded, means that the cognitive faculty cannot be localized in a brain area alone. We review recent research on neural reuse, the 1/f structure of human activity, tool use, group cognition, and social coordination dynamics that we believe demonstrates how the boundary between (...) the different areas of the brain, the brain and body, and the body and environment is not only blurred but indeterminate. In turn, we propose that cognition is supported by a nested structure of task-specific synergies, which are softly assembled from a variety of neural, bodily, and environmental components (including other individuals), and exhibit interaction dominant dynamics. (shrink)

Regulation must target the financial sector, which often funds and profits from environmentally unsustainable development. In an era of global financial markets, the financial sector has a crucial impact on the state of the environment. The long-standing movement for ethically and socially responsible investment (SRI) has recently begun to advocate environmental standards for financiers. While this movement is gaining more adherents, it has increasingly justified responsible financing as a path to be prosperous, rather than virtuous. This trend partly owes to (...) how financial institutions view their legal responsibilities. The business case motivations that now predominantly drive SRI are not sufficient to make the financial sector a means to sustainable development. Some modest legal reforms to improve the quality and extent of SRI have yet to make a tangible difference. A more ambitious strategy to promote SRI for environmental sustainability is possible, based on reforming the fiduciary duties of financial institutions. Such duties, tied to concrete performance standards, could make financiers invest in more ethically responsible ways. Other collateral reforms to financial markets, including improved corporate environmental reporting, are required to promote sustainability. (shrink)

This paper explores the convergence of two recent and growing streams of bioethical work and concern. Each has originated independently, but each arises from the fact that the Common Rule that has shaped medical research ethics, as institutionalized in the United States and also abroad, is largely silent about what needs to be done in response to researchers’ positive obligations. One stream concerns what to do about the sometimes vast range of findings that may arise incidentally to performing research procedures. (...) The other asks whether medical researchers owe their study participants any “ancillary care” — that is, medical care that their study participants need but that goes beyond what is required to do the science safely. (shrink)

Nietzsche wrote in a scientific culture transformed by Darwin. He read extensively in German and British Darwinists, and his own works dealt often with such obvious Darwinian themes as struggle and evolution. Yet most of what Nietzsche said about Darwin was hostile: he sharply attacked many of his ideas, and often slurred Darwin himself as mediocre. So most readers of Nietzsche have inferred that he must have cast Darwin quite aside. But in fact, John Richardson argues, Nietzsche was deeply (...) and pervasively influenced by Darwin. He stressed his disagreements, but was silent about several core points he took over from Darwin. Moreover, Richardson claims, these Darwinian borrowings were to Nietzsche's credit: when we bring them to the surface we discover his positions to be much stronger than we had thought. Even Nietzsche's radical innovations are more plausible when we expose their Darwinian ground; we see that they amount to a new Darwinism. (shrink)

The pull to coordinate with other individuals is fundamental, serving as the basis for our social connectedness to others. Discussed is a dynamical and ecological perspective to joint action, an approach that embeds the individual’s mind in a body and the body in a niche, a physical and social environment. Research on uninstructed coordination of simple incidental rhythmic movement, along with research on goal‐directed, embodied cooperation, is reviewed. Finally, recent research is discussed that extends the coordination and cooperation studies, examining (...) how synchronizing with another, and how emergent social units of perceiving and acting are reflected in people’s feelings of connection to others. (shrink)

Multiple realization was once taken to be a challenge to reductionist visions, especially within cognitive science, and a foundation of the “antireductionist consensus.” More recently, multiple realization has come to be challenged on naturalistic grounds, as well as on more “metaphysical” grounds. Within cognitive science, one focal issue concerns the role of neural plasticity for addressing these issues. If reorganization maintains the same cognitive functions, that supports claims for multiple realization. I take up the reorganization involved in language dysfunctions to (...) deal with questions concerned with multiple realization and neural plasticity. Beginning with Broca’s case for localization and the nineteenth century discussion of “reorganization,” and returning to more recent evidence for neural plasticity, I argue that, in the end, there is substantial support for multiple realization in cognitive systems; I further argue that this is wholly consistent with a recognition of methodological pluralism in cognitive science. (shrink)

The mutual influence of science and values in biology is exhibited in several cases from the biological literature. It is argued in a number of cases, from R. A. Fisher's argument for the optimality of a 50:50 sex ratio to A. Jensen's defense of a genetic basis for intelligence, and including work on the evolution of sexual dimorphism and muted aggression, that the credence accorded the views is disproportionate with their theoretical and empirical warrant. It is, furthermore, suggested that the (...) proper explanation for the attraction and persistence of such views lies in their conformity with ideological norms. There is thus an important, if circumscribed, role for ideological critique in the evaluation of scientific theories; in particular, it lies in the explanation of the acceptance and persistence of scientific views, given independent grounds for questioning their justifiability. (shrink)

In this article, we analyse Il Memoriale della Shoah, the memorial of the victims of the Shoah in Milan, which was inaugurated in 2013 and, in 2015, was turned into a night shelter for destitute migrants. To understand the rhetoric and politics of the Memorial, we bring together the notions of affective practices, découpages du temps (lit. slices of time) and multidirectional memory. This analytic approach allows us to examine the nonlinear shape of remembering, the dialectic relationships between the spatialisation (...) of time and the temporalisation of space, the ways in which emotions are brought into being semiotically in context, and the ethical questions that these feelings raise. Through detailed multimodal and affective analysis of the affordances of the built environment and its soundscape, the curation of the Memorial, the contextualisation of three guided tours (two online and one in situ) and politicised commentary on the Memorial’s decision to shelter refugees, our paper illustrates the multi-layered character of the relationship between space and time – one in which the past, the present and the future partly overlap and mobilise political action. (shrink)

Developmental biology has resurfaced in recent years, often without a clearly central role for the organism. The organism is pulled in divergent directions: on the one hand, there is an important body of work that emphasizes the role of the gene in development, as executing and controlling embryological change; on the other hand, there are more theoretical approaches under which the organism disappears as little more than an instance for testing biological generalizations. I press here for the ineliminability of the (...) organism in developmental biology on explanatory grounds. I examine classical work concerned with growth and development, particularly in Drosophila and C. elegans. Some of this work is suggestive of modular development, and accordingly suggests a level below that of the organism as being explanatory. These are not the only type of case. There are other equally well-established results, which indicate greater integration in the developing organism. Though with a modular organization the organism can be thought of as made up of its constituent traits, and though the explanations of these traits may lie in terms of cells or genes, even with modular development the explanations of "genetic" differences require an appeal to the organism. With non-modular organization the organism has an even more central role. This does not mean that these genetic or cellular contributions are unreal in any way, or that development requires some sort of vitalistic contribution; but the genetic contributions make sense only as constituents of the organism, embedded in a larger organic context. (shrink)

Linear structural equation models (SEMs) are widely used in sociology, econometrics, biology, and other sciences. A SEM (without free parameters) has two parts: a probability distribution (in the Normal case specified by a set of linear structural equations and a covariance matrix among the “error” or “disturbance” terms), and an associated path diagram corresponding to the functional composition of variables specified by the structural equations and the correlations among the error terms. It is often thought that the path diagram is (...) nothing more than a heuristic device for illustrating the assumptions of the model. However, in this paper, we will show how path diagrams can be used to solve a number of important problems in structural equation modelling. (shrink)

The classic charge against Freudian theory is that the therapeutic success of psychoanalysis can be explained without appeal to the mechanisms of repression and insight. Whatever therapeutic success psychoanalysis might enjoy would then provide no support for the diagnostic claim that psychological disorders are due to repressed desires or for the therapeutic claim that the gains in psychoanalysis are due to insight into repressed causes. Adolf Grünbaum has repeated the charge in The Foundations of Psychoanalysis (1984), arguing that Freud's response (...) to it in what he calls the "Tally Argument" is woefully inadequate. Grünbaum claims that Freud's defense depends on the view that only psychoanalytic techniques can yield therapeutic effects, and therefore that the transience of some psychoanalytic "cures", the existence of alternative treatment modalities, and the frequency of spontaneous remission undermine Freud's defense of psychoanalysis. I argue that, whatever the merits of psychoanalysis, Freud is not logically committed to any view as extreme as that attributed to him by Grünbaum; and, furthermore, Grünbaum's rendering of Freud is historically inaccurate. (shrink)

This chapter begins with a discussion of the “opposition” between beauty and truth, and the way Nietzsche seems to divide his loyalty between them. It then considers Nietzsche's genealogy and argues that Nietzsche wants us to redesign our aesthetic aims once again, by “self selecting” them. This fourth locus of Darwinism in Nietzsche is probably the most surprising of all.

This chapter develops the core idea that “the world is will to power” – what I call Nietzsche's “power ontology.” I give careful analyses of “will” and “power,” and clarify how he thinks these are things’ essence or being. I distinguish between two basic forms that will to power can take – the active and the reactive – which will lie at the root of his values. The chapter then shows how this notion of will to power grounds Nietzsche's conception (...) of persons as systems or syntheses of such wills, as well as his distinction of three basic types of persons – master, slave, and overman – each clarified as a specific way such a system of drives can be organized. (shrink)

This chapter begins by examining the interface between Nietzsche's values generally and the claims of fact sketched in Chapter 1. It is argued that just as his explanations are variants on Darwinian ones, so is his way of making his transition from explanations to values. How Nietzsche explains values is determined in order to address his metaethics — in particular this question about the ontic and epistemic relations between his facts and his values. It is shown that Nietzsche uses his (...) quasi-Darwinian facts about the sources of our values to raise himself into a superior valuative stance, from which he carries out his “revaluation of values”. This stance gives credit or support to the “new values” that result from this revaluation. (shrink)

This article examines Nietzsche’s conception of values and how he uses it to evaluate values and justify his own. It distinguishes several different senses of “life”—biological, human, phenomenal, personal, poetic—and shows how the first four are combined in Nietzsche’s analysis of humans as complexes of drives deposited during the deep history of biological and cultural evolution. It addresses the question: what authority does life have, what criterion does it give for revaluing values, and what correction in our values does this (...) criterion dictate? (shrink)

Reprising and revising a question from Longino regarding an earlier phase of standpoint theory, I raise some issues regarding the place of a substantive normative social theory in the strong objectivity project in Harding’s recent book, Objectivity and Diversity. I offer reasons to think the issue needs to be reframed in the co-constructionist and pluralist setting of the new book but that interesting issues continue to arise in thinking about the philosophical resources feminist philosophies of science can or might rely (...) on. (shrink)

This work provides an overall review and analysis of the history of education and of its key research priorities in the British context. It investigates the extent to which education has contributed historically to social change in Britain, how it has itself been moulded by society, and the needs and opportunities that remain for further research in this general area. Contributors review the strengths and limitations of the historical literature on social change in British education over the past forty years, (...) ascertain what this literature tells us about the relationship between education and social change, and map areas and themes for future historical research. They consider both formal and informal education, different levels and stages of the education system, the process and experience of education, and regional and national perspectives. They also engage with broader discussions about theory and methodology. The collection covers a large amount of historical territory, from the sixteenth century to the present, including the emergence of the learned professions, the relationship between society and the economy, the role of higher technological education, the historical experiences of Ireland, Scotland and Wales, the social significance of teaching and learning, and the importance of social class, gender, ethnicity, and disability. It involves personal biography no less than broad national and international movements in its considerations. This book will be a major contribution to research as well as a general resource in the history and historiography of education in Britain. (shrink)

Harris levels two main criticisms against our original defence of QALYs (Quality Adjusted Life Years). First, he rejects the assumption implicit in the QALY approach that not all lives are of equal value. Second, he rejects our appeal to Rawls's veil of ignorance test in support of the QALY method. In the present article we defend QALYs against Harris's criticisms. We argue that some of the conclusions Harris draws from our view that resources should be allocated on the basis of (...) potential improvements in quality of life and quantity of life are erroneous, and that others lack the moral implications Harris claims for them. On the other hand, we defend our claim that a rational egoist, behind a veil of ignorance, could consistently choose to allocate life-saving resources in accordance with the QALY method, despite Harris's claim that a rational egoist would allocate randomly if there is no better than a 50% chance of being the recipient. (shrink)

Environmental ethicists and experts in human health have raised concerns about the effects of hydraulic fracking to access natural oil and gas resources found deep in shale rock formations on surrounding ecosystems and communities. In this study, we analyzed the prevalence of discourse on brain and mental health, and ethics, in the peer-reviewed and grey literature in the five-year period between 2016 and 2022. A total of 84 articles met inclusion criteria for analysis. Seventy-six percent (76%) mentioned impacts on brain (...) (e.g., neural tube defects, neurological symptoms), and mental health (e.g., negative psychological effects, stress, depression) briefly; 11 reports dedicated substantive discourse to either or both together. References to safety (77%) dominated the ethics context. Discussion of environmental injustices as fracking sites disproportionately affect vulnerable communities appeared in 38% of the papers. We examine the findings through the lens of environmental neuroethics that brings human-made changes to the environment, brain and mental health, and ethics together into three interwoven lines of inquiry. (shrink)

Supply-side interventions such as prescription drug monitoring programs, “pill mill” laws, and dispensing limits have done little to quell the burgeoning opioid crisis. An increasingly popular demand-side alternative to these measures – now adopted by 38 jurisdictions in the USA and 7 provinces in Canada — is court-mandated involuntary commitment and treatment. In Massachusetts, for example, Part I, Chapter 123, Section 35 of the state's General Laws allows physicians, spouses, relatives, and police officers to petition a court to involuntarily commit (...) and treat a person whose alcohol or drug abuse poses a likelihood of serious harm. This paper explores the ethical underpinnings of this law as a case study for others. First, we highlight the procedural and substantive standards of Section 35 and evaluate the application of the law in practice, including the frequency with which it has been invoked and outcomes. We then use this background to inform an ethical critique of the law. Specifically, we argue that the infringement of autonomy and privacy associated with involuntary intervention under Section 35 is not currently justified on the grounds of a lack of evidenced benefits and a risk of significant of harm. Further ethical concerns also arise from a lack of standard of care provided under the Section 35 pathway. Based on this analysis, we advance four recommendations for change to mitigate these ethical shortcomings. (shrink)

Our first encounter with Socrates in the Symposium is bizarre. Aristodemus, surprised to run into Socrates fully bathed and with his sandals on, asks him where he is going “to have made himself so beautiful (kalos)” (174a4, Rowe trans.). Socrates replies that he is on his way to see the lovely Agathon, and so that “he has beautified himself in these ways in order to go, a beauty to a beauty (kalos para kalon)” (174a7–8). Why does Socrates, who in just (...) a few moments will be lost in contemplation out on the front porch, care about being beautiful? His remark to Aristodemus is clearly in some sense ironic, but on the other hand, he really has taken unusual care with his physical appearance. Later, in his encomium to love, he will claim that beauty has this effect on lovers: the beauty of the beloved causes the lover to disdain his former way of life and “give birth” to beautiful “offspring.” Is the image of the squat and snub-nosed Socrates all freshly scrubbed and kitted out a comic foreshadowing, or a debunking, of his serious speech? Does Socrates really believe in the transformative power of beauty? (shrink)

Presents a comprehensive introduction to the period, covering such topics as science, education, art and architecture, aesthetics, and music, as well as the key terms, individuals, locations, and significant works.

Chinese negotiators are known to have a negotiation emphasis that differs from their Western counterparts, especially in issues of face and conflict. These values, however, are not monolithic, and can change depending on the negotiation circumstance. This research examines how negotiation tactics changes when Chinese negotiators are faced with counterparts from near and distant cultures. An online conjoint simulation drew 351 respondents in Taiwan to test subjective perceptions of counterparts from the USA and Japan. Chinese respondents exhibited increased cultural accommodation (...) when the counterpart's culture was more distant – paying more attention to sacrificing self-interest and saving face for the other side. Integration in the negotiation was emphasized across both near and distant cultures above that observed for negotiation with Chinese counterparts. Saving face, ignoring conflict, and domination tactics were consistently valued, irrelevant of culture. Masculinity among Chinese respondents was exhibited in a preference for integration with male counterparts, especially for Chinese male negotiators. Results indicate practical considerations when preparing for negotiation with a Chinese counterpart by considering inconsistencies in preferences while also considering consistent values. (shrink)

Harris argues that if QALYs are used only 50% of the population will be eligible for survival, whereas if random methods of allocation are used 100% will be eligible. We argue that this involves an equivocation in the use of "eligible", and provides no support for the random method. There is no advantage in having a 100% chance of being "eligible" for survival behind a veil of ignorance if you still only have a 50% chance of survival once the veil (...) is lifted. A 100% chance of a 50% chance is still only a 50% chance. We also argue that Harris provides no plausible way of dealing with the criticism that his random method of allocation may result in the squandering of resources. (shrink)

In _This Strange Idea of the Beautiful_, François Jullien explores what it means when we say something is beautiful. Bringing together ideas of beauty from both Eastern and Western philosophy, Jullien challenges the assumptions underlying our commonly agreed upon definition of what is beautiful and offers a new way of beholding art. Jullien argues that the Western concept of beauty was established by Greek philosophy and became consequently embedded within the very structure of European languages. And due to its relationship (...) to language, this concept has determined ways of thinking about beauty that often go unnoticed or unchecked in discussions of Western aesthetics. Moreover, through globalization, Western ideals of beauty have even spread to cultures whose ancient traditions are based upon radically different aesthetic foundations; yet, these cultures have adopted such views without question and without recognizing the cultural assumptions they contain. Looking specifically at how Chinese texts have been translated into Western languages, Jullien reveals how the traditional Chinese refusal to isolate or abstract beauty is obscured in translation in order to make the works more understandable to Western readers. Creating an engaging dialogue between Chinese and Western ideas, Jullien reasseses the essence of beauty. (shrink)

Lex Luthor despises Superman. He obsesses about Superman. He tries to kill Superman. Luthor takes existentialism to the extreme, though, rejecting ethics and becoming an anti‐hero. In Superman: Secret Origin, Luthor is presented as self‐directed from an early age. Friedrich Nietzsche can help us understand Luthor as an iconoclast, literally one who breaks sacred images. Luthor also explains why he is so obsessed with bringing down Superman. Luthor thinks that Superman interferes with people viewing their lives as an existential project. (...) Lex Luthor underscores the complexities of existentialist philosophy. While he is creative, self‐determined, and autonomous, he is also completely immoral. His willingness to sacrifice anything or anyone takes existentialism to an extreme that Nietzsche, Sartre, and Kierkegaard would reject. And so, we are left to wonder: is Lex Luthor an evil genius and an abomination to existentialism, or might he be a true evolution of what existentialism can become. (shrink)

This study examines new and existing photographic and lens-based art focusing upon the theme of social exchange. The text explores the history of documentary photography and maps out current solutions and strategies to problems in the discourse between photographer and subject.