Coastal ecosystems are increasingly dominated by humans. Consequently, the human dimensions of sustainability science have become an integral part of emerging coastal governance and management practices. But if we are to avoid the harsh lessons of land management, coastal decision makers must recognize that humans are one of the more coastally dependent species in the biosphere. Management responses must therefore confront both the temporal urgency and the very real compromises and sacrifices that will be necessary to achieve a sustainable coastal (...) ecosystem, one that is economically feasible, socially just, and ecologically sound. (shrink)

We define the notion of a completely determined Borel code in reverse mathematics, and consider the principle $CD - PB$, which states that every completely determined Borel set has the property of Baire. We show that this principle is strictly weaker than $AT{R_0}$. Any ω-model of $CD - PB$ must be closed under hyperarithmetic reduction, but $CD - PB$ is not a theory of hyperarithmetic analysis. We show that whenever $M \subseteq {2^\omega }$ is the second-order part of an ω-model (...) of $CD - PB$, then for every $Z \in M$, there is a $G \in M$ such that G is ${\rm{\Delta }}_1^1$-generic relative to Z. (shrink)

Background Informed consent is a requirement for all research. It is not, however, clear how much information is sufficient to make an informed decision about participation in research. Information on an online questionnaire about childhood development was provided through an unfolding electronic participant sheet in three levels of information. Methods 552 participants, who completed the web-based survey, accessed and spent time reading the participant information sheet (PIS) between July 2008 and November 2009. The information behaviour of the participants was investigated. (...) The first level contained less information than might be found on a standard PIS, the second level corresponded to a standard PIS, and the third contained more information than on a standard PIS. The actual time spent on reading the information provided in three incremental levels and the participants' evaluation of the information were calculated. Results 77% of the participants chose to access the first level of information, whereas 12% accessed the first two levels, 6% accessed all three levels of information and 23% participated without accessing information. The most accessed levels of information were those that corresponded to the average reading times. Conclusion The brief information provided in the first level was sufficient for participants to make informed decisions, while a sizeable minority of the participants chose not to access any information at all. This study adds to the debate about how much information is required to make a decision about participation in research and the results may help inform the future development of information sheets by providing data on participants' actual needs when deciding about questionnaire surveys. (shrink)

We propose a model of cognition grounded in ancient Greek philosophy which encompasses Aristotle’s categories. Taking for First Principles the brute facts of the mental actions of separation, aggregation and ordering, we derive Aristotle’s categories as follows. First, Separation lets us see single entities, giving the simple concept of an individual. Next, Aggregation lets us see instances of some kind, giving the basic concept of a particular. Then, Ordering lets us see both wholes-with-parts as well as parts-of-some-whole, giving the subtle (...) concept of a relational or Gestalt. The basic and the subtle concept give us the major and minor categories. The categories constitute a top-level ontology and describe universal usage so that any other category necessarily describes particular or domain usage. (shrink)

This article compares the information processing and dynamical systems perspectives on problem solving. Key theoretical constructs of the information-processing perspective include “searching” a “p...

In discussions surrounding epistemology and rationality, it is often useful to assume an agent is rational or ideally rational. Often, this ideal rationality assumption is spelled out along the following lines: -/- 1. The agent believes everything about a situation which the evidence entitles her to believe and nothing which it does not. -/- 2. The agent believes all the logical consequences of any of her beliefs. -/- 3. The agent knows her own mind: if she believes P, she believes (...) that she believes P; and if she doesn't believe P, she believes that she doesn't believe P. -/- 4. The agent believes nothing of the form 'P and it is not the case that P.' -/- 5. If an agent's background belief-set satisfies 1-4 and if rationality requires the agent to add P to her belief-set, then the resulting belief-set will also satisfy 1-4. -/- While individually plausible, there are cases in which holding on to 1-5 generates paradox. Some resolve such paradoxical cases by granting 1-5 but arguing while ideally rational agents can exist, they can't possibly ever find themselves in such a situation: such case descriptions are epistemically incoherent. Others allow that rational agents can coherently find themselves in such odd circumstances, and argue that it's more reasonable to weaken our concept of ideal rationality and give up premise (2) above. However, this strategy has also been rejected. My aim in this paper is to defend the utility of positing an ideally rational agent in such paradoxical circumstances. I argue in such cases we should give up (2), in particular the assumption that (necessarily) if an ideally rational agent believes both P and the conditional, if P then Q, then she believes Q.. What's important is to hold on to the goal of positing ideal rationality: to maximize the amount of true or probably true information a thinker can justifiably believe in a given circumstance. Normally that will mean holding on to (2), but these unusual paradoxical cases are best handled by giving up (2). (shrink)

This essay addresses the question of what it means to be an American today. In the first half, I respond to Samuel P. Huntington’s claim that America’s national identity is fundamentally Anglo-Protestant by rehearsing Jacques Derrida’s argument that the founding of a nation whose self-understanding is based on the idea of a social contract, such as the United States, implies an “originating violence” governed by extralegal considerations. In the second half, I discuss the “melting pot” and “salad bowl” concepts of (...) American identity and show how deconstruction does not force us to choose between them. However, I suggest that the dynamic nature of the melting pot is more consonant with the deconstructionist idea of the American people “to come” presented in the first half. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Postmodern Theory and Biblical Theology: Vanquishing God’s ShadowWalter L. ReedPostmodern Theory and Biblical Theology: Vanquishing God’s Shadow, by Brian D. Ingraffia; xvi & 284 pp. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995, $59.95 cloth, $17.95 paper.At the beginning of John Updike’s new novel In the Beauty of the Lilies, a Presbyterian minister, trained by the Princeton Fundamentalists in the early years of the 20th century, is reading a book by (...) the popular agnostic Robert Ingersoll when he suddenly loses his faith. Brian Ingraffia’s Postmodern Theory and Biblical Theology puts secular clerics at the end of the century, secure in their atheism or agnosticism, in danger of the opposite fate. Postmodern theorists are at risk here of losing their doubt. At least they are in danger of losing their confidence that Christianity need not be taken seriously since Nietzsche announced its demise and Heidegger and Derrida elaborated its obituary.Ingraffia is straightforward about his intentions. “In this study I seek to analyze critically the antipathy exhibited in postmodern theory toward theology,” he begins. “Whereas modernism tried to elevate man into God’s place, postmodern theory seeks to destroy or deconstruct the very place and attributes of God” (p. 1). Ingraffia focuses on Nietzsche, Heidegger and Derrida, arguably the three most rigorous and original philosophers of what has come to be known more loosely as postmodern theory. He analyzes the development of each writer’s critique of Western metaphysics in its own right, but he also attends to the genealogy of subversive genealogies among them—in Heidegger’s critique of the residual metaphysics of Nietzsche, for example, [End Page 184] and Derrida’s attempt to deconstruct, at times by appealing to concepts from Nietzsche, the residual ontotheology of Heidegger. “By deconstructing the metaphysics of presence, these thinkers all claim to have deconstructed ontotheology, [that is,] both Greek metaphysics and Christian theology,” Ingraffia concludes. But as he has argued in different specific contexts throughout his persuasive book, “the logos of biblical theology is radically different from the logos of Greek philosophy and modern rationalism,” these being the real sources or substance of the ontotheology that postmoderism is so dead set against (p. 237). In planting a headstone over Christian theology, in other words, postmodern theory has got the wrong grave.The genuine “biblical theology” Ingraffia counterposes to the misrepresentations of Christianity by Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Derrida is found first and foremost in the New Testament letters of Paul. It is one of the striking features of the book that it brings a powerful voice from the first century into conversation and controversy with these powerful voices from the modern era. “The inventor of Christianity,” as Nietzsche labeled Paul in one of his many bitter aphorisms, is the central spokesman for the Christian understanding of truth that postmodernism has, deliberately as well as misadvertently, according to Ingraffia, misconstrued. Thus Paul’s doctrine of “the redemptive-eschatological separation between the present world and the world to come” (pp. 62 ff.), especially in the Letter to the Philippians, is set against Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence; Paul’s discrimination of “flesh and spirit,” with a salutary attention to the koiné Greek meanings of these terms and their cognates in the Letter to the Romans, is opposed to Heidegger’s doctrine of the authentic self. And in the most original of Ingraffia’s Pauline probes, Paul’s distinction between the “letter” (gramma) foolishly grasped and the “Scripture” (graphe) spiritually apprehended in the Second Letter to the Corinthians is counterposed to Derrida’s grammatology, where arche-writing effectively levels all hierarchies and distinctions.The strength of Ingraffia’s argument lies in his clear and, on one level, sympathetic exposition of the different but related projects of these three thinkers. This is not the kind of defensive dismissal of “secular humanism” or “godless philosophy” that evangelical Christianity has sometimes made from behind the barricades of its antimodernist revolt. With lucid expositions of crucial turns of their arguments and judicious appeals to current scholarship on each figure, Ingraffia shows how Nietzsche and Heidegger, “theology students turned philosopher” (p. 47), derive important concepts by borrowing from Christian theology on the one hand... (shrink)

PHOTO ID 121339257© Designer491| Dreamstime.com ABSTRACT When physicians use their clinical knowledge and skills to advance the well-being of their patients, there may be apparent conflict between patient autonomy and physician beneficence. We are skeptical that today’s medical ethics education adequately fosters future physicians’ commitment to beneficence, which is both rationally defensible and fundamentally consistent with patient autonomy. We use an ethical dilemma that was presented to a group of third-year medical students to examine how ethics education might be causing (...) them to give undue deference to autonomy, thereby undermining their commitment to beneficence. INTRODUCTION The right of patients to choose which treatments they prefer is rooted in today’s social mores and taught as a principle of medical ethics as respect for autonomy. Yet, when physicians use their clinical knowledge and skills to advance the well-being of their patients, there may be a conflict between patient autonomy and physician beneficence. We are skeptical that today’s medical ethics education adequately fosters a commitment to beneficence, which is both rationally defensible and fundamentally consistent with patient autonomy. I. An Ethical Dilemma The impetus for this paper arose when students who were completing their third clinical year discussed a real-life ethical dilemma. A middle-aged man developed a pulmonary hemorrhage while on blood thinners for a recently placed coronary stent. The bleeding was felt to be reversible, but the patient needed immediate intubation or he would die. The cardiologist was told that the patient previously expressed to other physicians that he never wanted to be intubated. However, the cardiologist made the decision to intubate the patient anyway, and the patient eventually recovered.[1] Students were asked if they believed that the cardiologist had acted ethically. Their overwhelming response was, “No, the patient should have been allowed to die.” We looked into how students applied ethical reasoning to conclude that this outcome was ethically preferred. To explore how the third-year clinical experience might have formed the students’ judgment, we presented the same case to students who were just beginning their third year. Their responses were essentially uniform in recommending intubation. While there is likely more than one reasonable view in this case, we agree with the physician and the younger medical students that intubation was the ethically appropriate decision and will present an argument for it. But first, we explain the reasoning behind the more advanced medical students’ decision to choose patient autonomy at the expense of beneficence. II. Medical Ethics Education and the Priority of Autonomy Beauchamp and Childress’s Principles of Biomedical Ethics, first published in 1979 and now in its 8th edition, is a significant part of the formal ethics education in medical school.[2] Students learn an ethical decision-making approach based on respect for four ethical principles: autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence, and justice. While Beauchamp and Childress officially afford no prima facie superiority to any principle, the importance of respect for patient autonomy has increased through the editions of their book. For example, early editions of their book opposed the legalization of physician-assisted death compared to recent editions that defended it.[3] As another example, Beauchamp and Childress make paternalism harder to justify by adding an autonomy-protecting condition to the list of conditions for acceptable paternalism.[4] Authority, they contend, need not conflict with autonomy—provided the authority is autonomously chosen.[5] “The main requirement,” they write, “is to respect a particular patient’s or subject’s autonomous choices, whatever they may be.[6] In the principlism of Beauchamp and Childress, autonomy now seems to have a kind of default priority.[7] However, the bioethics discourse has strong counternarratives, noting some movement to elevate the role of beneficence and to respect the input of stakeholders, including the family and the healthcare team. Ethics education achieves particular relevance in the third clinical year when students become embedded in the care of patients and learn from what has been called the informal curriculum. They observe how attending physicians approach day-to-day ethical problems at the patient’s bedside. In this context, students observe the importance of informed consent for serious treatments or invasive procedures, a practice that highlights the principle of patient autonomy. In both the formal and informal curriculum, medical students observe how, in the words of Paul Wolpe, “patient autonomy has become the central and most powerful principle in ethical decision-making in American medicine.”[8] In short, students appear to learn a deference for patient autonomy. This curricular shift in favor of autonomy coincides with legal developments that protect patients’ rights and decision-making with respect to their healthcare choices. The priority of autonomy in medicine benefits patients by reflecting their choices and, in some cases, their fundamental liberty. III. The Practice of Medicine and the Commitment to Beneficence There are many critiques of the dominant place that autonomy has in biomedical ethics,[9] especially considering that autonomy seems to be biased toward individualistic, Western, and somewhat American culture-driven values.[10] In addition, many bioethical dilemmas are cast as a conflict between autonomy and beneficence. Our point is that medical students bring to their study of medicine a commitment to beneficence that seems to be suppressed by practical ethics education. We think this commitment is rationally defensible and should be nurtured. It is striking that young medical students have a pre-reflective commitment to beneficence at all. For, as we mentioned, it is not just medicine but Western culture generally that prioritizes autonomy in settling ethical dilemmas. In wanting to act for the good of others (rather than simply agreeing to what others want), physicians are already swimming somewhat against the cultural tide.[11] However, doing so makes sense, given the nature of medicine and the profession of healing. When prospective medical students are asked why they wish to become physicians, the usual answer is some variation on caring for the sick and preventing disease. It is unlikely that a reason to become a physician is to respect a patient’s autonomy. It would be easy to dismiss medical students’ commitment to beneficence as a mere intuition and contrary to a more reasoned and deliberative approach. Beauchamp and Childress seem to minimize the value of physician intuition, stating that justifications for certain procedures are “…supported by good reasons. They need not rest merely in intuition or feeling.”[12] Henry Richardson writes that “situational or perceptive intuition…leaves the reasons for decision unarticulated.”[13] We think this is a crude and rather thin way of understanding intuition. Some bioethicists have defended intuition as essential to the practice of medicine and not something opposed to reason.[14] In the case we describe, we believe the ethical justifications s for the patient’s intubation are fundamentally sound: the patient did not have a “do not intubate” order written in the chart, the emergency intubation had not been foreseen, so the patient did not have the opportunity to consent to or reject intubation; the patient had consented to the treatment for his cardiac disease so his consent for intubation could have been assumed;[15] and the consequences of respecting his autonomy did not justify allowing him to die.[16] While it is possible to have more than one reasonable view on this case, we think the case for beneficence is strong and certainly should not be dismissed out of hand. We do not deny that if a patient makes a clearly documented, well-informed decision to forgo intubation that this decision ought to be respected by the physician (even if the physician disagrees with the patient’s decision). But, in this situation, as in many others in the practice of medicine, the patient’s real wishes and preferences are not well-articulated in advance. There are many cases where a physician acts based on what she believes the patient, or the surrogate, would want, sometimes in situations that do not allow much time for reflection. An example might be resuscitation of a newborn at the borderline of viability. In their ethics education, beneficence would mean acting first to save a life. If the patient or surrogate makes an informed decision to the contrary, a beneficent physician respects that autonomous decision. In the case presented, the patient expressed gratitude to the cardiologist when extubated. But what if he had expressed anger at the physician for violating his autonomy? There are those who could argue that not only was intubation ethically wrong but that the cardiologist put himself in legal jeopardy by his actions (especially if there had been a written refusal applicable to the specific situation). In the example we use, we point out that the cardiologist may not have escaped a lawsuit if the patient had died without intubation. His family, when hearing the circumstances, may have sued for failure to act and dereliction of the cardiologist’s duty to save him. Beyond a potential legal challenge for either action or inaction, there is an overriding ethical question the cardiologist had to address: what course would be most satisfying to his conscience? Would he rather allow a patient to die for fear of recrimination, or act to save his life, regardless of the personal consequences? In the absence of real knowledge about the patient’s considered wishes, it is most reasonable to err on the side of promoting patient well-being. A physician’s commitment to beneficence is not necessarily a way of undermining a patient’s autonomy. In acting for the patient's good, physicians are also acting on what it is reasonable to believe a patient (or most patients, perhaps) would want, which is obviously connected to what a patient does want. Pellegrino and Thomasma argue that beneficence includes respect for a patient’s autonomy since “the best interests of the patient are intimately linked with their preferences.”[17] Instead of conceptualizing ethical dilemmas in medicine as conflicts between autonomy and beneficence, it is possible that medical schools could teach students that truly practicing beneficence is a way of valuing patient autonomy, especially when the patient’s wishes are not specific to the situation and are not clearly expressed. CONCLUSION It is important for students and practicing physicians to understand the principle of respect for patient autonomy in a pluralistic society that demands personal self-determination. However, the role of the physician as a beneficent healer should not be diminished by this respect for autonomy. Respecting a patient’s autonomy is grounded in and manifested by physician beneficence.[18] That is, seeking what is good for the patient can only be good if it respects their personhood and dignity. We propose that a commitment to beneficence, incipient in young medical students, should be developed over time with their other clinical reasoning skills. Such a commitment need not be sacrificed on the altar of patient autonomy. Beneficence needs greater relative moral weight with students as they proceed in their ethics education. - [1] S. Jauhar, “When Doctors Need to Lie,” New York Times, February 22, 2014, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/23/opinion/sunday/when-doctors-need-to-lie.html. [2] T. L. Beauchamp and James F. Childress, Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 8th ed. (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2019). [3] Louise A. Mitchell, “Major Changes in Principles of Biomedical Ethics,” The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 14, no. 3 (2014): 459–75, https://doi.org/10.5840/ncbq20141438. [4] Tom L. Beauchamp and James F. Childress, Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 8th ed. (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2019), 238. [5] Beauchamp and Childress, 103. [6] Beauchamp and Childress, p. 108. [7] For other accounts that prioritize autonomy, see e.g. Allen E. Buchanan and Dan W. Brock, Deciding for Others: The Ethics of Surrogate Decision Making (Cambridge University Press, 1989), 38–39; R Gillon, “Ethics Needs Principles—Four Can Encompass the Rest—and Respect for Autonomy Should Be ‘First among Equals,’” Journal of Medical Ethics 29, no. 5 (October 2003): 307–12, https://doi.org/10.1136/jme.29.5.307. For examples of critiques of these accounts, see footnote 9. [8] P. R. Wolpe, “The Triumph of Autonomy in American Bioethics: A Sociological View,” in Bioethics and Society: Constructing the Ethical Enterprise, p. 43. [9] V. A. Entwistle et al., “Supporting Patient Autonomy: The Importance of Clinician-Patient Relationships,” Journal of General Internal Medicine 25, no. 7 (July 2010): 741–45; C. Foster, Choosing Life, Choosing Death: The Tyranny of Autonomy in Medical Ethics and Law, 1st ed. (Oxford ; Hart Publishing, 2009); O. O’Neill, Autonomy and Trust in Bioethics, The Gifford Lectures, University of Edinburgh 2001 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002). [10] P. Marshall and B. Koenig, “Accounting for Culture in a Globalized Bioethics,” The Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics: A Journal of the American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics 32, no. 2 (2004): 252–66; R. Fan, “Self-Determination vs. Family-Determination: Two Incommensurable Principles of Autonomy,” Bioethics 11, no. 3–4 (1997): 309–22. [11] Arguments stressing the importance of beneficence, as ours does here, certainly approach paternalistic arguments. We set aside the complex issue of paternalism for purposes of this paper and simply note that the principle of beneficence as such does not say anything specifically about acting against the patient’s will. In the case study that focuses this paper, we do not believe the patient’s will or wishes were clearly indicated. [12] Beauchamp and Childress, Principles of Biomedical Ethics, p. 20, see note 2 above. [13] H. S. Richardson, “Specifying, Balancing, and Interpreting Bioethical Principles,” The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy: A Forum for Bioethics and Philosophy of Medicine 25, no. 3 (January 1, 2000): 285–307, p. 287. [14] H. D. Braude, Intuition in Medicine a Philosophical Defense of Clinical Reasoning (Chicago ; University of Chicago Press, 2012). [15] R. Kukla, “Conscientious Autonomy: Displacing Decisions in Health Care,” The Hastings Center Report 35, no. 2 (2005): 34–44. [16] M. Schermer, The Different Faces of Autonomy: Patient Autonomy in Ethical Theory and Hospital Practice, vol. 13, Library of Ethics and Applied Philosophy (Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands, 2002). [17] E. D. Pellegrino and D. C. Thomasma, For the Patient’s Good - the Restoration of Beneficence in Health Care (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1988), p. 29. [18] Pellegrino and Thomasma, For the Patient’s Good. 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Trotsky wrote his Terrorism and Communism in 1920, as a response to Karl Kautsky’s book of the same title of the previous year. Trotsky’s aim was to win over, to the side of the Bolshevik view of socialism, the various European socialist political parties. Trotsky’s book is a rare document in the history of political thought. It is a candid and impassioned defense of the Bolshevik view that the period of transition to socialism is incompatible with both individual liberties and (...) democratic institutions as we normally understand them, and requires instead a one-party state with unlimited powers, prepared to use instruments of terror and repression to achieve its goals. In two articles that he wrote in the late 1930s, he elaborated on this view: he sought to provide an explicitly philosophical defense of theBolsheviks’ use of terror and repression.Trotsky’s views merit examination for several reasons: first, because they illuminate the ethical underpinnings of the distinctively Bolshevik view of socialism, and second, because they force one to come to terms with the question of how intelligent, reflective, and decent individuals could have advanced policies that strike us today as ghastly. In this paper I try to piece together Trotsky’s arguments as they bear upon both the Civil War and the immediate postwar period of reconstruction. I also examine criticisms of the policies that Trotsky was defending—criticisms that were advanced by Marxists of such disparate stripes as Kaustky, on the one hand, and Rosa Luxemburg, on the other. (shrink)

Mr. Reed has performed a distinct service by reminding us ,309 ff.) of the odd statement by Guglielmo da Pastrengo that Tacitus was once the director of Titus' private library: if authentic, the information is too precious to be neglected. We cannot deny that Guglielmo may have had ancient sources now lost. When we know that a short epic, probably by Rabirius, one of the most admired poets of the Augustan age, disappeared after 1466, although it was protected by (...) a false ascription to Virgil, it would be foolhardy to claim that any loss after 1350 was impossible. On the other hand, we all know that instant erudition was a speciality of many Medieval sciolists whom admirers of the Middle Ages now call ‘Humanists’’ and ‘scholars’’, e.g. Arnulf of Orleans, whose recondite learning enabled him to inform us that Lucan was called Annaeus because bees settled on the infant's lips, and that he was brought to Rome as a captive after Nero stormed Cordova. (shrink)

Reflecting Alan Robinson's fundamental contribution to computational logic, this book brings together seminal papers in inference, equality theories, and logic programming. It is an exceptional collection that ranges from surveys of major areas to new results in more specialized topics. Alan Robinson is currently the University Professor at Syracuse University. Jean-Louis Lassez is a Research Scientist at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center. Gordon Plotkin is Professor of Computer Science at the University of Edinburgh. Contents: Inference. Subsumption, A Sometimes (...) Undervalued Procedure, Larry Wos, Ross Overbeek, and Ewing Lusk. The Markgraf Karl Refutation Procedure, Hans Jurgen Ohlbach and Jorg H. Siekmann. Modal Logic Should Say More than it Does, Melvin Fitting. Interactive Proof Presentation, W. W. Bledsoe. Intelligent Backtracking Revisited, Maurice Bruynooghe. A Science of Reasoning, Alan Bundy. Inductive Inference of Theories from Facts, Ehud Y. Shapiro. Equality. Solving Equations in Abstract Algebras: A Rule-based Survey of Unification, Jean-Pierre Jouannaud and Claude Kirchner. Disunification: A Survey, Hubert Comon. A Case Study of the Completion Procedure: Proving Ring Commutativity Problems, Deepak Kapur and Hantao Zhang. Computations in Regular Rewriting Systems I and II, Girard Huet and JeanJacques Levy. Unification and ML Type Reconstruction, Paris Kanellakis, Harry Mairson, and John Mitchell. Automatic Dimensional Analysis, Mitchell Wand. Logic Programming. Logic Programming Schemes and Their Implementations, Keith Clark. A Near-Horn Prolog for Compilation, Donald Loveland and David Reed. Unfold/Fold Transformations of Logic Programs, P. A. Gardner and J. C. Shepherdson. An Algebraic Representation of Logic Program Computations, Andrea Corradini and Ugo Montanari. Theory of Disjunctive Logic Programs, Jack Minker, Arcot Rajasekar, and Jorge Lobo. Bottom-Up Evaluation of Logic Programs, Jeffrey Naughton and Raghu Ramakrishnan. Absys, the First Logic Programming Language: A View of the Inevitability of Logic Programming, E. W. Elcock. (shrink)

I argue that four-dimensionalism and the desire satisfaction account of well-being are incompatible. For every person whose desires are satisfied, there will be many shorter-lived individuals (‘person-stages’ or ‘subpersons’) who share the person’s desires but who do not exist long enough to see those desires satisfied; not only this, but in many cases their desires are frustrated so that the desires of the beings in whom they are embedded as proper temporal parts may be fulfilled. I call this the frustrating (...) problem for four-dimensionalism. In the first half of the paper I lay the groundwork for understanding the frustrating problem, and then in the second half, I will examine six possible responses to the frustrating problem on behalf of the four-dimensionalist, (i) the Parfit (1984) inspired claim that identity is not what matters, (ii) the personal pronoun revisionism of Noonan (2010), (iii) the indirect concern account of Hudson (2001), (iv) the sensible stages account of Lewis (1986), (v) a multiple-concepts account of desire satisfaction, and (vi) a No Desire View according to which subpersons have no mental states and thus no desires to frustrate. I argue that none of these solutions will help the four-dimensionalist; she does better to reject the desire satisfaction theory, while the defender of the desire satisfaction theory does better to reject four-dimensionalism. (shrink)

The conflict in Gaza and Israel that ignited on October 7, 2023 signals a catastrophic breakdown in the possibility of ethical dialogue in the region. The actions on both sides have revealed a dissolution of ethical restraints, with unimaginably cruel attacks on civilians, murder of children, destruction of health facilities, and denial of basic needs such as water, food, and shelter. There is a need both to understand the nature of the ethical singularity represented by this conflict and what, if (...) any, options are available to allow the reconstruction of communication between the warring parties. This article seeks to address these tasks by analysing the conflict as inherently an ethical one, in the sense that it exposes a rupture in the fabric of communicative relationships that has evolved systematically out of the deep cultural structures from which all protagonists have emerged. Drawing on the work of Levinas, Habermas, Arendt, and others, and referring to the specific circumstances in the region, it examines the ethical sources of the crisis and tries to identify conditions for its resolution. The possibility of reconciliation—that is, of refiguring relationships to open up a space for dialogue to create pathways to heal the ruptures—is examined. The dark legacy of the Holocaust is identified as an abiding cultural vulnerability for both societies. It is concluded, however, that the rich history of partnerships and collaborations between Jews and Palestinians provides a robust infrastructure on the basis of which a sustainable peace might be built, providing a much-needed source of hope. (shrink)

A continuoxis t- norm is a continuous map * from [0, 1]² into [0,1] such that is a commutative totally ordered monoid. Since the natural ordering on [0,1] is a complete lattice ordering, each continuous t-norm induces naturally a residuation → and becomes a commutative naturally ordered residuated monoid, also called a hoop. The variety of basic hoops is precisely the variety generated by all algebras, where * is a continuous t-norm. In this paper we investigate the structure of the (...) variety of basic hoops and some of its subvarieties. In particular we provide a complete description of the finite subdirectly irreducible basic hoops, and we show that the variety of basic hoops is generated as a quasivariety by its finite algebras. We extend these results to Hájek's BL-algebras, and we give an alternative proof of the fact that the variety of BL-algebras is generated by all algebras arising from continuous t-norms on [ 0,1] and their residua. The last part of the paper is devoted to the investigation of the subreducts of BL- algebras, of Gödel algebras and of product algebras. (shrink)

The prospect of using cell-based interventions to treat neurological conditions raises several important ethical and policy questions. In this target article, we focus on issues related to the unique constellation of traits that characterize CBIs targeted at the central nervous system. In particular, there is at least a theoretical prospect that these cells will alter the recipients' cognition, mood, and behavior—brain functions that are central to our concept of the self. The potential for such changes, although perhaps remote, is cause (...) for concern and careful ethical analysis. Both to enable better informed consent in the future and as an end in itself, we argue that early human trials of CBIs for neurological conditions must monitor subjects for changes in cognition, mood, and behavior; further, we recommend concrete steps for that monitoring. Such steps will help better characterize the potential risks and benefits of CBIs as they are tested and potentially used for treatment. (shrink)

A laboratory-testable, solid-state Maxwell demon is proposed that utilizes the electric field energy of an open-gap p-n junction. Numerical results from a commercial semiconductor device simulator (Silvaco International–Atlas) verify primary results from a 1-D analytic model. Present day fabrication techniques appear adequate for laboratory tests of principle.

A relative value of life dependent on age has been produced from a survey of 721 randomly selected individuals together with other observations of professional practice. The results are presented in diagrammatic form. If two identical people, except for age, present for medical treatment for a life-threatening condition and only one can be treated then the diagram indicates what the choice should be.

In programs of acoustic survey, the amount of data collected and the lack of automatic routines for their classification and interpretation can represent a serious obstacle to achieving quick results. To overcome these obstacles, we are proposing an ecosemiotic model of data mining, ecoacoustic event detection and identification, that uses a combination of the acoustic complexity indices and automatically extracts the ecoacoustic events of interest from the sound files. These events may be indicators of environmental functioning at the scale of (...) individual vocal species, the acoustic community, the sound marks, or the soundscape. The EEDI model is represented by three procedural steps: 1) selecting acoustic data according to environmental variables, 2) detecting the events by creating an ecoacoustic event space produced by plotting ACIft and its evenness, 3) identifying events according to the level of correlation between the acoustic signature of the detected events and an ad hoc library of previously identified events. The EEDI procedure can be extensively used in basic and applied research. In particular, EEDI may be used in long-term monitoring programs to assess the effect of climate change on individual vocal species behavior, population, and acoustic community dynamics. The EEDI model can be also used to investigate acoustic human intrusion in natural systems and the effect in urban areas. (shrink)

Zeno's so-called proofs of divine existence -- Zeno and the traditional gods: a serious problem -- Cleanthes' proofs -- Cleanthes and the traditional gods -- Chrysippus' contribution -- Chrysippus and the traditional gods -- Other Stoic proofs -- Other (Stoic?) arguments in Sextus -- Polemics against the arguments pro the existence of God(s) -- Abolishing the gods leads to odd consequence: the atopical arguments pro the existence of the gods -- The counter-arguments -- Carneades and the data of Sextus and (...) Cicero -- The sorites arguments as a weapon against the traditional gods -- Epilogue -- Appendix I. Cleanthes' humn on Zeus: a running commentary -- Appendix II. Where is God? -- Appendix III. Alexinus' Parabolai. (shrink)

Antisthenes (c. 445- c. 365 BC), was a prominent follower of Socrates and bitter rival of Plato. In this revisionary account of his philosophy in all its aspects, P. A. Meijer claims that Plato and Aristotle have corrupted our perspective on this witty and ingenious thinker. The first part of the book reexamines afresh Antisthenes' ideas about definition and predication and concludes from these that Antisthenes never held the (in)famous theory that contradiction is impossible. The second part of the book (...) argues that Antisthenes' logical theories bear directly on his activities as an exegete of Homer and hence as a theological thinker. Part three, finally, offers innovative readings of Antisthenes' ethical fragments. (shrink)

In response to Korn, Huelsman, and Reed's (1992)question, "Who defines those interests, and how serious must the setback be?" (p. 126), we argue that a wrongful (unjust) harm (a setback of interest) is not equivalent to a hurt (a temporary distressing mental state) and that the interests of importance are welfare interests (general means to our ulterior aims), not just a desire to avoid unpleasant mental states (hurts). To set back a welfare interest is to reverse its course or (...) to impede, thwart, defeat, or doom it. It is the primary responsibility of the investigator to define both welfare interests and the risk of harm. An informed consent - one with substantial understanding, in substantial absence of control by others, and given intentionally - allows participants to autonomously authorize participation in research, including their toleration of acts of mental discomfort or distress during an experiment. Not only were our participants not wrongfully harmed, they benefited and were willing to volunteer for future research. No strong evidence has been advanced or linked to guided imagery in a way that would justify its restraint; to so claim evokes a standard of legal paternalism that fails to respect participants' competence and autonomy to choose to participate in research on rape using guided imagery. (shrink)

The view of Deitz and Arrington that Wittgenstein's ordinary language philosophy allows behaviorism to use cognitive terms with a behavioristic system is disputed and an alternative is suggested.

Despite the many meanings of the term "myth" and the diversity of its definitions, "it is usually assumed that a myth is a story, an invention, a fantasy" [2, p. 13], that is, an inadequate reflection of reality. Myths arise when there is either a deficit of information or a surplus, when someone is interested in concealing the truth and replacing it with falsehood. Anything can be the object of a myth, from the neighbor's salary to the future of an (...) individual country, but usually it is something important for the bulk of society. Social structures, not only secret but also fully "open" ones such as science, can be overgrown with myths. (shrink)

Integrated information theory (IIT) is a candidate theory of consciousness that highlights the role of complex interactions between parts of a system as the basis of consciousness – and, due to its general information-theoretic formulation, is capable of making statements about consciousness in neural and non-neural systems alike. Here, we argue that a system radically different to a human brain, host to complex physiological and functional structures capable of integrating information, can be found in the meristems and vascular system of (...) higher plants. Following a pragmatic and ontologically innocent approach, neither taking for granted that plants are conscious nor dismissing the possibility that they are, we argue that the time is ripe to apply analysis tools inspired by IIT to plants, taking advantage of recent developments in both plant imaging and information theory. We introduce and discuss the relevant literature, and pro information and integration in plant behaviour, assessing the plausibility of plant sentience. If successful, these experiments could position plants as the next frontier in consciousness science, and urge us to rethink our perspectives on consciousness, how to measure it, and its prevalence amongst living beings. (shrink)

Textes de philosophes français et britanniques issus du colloque tenu à l'Université de Nantes en 1998. Ils sont consacrés à la philosophie analytique de la religion et abordent des sujets tels que la nature et la justification des croyances religieuses, la question du mal, celles des preuves de l'existence de Dieu, de la théodicée, du langage religieux, du miracle, de la prière, etc.

9 Eastern Christianity and Jesuit Scholarship on Arabic and Islam: Modern History and Contemporary Theological Reflections -- 10 Autonomy, Dignity, Human Rights: Correcting a Popular Error -- 11 Liberal and Authoritarian Approaches to Raising Good Citizens -- 12 Stewardship as Welcome and Respect for the Dignity of the Vulnerable: An Essay in Bioethics -- 13 Dialogue in a Pluralist Context: Theological Ethics and the New Interest in Happiness -- Index.