Libertarians are an increasingly prominent ideological group in U.S. politics, yet they have been largely unstudied. Across 16 measures in a large web-based sample that included 11,994 self-identified libertarians, we sought to understand the moral and psychological characteristics of self-described libertarians. Based on an intuitionist view of moral judgment, we focused on the underlying affective and cognitive dispositions that accompany this unique worldview. Compared to self-identified liberals and conservatives, libertarians showed 1) stronger endorsement of individual liberty as their foremost guiding (...) principle, and weaker endorsement of all other moral principles; 2) a relatively cerebral as opposed to emotional cognitive style; and 3) lower interdependence and social relatedness. As predicted by intuitionist theories concerning the origins of moral reasoning, libertarian values showed convergent relationships with libertarian emotional dispositions and social preferences. Our findings add to a growing recognition of the role of personality differences in the organization of political attitudes. (shrink)

The attitude that ordinary language description of experience is in fact a description of the world is called “naïve realism.” There is an entire branch of modern Western philosophy that is devoted to critically examining the assumptions behind the everyday language we use to describe the macroscopic world in which we live and the validity of naïve realism as an adequate description of the world. This branch of philosophy is called “ordinary language philosophy.” Surprisingly, it has something in common with (...) quantum physics: insight into the inadequacy of ordinary language to describe observable reality. It is this connection between ordinary language philosophy and quantum physics that we shall explore in this article. In the process, we shall also offer a basic introduction to both basic philosophy and basic quantum theory. (shrink)

The Copenhagen interpretation, which informs the textbook presentation of quantum mechanics, depends fundamentally on the notion of ontological wave-particle duality and a viewpoint called “complementarity.” In this paper, Bohr's own interpretation is traced in detail and is shown to be fundamentally different from and even opposed to the Copenhagen interpretation in virtually all its particulars. In particular, Bohr's interpretation avoids the ad hoc postulate of wave function ‘collapse' that is central to the Copenhagen interpretation. The strengths and weakness of both (...) interpretations are summarized. ‡I thank Edward Mackinnon, Henry Folse, and Greg Anderson for valuable comments on the penultimate draft. The final responsibility for the paper rests with the author. †To contact the author, please write to: Bhaktivedanta Institute, 2334 Stuart Street, Berkeley, CA; e-mail: [email protected]. I have been unable to achieve a sharp formulation of Bohr's principle of complementarity despite much effort I have expended on it. (Einstein 1949, 674) While imagining that I understand the position of Einstein, as regards the EPR correlations, I have very little understanding of his principal opponent, Bohr. (Bell 1987, 155) Niels Bohr brain-washed a generation of physicists into believing that the problem had been solved fifty years ago. (Gell-Mann 1979, 29) Every sentence I say must be understood not as an affirmation, but as a question. (Niels Bohr, quoted in Jammer 1966, 175) Bohr's interpretation has never been fully clarified. It needs an interpretation itself, and only that will be its defense. (Weizsäcker 1971, 25). (shrink)

Collection of weekly talks, conversations, and messages delivered by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.

Theories of relations between language and conceptual development benefit from empirical evidence for concepts available in infancy, but such evidence is comparatively scarce. Here, we examine early representations of specific concepts, namely, sets of dynamic events corresponding either to predicates involving two variables with a reversible, asymmetric relation between them (such as the set of all events that correspond to a linguistic phrase like “a dog is pushing a car,”) or to comparatively simpler, one-variable predicates (such as the set of (...) events corresponding to a phrase like “a dog is jumping.”). We develop a non-linguistic, anticipatory eye-tracking task that can be administered to both infants and adults, and we use this task to gather evidence for the formation and use of such one-and two-place-predicate classes (which we refer to as event sortals) in 12–24-mo-old infants, and in adults with and without concurrent verbal prose shadowing. Using visually similar stimuli for both the simpler (one-place) and the more complex (reversible, asymmetric, two-place) concepts, we find that infants only show evidence for forming and generalizing one-place event sortals, and, while adults succeed with both kinds in the absence of verbal shadowing, shadowing hampers their ability to form and use the asymmetric two-place event sortals. In a subsequent experiment with adults, we find that if the shadowing material is grammatically impoverished, adults now succeed in forming and using both one- and two-place event sortals. We discuss implications of these results for theories of concept acquisition, and the role of language in this process. (shrink)

I argue that moral principles involve the same sort of generalization as ordinary yet elusive generic generalizations in natural language such as ‘Tigers are striped’ or ‘Peppers are spicy’. A notable advantage of the generic view is that it simultaneously allows for pessimism and optimism about the role and status of moral principles in our lives. It provides a new perspective on the nature of moral principles on which principles are not apt for determining the moral status of particular actions (...) while they may be apt, and even fundamental, to our acquisition of moral knowledge. A natural consequence of the view is variation among moral principles, with some regularly warranting exceptions and some appearing arguably exceptionless. I will also argue that this generic conception of moral principles has significant advantages, as a normative model of moral reasoning, over the view of moral principles as defaults advanced in recent years. (shrink)

With its Vedāntic metaphysics and devotionally rich narratives, the Bhāgavata Purāṇa can provide valuable models for ecological care and preservation. Throughout the Purāṇa, we find narratives that can be harnessed in service of the environment, whether it be Kṛṣṇa battling the serpent Kāliya or Varāha lifting the Earth from the depths of the cosmic ocean. This article, however, will focus on a little-known narrative found in Book Four, namely, the Pracetās’ destruction, and eventual protection, of the Earth’s trees. The Pracetās’ (...) narrative is significant for several reasons: instead of simply venerating nature, the story demonstrates the challenge of balancing human needs and the needs of other life forms; it accords agency to the Earth by giving the forest a voice within the narrative; and it bridges the boundary between human beings and the natural world by building kinship relationships between them. This article will explore the ways in which Vaiṣṇava commentators have interpreted this episode as they attempt to negotiate the question: who has priority—humans or nature? (shrink)

Study on the works of Prabhākaramiśra, ancient Sanskrit philosopher and thinker of Mimamsa philosophy.

Healthcare workers are at a high risk of psychological morbidity in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, there is significant variability in the impact of this crisis on individual healthcare workers, which can be best explained through an appreciation of the construct of resilience. Broadly speaking, resilience refers to the ability to successfully adapt to stressful or traumatic events, and thus plays a key role in determining mental health outcomes following exposure to such events. A proper understanding of resilience (...) is vital in enabling a shift from a reactive to a proactive approach for protecting and promoting the mental well-being of healthcare workers. Research in the past decade has identified six areas that provide promising leads in understanding the biological basis of individual variations in resilience. These are: the key role played by the monoamines noradrenaline and serotonin, the centrality of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis in influencing stress vulnerability and resilience, the intimate links between the immune system and stress sensitivity, the role of epigenetic modulation of gene expression in influencing the stress response, the role played by certain neuropeptides as a natural “brake” mechanism in the face of stress, and the neurobiological mechanisms by which environmental factors, such as exercise, diet, and social support, influence resilience to subsequent life events. Though much of this research is still in its early stages, it has already provided valuable information on which strategies – including dietary changes, lifestyle modification, environmental modification, psychosocial interventions, and even pharmacological treatments – may prove to be useful in fostering resilience in individuals and groups. This paper examines the above evidence more closely, with a specific focus on the challenges faced by healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic, and provides suggestions regarding how it may be translated into real-world interventions, as well as how the more tentative hypotheses advanced in this field may be tested during this critical period. (shrink)

The dissertation analyzes the ontological and epistemological arguments that motivate Plato's theory of Forms.

In Xenophon’s Socratic literature, there is repeated emphasis on the utility the friends provide one another. One extended passage, _Memorabilia_ 2.6, shows that Socrates takes a good person to care about a friend both for the benefits to be gained for oneself and for the sake of the other’s welfare. Genuine friendship, for Socrates, is not transactional or self-interested but rather rooted in the mutual benefit that only good people can provide one another.

On the philosophy of Ghāsīdāsa, b. 1756, Hindu religious leader and social worker.

Care Ethics needs to make clear and defensible normative claims. Michael Slote’s work shows how accounts taking care as a sentimental motive can do the needful. Such motive accounts of care can also provide a way to capture the important distinction between care and justice approaches to morality. However, it is important for Care Ethics to establish harmony between caring motives and acting rightly. Slote’s account does so at the cost of an unintuitive account of obligation. We propose another way (...) to capture this harmony. (shrink)

ABSTRACT M.M. McCabe argues that in Plato’s Euthydemus, Dionysodorus and Euthydemus hold a view she calls ‘chopped logos’. Chopped logos implies that nothing said is false, or opposed to any other statement, or entailed by any other statement. We focus on a key piece of evidence for chopped logos, the argument concluding that there is no such thing as contradiction (285e9–286b6), and defend a competing interpretation. The argument in question, and the eristic exchanges as a whole, are simply examples of (...) a dialectical game, a contest that is the verbal equivalent of physical competitions like wrestling or the pankration. The argument has no doctrinal significance and no deep connection with the other arguments of the dialogue. Its interest proves to be broadly methodological rather than doctrinal, a showpiece of eristic display. (shrink)

A prevailing thought is that generics have a covert modal operator at logical form. I claim that if this is right, the covert generic modality is a weak necessity modal. In this paper, I pr...

A contemporary of Krishnamurti, Ravi Ravindra explores Krishnamurti's assertion that the miracle of personal transformation can be linked directly to the art of seeing rightly.

The need to nurture dynamic leadership in all possible ways is felt all the more today in the world. Leadership must be aligned with the world where it can be stated that the world is too complex and is rapidly changing and hence, one person alone cannot provide all the answers. Dynamism in thought, word and action can certainly benefit the leader, the organization as well as the country in diverse ways. Leader can no longer be a person - a (...) person who is in charge of a group and instead, the thought is that leadership can come from anyone. This means we need many leaders who are able to offer dynamic leadership that is needed in the modern age. Fallacious thinking most often leads to rigidity, self-centeredness, vindictiveness, biases, indifference in context to leadership are explicit today. For example, corruption, lack of commitment, opportunistic leadership etc. The possibility of nurturing dynamic leadership thought is an important proposition that this paper raises. This implies orienting leaders to eliminate fallacies and sharpen logical thinking in a gradual way. A good leader should exude integrity, self-awareness, courage, respect, empathy, and gratitude besides being an agile, effective delegator, and show the direction of growth. It is a belief that these key leadership qualities can be learned and improved through professional coaching, mentoring and counselling. Research indicates that value-based leadership generally leads to better decision-making, increased support for decisions and leader transparency, better follower morale, and opportunities to build trustworthy relationships. There is also a discussion that the leaders who appreciate the influence of servant leadership and emotional intelligence in their relationships have the potential to develop high-quality interpersonal relationships with all stakeholders. Hence, in view of leadership styles this paper is also an exploration of leadership styles that can be mentored through philosophical counselling. (shrink)

The relationship between ethical ideology and job stress appears to be complex. This study is based on a model presented by Forsyth (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 39:175, 1980), showing two dimensions (idealism and relativism) that play an important role in ethical evaluation and behavior. Based on a survey of 561 employees of hotel industry in India, ethical ideologies were found to be negatively associated with job stress. The data were analyzed using Pearson correlations and multiple regressions. The result (...) showed that relativism is negatively correlated with job stress. Further, it has been established that idealism and relativism interacted in such a way that there is a negative relationship between idealism and job stress when relativism is low and positive relationship when relativism is high. The findings imply that ethical ideology adversely influences the job stress in the organization. (shrink)

Although quantum theory is presented as a radically non classical theory in physics, it is an open secret that our present understanding of it is based on a conceptual base borrowed from classical physics, leading to the situation that all of the radical implications of quantum theory are expressed using terminology that, in other circumstances would be considered blatantly self contradictory. To give but a few examples: wave particle duality (one and the same ontological entity can be ascribed two mutually (...) differing space time pictures), superposition (a microscopic object is required to be simultaneously in two distinct and mutually exclusive classical states), and non locality (two objects presumed to.. (shrink)

Non-relativistic quantum mechanics is incompatible with our everyday or ‘classical’ intuitions about realism, not only at the microscopic level but also at the macroscopic level. The latter point is highlighted by the ‘cat paradox’ presented by Schrödinger. Since our observations are always made at the macroscopic level — even when applying the formalism to the microscopic level — the failure of classical realism at the macroscopic level is actually more fundamental and crucial.