As the world watched the Fukushima reactors spew incalculable quantities of radionuclides into the sea and air and wondered what effect this would have on our health and that of generations to come, the warnings of Dr. Alice Stewart about low-dose radiation risk assumed a terrible timeliness. As industry, governments, and the media attempted to quiet the alarms, assuring us that radioactive releases will dilute and disperse and become too miniscule to matter, the reassurances of Sir Richard Doll, (...) foremost among Stewart's detractors, also became relevant. It is clear, as proponents and opponents of nuclear energy thrash it out, that there is not much more scientific consensus about the hazards of low-dose radiation .. (shrink)

SummaryIn 1968, a prospective study was started in collaboration with the Family Planning Association to try to provide a balanced view of the beneficial and harmful effects of different methods of contraception. This investigation is now in progress at seventeen clinics and over 17,000 women are under observation. At the time of recruitment, all these women were married white British subjects, aged 25–39 years, who voluntarily agreed to participate. Fifty-six per cent were using oral contraceptives, 25% were using a diaphragm (...) and 19% were using an intrauterine device. During follow-up each woman is questioned at return visits to the clinic and a record of pregnancies and their outcome, hospital referrals, changes in contraceptive methods and the results of cervical smears, is accumulated. Women who default are sent a postal questionnaire and, if this is not returned, are telephoned or visited in their homes to collect the necessary information.So far, data obtained during 56,000 woman-years of observation are available for analysis. Follow-up has been maintained with an annual lapse rate of about 0.3%due to withdrawal of co-operation or loss of contact; adherence to the method of contraception in use at recruitment has been reasonably good, and the reporting of pregnancies and hospital admissions appears to have been both reliable and unbiased.The present data include only 24 deaths, so the mortality associated with different contraceptive methods cannot yet be estimated. With regard to morbidity, however, our preliminary results closely resemble those obtained in the prospective study carried out by the Royal College of General Practitioners and in the principal retrospective studies carried out in Britain and the United States. Women who used oral contraceptives at the start of the study experienced adeficiencyof hospital referrals for cancer, benign lesions of the breast, menstrual disorders other than amenorrhoea, duodenal ulcer, and retention cysts of the ovary; they showed anexcessof referrals for cerebrovascular disease, cervical erosion, skin disorders, self-poisoning, migraine, venous thrombosis and embolism, hayfever, gallbladder disease, amenorrhoea, and sterility. Women who used a diaphragm showed adeficiencyof hospital referrals for carcinoma-in-situ and dysplastic lesions of the cervix uteri and accidental injury; and anexcessof referrals for haemorrhoids and cystitis. Women who used an IUD experienced anexcessof hospital referrals for anaemia, varicose veins and salpingitis. About half of these differences were predicted from other studies while some suggestive evidence already existed for a further five. Of the remaining six, some probably reflect the influence of selective factors or chance.Multiple pregnancies, stillbirths, malformations, the sex ratio and birthweight showed no consistent relationship to method of contraception. The outcome of unplanned pregnancies occurring in women using an IUD, however, was remarkably unfavourable both in terms of ectopic gestation and miscarriage.Clear evidence was found of impairment of fertility after discontinuation of oral contraceptives. Whether this is likely to lead to permanent sterility in some women is uncertain.The study has provided data on the efficacy of a wide variety of contraceptive methods. In general the failure rates are in keeping with those obtained in other large-scale studies, save that those for the diaphragm and the sheath are much lower than those usually quoted.The available evidence does not yet allow a final balance to be struck between the benefits and risks associated with the new methods of contraception that have become widely used during the last two decades. It seems clear, however, that there are no material risks associated with the use of the diaphragm apart from the risk of pregnancy and that there may be some unintended benefits. (shrink)

The first two seasons of Russian Doll ambitiously take on a number of topics in the Philosophy of Time. In particular, it addresses the metaphysics of time loops and time travel. The metaphysics of time are notoriously thorny and complicated, and Russian Doll provides a treatment of those issues that both does justice to their complexity as well as attempts to provide solutions to some of those issues (or at minimum, in some cases, hints at possible solutions). As (...) is the case with most enduring philosophical topics, the discussion does not happen in a philosophical vacuum. Just as a discussion of the nature of knowledge naturally leads to a discussion of the nature of truth, and so forth, discussions in the metaphysics of time naturally lead to discussions of the ethics of time travel, the nature of the universe, the nature of the reality, God, relativism, the nature of paradoxes, consciousness, and, perhaps most importantly, existential questions about how one should live. This chapter will provide a general account of the way these philosophical issues are presented in Russian Doll with an eye toward (1) explicating the ways in which the various characters in Russian Doll conceive of the issues, (2) making it clear what their responses to the issues are (in those instances in which responses are provided), and (3) where appropriate, evaluating those responses for philosophical consistency, accuracy, and plausibility. (shrink)

Many have been attracted to the idea that for something to be good there just have to be reasons to favour it. This view has come to be known as the buck-passing account of value. According to this account, for pleasure to be good there need to be reasons for us to desire and pursue it. Likewise for liberty and equality to be values there have to be reasons for us to promote and preserve them. Extensive discussion has focussed on (...) some of the problems that the buck-passing account faces, such as the 'wrong kind of reason' problem. Less attention, however, has been paid as to why we should accept the buck-passing account or what the theoretical pay-offs and other implications of accepting it are. The Normative and the Evaluative provides the first comprehensive0motivation and defence of the buck-passing account of value. Richard Rowland argues that the buck-passing account explains several important features of the relationship between reasons and value, as well as the relationship between the different varieties of value, in a way that its competitors do not. He shows that alternatives to the buck-passing account are inconsistent with important views in normative ethics, uninformative, and at odds with the way in which we should see practical and0epistemic normativity as related. In addition, he extends the buck-passing account to provide an account of moral properties as well as all other normative and deontic properties and concepts, such as fittingness and 'ought', in terms of reasons. (shrink)

Slurs are words with a well-known tendency to conjure up painful memories and experiences in members of their target communities. Owing to this tendency, it’s widely agreed that one ought to exercise considerable care when even mentioning a slur, so as to avoid needlessly inflicting distressing associations on members of the relevant group. This paper argues that this tendency to evoke distressing associations is precisely what makes slurs impactful verbal weapons. According to the ballistic theory, slurs make such potent insults (...) because they enable their users to maliciously inflict noxious associations on members of their target groups. To motivate this theory, I demonstrate its ability to explain a number of facts about slurs’ offensiveness that pose formidable difficulties for competing theories of slurs. I argue that the ballistic theory not only explains why slurs make such explosively impactful terms of abuse, but also why: uses of slurs can provoke offense even when they aren’t interpreted as expressions of the speaker’s racist attitudes; and why mentions of slurs are inoffensive in some contexts, but in other contexts, warrant a level of offense every bit as severe as that warranted by weaponized uses. I conclude with a brief discussion of a practical application of the ballistic theory. I demonstrate that the theory has an important consequence for legislative efforts to regulate and punish weaponized uses of slurs. (shrink)

The repertory grid method was used to determine what terminology respondents use to distinguish between different applications of genetic engineering drawn from food- related, agricultural, and medical applications. Respondents were asked to react to fifteen applications phrased in general terms, and results compared with a second study where fifteen more specific applications were used as stimuli. Both sets of data were submitted to generalized Procrustes analysis. Applications associated with animals or human genetic material were described as causing ethical concern, being (...) unnatural, harmful, and dangerous. Those involving plants or microorganisms were described as beneficial, progressive, and necessary. The results were validated in survey research, which indicated that general applications ofgenetic engineering were perceived as either positive or negative, whereas specific applications were more highly differentiated in perceptual terms. The results imply that the public debate about genetic engineering must take due account of the complexity of public concerns. (shrink)

Hannah Arendt is increasingly recognised as one of the most original social and political thinkers of the twentieth century. In this important book, Richard Bernstein sets out to show that many of the most significant themes in Arendt's thinking have their origins in their confrontation with the Jewish Question. By approaching her mature work from this perspective, we can gain a richer and more subtle grasp of her main ideas. Bernstein discusses some of the key experiences and events in (...) Arendt's life story in order to show how they shaped her thinking. He examines her distinction between the Jewish parvenu and the pariah, and shows how the conscious pariah becomes a basis for understanding the independent thinker. Arendt's deepest insights about politics emerged from her reflections on statelessness, which were based on her own experiences as a stateless person. By confronting the horrors of totalitarianism and the concentration camps, Arendt developed her own distinctive understanding of authentic politics - the politics required to express our humanity and which totalitarianism sought to destroy. Finally, Bernstein takes up Arendt's concern with the phenomenon of the banality of evil. He follows her use of Eichmann in order to explore how the failure to think and to judge is the key for grasping this new phenomenon. _Hannah Arendt and the Jewish Question _offers a new interpretation of Arendt and her work - one which situates her in her historical context as an engaged Jewish intellectual. (shrink)

This paper compares and contrasts relational quantum mechanics with a pragmatist view of quantum theory. I first explain important points of agreement. Then I point to two problems faced by RQM and sketch DP?s solutions to analogous problems. Since both RQM and DP have taken the Born rule to require relative facts I next say what these might be. My main objection to RQM as originally conceived is that its ontology of relative facts is incompatible with scientific objectivity and undercuts (...) the evidential base of quantum theory. In contrast DP?s relative facts have all the objectivity we need to accept quantum theory as scientific knowledge. But a very recent modification to RQM has successfully addressed my main objection,bringing the two views into even closer alignment. (shrink)

The more than 40 readings in this anthology cover the most important developments of the past six decades, charting the rise and decline of logical positivism ...

In the absence of empirical confirmation, scientists may judge a theory's chances of being viable based on a wide range of arguments. The paper argues that such arguments can differ substantially with regard to their structural similarly to empirical confirmation. Arguments that resemble empirical confirmation in a number of crucial respects provide a better basis for reliable judgement and can, in a Bayesian sense, amount to significant \textit{non-empirical} confirmation. It is shown that three kinds of non-empirical confirmation that have been (...) specified in earlier work do satisfy those conditions. (shrink)

Inhaltsverzeichnis/Table of Contents: Rudolf HALLER: Zwei Vorworte in einem. Evelyn DÖLLING: Alexius Meinong: "Der blinde Seher Theiresias". Jaakko HINTIKKA: Meinong in a Long Perspective. Richard SYLVAN: Re-Exploring Item-Theory. Francesca MODENATO: Meinong's Theory of Objects: An Attempt at Overcoming Psychologism. Jan WOLE??N??SKI: Ways of Dealing with Non-existence. Karel LAMBERT: Substitution and the Expansion of the World. Terence PARSONS: Meinongian Semantics Generalized. Reinhardt GROSSMANN: Thoughts, Objectives and States of Affairs. Peter SIMONS: Meinong's Theory of Sense and Reference. Barry SMITH: More Things (...) in Heaven and Earth. Michele LENOCI: Meinongs unvollständige Gegenstände und das Universalienproblem. Maria E. REICHER: Gibt es unvollständige Gegenstände? Dale JACQUETTE: Meinong's Concept of Implexive Being and Nonbeing. Herbert HOCHBERG:s, Functions, Existence and Relations in the Russell-Meinong Dispute, the Bradley Paradox and the Realism-Nominalism Controversy. Jacek PA_NICZEK: Are Contradictions Still Lurking in Meinongian Theories of Objects? Marie-Luise SCHUBERT KALSI: Apriorische Elemente im Denken. Liliana ALBERTAZZI: Forms of Completion. Johann Ch. MAREK: Zwei Gegenstände und ein Inhalt. Zur Intentionalität bei Meinong. Wolfgang KÜNNE: Some Varieties of Thinking. Reflections on Meinong and Fodor. Alberto VOLTOLINI: Is Meaning Without Actually Existing Reference Naturalizable? Markus S. STEPANIANS: Russells Kritik an Meinongs Begriff des Annahmeschlusses. Nenad MIŠ_EVI_: Imagination and Necessity. R.D. ROLLINGER: Meinong on Perception: Two Questions Concerning Propositional Seeing. Wolfgang G. STOCK: Die Genese der Theorie der Vorstellungsproduktion der Grazer Schule. Rudolf HALLER: Über Meinongs Wissenschaftstheorie. Alfred SCHRAMM: Meinongs Wahrscheinlichkeit. Karl SCHUHMANN: Der Wertbegriff beim frühen Meinong. Wilhelm BAUMGARTNER: Wertpräsentation. Ursula ZEGLÉN: Meinong's Analysis of Lying. Seppo SAJAMA: Hitting Reality: France Veber's Concept of Zadevanje. Matja_ POTR_: Sensation According to Meinong and Veber. Róbert SOMOS: Zwei Schüler Brentanos: Ákos von Pauler und Meinong. J.C. NYÍRI: Palágyis Kritik an der Gegenstandstheorie. David M. ARMSTRONG: Reaction to Meinong. (shrink)

The concept of self-control is incorporated in a theory of individual intertemporal choice by modeling the individual as an organization. The individual at a point in time is assumed to be both a farsighted planner and a myopic doer. The resulting conflict is seen to be fundamentally similar to the agency conflict between the owners and managers of a firm. Both individuals and firms use the same techniques to mitigate the problems which the conflicts create. This paper stresses the implications (...) of this agency model and discusses as applications the effect of pensions on saving, saving and the timing of income flows, and individual discount rates. (shrink)

Plant genome editing has the potential to become another chapter in the intractable debate that has dogged agricultural biotechnology. In 2016, 107 Nobel Laureates accused Greenpeace of emotional and dogmatic campaigning against agricultural biotechnology and called for governments to defy such campaigning. The Laureates invoke the authority of science to argue that Greenpeace is putting lives at risk by opposing agricultural biotechnology and Golden Rice and is notable in framing Greenpeace as unethical and its views as marginal. This paper examines (...) environmental, food and farming NGOs’ social and ethical concerns about genome editing, situating these concerns in comparison to alternative ethical assessments provided by the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, a key actor in this policy debate. In doing so, we show that participant NGOs and the Nuffield Council on Bioethics share considerable concerns about the social and ethical implications of genome editing. These concerns include choices over problem/solution framing and broader terminology, implications of regulatory and research choices on consumer choice and relations of power. However, GM-engaged NGOs and the Nuffield Council on Bioethics diverge on one important area: the NGOs seek to challenge the existing order and broaden the scope of debate to include deeply political questions regarding agricultural and technological choices. This distinction between the ethical positions means that NGOs provide valuable ethical insight and a useful lens to open up debate and discussion on the role of emerging technologies, such as genome editing, and the future of agriculture and food sovereignty. (shrink)

The Epicureans, Skeptics, and Stoics practiced philosophy not as a detached intellectual discipline, but as a worldly art of grappling with issues of daily and urgent human significance: the fear of death, love and sexuality, anger and aggression. Like medicine, philosophy to them was a rigorous science aimed both at understanding and at producing the flourishing of human life. In this engagingly written book, Martha Nussbaum maintains that these Hellenistic schools have been unjustly neglected in recent philosophic accounts of what (...) the classical "tradition" has to offer. By examining texts of philosophers committed to a therapeutic paradigm - including Epicurus, Lucretius, Sextus Empiricus, Chrysippus, and Seneca - she recovers a valuable source for current moral and political thought and encourages us to reconsider philosophical argument as a technique through which to improve lives. In describing the contributions of Hellenistic ethics, Nussbaum focuses on each thinker's treatment of the question of emotion. All argued that many harmful emotions are based on false beliefs that are socially taught, and that good philosophical argument can transform emotions, and, with them, both private and public life. Written for general readers and specialists, this book addresses compelling issues ranging from the psychology of human passion through rhetoric to the role of philosophy in public and private life. (shrink)

Objective: The objective of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Chinese version of the decision regret scale. Methods: The data of 704 patients who completed the DRSc were used for the analyses. We evaluated the construct, convergent/discriminant, and known-group validity; internal consistency and test–retest reliability; and the item invariance of the DRSc. A receiver operating characteristic curve was employed to confirm the optimal cutoff point of the scale. Results: A confirmatory factor analysis indicated that a one-factor (...) model fits the data. The internal consistency and test–retest reliability [intraclass correlation coefficient = 0.71] of the DRSc were acceptable. The DRSc demonstrated unidimensionality and invariance for use across the sexes. It was confirmed that an optimal cutoff point of 25 could discriminate between patients with high and low decisional regret during clinical practice. Conclusion: The DRSc is a parsimonious instrument that can be used to measure the uncertainty inherent in medical decisions. It can be employed to provide knowledge, offer support, and elicit patient preferences in an attempt to promote shared decision-making. (shrink)

Organizational ethics and institutional theories are extended by recovering Weberian and Pre-Weberian theorizing that emphasized the joining of ethics and institutional theories. Understanding how ethics and institutional systems influence each other can advance our understanding of the nature and causes of structural organizational ethics issues and help guide potential reforms. We consider the interplay of these elements during the recession of 2008–2009, highlighting how structural ethics problems may have to be addressed at the institutional levels and not solely the individual (...) or organizational levels. (shrink)

In light of recent developments in argumentation theory, we begin by considering the account that Aristotle gives of what he calls sophistical refutations and of the usefulness of being able to recognise various species of them. His diagnosis of one of his examples of the grouping that he labels epomenon is then compared with a very recent account of the matter, which, like Aristotle, calls on us to attribute a mistake or confusion to anyone who uses this kind of argument. (...) From examination of three other examples that Aristotle himself supplies of epomenon, it appears that there are cases of inferences of this kind that we need not, and perhaps cannot, avoid making. The suggestion is made that this is because the whole family of what Peirce calls abductions have important characteristics in common with epomenon. (shrink)

The major part of our beliefs and our knowledge of the world is based on, or grounded in, sensory experience. But, how is it that we can have perceptual beliefs that things are thus and so, and, moreover, be justified in having them? What conditions must experience satisfy to rationally warrant, and not merely to cause, our beliefs? Against the currently very popular contention that experience itself already has to be propositionally and conceptually structured, I will rehabilitate the claim that (...) there is given element in experience which is independent of thought and which is possessed of a distinctive nonpropositional and nonconceptual content. Further, I will argue that this given element is indeed fit to play a significant evidential role in the justification of our beliefs about the world. (shrink)

This pleasantly written book has two related themes. The first is a statistical argument which Gould believes has great generality, uniting baseball, a moving personal response to the serious illness from which, thankfully, the author has now recovered, and his second theme: that of whether evolution is progressive.

The Philosophical Imagination is a collection of essays ranging over a wide range of philosophical themes: from the emotional engagement with fictions, to the functioning of metaphor in poetry and in rhetoric, to the concept of beauty in Kant and in Proust, and the nature of the first-person perspective in thought and action.

In this essay Rorty argues that care or concern alone is inadequate for dealing with problems of Third World poverty; neither is there likely to be a convenient technological fix. There is no evading the hard decisions that global poverty will require of the rich nations, and there is no way past E. M. Forster’s dictum, in Howard’s End, that “We are not concerned with the very poor. They are unthinkable and only to be approached by the statistician or the (...) poet.” Most of Rorty’s essay focuses on works of Forster demonstrating that, in Rorty’s words, “tenderness only appears... when there is enough money to produce a little leisure, a little time in which to love.... The cash value of the Christian ideal of universal brotherhood has, for the last two centuries, been the conviction that once science and technology have produced enough wealth—and enlightened, unselfish political initiatives have redistributed it—there will be no one left who is incapable of tenderness. All human beings will live in the light; all of them will be possible characters in novels.”. (shrink)

What is strange? Or better, who is strange? When do we encounter the strange? We encounter strangers when we are not at home: when we are in a foreign land or a foreign part of our own land. From Freud to Lacan to Kristeva to Heidegger, the feeling of strangeness--das Unheimlichkeit--has marked our encounter with the other, even the other within our self. Most philosophical attempts to understand the role of the Stranger, human or transcendent, have been limited to standard (...) epistemological problems of other minds, metaphysical substances, body/soul dualism and related issues of consciousness and cognition. This volume endeavors to take the question of hosting the stranger to the deeper level of embodied imagination and the senses. This volume plays host to a number of encounters with the strange. It asks such questions as: How does the embodied imagination relate to the Stranger in terms of hospitality or hostility? How do we distinguish between projections of fear or fascination, leading to either violence or welcome? How do humans "sense" the dimension of the strange and alien in different religions, arts, and cultures? How do the five physical senses relate to the spiritual senses, especially the famous "sixth" sense, as portals to an encounter with the Other? Is there a carnal perception of alterity, which would operate at an affective, prereflective, preconscious level? What exactly do "embodied imaginaries" of hospitality and hostility entail, and how do they operate in language, psychology, and social interrelations? And what, finally, are the topical implications of these questions for an ethics and practice of tolerance and peace? (shrink)

Why did Greek philosophy begin in the sixth century BCE? Why did Indian philosophy begin at about the same time? Why did the earliest philosophy take the form that it did? Why was this form so similar in Greece and India? And how do we explain the differences between them? These questions can only be answered by locating the philosophical intellect within its entire societal context, ignoring neither ritual nor economy. The cities of Greece and northern India were in this (...) period distinctive also by virtue of being pervasively monetised. The metaphysics of both cultures is marked by the projection and the introjection of the abstract, all-pervasive, quasi-omnipotent, impersonal substance embodied in money. And in both cultures this development accompanied the interiorisation of the cosmic rite of passage. (shrink)

What does it mean to ‘give’ the value of a variable in an algebraic context, and how does giving the value of a variable differ from merely describing it? I argue that to answer this question, we need to examine the role that giving the value of a variable plays in problem-solving practice. I argue that four different features are required for a statement to count as giving the value of a variable in the context of solving an elementary algebra (...) problem: the variable must be in the scope opened by the problem statement; the values given must be in the range of the variable, which is determined by the problem; the statement giving the values must represent a complete solution; and it must be in a canonical form. This account helps us better understand elementary algebra itself, as well as the use of algebraic tools to analyze phenomena in natural language. (shrink)

Internal due process systems are the formal mechanisms thatmany organizations use to address and resolve ethics conflicts.Problematical due process systems such asinvestigation-punishment and grievance-arbitration systemsnarrowly constrain the political and moral space needed formeaningful ethics voice, praxis, and community. The relativelyuncommon employee board and mediator-counselor types of systemscan help solve such problems. The employee board andmediator-counselor systems permit questioning not only of guiltwith respect to policy violations but also the appropriateness ofthe policies as well as potential biases in an organization'sembedded tradition-system (...) that may be contributing to unethicalbehavior. Theoretical implications for organization ethics,praxis, community, and integrative social contracts theories areexplored. Several case examples are discussed. (shrink)

Sex chromosomes can differ between species as a result of evolutionary turnover, a process that can be driven by evolution of the sex determination pathway. Canonical models of sex chromosome turnover hypothesize that a new master sex determining gene causes an autosome to become a sex chromosome or an XY chromosome pair to switch to a ZW pair (or vice versa). Here, a novel paradigm for the evolution of sex determination and sex chromosomes is presented, in which there is an (...) evolutionary transition in the master sex determiner, but the X chromosome remains unchanged. There are three documented examples of the novel paradigm, and it is hypothesized that a similar process could happen in a ZW sex chromosome system. Three other taxa are also identified where the novel paradigm may have occurred, and how it could be distinguished from canonical trajectories in these and additional taxa is also described. (shrink)

Paul Grice’s account of the nature of intentional communication has often been supposed to be cognitively too complex to work as an account of the communicative interactions of pre-verbal children. This chapter is a (fairly uncritical) review of a number of responses to this challenge that others have developed. I discuss work on Relevance Theory (by Sperber and Wilson), Pedagogy Theory (by Gergely and Csibra), and Expressive Communication (by Green and Bar-On). I also discuss my own response to the challenge (...) of Gricean communication. (shrink)

This book tells the story of critical theory's introduction into the study of international relations.

The Argument of the "Tractatus" presents a single unified interpretation of the Tractatus based on Wittgenstein's own view that the philosophy of logic is the real foundation of his philosophical system.

We present a novel way of using proof nets for the multimodal Lambek calculus, which provides a general treatment of both the unary and binary connectives. We also introduce a correctness criterion which is valid for a large class of structural rules and prove basic soundness, completeness and cut elimination results. Finally, we will present a correctness criterion for the original Lambek calculus Las an instance of our general correctness criterion.