The ethical features of citizenship in democratic societies have been explored from several perspectives. This account is based on the analysis of our condition as co-practitioners in civil society and aims to address the public role of religions and to include multiple forms of citizenship. Under conditions of pluralism, one’s involvement in cooperative practices is shaped and unsettled by the presence of co-practitioners who carry different self-understandings about the relationship between their beliefs and their social agency. Social cooperation is threatened (...) when these self-understandings come into conflict. The notion of postsecularism provides a valuable clue for better understanding this kind of conflict, thanks to its focus on how the self-understanding of religious and secular actors is affected by their co-implication in the same public space. Within this framework, I suggest that a reflective consideration of the practical cooperative relationships that ordinarily characterize our agency as actors of civil society may adequately ground a normative ethics of citizenship. This reflective awareness affects the self-understanding of both religious and secular citizens, and normatively points towards a disposition to cooperatively re-arrange and re-formulate one’s own beliefs and arguments in the light of the structural co-implication of one’s own belief with the beliefs of others. The basic duties of citizenship emerge from the implications of participating in a body of social practices that extends to different communities of practice at a local, national and global level. This ethics of citizenship is therefore not bound to membership in a specific political entity. (shrink)

Does art need to be beautiful? Can humour be beautiful? What is the relationship between beauty and mimetic behaviour? What does literature have to do with beauty? What are the limitations of neuroscientific approaches to beauty? Are the experience of beauty and the production of â oeartâ confined to anatomically modern humans? Is the experience of beauty confined to humans at all? These are just some of the questions discussed in this volume. It gathers together authors from different areas of (...) research, including philosophy, history of philosophy, history of ideas, cognitive biology, neuroscience, anthropology and paleoanthropology, in order to investigate some of the most debated aspects of the problem of beauty and aesthetic experience. The volume will appeal to both the general reader and the specialist in the humanities, social sciences and the natural sciences. (shrink)

Workplace spirituality research has sidestepped religion by focusing on the function of belief rather than its substance. Although establishing a unified foundation for research, the functional approach cannot shed light on issues of workplace pluralism, individual or institutional faith-work integration, or the institutional roles of religion in economic activity. To remedy this, we revisit definitions of spirituality and argue for the place of a belief-based approach to workplace religion. Additionally, we describe the construction of a 15-item measure of workplace religion (...) informed by Judaism and Christianity – the Faith at Work Scale (FWS). A stratified random sample (n = 234) of managers and professionals assisted in refining the FWS which exhibits a single factor structure (Eigenvalue = 8.88; variance accounted for = 59.22%) that is internally consistent (Cronbach’s α = 0.77) and demonstrates convergent validity with the Faith Maturity Scale (r = 0.81, p > 0.0001). The scale shows lower skew and kurtosis with Mainline and Catholic adherents than with Mormons and Evangelicals. Validation of the scale among Jewish and diverse Christian adherants would extend research in workplace religion. (shrink)

One of the essential distinctions in action theory is that between activity and passivity. I address this distinction in this article.

The present essay analyzes an eighteenth-century phase of the querelle des monstres and highlights two main points. 1) As the cases of Lémery and Winslow demonstrate, in the period when preformation was the dominant view, the dispute over the origin of monsters carried into the very field of preformation the contrast which had originally opposed it to the now defeated model of epigenesis, namely the alternative between mechanical genesis and pre-existence of the monstrous form itself. 2) One of the most (...) important episodes in the shift of teratology from a primarily theological or metaphysical issue to a purely natural one was due to Albrecht von Haller. Haller shifted the dispute from anatomy to embryology; and it is on an embryological base and not on metaphysics that he built his own demonstration of the original nature of the monster. He was furthermore the only scientist of authority who dealt with teratology from an epigenetic standpoint. His numerous changes of view in the field of embryology did in fact never affect his early adherence to the thesis of original monstrosity. (shrink)

Large Language Models (LLMs) are generative AI systems capable of producing original texts based on inputs about topic and style provided in the form of prompts or questions. The introduction of the outputs of these systems into human discursive practices poses unprecedented moral and political questions. The article articulates an analysis of the moral status of these systems and their interactions with human interlocutors based on the Habermasian theory of communicative action. The analysis explores, among other things, Habermas's inquiries into (...) the analogy between human minds and computers, and into the status of atypical participants in the linguistic community such as genetically modified subjects and animals. Major conclusions are the LLMs seem to qualify as authors that originally participate in discursive practices but do display only a structurally derivative form of communicative competence and fail to meet the status of communicative agents. In this sense, while the contribution of AI writing systems in public discourse and deliberation can support the process of mutual understanding within the community of speakers, the human actors involved in the development, use, and diffusion of these systems share a collective responsibility for the disclosure of AI authorship and verification and adjudication of validity claims. (shrink)

In an explanation, what does the explaining and what gets explained? What are the relata of the explanation relation? Candidates include: people, events, facts, sentences, statements, and propositions.

In the context of his advanced theory of ethics Aristotle like later Kant seems considering the Golden Rule as trivial and not bound to be articulated. It is possible that Aristotle did not feel necessity to mention the Golden Rule, because the very Golden Rule was spread out in his ethics. Though he did not use the formula ofthe Golden Rule in his texts, he often expressed his understanding of virtuous character and virtuous relations using intellective constructions evidently relevant to (...) the Golden Rule. The analysis of Aristotle’s reasoning on shame, social intercourse and, mainly, friendship shows that his ethics is saturated with the content andspirit of the Golden Rule, including such features agent’s initiative, activity, commitment and thus her/his responsibility for establishing relations, their potential reversibility, mutuality, and universalizability. (shrink)

How do actors cope when their repeated efforts to bring change seem futile? In this qualitative study, we consider sustainable development initiatives within a U.S. higher education institution where repeated efforts by actors led to nominal change. We focus on understanding how actors sought to enact sustainable development initiatives in the face of an unresponsive context, that is, in a context characterized by pressures to maintain the status quo. We show how actors’ attempts to embed sustainable development practices into the (...) university represent a dynamic process, characterized by periods of persistence and suspension. Our theorizing reveals that actors used three coping mechanisms to maintain focus on their sustainability goals: community building, resourcefulness, and vision. By emphasizing these dimensions of their initiatives, actors’ emotional response is focused on encouragement and hope to persist in a context that is largely unresponsive to sustainable development. Our study contributes to the sustainability literature by explicating how actors develop resilience in their efforts to pursue sustainable development in unresponsive contexts. (shrink)

Bank customers are not financial experts, and yet they make high-stakes decisions that can substantively affect personal wealth. Sooner or later, every individual has to take relevant investment decisions. Using data collected from financial advisors, bank customers and university students in Italy, this paper aims to reveal new insights about the decision processes of average non-expert investors: their investment goals, the information sets they consider, and the factors that ultimately influence decisions about investment products. Using four portfolio choice tasks based (...) on data collected directly from financial advisors and their clients, we find that most subjects used a limited set of information, ignoring factors that conventional economic models usually assume drive investor behavior. Furthermore, we suggest that non-compensatory decision-tree models, which make no trade-offs among investment features, are parsimonious descriptions of investor behavior useful for improving the organization of financial institutions and in policy contexts alike. (shrink)

The principle of sufficient reason can be taken as a guide to the progress of philosophical and scientific knowledge. Thus, we could establish a link between scientific disciplines and philosophy, which would result in a mutually enriching dialogue. However, it can be shown that the use of the principle of sufficient reason is not suitable for the philosophical and scientific research, so neither can be used to establish a dialogue. It is argued, therefore, that other principles must be deepened, e.g., (...) causality, to establish a link between science and philosophy. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Call for Proposals:The Seventh International Buddhist-Christian Conference, "Hear the Cries of the World"Ruben HabitoThe Society for Buddhist Christian Studies will hold the Seventh International Buddhist-Christian Conference at the Loyola Marymount University campus, Los Angeles, California, 3-8 June 2005. (This conference was earlier posted to take place in August 2004, but was postponed for various reasons.) The overall theme will remain as previously announced: "Hear the Cries of the (...) World: Buddhism and Christianity in Dialogue Toward Global Healing."The program committee welcomes proposals for working groups, scheduled to meet in three successive morning sessions for two hours each, addressing a specific theme or issue, with one or two coordinators and five or more core-group members; full panels, to be presented in one two-hour session, on a specific theme, with a moderator, three to four speakers, and one or two respondents; and individual papers on a specific topic related to an issue or issues in Buddhist-Christian dialogue.Proposals for working groups on themes such as religion and ecology, human rights and social justice, women and religion, toward a global ethic, practice across traditions, Catholic-Buddhist relations, religious responses to violence, religion and globalization, and other relevant themes, are welcomed. Working group proposals should include the title or theme of the working group, a short 200-300 word description of the goal(s) of the working group, and the names and contact information (including address, phone, fax, and e-mail) of the coordinator(s) and at least five other core-group members.Proposals for full panels for a two-hour time slot, addressing specific themes, including issues in doctrine and theory, ritual, religious practice, methodology, and others, are encouraged. Full panel proposals should include the title of the panel, a short 100-200 word description of the theme and intent of the panel, and the names and contact information of the moderator and three or four panel participants.Individual paper proposals for a 30-minute presentation on various themes, including doctrinal, ritual, practical, ethical, and other issues relevant to Buddhist-Christian dialogue are also encouraged. [End Page 245]In addition to the working groups, panel, and individual paper sessions, there will be opportunities for participation in various forms of meditative practice, prayer, and/or ritual in the morning before breakfast and early evening before dinner. These will be led by spiritual leaders and teachers of various Buddhist and Christian traditions.Further, because Los Angeles is known to be one of the most religiously diverse cities in the world, there will be opportunities to visit religious sites in the area and meet with leaders and members of different Buddhist and Christian communities.Proposals preferably should be sent by e-mail to, with a copy to, or by postal mail to Prof. Ruben Habito, Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX 75225, USA. The deadline for submission of proposals is 31 January 2005, but early submissions are encouraged.Lodging and meals will be available at the Loyola Marymount University campus in Los Angeles, as well as in hotels nearby. Registration fees and costs for lodging and meals will be announced at a later date. For queries regarding site facilities and registration, please email the conference director, Prof. James Fredericks, at.Copyright © 2004 The University of Hawai'i Press... (shrink)

NOTA DEL EDITOR: Bioética en práctica incluye también el texto “Criterios para la asignación de asistencia mecánica respiratoria en pacientes con Covid 19, un mirada bioética” del P. Rubén Revello, del Instituto de Bioética de la Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina, quien amablemente autorizó su reproducción para esta sección de la revista. El Dr. Carlos A. Gómez Fajardo, docente de Bioética de la Facultad de Medicina de la Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana y miembro del Comité editorial de la revista Persona y Bioética (...) agradece y comenta brevemente el texto: “Agradezco y recibo con gran atención sus valiosos contenidos. Son pertinentes y acertados los principios mencionados sobre el bien global del paciente y el respeto a la vida de toda persona, sin discriminación, como parte esencial del ethos hipocrático. Es innegable la necesidad del uso de criterios objetivos en la asignación de asistencia mecánica respitatoria. Para ello, en la disciplina de los cuidados críticos se dispone de las herramientas soportadas en la evidencia, de gran valor práctico y como es obvio en el uso de elementos de diagnóstico y terapia, también con sus limitantes, como sucede con las limitaciones de valores predictivos de las mismas. Encuentro que el uso del concepto “preservar la mayoría de los años de vida”, por parte de Jakie Powder del Jhon Hopkins Center of Bioethic, se puede prestar a equívocos, pues podría entenderse como un intento de reducción de criterios utilitaristas para la asignación de recursos de ARM; el autor se hace cargo del tema e indica que “cabe aclarar que ‘preservar la mayoría de los años de vida’ no significa hacer un triage que excluya de la AMR a pacientes que sobrepasan una cierta edad, sino que no se incluya a pacientes cuya prolongación de la vida solo resulte precaria y penosa”. En el ámbito académico-filosófico de la disciplina de la bioética se encuentran en contradicción esencial dos visiones: la utilitarista materialista y la realista; es de difícil conciliación racional el intento de cuantificación objetiva de “calidad de vida”, pues ello conduciría a posibles decisiones injustas. Creo que es pertinente reconocer que el ejercicio práctico de la medicina se enmarca, generalmente -no solo en situación de pandemia- en un entorno de escasez de recursos. Estos, por supuesto, siempre han de asignarse dentro del marco de la racionalidad, la proporcionalidad terapéutica y la justicia, pero es pertinente reconocer que existen variables que determinan resultados fatales y que no pueden ser atribuibles a los procesos de decisión del clínico, quien no ha de ser obligado a lo imposible cuando el volumen y complejidad de las circunstancias de triage son apremiantes. Ello no deroga el imperativo racional hipocrático del respeto a la vida de todos como inspiración del quehacer”. Este escrito fue publicado por el Centro de Bioética: Persona & Familia, en su portal web, el 22 de abril de 2020. El autor autorizó a la revista Persona y Bioética publicarlo en su sección de Bioética en práctica. Se hicieron modificaciones ortotipográficas leves al texto y una adaptación de las referencias para hacerlo compatible con las pautas editoriales de la revista. (shrink)

This book introduces readers to the topic of explanation. The insights of Plato, Aristotle, J.S. Mill and Carl Hempel are examined, and are used to argue against the view that explanation is merely a problem for the philosophy of science. Having established its importance for understanding knowledge in general, the book concludes with a bold and original explanation of explanation.

In the field of organizational communication, the notion of autopoiesis has been mostly used to explain the mechanisms that constitute organizations in autonomous systems. In this paper we argue that to better understand the autonomy and the constitutive mechanisms of organizations we need to study the narrative processes that distinguish organization as a unity. This statement is based on two premises: first, the intrinsic relation between autopoiesis and the interpretative capacity of living beings; second, the importance of the act of (...) distinction in the sensemaking process, from which we differentiate the unity from a ground. En el campo de la comunicación organizacional, el concepto de autopoiesis se ha usado principalmente para explicar los mecanismos que constituyen las organizaciones en sistemas autónomos. El presente trabajo postula que para comprender mejor la autonomía y los mecanismos constituyentes de las organizaciones debemos estudiar los procesos narrativos que distinguen a la organización como unidad. Esta afirmación se basa en dos premisas: primero el vínculo intrínseco entre autopoiesis y la capacidad interpretativa del ser vivo; segundo, la importancia en ese proceso de significación del acto de distinción, a partir del cual separamos a lo señalado como distinto de un fondo. (shrink)

Se explora el desarrollo del campo de la Alfabetización Mediática y Digital en México, entre 2000 y 2021, mediante el análisis bibliométrico de publicaciones en Scopus y Web of Science, a partir del uso de frases sinónimas. Se observa una incipiente y dispersa producción científica en dicha área del conocimiento para el periodo de estudio.

El presente artículo explora el carácter farmacológico de la tecnología a partir del caso del software libre de navegación anónima por internet y su potencial político. Se defiende la tesis de que el software, que es la base del sistema de vigilancia y control psicopolítico neoliberal descrito por Byung-Chul Han, puede ser al mismo tiempo, cuando se implementa en programas de código abierto que camuflan nuestra huella digital, una herramienta para la resistencia y emancipación. Esto se debe a que dicha (...) implementación ataca los principios fundamentales de la lógica de dominación dataísta: la transparencia y la predictibilidad. (shrink)

Este trabajo aborda la relación entre el populismo y los discursos del odio. Tomando como referencia la visión favorable del populismo teorizada por Laclau y Mouffe, desarrollaré un concepto de discurso populista formado por tres subtipos de discurso: el agonista, el solidario y el movilizador. Tras contrastar este concepto con el de discurso del odio, concluyo que ambos son independientes y que por tanto el populismo no necesita recurrir a discursos del odio, al menos en teoría. Sin embargo, advierto, la (...) naturaleza del populismo le hace propenso a caer en ese tipo de discursos, lo cual sugiere que la praxis populista difícilmente podrá evitarlos. Dada la inmoralidad del discurso del odio, esta afinidad ofrece una razón _pro tanto_ para abstenerse de prácticas populistas. (shrink)

El texto trata de abordar la noción de «significante» lacaniano desde una hermenéutica filosófica. Para ello se recorrerán algunos momentos clave de la elaboración de Lacan sin dar por supuesto ningún uso o definición que se promueve del término en cuestión, todo ello con la intención de subrayar aspectos como el del sentido y la vedad que desde un análisis hermenéutico-filosófico pueden ser captados en toda su profundidad.

In Democratic Authority and the Separation of Church and State, Robert Audi addresses disagreements among equally rational persons on political matters of coercion by analysing the features of discussions between epistemic peers, and supporting a normative principle of toleration. It is possible to question the extent to which Audi’s views are consistent with the possibility of religious citizens being properly defined as epistemic peers with their non-religious counterparts, insofar as he also argues for some significant constraints on religious reasons in (...) public debates, and he advocates secular reasons being considered as equivalent to natural reasons. I shall also consider Jürgen Habermas’s criticism of Audi’s stance. One of Habermas’ main points focused on Audi’s strong division between religious and non-religious arguments that requires religious citizens to artificially split their reasons, while non-religiously affiliated citizens are not met with any similar requirement. Also, analysing the concept of epistemic parity, we can as well grasp some of the main features of the Habermasian idea of postsecularism. The difference between secular and postsecular views can be framed as hinging on what it means to be epistemic peers, thus bearing consequences on the understanding of the relationship between church and state—particularly regarding the nature of state neutrality and the different status of churches and organised secular groups. (shrink)

In a recent paper, Daniel Whiting has argued that there are no exclusionary reasons (i.e., second-order reasons not to act for a reason). The premise of the argument is what he calls the motivation constraint, according to which for the fact that p to be a reason for you to ϕ, it must be possible for you to ϕ for the reason that p. However, the argument goes, it is not possible to act (or not to act) for a reason (...) for a reason. Therefore, he concludes, there are no second-order reasons. In this paper, I shall argue that Whiting's argument ought to be rejected. Thus, I will argue that we should not accept the motivation constraint on which it is based. It is true that for the fact that p to be a reason for you to ϕ, it must be possible for you to ϕ guided in the right way by the consideration that p favours you ϕing. However, I shall argue that it is possible for exclusionary reasons to guide us in the right way, even if it not possible for us to not to ϕ for a reason for a reason. (shrink)

Ruben Berrios Queen’s University Belfast Anti-realism and Aesthetic Cognition Abstract At the core of the debate between scientific realism and anti-realism is the question of the relation between scientific theory and the world. The realist possesses a mimetic conception of the relation between theory and reality. For the realist, scientific theories represent reality. The anti-realist, in contrast, seeks to understand the relations between theory and world in non-mimetic terms. We will examine Cartwright’s simulacrum account of explanation in order to (...) illuminate the anti-realist position. Science consists of phenomenological and theoretical laws. The former are concerned with appearances, or those phenomena that can be directly observed; the latter involve the unobservable reality that is alleged to underlie appearances, and are capable only of indirect confirmation. Phenomenological laws are said to be descriptive, whilst theoretical laws are understood as explanatory. Cartwright is concerned with the theoretical. She claims that the standard realist account of the explanatory efficacy of theoretical laws is faulty. The explanatory power of theoretical laws consists in their ability to provide an explanation of physical phenomena. According to Cartwright, the realist claims that laws explain phenomena by providing an abstract description of them, in terms of their micro-structural features, that is alleged to be true. On this view, explanatory power is entirely dependent on descriptive adequacy. As phenomenological laws describe appearances, so theoretical laws describe the fundamental reality that governs appearances. Cartwright rejects the preceding view and in its place proposes a simulacrum account of explanation. According to Cartwright, the explanatory power of theoretical laws is related not to descriptive adequacy, but rather to the construction of adequate models. To explain a phenomenon is to construct a model which best or most adequately accommodates the phenomenon to a theory. The model will consist of various posited objects that serve to explain the phenomena in terms that are consistent with a set of theoretical laws. Cartwright claims that theoretical laws are true of, or describe, the objects of the model. The objects of the model, however, are not descriptive of reality. They are simulacra. They have, that is, the form or appearance of things, without possessing their substance or proper qualities. In light of the foregoing account we can summarise the distinction between scientific realism and anti-realism as follows. The realist claims that theoretical laws literally represent real objects. The anti-realist claims that laws represent objects of a model that are simulacra of reality. Anti-realism has an aesthetic dimension. The movement from realism to anti-realism is also the movement from the mimetic conception of the scientist as holding a mirror to nature to the constructionist view of the scientist as engaging with nature through invention. There is a lot of the artist in the anti-realist’s view of the scientist. This is true for Cartwright as well as, for example, Van Fraassen in his doctrine of constructive empiricism. It would appear, then, that the philosophy of science has absorbed some concepts that are ordinarily housed in aesthetics. And it has done so profitably. The aim of this paper is to reverse the direction of disciplinary influence. Can art, in relation to its status as a cognitive enterprise, be illuminated by scientific anti-realism? I will argue that it can. In an unexpected reference to the Nicomachean Ethics, Cartwright draws a suggestive parallel between theoretical laws and general moral principles, on the one hand, and physical phenomena and everyday moral conduct, on the other hand. If we add to this the claim that a central component of art’s value is cognitive, then we have the basic materials with which to flesh out a broadly anti-realist view of art. In the production of art, artists can construct models that mediate between everyday ethical phenomena and general ethical tendencies. These models reveal the ways in which there are implicit consistencies or inconsistencies, conflicts or congruences and so forth, between the phenomena and the tendencies. On this basis art can contribute to the reflective understanding of ethical life. This constitutes to a large degree art’s status as a cognitive enterprise. To apprehend art cognitively as artist or critic is to engage in aesthetic cognition. (shrink)