This volume contains work by the very best young scholars working in Applied Ethics, gathering a range of new perspectives and thoughts on highly relevant topics, such as the environment, animals, computers, freedom of speech, human enhancement, war and poverty. For researchers and students working in or around this fascinating area of the discipline, the volume will provide a unique snapshot of where the cutting-edge work in the field is currently engaged and where it's headed.

Nijhawan's theory rests on the assumption that transient signals compete with predictive signals to generate the visual percept. We describe experiments that show that this assumption is incorrect. Our results are consistent with an alternative theory that proposes that vision is instead postdictive, in that the perception of an event is influenced by occurrences after the event.

Genomic research results and incidental findings with health implications for a research participant are of potential interest not only to the participant, but also to the participant's family. Yet investigators lack guidance on return of results to relatives, including after the participant's death. In this paper, a national working group offers consensus analysis and recommendations, including an ethical framework to guide investigators in managing this challenging issue, before and after the participant's death.

Purpose This paper aims to explore the ethical and social impact of augmented visual field devices, identifying issues that AVFDs share with existing devices and suggesting new ethical and social issues that arise with the adoption of AVFDs. Design/methodology/approach This essay incorporates both a philosophical and an ethical analysis approach. It is based on Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, philosophical notions of transparency and presence and human values including psychological well-being, physical well-being, privacy, deception, informed consent, ownership and property and (...) trust. Findings The paper concludes that the interactions among developers, users and non-users via AVFDs have implications for autonomy. It also identifies issues of ownership that arise because of the blending of physical and virtual space and important ways that these devices impact, identity and trust. Practical implications Developers ought to take time to design and implement an easy-to-use informed consent system with these devices. There is a strong need for consent protocols among developers, users and non-users of AVFDs. Social implications There is a social benefit to users sharing what is visible on their devices with those who are in close physical proximity, but this introduces tension between notions of personal privacy and the establishment and maintenance of social norms. Originality/value There is new analysis of how AVFDs impact individual identity and the attendant ties to notions of ownership of the space between an object and someone’s eyes and control over perception. (shrink)

No consensus yet exists on how to handle incidental fnd-ings in human subjects research. Yet empirical studies document IFs in a wide range of research studies, where IFs are fndings beyond the aims of the study that are of potential health or reproductive importance to the individual research participant. This paper reports recommendations of a two-year project group funded by NIH to study how to manage IFs in genetic and genomic research, as well as imaging research. We conclude that researchers (...) have an obligation to address the possibility of discovering IFs in their protocol and communications with the IRB, and in their consent forms and communications with research participants. Researchers should establish a pathway for handling IFs and communicate that to the IRB and research participants. We recommend a pathway and categorize IFs into those that must be disclosed to research participants, those that may be disclosed, and those that should not be disclosed. (shrink)

In this paper we examine the case of Tay, the Microsoft AI chatbot that was launched in March, 2016. After less than 24 hours, Microsoft shut down the experiment because the chatbot was generating tweets that were judged to be inappropriate since they included racist, sexist, and anti-Semitic language. We contend that the case of Tay illustrates a problem with the very nature of learning software that interacts directly with the public, and the developer's role and responsibility associated with it. (...) We make the case that when LS interacts directly with people or indirectly via social media, the developer has additional ethical responsibilities beyond those of standard software. There is an additional burden of care. (shrink)

To many who develop and use free software, the GNU General Public License represents an embodiment of the meaning of free software. In this paper we examine the definition and meaning of free software in the context of three events surrounding the GNU General Public License. We use a case involving the GPU software project to establish the importance of Freedom 0 in the meaning of free software. We analyze version 3 of the GNU General Public License and conclude that (...) although a credible case can be made that the added restrictions are consistent with the definition of free software, the case requires subtle arguments. Strong arguments against the added restrictions are less subtle, and may therefore be more convincing to many users and developers. We also analyze the Affero General Public License and conclude that it is inconsistent with the definition of free software. (shrink)

Evolutionary change is opportunistic, but its course is strongly constrained in several fundamental ways. These constraints (historical/phylogenetic, functional/adaptive, constructional/morphogenetic) and their dynamic relationships are discussed here and shown to constitute the conceptual framework of Constructional Morphology. Notwithstanding recent published opinions which claim that the discovery of constraints renders Neodarwinian selection theory obsolete, we regard the insights of Constructional Morphology as being entirely consistent with this theory. As is shown here in the case of the Hyracoidea, formal analysis of the constraints (...) which have framed the evolution of various characters extends our understanding of the evolution of a taxon. (shrink)

In their important paper “Autonomous Agents”, Floridi and Sanders use “levels of abstraction” to argue that computers are or may soon be moral agents. In this paper we use the same levels of abstraction to illuminate differences between human moral agents and computers. In their paper, Floridi and Sanders contributed definitions of autonomy, moral accountability and responsibility, but they have not explored deeply some essential questions that need to be answered by computer scientists who design artificial agents. One such question (...) is, “Can an artificial agent that changes its own programming become so autonomous that the original designer is no longer responsible for the behavior of the artificial agent?” To explore this question, we distinguish between LoA1 (the user view) and LoA2 (the designer view) by exploring the concepts of unmodifiable, modifiable and fully modifiable tables that control artificial agents. We demonstrate that an agent with an unmodifiable table, when viewed at LoA2, distinguishes an artificial agent from a human one. This distinction supports our first counter-claim to Floridi and Sanders, namely, that such an agent is not a moral agent, and the designer bears full responsibility for its behavior. We also demonstrate that even if there is an artificial agent with a fully modifiable table capable of learning* and intentionality* that meets the conditions set by Floridi and Sanders for ascribing moral agency to an artificial agent, the designer retains strong moral responsibility. (shrink)

The foundations of mathematics include mathematical logic, set theory, recursion theory, model theory, and Gödel's incompleteness theorems. Professor Wolf provides here a guide that any interested reader with some post-calculus experience in mathematics can read, enjoy, and learn from. It could also serve as a textbook for courses in the foundations of mathematics, at the undergraduate or graduate level. The book is deliberately less structured and more user-friendly than standard texts on foundations, so will also be attractive to those outside (...) the classroom environment wanting to learn about the subject. (shrink)

Large-scale sequencing tests, including whole-exome and whole-genome sequencing, are rapidly moving into clinical use. Sequencing is already being used clinically to identify therapeutic opportunities for cancer patients who have run out of conventional treatment options, to help diagnose children with puzzling neurodevelopmental conditions, and to clarify appropriate drug choices and dosing in individuals. To evaluate and support clinical applications of these technologies, the National Human Genome Research Institute and National Cancer Institute have funded studies on clinical and research sequencing under (...) the Clinical Sequencing Exploratory Research program as well as studies on return of results. Most of these studies use sequencing in real-world clinical settings and collect data on both the application of sequencing and the impact of receiving genomic findings on study participants. They are occurring in the context of controversy over how to obtain consent for exome and genome sequencing. (shrink)

Returning genomic research results to family members raises complex questions. Genomic research on life-limiting conditions such as cancer, and research involving storage and reanalysis of data and specimens long into the future, makes these questions pressing. This author group, funded by an NIH grant, published consensus recommendations presenting a framework. This follow-up paper offers concrete guidance and tools for implementation. The group collected and analyzed relevant documents and guidance, including tools from the Clinical Sequencing Exploratory Research Consortium. The authors then (...) negotiated a consensus toolkit of processes and documents. That toolkit offers sample consent and notification documents plus decision flow-charts to address return of results to family of living and deceased participants, in adult and pediatric research. Core concerns are eliciting participant preferences on sharing results with family and on choice of a representative to make decisions about sharing after participant death. (shrink)

We prove (in ZFC Set Theory) that all infinite games whose winning sets are of the following forms are determined: (1) (A - S) ∪ B, where A is $\Pi^0_2, \bar\bar{S}, 2^{\aleph_0}$ , and the games whose winning set is B is "strongly determined" (meaning that all of its subgames are determined). (2) A Boolean combination of Σ 0 2 sets and sets smaller than the continuum. This also enables us to show that strong determinateness is not preserved under complementation, (...) improving a result of Morton Davis which required the continuum hypothesis to prove this fact. Various open questions related to the above results are discussed. Our main conjecture is that (2) above remains true when "Σ 0 2 " is replaced by "Borel". (shrink)

We demonstrate that different categories of software raise different ethical concerns with respect to whether software ought to be Free Software or Proprietary Software. We outline the ethical tension between Free Software and Proprietary Software that stems from the two kinds of licenses. For some categories of software we develop support for normative statements regarding the software development landscape. We claim that as society's use of software changes, the ethical analysis for that category of software must necessarily be repeated. Finally, (...) we make a utilitarian argument that the software development environment should encourage both Free Software and Proprietary Software to flourish. (shrink)

As software developers design artificial agents , they often have to wrestle with complex issues, issues that have philosophical and ethical importance. This paper addresses two key questions at the intersection of philosophy and technology: What is deception? And when is it permissible for the developer of a computer artifact to be deceptive in the artifact’s development? While exploring these questions from the perspective of a software developer, we examine the relationship of deception and trust. Are developers using deception to (...) gain our trust? Is trust generated through technological “enchantment” warranted? Next, we investigate more complex questions of how deception that involves AAs differs from deception that only involves humans. Finally, we analyze the role and responsibility of developers in trust situations that involve both humans and AAs. (shrink)

This text is designed to teach students how to read and write proofs in mathematics and to acquaint them with how mathematicians investigate problems and formulate conjecture.

Volume 20, Issue 8, August 2020, Page 41-43.

We agree with Alfandre and colleagues that ethics guidance for contingency conditions in public health emergencies is urgently needed. The Minnesota COVID Ethics Collabora...

Background Professional ethics in nursing exist to guide care and allow for decision-making to be patient-centered. In the current medicolegal landscape post-Roe and in light of bans on gender-affirming care, the decision-making processes of emergency nurses in the clinical environment of care as informed by both professional and personal ethics are an important area of inquiry. Aim The aim of this study was to examine the contribution of moral courage to decision-making by emergency nurses. Research Design A mixed-methods exploratory sequential (...) approach was used, using a standard demographics form and the Nurses Moral Courage Scale to collect quantitative data. These data were used to inform an interview guide for qualitative data collection. Situational analysis was used to analyze the interview data. Ethical Considerations Prior to recruitment, this study was reviewed and approved by the University of Massachusetts IRB (#00003909). Participants were provided with an informed consent document at the time of registration and at the time of interview; participants provided both signed consent and verbal assent. Participants were assigned study codes to maintain anonymity and data were maintained in a secure University cloud. Participants and Research Context US-based emergency nurses working in environments with care limitations. Results 70% of respondents reported that they would speak up if they were aware of a situation that was ethically challenging. Respondents reported that it was fairly easy or very easy to defend their values when addressing ancillary staff, coworkers, authorities outside the organization, patients, and patient families. Respondents reported challenges in defending their professional values to charge nurses, physicians, or administrators. In response to a serious ethical problem, 65.8% of respondents answered that they would bring up the problem for discussion, 21.1% would file an internal report, and 13.2% would report externally. Interview participants reported significant social and professional barriers to acting in response to an ethical violation. Willingness to act centered on personal values and not professional codes of ethics. Conclusions While emergency nurses in this study reported high perceived levels of moral courage, they also reported low willingness to act directly, citing burnout and significant social and professional barriers. Adherence to professional codes of ethics is not the primary driver of moral courage. (shrink)

Empiricism is a claim about the contents of the mind: its classic slogan is nihil est in intellectu quod non fuerit in sensu, ‘there is nothing in the mind (intellect, understanding) which is not first in the senses’. As such, it is not a claim about the fundamental nature of the world as material. I focus here on in an instance of what one might term the materialist appropriation of empiricism. One major component in the transition from a purely epistemological (...) claim about the mind and its contents, to an ontological claim about the nature of the world, is the new focus on brain-mind relations in the eighteenth century. Here I examine a Lockean trajectory as exemplified in Joseph Priestley’s 1777 Disquisitions Relating to Matter and Spirit. But Locke explicitly ruled out that his inquiry into the logic of ideas amounted to a ‘physical consideration of the mind’. What does it mean, then, for Priestley to present himself as continuing a Lockean tradition, while presenting mental processes as tightly identified with ‘an organical structure such as that of the brain’ (although he was not making a strict identity claim as we might understand it, post-Smart and Armstrong)? One issue here is that of Priestley's source of ‘empirical data’ regarding the correlation and indeed identification of mental and cerebral processes. David Hartley’s theory in his 1749 Observations on Man was, as is well known, republished in abridged form by Priestley, but he discards Hartley's 'vibratory neurophysiology' while retaining the associationist framework, although not because he disagreed with the former. Yet Hartley was at the very least, strongly agnostic about metaphysical issues (and it is difficult to study these authors while bracketing off religious considerations). One could see Locke and Hartley as articulating programs for the study of the mind which were more or less naturalistic (more strongly so in Hartley’s case) while avoiding ‘materialism’ per se; in contrast, Priestley bit the (materialist) bullet. In this paper I examine Priestley’s appropriation and reconstruction of this ‘micro-tradition’, while emphasizing its problems. (shrink)

"The Rules" are found in a collaborative document that states principles for responsibility when a computer artifact is designed, developed and deployed into a sociotechnical system. At this writing, over 50 people from nine countries have signed onto The Rules. Unlike codes of ethics, The Rules are not tied to any organization, and computer users as well as computing professionals are invited to sign onto The Rules. The emphasis in The Rules is that both users and professionals have responsibilities in (...) the production and use of computing artifacts. In this paper, we use The Rules to examine issues of trust. (shrink)

Hegel often says that his "logic" is meant to replace metaphysics. Since Hegel's Science of Logic is so different from a standard logic, most commentators have not treated the portion of that work devoted to logical forms as relevant to this claim. This paper argues that Hegel's discussion of logical forms of judgment and syllogism is meant to be the foundation of his reformation of metaphysics. Implicit in Hegel's discussion of the logical forms is the view that the metaphysical concepts (...) discussed in Books I and II of the Science of Logic supervene on the role of subject and predicate terms in the logical forms discussed in Book III. Hegel thus has an explanation for the nature and significance of metaphysical concepts that resembles Kant's "metaphysical deduction," according to which the categories can be derived from the table of judgments. Though Hegel's metaphysics is often supposed to be influenced by Kant, prevailing interpretations do not show how Hegel's fine-grained treatment of logical forms is relevant to his critical view of metaphysics. The present interpretation provides a model for Hegel's explanation of metaphysical concepts, as well as a new picture of the structure of his Science of Logic that emphasizes the priority of its Doctrine of the Concept. (shrink)

Heidegger's Eschatology is a ground-breaking account of Heidegger's early engagement with theology, from his beginnings as an anti-Modernist Catholic to his turn towards an undogmatic Protestantism and finally to a resolutely a-theistic philosophical method.

A secondary analysis was performed on preliminary data from an ongoing cross-cultural study on assortative pairing. Independently sampled pairs of opposite-sex romantic partners and of same-sex friends rated themselves and each other on Life History (LH) strategy and mate value. Data were collected in local bars, clubs, coffeehouses, and other public places from three different cultures: Tucson, Arizona; Hermosillo, Sonora; and San José, Costa Rica. The present analysis found that slow LH individuals assortatively pair with both sexual and social partners (...) more strongly than fast LH individuals. We interpret this phenomenon as representing (1) an adaptation for preserving coadapted genomes in slow LH strategists to maintain high copying fidelity genetic replication while producing a lower number of offspring in stable, predictable, and controllable environments and (2) a bet-hedging adaptation in fast LH strategists, favoring the genetic diversification of a higher number of offspring in unstable, unpredictable, and uncontrollable environments. (shrink)

This essay defends a reading of Hegel as a metametaphysical antirealist. Metametaphysical antirealism is a denial that metaphysics has as its subject matter answers to theoretical questions about the mind-independent world. Hence, on this view, metaphysical questions are not, in principle, knowledge transcendent. I hold that Hegel presents a version of metametaphysical antirealism in the Science of Logic because he pursues his project by suspending reference to all supposed objects of metaphysical theory as practiced before him. Hegel introduces reference in (...) his theory only by the self-reference of thought to itself in the Doctrine of the Concept. I motivate the relevance of Hegel’s approach to metaphysics by comparing it to Kit Fine’s (2017) concept of “naïve metaphysics.” I argue that Hegel’s theory results from a comprehensively naïve metaphysics. (shrink)

It is commonly assumed that the expression “an sich selbst” (“in itself”) in Kant combines with terms to form complex nouns such as “thing in itself” and “end in itself.” I argue that the basic use of “an sich selbst” in Kant’s German is as a sentence adverb, which has the role of modifying subject-predicate combinations, rather than either subject or predicate on their own. Expressions of the form “S is P an sich selbst” mean roughly that S is P (...) ‘in its own right’ or without some further ‘condition’. Accordingly, “an sich selbst” should not be treated as forming complex nouns. This analysis has significant consequences for the interpretation of “thing in itself” in particular, for it implies that the latter is not a complete nominal expression. Instead, one must treat ‘an sich selbst’ as expressing how some S is a ‘thing’, looking to the wider sentential context. I conclude with a brief account of the new significance granted to the concept of a ‘thing’ (Ding) according to the present interpretation. (shrink)