Language sample analysis is an important practice for providing a culturally sensitive and accurate assessment of a child's language abilities. A child's usage of literate language devices in narrative samples has been shown to be a critical target for evaluation. While automated scoring systems have begun to appear in the field, no such system exists for conducting progress-monitoring on literate language usage within narratives. The current study aimed to develop a hard-coded scoring system called the Literate Language Use in Narrative (...) Assessment, to automatically evaluate six aspects of literate language in non-coded narrative transcripts. LLUNA was designed to individually score six literate language elements. The interrater reliability of LLUNA with an expert scorer, as well as its' reliability compared to certified undergraduate scorers was calculated using a quadratic weighted kappa. Results indicated that LLUNA met strong levels of interrater reliability with an expert scorer on all six elements. LLUNA also surpassed the reliability levels of certified, but non-expert scorers on four of the six elements and came close to matching reliability levels on the remaining two. LLUNA shows promise as means for automating the scoring of literate language in LSA and narrative samples for the purpose of assessment and progress-monitoring. (shrink)

These meditations, which begin with Stephan Schwartz and Mark Schroll's contested and contesting histories of the lineage and founding of the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness (below), contribute to the imagining of what Bethe Hagens calls "the relatively new interdisciplinary field of anthropology of consciousness.” Ethnographic vignettes from fieldwork of anthropologists, as well as fieldwork of students studying that fieldwork, highlight the paradox of anthropology's secularism and invite the reader, through the reading and writing of the text itself, (...) to participate in the practices of consciousness described. Using Schwartz's metaphor of "boulders in the stream,” these practices, and the modes of consciousness they invoke, serve as boulders that readers must swim around, or hop from, secularist anthropology through cyborg anthropology to an anthropology of consciousness itself. (shrink)

This study provides an additional partial test of the Hunt-Vitell theory [1986, Journal of Macro-marketing, 8, 5-16; 1993, 'The General Theory of Marketing Ethics: A Retrospective and Revision', in N. C. Smith and J. A. Quelch (eds.), Ethics in Marketing (Irwin Inc., Homewood), pp. 775-784], within the consumer ethics context. Using structural equation modeling, the relationships among an individual's personal values (conceptualized by the typology of Schwartz [1992, 'Universals in the Content and Structure of Values: Theoretical Advances and Empirical (...) Tests in 20 Countries', in M. P. Zanna (ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 25, Academic Press, Orlando), pp. 1--65] ethical ideology and ethical beliefs are investigated. The validity of the model is assessed in a two-step procedure. First, a measurement model of constructs is tested for key validity dimensions. Next, the hypothesized causal relationships are examined in several path models, comparing no mediation, partial and complete mediation of ethical ideology. The empirical results indicate that individual differences in value priorities (resultant conservation and resultant self-enhancement) directly and indirectly (through idealism) influence the judgment of ethically questionable consumer practices. These findings may significantly contribute to the theoretical understanding of ethical decision-making. (shrink)

We study the values on which managers of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) draw when constructing their personal and organizational-level engagement with environmental issues, particularly climate change. Values play an important mediating role in business environmental engagement, but relatively little research has been conducted on individual values in smaller organizations. Using the Schwartz Value System (SVS) as a framework for a qualitative analysis, we identify four “ideal-types” of SME managers and provide rich descriptions of the ways in which values (...) shape their constructions of environmental engagement. In contrast to previous research, which is framed around a binary divide between self-enhancing and self-transcending values, our typology distinguishes between individuals drawing primarily on Power or on Achievement values and indicates how a combination of Achievement and Benevolence values is particularly significant in shaping environmental engagement. This demonstrates the theoretical usefulness of focusing on a complete range of values. Implications for policy and practice are discussed. (shrink)

An implicit association test (IAT) measures differential association of 2 target concepts with an attribute. The 2 concepts appear in a 2-choice task (e.g., flower vs. insect names), and the attribute in a 2nd task (e.g., pleasant vs. unpleasant words for an evaluation attribute). When instructions oblige highly associated categories (e.g., flower + pleasant) to share a response key, performance is faster than when less associated categories (e.g., insect + pleasant) share a key. This performance difference implicitly measures differential association (...) of the 2 concepts with the attribute. In 3 experiments, the IAT was sensitive to (a) near-universal evaluative differences (e.g., flower vs. insect), (b) expected individual differences in evaluative associations (Japanese + pleasant vs. Korean + pleasant for Japanese vs. Korean subjects), and (c) consciously disavowed evaluative differences (Black + pleasant vs. White + pleasant for self-described unprejudiced White subjects). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)

This book is a series of essays by distinguished scholars concerned with the improvement of primary, secondary, and tertiary studies, most especially in arts but also in mathematics and science. It is concerned with past ideas about education in Australia, most particularly with the traditions that have yielded an education that has proven most beneficial to Australia in terms of comparison with other countries; and it advocates and emphasises how this tradition can be maintained and improved in specific ways. Essays (...) focus on primary and secondary education in music, and art, mathematics, history and the classics, on the improvement of memory and vocabulary, but more particularly on university education, discussing the purpose of education, learning in general, the use of the seminar, the necessity of freedom of debate, the inadequacies and contradictions of French and Anglo-post modernism, the teaching of history, of philosophy, and its branch aesthetics, mathematics, equality in education, teaching at university and funding of the whole enterprise. The authors are all well known in their disciplines and some are experts, internationally recognised in their fields. This book features essays by: David Daintree, Karl Schmude, Simon Haines, Kevin Donnelly, Matthew Lesh, Chris Berg & Bella d'Abrera, David Furse-Roberts, Greg Melleuish, Steven Schwartz, Blaise Joseph, James Franklin, Christopher Allen, Richard Gill, Jeremy Bell, Barry Spurr, David Brooks, Natalie Kennedy, Sarah Williams, Sarah Lawrence, Ivan Francis Head. (shrink)

At the end of their article in the September 2014 issue of the Journal of Business Ethics, Douglas R. May, Matthew T. Luth, and Catherine E. Schwoerer state that they are “hopeful in outlook” about the “evidence that business ethics instructors are….able to encourage students…to develop the courage to come forward even when pressures in organizations dictate otherwise”. We agree with May et al. that it is essential to augment students’ moral courage. However, it seems overly optimistic to believe that (...) this improvement will result from any course in business ethics. Indeed, we question the appropriateness of their measure of moral courage and assert that business ethics educators must purposely design their courses to develop students’ moral courage. In particular, we advocate introducing business ethics students to works of literature featuring protagonists who exercise moral courage in organizations. Fiction provides rich accessible narratives that show students worlds beyond their experience, awaken their imaginations, and evoke their emotions. Further, we highlight morally courageous exemplars because they inspire the cultivation of character. Joining those who underscore the role of virtue in business ethics education, we argue that exposure to moral exemplars in fiction will help students to build the moral courage they need to carry out ethical decisions in the workplace. Results from 46 students at the end of an MBA ethics course featuring moral courage provide preliminary evidence of the effectiveness of our approach. (shrink)

This paper examines the practice of using predictive systems to lengthen the prison sentences of convicted persons when the systems forecast a higher likelihood of re-offense or re-arrest. There has been much critical discussion of technologies used for sentencing, including questions of bias and opacity. However, there hasn’t been a discussion of whether this use of predictive systems makes sense in the first place. We argue that it does not by showing that there is no plausible theory of punishment that (...) supports it. (shrink)

This paper examines the problem of vituperative feedback from peer reviewers. We argue that such feedback is morally unacceptable, insofar as it humiliates authors and damages their dignity. We draw from social-psychological research to explore those aspects of the peer-review process in general and the anonymity of blind reviewing in particular that contribute to reviewers’ humiliating comments. We then apply Iris Murdoch's ideas about a virtuous consciousness and humility to make the case that peer referees have a moral obligation not (...) to humiliate the authors whose work they review. (shrink)

The clinical ethics propounded by Richard Zaner is unique. Partly because of his phenomenological orientation and partly because of his own daily practice as a clinical ethicist in a large university hospital, Zaner focuses on the particular concrete situations in which patients and their families confront illness and injury and struggle toward workable ways for dealing with them. He locates ethical reality in the clinical encounter. This encounter encompasses not only patient and physician but also the patients family and friends (...) and indeed the entire lifeworld in which the patient is still striving to live. In order to illuminate the central moral constituents of such human predicaments, Zaner discusses the often-overlooked features of disruption and crisis, the changed self, the patients dependence and the physicians power, the violation of personal boundaries and their necessary reconfiguring, and the art of listening. (shrink)

Given the technological constraints of long-duration space travel and planetary settlement, off-Earth humans will likely need to employ food systems very different from their terrestrial counterparts, and newly emerging food technologies are being developed that will shape novel food systems in these off-Earth contexts. Projected off-Earth food systems may therefore potentially “alienate” their users in new ways compared to Earth-based food systems. They will be susceptible to alienation in ways that are similar to such potential on Earth, where there are (...) points of overlap between off-Earth food systems and any of the multitudes of ways in which food systems on Earth are structured. They will also be susceptible to new forms of alienation, as we encounter scenarios that are genuinely structurally novel to humanity. These are especially important to consider since there are comparatively fewer analyses of these food systems where they differ from existing ones. We propose five non-exhaustive sources of value beyond nutrition our individual relationships with a food may possess: gustatory, social, cultural, epistemic, and authorial value. Using these, we offer examples of ways in which an off-Earth food system may exacerbate or alleviate alienation for humans in long-term off-Earth food systems. (shrink)

Most empirical research examining physician views on physician-assisted suicide has used quantitative methods to characterize positions and identify predictors of individual attitudes. This approach has generated limited information about the nature and depth of sentiments among physicians most impassioned about PAS. This study reports qualitative data provided by 909 physicians as part of a larger survey regarding attitudes toward and experiences with PAS and palliative care. Emergent themes illustrate important clinical, social, and ethical considerations in this area. The data illustrate (...) the diverse and ardent responses that PAS evokes among certain physicians. The role of physicians' personal values is central to discussions about legalization of PAS. Polarized views such as those expressed by physicians in this study are not likely to be reconciled, thereby constraining the development of public policy regarding PAS. (shrink)

Backdating of stock options is an example of an agency problem. It has emerged despite all the measures (i.e., new regulations and additional corporate governance mechanisms) aimed at addressing such problems? Beyond such negative controlling measures, a more positive empowering approach based on ethics may also be necessary. What ethical measures need to be taken to address the agency problem? What values and norms should guide the board of directors in protecting the shareholders' interests? To examine these issues, we first (...) discuss the role values and norms can play with respect to underlying corporate governance and the proper role of directors, such as transparency, accountability, integrity (which is reflected in proper mechanisms of checks and balances), and public responsibility. Second, we discuss various stakeholder approaches (e.g., government, directors, managers, and shareholders) by which conflicts of interest (i.e., the agency problem) can be addressed. Third, we assess the practice of backdating stock options, as an illustration of the agency problem, in terms of whether the practice is legally acceptable or ethically justifiable. Fourth, we proceed to an analysis of good corporate governance practice involving backdating options based on a series of ethical standards including: (1) trustworthiness; (2) utilitarianism; (3) justice; and (4) Kantianism. We conclude that while executive compensation schemes (e. g., stock options) were originally intended to help remedy the agency problem by tying together the interests of the executives and shareholders, these schemes may have actually become "part of the problem," and that the solution ultimately depends upon whether directors and executives accept that all of their actions must be based on a set of core ethical values. (shrink)

ABSTRACTRumination has long been considered a verbal thought process, though emerging evidence suggests that some individuals dwell on maladaptive imagery. This series of studies evaluated imagery and verbal thought during experimentally induced rumination and distraction. In Study 1, imagery and verbal thought during rumination resulted in similar increases in negative affect. Greater imagery during distraction, on the other hand, was associated with greater decreases in negative affect while verbal thought was not related to affect change. Given that greater verbal thought (...) was reported in the rumination condition and greater imagery was reported in the distraction condition, Study 2 evaluated whether the rumination/distraction induction was confounded by concurrent induction of imagery or verbal thought. The rumination prompts induced both rumination and verbal thought and the distraction prompts induced both distraction and imagery. Using a revised induction, Study 3 tested whether imagery and verbal t... (shrink)

Beginnings : a Russian émigré's first interviews (1932-1949) -- Russian girl jeers at U.S. for depression complaint, Oakland Tribune, 1932 -- True picture of Russian girls' love life tragic, Boston Post, 1936 -- The woman of tomorrow, WJZ radio, 1949 -- On campus : Ayn Rand talks with future intellectuals (1962-1966) -- Objectivism versus conservatism -- The campaign against extremism -- The robber-barons -- Myths of capitalism -- The political structure of a free society -- The American Constitution -- Objective (...) law -- The role of a Free Press -- Education -- Romantic literature -- Romanticism versus naturalism -- The visual arts -- Cyrano de Bergerac -- Favorites in art -- The nature of humor -- The foundations of morality -- Altruism -- Individual rights -- The ethics of objectivism -- On television and radio : Ayn Rand in America's living rooms (1959-1981) -- The Mike Wallace interview, ABC-TV, 1959 -- For the intellectual, University of Michigan television, with Professor James McConnell, 1961 -- The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, NBC-TV, August 1967 -- The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, NBC-TV, October 1967 -- Speaking freely with Edwin Newman, NBC-TV, 1972 -- Day and Night, a television program hosted by James Day, 1974 -- Focus on youth, a radio show hosted by Garth R. Ancier, 1976 -- The Raymond Newman Journal, a radio show, 1980 -- Louis Rukeyser's Business Journal, 1981. (shrink)

Ethics advisory groups, in various forms, have existed for at least 50 years in the United States and other countries. In science and biomedicine, four principal types of committees can be distinguished: policy-making and/or advisory committees, health professional association committees, health care ethics committees, and research ethics committees. Overall, these bodies have been of use to governments, policy makers, health care professionals, and the public in considering ‘what is ethical’ and ‘what is unethical’ in areas such as research involving humans (...) or animals or environmental questions such as whether to use genetically modified crops. This paper concentrates on a particular and... (shrink)

This paper concerns the growing political polarization in the U.S. and the challenges faced by political activists in their effort to mobilize around struggles and demands for policy changes. We argue that basic income can serve as a key policy around which social movements and political activists of different beliefs systems – feminist activists, racial justice activists, liberal egalitarians, Marxists-socialists, and libertarians – could form an overlapping consensus. This would allow them to have a common political goal without having to (...) reach agreement over fundamental values, thus gaining more political visibility and increasing their ability to promote socio-political change. (shrink)

Authorship of a scientific paper is important in recognition of one’s work, and in the academic setting, helps in professional promotion. Conflicting views of authorship have led to disputes and debates in many scientific communities. Addressing ethical issues in medical research and publishing, and conforming to the requirements of international organizations and local research ethics boards, has become an essential part of the research endeavor. Ethical issues of biomedical authorship have been a matter of debate for years. Authorship problems may (...) involve problems with integrity, including ghost authorship and guest authorship. Some scientific disciplines, such as engineering or social sciences, may not have a firm guideline for authorship criteria; however this article reviews the criteria of authorship recommended by related international organizations of biomedical field and discusses common scenarios that may lead to authorship disputes and misconducts as well as issues related to authorship in multicenter studies. The paper also discusses possible scenarios that might be legitimate to make changes in authorship lists. (shrink)

Ein zentrales Thema des christlichen Glaubens wird in diesem Textbuch von fuhrenden zeitgenossischen Philosophen und Philosophinnen beleuchtet. In systematischer Anordnung werden neben deutschsprachigen "Klassikern" und neuen Originaltexten auch einige der einflussreichsten Autoren der angelsachsischen Debatte in Ubersetzung zuganglich gemacht. Auch diese von der analytischen Philosophie gepragten Texte wurden teilweise eigens fur diesen Band geschrieben oder uberarbeitet. Die Auseinandersetzungen im kontinentaleuropaischen protestantischen und katholischen Denken um Seele, Unsterblichkeit und leibliche Auferstehung in der Mitte des letzten Jahrhunderts werden hier auf lebendige und (...) begrifflich prazise Weise weitergefuhrt. Die Religionsphilosophie und die Theologie werden am Reichtum der Argumente und Positionen nicht vorbeigehen konnen. Mit Texten von Oscar Cullmann, Gisbert Greshake, Gerd Haeffner, Thomas Schartl, Eleonore Stump, Peter van Inwagen, Dean Zimmerman, Alvin Plantinga, William Hasker, Lynne Baker, Hud Hudson und Godehard Bruntrup. (shrink)

Three decades ago, interactions between evolutionary biology and physiology gave rise to evolutionary physiology. This caused comparative physiologists to improve their research methods by incorporating evolutionary thinking. Simultaneously, evolutionary biologists began focusing more on physiological mechanisms that may help to explain constraints on and trade‐offs during microevolutionary processes, as well as macroevolutionary patterns in physiological diversity. Here we argue that evolutionary physiology has yet to reach its full potential, and propose new avenues that may lead to unexpected advances. Viewing physiological (...) adaptations in wild animals as potential solutions to human diseases offers enormous possibilities for biomedicine. New evidence of epigenetic modifications as mechanisms of phenotypic plasticity that regulate physiological traits may also arise in coming years, which may also represent an overlooked enhancer of adaptation via natural selection to explain physiological evolution. Synergistic interactions at these intersections and other areas will lead to a novel understanding of organismal biology. (shrink)

This new volume on logic follows a recognizable format that deals in turn with the topics of mathematical logic, moving from concepts, via definitions and inferences, to theories and axioms. However, this fresh work offers a key innovation in its ‘pyramidal’ graph system for the logical formalization of all these items. The author has developed this new methodology on the basis of original research, traditional logical instruments such as Porphyrian trees, and modern concepts of classification, in which pyramids are the (...) central organizing concept. The pyramidal schema enables both the content of concepts and the relations between the concept positions in the pyramid to be read off from the graph. Logical connectors are analyzed in terms of the direction in which they connect within the pyramid. Additionally, the author shows that logical connectors are of fundamentally different types: only one sort generates propositions with truth values, while the other yields conceptual expressions or complex concepts. On this basis, strong arguments are developed against adopting the non-discriminating connector definitions implicit in Wittgensteinian truth-value tables. Special consideration is given to mathematical connectors so as to illuminate the formation of concepts in the natural sciences. To show what the pyramidal method can contribute to science, a pyramid of the number concepts prevalent in mathematics is constructed. The book also counters the logical dogma of ‘false’ contradictory propositions and sheds new light on the logical characteristics of probable propositions, as well as on syllogistic and other inferences. (shrink)

_The Futures of School Reform_ represents the culminating work of a three-year discussion among national education leaders convened by the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Based on the recognition that current education reform efforts have reached their limits, the volume maps out a variety of bold visions that push the boundaries of our current thinking. Taken together, these visions identify the leverage points for generating dramatic change and highlight critical trade-offs among different courses of action. The goal of this book (...) is not to present a menu of options. Rather, it is to surface contrasting assumptions, tensions, constraints, and opportunities, so that together we can better understand—and act on—the choices that lie before us. (shrink)

The cytokine interferon‐γ (IFN‐γ), initiates both cell cycle arrest and cell death in certain cell lines. Through a novel strategy of cell transfection with episomal vectors expressing antisense cDNAs, Deiss et al.(1.2) have demonstrated that it is possible to isolate genes that are required for the initiation of cell death by the cytokine IFN‐γ. This approach, referred to as TKO, for Technical Knock Out, has identified several genes whose activity appears to be essential for the induction of apoptosis by IFN‐γ (...) in HeLa cells. Interestingly, these genes appear to mediate IFN‐γ‐induced apoptosis in HeLa cells, but their inhibition by antisense does not ameliorate the anti‐proliferative effects of IFN‐γ in these cells. The clever strategy employed by these authors holds promise for others who wish to isolate genes required for other differentiative processes in cultured cell lines. (shrink)

In the target article Pylyshyn revives the spectre of the “little green man,” arguing for a largely symbolic representation of visual imagery. To clarify this problem, we provide precise definitions of the key term “picture,” present some examples of our definition, and outline an information-theoretic analysis suggesting that the problem of addressing data in the brain requires a partially analogue and partially symbolic solution. This is made concrete in the ventral stream of object recognition, from V1 to IT cortex.

IN AT LEAST SIX PLACES AQUINAS WRITES: “Concord is a union of wills, not of opinions.” This dictum is problematic because one would think that without some union of opinions, union of wills can not obtain. This article seeks to clarify the meaning of this dictum and to show that it does not imply that shared opinions are unnecessary for concord.