As the purpose of this book is to open dialogue, we draw no conclusions. Instead, reflecting on the theoretical and practical implications that arise from each chapter, we offer some reflection through an exploration of the ways in which Australia has broadened discussions on P4C. In addition, we situate our discussion in contemporary global issues relevant to education and schooling: gender stereotyping, bias and language; Aboriginal philosophy; environmental education; and sexuality, adolescence and discrimination. As a community of children, adolescents and (...) adults, philosophers and educators, as well as citizens, we have an opportunity to contribute educationally to an inquiring society. (shrink)

IntroductionElements mark the reality of reading the female body in symbolic constructions and social symbols in the exercise of their reproductive health. The study aims to identify elements that characterize the female condition while analyzing the reproductive health of Brazilian and French women.Materials and MethodsA qualitative, multicenter, international study was conducted in Brazil and in France between 2016 and 2019. Data were produced through the use of semi-structured scripts. Focus group discussions and individual interviews were conducted with women who gave (...) birth, hetero-female couples who lived the experience of gestation and birth of a baby, and professionals of maternal and childcare services or members of the associations concerned with the health of mothers and babies. It was guided by the theoretical-methodological framework of institutional analysis in line with the French Institutional Socioclinics.ResultsSexual and reproductive health in the realities researched in Brazil and France are sometimes close and sometimes far apart. In what involves the Brazilian health system, abortion is criminalized and often performed illegally. Furthermore, pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period are highly medicalized. In addition, childbirth is not assured as an experience for a woman and her family. This aspect is confirmed by high numbers of cesarean sections performed or by maternal and infant mortality indicators. The French health system prioritizes vaginal deliveries and seems to assure more autonomy to women, but at the same time, it is worn out by the logic of profit, the efficiency of actions, and the rationalization of practices. In association with these, there are other intrinsic elements in the functioning of the institution that delineates the format of each country: notion of women's rights, violence against women, and discussion regarding the oppression markers of race, gender, sexuality, and social class.ConclusionsBoth countries reveal aspects related to the social role of women's bodies. The established logic reflects in the decision to have children, motherhood, women's autonomy over their own bodies, and in the core values linked to the termination of pregnancy and the professional practices developed in prenatal care, childbirth, and postpartum. (shrink)

The type identity theory, according to which types of mental state are identical to types of physical state, fell out of favour for some years but is now being considered with renewed interest. Many philosophers are critically re-examining the arguments which were marshalled against it, finding in the type identity theory both resources to strengthen a comprehensive, physicalistic metaphysics and a useful tool in understanding the relationship between developments in psychology and new results in neuroscience. This volume brings together leading (...) philosophers of mind, whose essays challenge in new ways the standard objections to type identity theory, such as the multiple realizability objection and the modal argument. Other essays show how cognitive science and neuroscience are lending new support to type identity theory and still others provide, extend and improve traditional arguments concerning the theory's explanatory power. (shrink)

Constitutional reform has been an important means to push populist authoritarian agendas in Hungary, Poland, Turkey and Venezuela. The embrace of constitutional means and rhetoric in pursuit of these agendas has led to the growing recognition of ‘populist constitutionalism’ as a contemporary political phenomenon. In all four examples mentioned above, democracy, popular sovereignty and direct plebiscitary appeal to the people is the rhetorical and justificatory framework for constitutional reform. This, I worry, gives democracy a bad name and reinforces the widespread (...) suspicion that citizens should not be directly involved in constitutional reform as popular participation can lead to dangerous majoritarianism and is easily manipulated by elite actors seeking to weaken constitutional checks and balances. But the problem, I argue, is not inherent in citizen’s participation in constitutional reform. In contrast to populist constitutionalism, I develop an idea of deliberative constitutionalism in which citizens can participate in constitution-making and reform without hijacking constitutionalism for majoritarian, nationalist or anti-pluralist ends. Deliberative constitutionalism as I understand it has four features: a Habermasian co-originality thesis that articulates the interdependence of democracy and liberalism mediated by a conception of discourse; a proceduralized idea of popular sovereignty that reduces the tension between appeal to the people and respect for pluralism; the centrality of the public sphere over the voting booth as the cradle of democracy; institutional innovations intended to include citizens in constitutional reform (including through referendums) but avoid majoritarian and populist pathologies. (shrink)

The pathologies of the democratic public sphere, first articulated by Plato in his attack on rhetoric, have pushed much of deliberative theory out of the mass public and into the study and design of small scale deliberative venues. The move away from the mass public can be seen in a growing split in deliberative theory between theories of democratic deliberation (on the ascendancy) which focus on discrete deliberative initiatives within democracies and theories of deliberative democracy (on the decline) that attempt (...) to tackle the large questions of how the public, or civil society in general, relates to the state. Using rhetoric as the lens through which to view mass democracy, this essay argues that the key to understanding the deliberative potential of the mass public is in the distinction between deliberative and plebiscitary rhetoric. (shrink)

Volume 24, Issue 3, June 2019, Page 3-18.

Jean-Paul Grandjean – devenu de Fouchy en 1743, lorsqu’il est nommé secrétaire perpétuel de l’Académie des sciences – s’est formé à l’astronomie auprès de J.-N. Delisle, avant le départ de ce dernier pour la Russie. Fouchy installe bientôt chez lui un observatoire qu’il équipe d’instruments du constructeur Claude Langlois, et où il mène différentes observations. Le domaine d’intérêt principal de Fouchy concerne les «machines»; il s’agit entre autres d’appareils venant équiper les quarts-de-cercle pour en faciliter l’emploi. Comme secrétaire perpétuel, il (...) demeure en fonction jusqu’en 1776 et, à ce titre, il prononce de nombreux éloges dont une dizaine sont relatifs à des astronomes. (shrink)

The problem of free will lies at the heart of modern scientific studies of consciousness. Some authors propose that actions are unconsciously initiated and awareness of intention is referred retrospectively to the action after it has been performed [e.g. Aarts, H., Custers, R., & Wegner, D. M. . On the inference of personal authorship: Enhancing experienced agency by priming effect information. Consciousness & Cognition, 14, 439–458]. This contrasts with the common impression that our intentions cause those actions. By combining a (...) stop signal paradigm and an intentional action paradigm we show that participants sometimes indicate to have intentionally initiated an action while reaction time data strongly suggest that they in fact failed to stop the action. In a second experiment we demonstrate that the number of trials in which participants misattributed their awareness of intention varied with the intentional involvement during action planning. Our data support the retrospective account of intentional action. Furthermore, we introduce an experimental approach that objectifies introspective judgments of awareness of intention. (shrink)

Since Hintikka’s epistemic logic, the logic of knowledge, has been a subject of research in philosophy, computer science, artificial intelligence and game theory. This paper presents a framework of dynamic epistemic logic capable of investigating interactive voting decisions in liquid democracy.

_Gravity and Grace_ shows Weil's religious thoughts and ideas, drawn from many sources - Christian, Jewish, Indian, Greek and Hindu - and focusing on suffering and redemption. It brings the reader face to face with the profoundest levels of existence as Weil explores the relationship of the human condition to the realm of the transcendent.

In this article, I deal with the role of hypothesis in the scientific methodology of Isaac Newton, Francis Bacon and René Descartes. The first paragraph is about hypothesis in Newton's lexicon, especially trying to understand the meaning of his famous hypotheses non fingo. The second paragraph deals with Bacon's methodology, arguing especially that his epis-temology was the first to propose an artificial way for inductive inferences, also giving up all hypothesis in science. The third paragraph shows how Descartes, following Bacon's (...) traces and reading his methodology in the light of the idea of a Mathesis Universalis based on mental evidence, structures a full hypothetical-deductive methodology, charging metaphysics with the analytical phase and depriving experiments of any role in it. The fourth paragraph, on Newton again, tries to understand Newton's specific account of hypothesis as an auxiliary phase in the scientific discovery, and what really differentiates Newton from his contemporaries, Boyle and Hooke. (shrink)

A widespread historiographical portrayal represented Descartes' dualism as constituted in direct contrast with Aquinas' concept of soul-form. In the wake of the many studies that have opposed this prejudice in recent decades, this book reconstructs the fifteenth and seventeenth-century debate on psychology, focusing primarily on the Jesuit context and on the intersection between Aristotelianism, Platonism, and Augustinianism in early modern France. Beginning with a rigorous investigation of the theories of the separated soul, particular attention is then given to the indirect (...) derivation of the Cartesian cogito and innatism from angelological themes of the time. Indeed, in the years in which Descartes elaborates his metaphysics, the immediate proximity between souls and angels is somehow a matter of fact, in the light of which many of the argumentative choices of the Meditations, and even the relationship that closely joins the "thinking substance" with the body-machine, appear clear. -/- . (shrink)

This is the first collection of essays bringing together Deleuzian Philosophy and postcolonial theory. Bignall and Patton assemble some of the world's leading figures in these fields to explore rich linkages between two previously unrelated areas of study.

In this article we discuss what are the implications for improving the design of corporate ethics programs, if we focus on the moral motivation accounts offered by main ethical theories. Virtue ethics, deontological ethics and utilitarianism offer different criteria of judgment to face moral dilemmas: Aristotle's virtues of character, Kant's categorical imperative, and Mill's greatest happiness principle are, respectively, their criteria to answer the question "What is the right thing to do?" We look at ethical theories from a different perspective: (...) the question we ask is "Why should I do the right thing?" In other words, we deal with the problem of moral motivation, and we examine the different rationale the main ethical theories provide. We then point out the relation between moral motivation and the concept of rationality in the different approaches - is acting morally seen as an expression of rational behavior? Our analysis of moral motivation provides a useful framework to improve the understanding of the relationships between formal and informal elements of corporate ethics programs, emphasizing the importance of the latter, often overlooked in compliance-focused programs. We conclude by suggesting that the concept of moral imagination can provide a unifying approach to enhance the effectiveness of corporate ethics programs, by providing an intangible asset that supports the implementation of their formal components into management decision making. (shrink)

The term “lean in” was popularized by Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO, via her #1 Best Seller encouraging women to defy their fears and dare to be leaders in their fields. She received criticism because although admitting to external barriers contributing to the gender gap in leadership, the scope of her book focused on the internal shortcomings of women. She asserted that women are hindered by barriers that exist within themselves, and provided practical tips, backed by research, to equip women with (...) strategies to proactively progress in the workplace instead of shying away. Sandberg is not the first to raise concern about gender inequality. Other women in history like Susan B. Anthony and Maggie Lena Walker also challenged lopsided gender roles through their words and actions. Using the critical biography methodology, this paper explores these women’s experiences, philosophies and contributions, reflects on Sandberg’s insight, and develops a framework, based on the theory of planned behavior as well as the ethical principles of utilitarianism and corporate social responsibility, that links internal factors, organizational external factors, and societal external factors to intentions to lean in and leaning in behavior. Thus, via critical biography, this paper examines both internal and external factors, showing how they are linked, and how they may impact leaning in intentions and behavior. The paper also discusses how leaning in may influence both individual and gender mobility for women, and ultimately, increased gender equality. (shrink)

The article introduces Marin Cureau de La Chambre’s theory of light, focusing especially on the treatise Le Lumière (1657). Specifically, the anti-Cartesian and anti-mechanistic side of Cureau’s work is stressed, reconstructing its account of the “essential” nature of light, linking it to the Franciscan and the Platonic tradition and focusing on the peculiar use of the notion of “extensio formalis.” Additionally, Cureau’s theory of color and his theories on irradiance and light’s movement is presented. Finally, the article illustrates Cureau’s qualitative (...) explanation of refraction and reflection, reconstructing his role in the genesis of Fermat’s ‘principle of least time.’ . (shrink)

Hailed by Albert Camus as ‘the only great spirit of our times’, Simone Weil was one of great essayists and activists of the twentieth century. Her writings on the nature of religious faith and spirituality have inspired many subsequent thinkers. Wrestling with the moral dilemmas entailed by commitment to the Catholic Church, Letter to a Priest is a brilliant meditation on the perennial battle between faith and doubt and resonates today as much as when it was first written. This (...) edition also includes one of her most inspiring and celebrated essays, ‘Human Personality’, where Weil offers a moving and unorthodox account of the preciousness of human beings. With a new foreword by Raimond Gaita. (shrink)

ABSTRACTSkepticism about citizen competence is a core component of Christopher H. Achen and Larry M. Bartels’s call, in Democracy for Realists, for rethinking our model of democracy. In this paper I suggest that the evidence for citizen incompetence is not as clear as we might think; important research shows that we are good group problem solvers even if we are poor solitary truth seekers. I argue that deliberative democracy theory has a better handle on this fundamental fact of human cognition (...) and therefore has a more realistic view of the conditions that might improve citizen competence. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that the asymmetrical mediated communication of the broad democratic public sphere can profitably be understood through the lens of deliberative democracy only if we adopt a system approach to deliberation. A system approach, however, often introduces a division of labor between ordinary citizens and experts. Although this division of labor is unavoidable and I believe compatible with a deliberative principle of legitimacy, it flirts with elitist theories of democracy: epistemic elites come up with the agendas, (...) ideas, and policy positions and democratic publics ratify or repudiate the agendas but do not generate or really engage with them. This I argue would violate an essential defining feature of deliberative democracy, namely that epistemic quality and equal participation are tightly linked. I turn to Habermas and his idea of a feedback loop as a possible solution to this dilemma. (shrink)

This paper explores the current practice dilemmas and common ideologies that characterize inter-country adoption in Ireland and explores these issues through a child rights lens. The social and historical development and construction of adoption are examined in order to outline the broad parameters within which inter-country adoption occurs in Ireland. The role of social workers in this complex and specialized area of work is examined and some of the questions posed by adoption professionals are highlighted. A real consideration for the (...) best interests of children is put into perspective and the role of the social worker as a child rights advocate is given recognition. (shrink)

The scope of a heuristic decision making rule is a product of its fit to the context, the extension to which a heuristic can be applied successfully. To achieve effective outcomes, decision makers may use a few heuristics with large scopes or many with narrow scopes. Through a directed review of the literature combined with ethnographic research, this paper contributes to the debate on the problem of scope in three types of heuristics, namely, multipliers, thresholds, and calends. The scope of (...) heuristic rules can be explored from different aspects, including the field in which a heuristic rule is applied and specific parameters that are used in a heuristic decision making process. The three types of heuristic rules we analyze were encountered in our ethnographic research, that was based on phenomenological interviews and observations. For these heuristics we discuss their scopes in through to the following organizing structures: the exploration of the adaptive tool-box, the role of ethnographic methodologies, and the categorization of heuristics. (shrink)

The so-called Paradox of Serious Possibility is usually regarded as showing that the standard axioms of belief revision do not apply to belief sets that are introspectively closed. In this article we argue to the contrary: we suggest a way of dissolving the Paradox of Serious Possibility so that introspective statements are taken to express propositions in the standard sense, which may thus be proper members of belief sets, and accordingly the normal axioms of belief revision apply to them. Instead (...) the paradox is avoided by making explicit, for any occurrence of an introspective modality in the object language, the belief state to which this occurrence refers; this will make it impossible for any doxastic modality to refer to two distinct belief sets within one and the same context of doxastic appraisal. By this move the standard derivation of a contradiction from the theory of belief revision in the presence of introspectively closed belief sets does not go through any more, and indeed the premisses of the Paradox of Serious Possibility become jointly consistent once they are reformulated with our amended introspective modalities only. Additionally, we present a probabilistic version of the Paradox of Serious Possibility which can be avoided in a perfectly analogous manner. (shrink)

ABSTRACTAs a postscript to this special issue, the author reflects on the difference between religion and ritual by drawing a comparison with culture and nature. In the same way that culture and nature are entangled yet distinct, so too religion and ritual are best understood as a paradoxical configuration of spiritual deliberation and unconscious desire. It is argued that religion and ritual exceed and depend on each other in equal measure as the organism explores new modes of living.

It may be surprising that the paradox of tragedy is worthy of further attention.1 After all, there are good reasons to assume that at least several of its presuppositions are problematic. Furthermore, it has been questioned whether the paradox forms a problem of its own or if it should be discussed as an issue within the field of pleasurable negative emotions.2 Reasonable objections seem no less important, which regard it as far from self-evident that rational agents merely seek pleasure or (...) flee pain or that emotions have a specific hedonic quality at all.3 If apparently negative emotions, however, do not have to be painful in the first place, it becomes less of a problem why they should ever be.. (shrink)

Since the early 1970s, Marcel Mauss’s Essai sur le Don, translated into English as The Gift in 1954, has been a standard reference in the social science and bioethical literature on the use of human body parts and substances for medical and research purposes. At that time, three social scientists—political scientist Richard Titmuss in the United Kingdom and sociologist Renée C. Fox working with historian Judith Swazey in the United States—had the idea of using this concept to highlight the fundamental (...) structure of the biomedical practices they were studying, respectively, blood donation, and hemodialysis and organ transplantation. The fact that these first applications of Mauss’s essay should emerge in English- rather than in French-speaking countries raises the question of what the translation of the essay, and notably of the word don as gift, may have to do with this fact. Reading Mauss in translation undoubtedly inspired a seminal approach to interpreting medical and research practices based on bodily giving. This article posits that something may have also been lost: a much broader concept of giving with unquestionable links to the Durkheimian concept of solidarity, which Mauss conceptualizes not only as an obligation but also as a liberty to give. (shrink)

While discourse and deliberation cannot replace voting, bargaining, or compromise, Chambers argues, it is important to maintain a background moral conversation in which to anchor other activities.

_Oppression and Liberty_ is one of Simone Weil's most important books on political theory.Here she discusses political and social oppression, its permanent causes, the way it works and its contemporary forms. Simone Weil's writings on oppression and liberty continue to be as valid and thought-provoking today as they were in her lifetime.

In this essay, I address Descartes’ medical thought, starting from the years of Le Monde and focus- ing especially on the “ontological” explanation of the dropsy in the Sixth Meditation. I especially consider Descartes’ attempt to ‘reform’ physiology according to the universal methodology of geometrical reasoning, as well as with the importance given by Descartes’ epistemology to the re- lationship between medicine and the mind-body union. The possibility of a coherent explanation of all the embodied phenomena, including illness and passions (...) is, in fact, a strategic opportunity to show the existence of an inner regularity in God’s Creation and so, to reconnect any ‘practical’ order (including medicine) to His essence. This leads Descartes to implicitly face the problem of the monstrous births, retracing what he could find in Toledo’s and Conimbricenses’ Commentaria. (shrink)