RESUMEN Largamente desatendida o malinterpretada, la noción de caos en la filosofía de Nietzsche es una pieza constitutiva de la particular concepción del ser que este autor habría dejado apenas esbozada. El artículo se propone elaborar este concepto en la obra nietzscheana, siguiendo algunas de las metáforas que lo iluminan. Desde allí se busca plantear los rasgos centrales de una ontologia del caos, de sesgo no metafísico, que, al afirmar el carácter acontecimental de la realidad, puede verse como precursora de (...) la ontología hermenéutica contemporánea. ABSTRACT The notion of chaos, which has long been neglected or misinterpreted, is a constitutive element of a peculiar conception of being that the philosopher only had time to outline. The objective of this article is to elaborate on this concept in Nietzschean philosophy, guided by some of the metaphors that shed light on it. This serves as the basis to set forth the main characteristics of a non-metaphysical ontology of chaos that asserts the eventful nature of reality and can thus be seen as a precursor of contemporary hermeneutic ontology. (shrink)

RESUMEN En este documento se presenta la traducción al español de la obra de teatro A lover of animals, escrita hace 120 años por Henry Stephens Salt, intelectual inglés activista por el trato justo hacia los humanos y los animales. Se introducen elementos que permiten al lector acercarse a la discusión planteada en la obra y se enfatiza en el personaje Claud Kersterman, médico y vivisector que expone una serie de ideas sobre la medicina, la ciencia y el valor de (...) los animales que se pueden apreciar en la actualidad. Finalmente, se resalta el valor que la literatura teatral puede tener para analizar discusiones como las que suscita el trato hacia los animales en contextos generales o particulares como el de la vivisección. ABSTRACT This document presents the Spanish translation of the play A lover of animals, written 120 years ago by Henry Stephens Salt, an English intellectual activist in favor of humans and animals being treated fairly. Elements are introduced which allow the reader to understand the discussion which is set out in the play. Emphasis is placed on the character of Claud Kersterman, a doctor and vivisector who states a series of ideas on medicine, science and the importance of animals, which can be appreciated nowadays. Finally, it is highlighted the significance that theatre literature can have to analyze discussions such as the ones given rise to by the way animals are treated in general or specific contexts such as vivisection. (shrink)

How can an agent's desire or will give him reasons for acting? Not long ago, this might have seemed a silly question, since it was widely believed that all reasons for acting are based in the agent's desires. The interesting question, it seemed, was not how what an agent wants could give him reasons, but how anything else could. In recent years, however, this earlier orthodoxy has increasingly appeared wrongheaded as a growing number of philosophers have come to stress the (...) action-guiding role of reasons in deliberation from the agent's point of view. What a deliberating agent has in view is rarely his own will or desires as such, even if taking something as a reason is intimately tied to desire. Someone who wants to escape a burning building does not evaluate her options by considering which is likeliest to realize what she wants or wills. She is focused, rather, on her desire's object: getting out alive. The fact that a successful route would realize something she wants is apt to strike her as beside the point or, at best, as a trivial bonus. (shrink)

The debate over recombinant DNA research is a unique event, perhaps a turning point, in the history of science. For the first time in modern history there has been widespread public discussion about whether and how a promising though potentially dangerous line of research shall be pursued. At root the debate is a moral debate and, like most such debates, requires proper assessment of the facts at crucial stages in the argument. A good deal of the controversy over recombinant DNA (...) research arises because some of the facts simply are not yet known. There are many empirical questions we would like to have answered before coming to a decision-questions about the reliability of proposed containment facilities, about the viability of enfeebled strains of E. coli, about the ways in which pathogenic organisms do their unwelcome work, and much more. But all decisions cannot wait until the facts are available; some must be made now. It is to be expected that people with different hunches about what the facts will turn out to be will urge different decisions on how recombinant DNA research should be regulated. However, differing expectations about the facts have not been the only fuel for controversy. A significant part of the current debate can be traced to differences over moral principles. Also, unfortunately, there has been much unnecessary debate generated by careless moral reasoning and a failure to attend to the logical structure of some of the moral arguments that have been advanced. (shrink)

This article proposes 3 principles and 3 imperatives as the philosophical foundations of a global journalism ethics. The central claim is that the globalization of news media requires a radical rethinking of the principles and standards of journalism ethics, through the adoption of a cosmopolitan attitude. The article explains how and why ethicists should construct a global journalism ethics, using a contractualist approach. It then formulates 3 "claims" or principles: the claims of credibility, justifiable consequence, and humanity. The claim of (...) humanity is developed further by the formulation of 3 imperatives: to act as a global agent, to serve world citizens, and to enhance nonparochial understandings. The article concludes by considering some implications of a cosmopolitan attitude for the practice of journalism. (shrink)

This chapter provide an introductory portrait of global media ethics as an evolving discipline in broad strokes—its motivating questions, its distinct concerns and methods, how the discipline is related to other forms of ethics, and why we need a global media ethics. Since our global world is linked by many forms of media, the chapter argues that we need an accompanying global media ethics that challenges the use of media to promote racism, xenophobia, extreme nationalism, and the denial of human (...) rights. The chapter explores the types of research and writing that comprise global media ethics and concludes with an outline of how a global media ethics can be realized in practice. (shrink)

With great energy and clarity, Sir James Fitzjames Stephen (1829-1894), author of History of the Criminal Law of England, and judge of the High Court from 1879-91, challenges John Stuart Mill's On Liberty and On Utilitarianism, arguing that ...

A virtual community is generally described as a group of people with shared interests, ideas, and goals in a particular digital group or virtual platform. Virtual communities have become ubiquitous in recent times, and almost everyone belongs to one or multiple virtual communities. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, with its associated national lockdowns, has made virtual communities more essential and a necessary part of our daily lives, whether for work and business, educational purposes or keeping in touch with friends (...) and family. Given these facts, how do we ensure that virtual communities become a true community qua community? We address this question by proposing and arguing for a ‘virtual communitarianism’—an online community that integrates essential features of traditional African communitarianism in its outlook and practice. The paper’s position is that virtual communitarianism can make for a strong ethical virtual community where members can demonstrate a strong sense of group solidarity, care and compassion towards each other. The inclusion of these virtues can bring members who often are farapart and help create a stronger community bond. This will ensure that the evolution of virtual communities does not happen without the integration of progressive African communitarian values. (shrink)

This article critiques the idea that, by establishing a general framework within which research must be conducted, philosophical argument can ‘take the lead’ in relation to research. It develops Holmwood’s work in this area by examining the ontological arguments put forward by critical realists, which attempt to establish the fundamental characteristics of the social realm prior to the production of empirically successful research in that realm. The article draws on a contrast with ontological argument in the natural sciences to demonstrate (...) the illegitimacy of this manoeuvre, showing that ontological claims can be given some justification, but only when they are derived from research that is widely held to be empirically successful. Realist ontological claims in the social sciences do not have this basis, and it is argued that Bhaskar’s alternative mode of justification for these claims is unconvincing. Archer’s view is also criticized that critical realist arguments should be given a strong regulatory role in relation to research, illustrating the problems with this by critiquing Cruickshank’s ontologically driven analysis of unemployment and the underclass. The article concludes that social scientific research should be conducted without philosophical legislation. (shrink)

Hastings Center Report, Volume 52, Issue S1, Page S83-S88, March‐April 2022.

It is hard to argue with the proposition that value for money should guide health spending. However, even after decades of development, economic evaluation is still a work in progress. As applied, it deals poorly with issues of social justice, ageing and end of life issues; cases involving small numbers—such as decisions about orphan drugs—are also contested. Unfortunately, differences in incremental cost-effectiveness ratios are presented with a degree of precision which contributes to an ‘illusion of validity’.1 Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen (...) has suggested that ‘when all the requirements of ubiquitous market-centred evaluation have been incorporated into the procedures of cost–benefit analysis, it is not so much a discipline as a daydream’.2 As with any approach to public decision making, the use of economic evaluation rests on an implicit social licence, including that the decision making is fair and reasonable. Many countries have developed special policies for rare, ‘ultrarare’ or ‘orphan’ diseases to moderate the effect of a ubiquitous application of economic evaluation. The threshold for defining ‘small’ or rare is a matter of judgement and ranges between 2 and 80 per 100 000 population.3 Magalhaes challenges the ethical basis of special programmes for low incidence conditions and argues against such provisions. In this commentary, I will argue the contrary: that there are good reasons …. (shrink)

Disrupting Journalism Ethics sets out to disrupt and change how we think about journalism and its ethics. The book contends that long-established ways of thinking, which have come down to us from the history of journalism, need radical conceptual reform, with alternate conceptions of the role of journalism and fresh principles to evaluate practice. Through a series of disruptions, the book undermines the traditional principles of journalistic neutrality and "just the facts" reporting. It proposes an alternate philosophy of journalism as (...) engagement for democracy. The aim is a journalism ethic better suited to an age of digital and global media. As a philosophical pragmatist, Stephen J. A. Ward critiques traditional conceptions of accuracy, neutrality, detachment and patriotism, evaluating their capacity to respond to ethical dilemmas for journalists in the 21st century. The book proposes a holistic mindset for doing journalism ethics, a theory of journalism as advocacy for egalitarian democracy, and a global redefinition of basic journalistic norms. The book concludes by outlining the shape of a future journalism ethics, employing these alternative notions. Disrupting Journalism Ethics is an important intervention into the role of journalism today. It asks: what new role journalists should play in today's digital media world? And what new mind-set, new aims, and new standards ought jounalists to embrace? The book aims to persuade--and provoke--ethicists, journalists, students, and members of the public to disrupt and invent. (shrink)

Critics of survival research often claim that the survival hypothesis is conceptually problematic at best, and literally incoherent at worst. The guiding intuition behind their skepticism is that there’s an essential link between the concept of a person (or personality or experience) and physical embodiment. Thus (they argue), since by hypothesis postmortem individuals such as ostensible mediumistic communicators have no physical body, there’s something wrong with the very idea of a postmortem person, personality or experience. However, critics can’t simply beg (...) the question and assert that physical embodiment is essential to personhood, personality, or experience, because the evidence suggesting survival is a prima facie challenge to the contrary. On the other hand, defenders of ostensible mediumistic communication need to explain how postmortem awareness and knowledge of the current physical world can occur without a physical body that experiences the world and represents it accurately enough to ground veridical postmortem reports. This paper will fi rst consider why survivalists face potentially serious problems in trying to make sense of apparent postmortem perception. Then it will consider a plausible—and arguably the only—way to deal with the issues. However, that solution turns out to be a double-edged sword. Ironically, the best way to deal with the problem of perspectival postmortem awareness may render the survival hypothesis gratuitous. (shrink)

How do people’s social roles change others’ perceptions of their intentions to cause harm? Three preregistered vignette-based experiments (N = 788) manipulated the social role of someone causing harm and measured how intentional people thought the harm was. Results indicate that people judge harmful consequences as intentional when they think the actor unjustifiably caused harm. Social roles were shown to alter intention judgments by making people responsible for preventing harm (thereby endering the harm as an intentional neglect of one’s responsibilities) (...) or for causing the harm (thereby excusing it as an unintentional byproduct of the role). Additionally, Experiment 3 conceptually replicated and moderated the side-effect effect—revealing that people think harmful side effects are intentional when the harm is unjustified but not when a role’s responsibility justifies it. We discuss the importance of social information—including roles—in how people judge others’ intentions. (shrink)

William James argued for a philosophy of democracy and pluralism that advocates individual and collective responsibility for our social arrangements, our morality, and our religion. In James' view, democracy resides first and foremost not in governmental institutions or in procedures such as voting, but rather in the characteristics of individuals, and in qualities of mind and conduct. It is a philosophy for social change, counselling action and hope despite the manifold challenges facing democratic politics, and these issues still resonate strongly (...) today. In this book, Stephen Bush explores how these themes connect to James' philosophy of religion, his moral thought, his epistemology, his psychology, and his metaphysics. His fresh and original study highlights the relevance of James' thought to modern debates, and will appeal to scholars and students of moral and political philosophy. (shrink)

Drawing on Protestant scholasticism, Puritan "precisionism," and virtue ethics, "Virtue Reformed" offers a comprehensive rereading of the ethical position of ...

A description and analysis of attitudes to non-human animals in classical and late antique Mediterranean thought.