In a paper on “Beauty and Greatness in Art” discussed at a recent meeting of the Aristotelian Society, Professor Alexander says: “In Art there are two standards; there is the strictly æsthetic standard, Is the work beautiful or not; has it attained beauty? and there is the question, Is it great or small?… This contrast of beauty and greatness is the old contrast of form and subject-matter.” Here is offered a problem of capital importance and of age-long interest, but alongside (...) of it there is a subsidiary and a much slighter question which has been comparatively little noticed and which may yet have bearing on the larger issue. This question is the relation of actual size, of size-in-itself, to the other factors in a work of art, and the reaction, if such there be, of such a size-factor upon the aesthetic whole. (shrink)

In her reply to Baylis the author takes the opportunity to “clarify, and in some cases to correct, some facts”I am pleased to see Dr Baylis’s article relating to the Olivieri case at the Hospital for Sick Children and the University of Toronto. I thank her for the many facets of that case that she has articulated. Nonetheless, as the bioethicist most closely connected with the case at the clinical level I would like to take this opportunity to clarify, and (...) in some cases to correct, some facts.Dr Baylis entitles her section on the role of bioethics as “Stories of silence”. I differ from this view. Perhaps the stories are less stories of silence than stories to which others have not listened.I wish to make it quite clear that I have always supported Dr Olivieri and her colleagues in their actions with respect to the research that is at the centre of this case. I have been public in my support and I continue to be so.My departure from the Hospital for Sick Children was in no way caused by the Olivieri case. I was offered a challenging position at another Ontario …. (shrink)

The experience of each one of us is individual, private and particular, and in its immediacy is incommunicable. Images of all sorts, sense factors, figments of the imagination, mental comments and judgments, all these impressions, some persistent, some fleeting, follow one another in endless passage through the consciousness.

There is an increased focus on fostering integrity in research by through creating an open culture where research integrity dilemmas can be discussed. We describe a pilot intervention study that used Moral Case Deliberation (MCD), a method that originated in clinical ethics support, to discuss research integrity dilemmas with researchers. Our research question was: can moral case deliberation in research groups help to navigate research integrity dilemmas? We performed 10 MCDs with 19 researchers who worked in three different research groups (...) from three different disciplinary fields at a university in the Netherlands. We analyzed the dilemmas and values discussed, sent out a survey questionnaire to assess self-perceived moral competencies, and conducted in-depth interviews. We found research integrity dilemmas pertained to authorship disputes, supervision of junior co-workers, and questionable handling of data. Participants perceived the majority of moral competencies to a higher degree during the MCD when compared to perceiving them in daily practice afterward. Interviewees told us that they felt most comfortable discussing dilemmas among peers with whom they were not closely affiliated. We conclude that MCD sessions could be relevant in navigating research integrity dilemmas, but that revisions to ensure commitment and safety are required. (shrink)

Extending lifelines still further, beyond determinism leads to doubt about females' ability to select mates with “good genes,” and to a scenario for troop selection and to a link with questions of scale in ecology.

That Piagetian epistemology has the dynamics of knowledge growth as its core consideration predetermines a need to consider it as potentially applicable to teaching. This paper addresses that need by first outlining the Piagetian theory of equilibration and then applying it to the construction of methods of teaching science.

Our memories are private and particular; when you and I share an experience our experience is yet in the very moment of sharing different for you and for me, and our two memories of an event in the past are still more disparate. For memories are shaped and constrained by the deep-lying organic stress of what we have lived through, of our actual living, in the interval between then and now. A memory follows the solitary track of our individual experience, (...) and, like the particle in modern Physical theory, is changed in and by the route it has traced. (shrink)

Time in romantic philosophies of music.- Romanticism, as an intellectual movement, presupposes a new vision, one which we are still living off. This paper makes a critique of time in the music of the period, and in musical thought of the period (taking for granted that the music and the thought are eseentially related). In this context, the question is raised, what conception of time is to be found in the philosophers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries? This leads on (...) to a study of time in music and in musical theory, especially in those of the nineteenth centuries. (shrink)

Consensus is the holy grail of bioethics, the lynch pin of the assumption that well informed, well intentioned people may reach generally acceptable positions on ethically contentious issues. It has been especially important in bioethics, where advancing technology has assured an increasing field of complex medical dilemmas. This paper results on the use of a multicriterion decision making system (MCDM) analyzing group process in an attempt to better define hospital policy. In a pilot program at The Hospital for Sick Children, (...) Toronto, a series of small scale focus groups was constituted to examine criteria defining organ transplant eligibility. Criteria were organized hierarchically using the Analytic Hierarchy Process, an MCDM approach, and the resulting data was analyzed using Expert Choice 9.0, software designed to facilitate AHP analysis. Qualitative and quantitative analysis map barriers to practical consensus in a way not previously possible. (shrink)

The formulation of quantum mechanics as a diffusion process by Nelson provides for an interesting approach on how we may transit from classical mechanics into quantum mechanics. Besides the presence of the real potential function, another type of potential function forms an intrinsic part of this theory. In this paper we attempt to show how both types of potential functions can have a use in a resolutely macroscopic context like financial asset pricing. We are particularly interested in uncovering how the (...) ‘quantum potential’ can add to the economics-based relevant information which is already supplied by the real potential function. (shrink)

Examines the nature of music and traces the history of music philosophy from ancient Greece to the twentieth century.

'Thinking Through Dance' explores important philosophical questions raised in and by dance. Its themes include the embodiment and personhood of dancers; issues of dance work ontology and performance identity; how dance is perceived and understood; the relevance of philosophy to dance as an artform; and whether dance itself, or its associated practices, are themselves philosophical in any significant sense. Individual essays draw on different philosophical traditions, including analytic, phenomenological and poststructuralist, and the primary focus is on theatre dance in the (...) Western tradition, although the issues discussed have a much broader sweep. The volume poses fundamental questions about what it means to be or witness a dancer moving, about the nature of choreography, dance works and performances, and about the interest and value of a dialogue between philosophy and dance. The philosophy of dance is a burgeoning field of enquiry and this volume seeks to represent something of the breadth of international research currently underway. It draws together contributors who are professional philosophers, dance scholars and dance practitioners, from Britain, continental Europe, the USA and South Africa. As the first anthology of essays about philosophy and dance to be published in English for some time, the aim is to provoke debate and develop the existing reflection on dance, but in new and invigorating directions. The Editors: The editors are colleagues at University of Roehampton, London: Jenny Bunker teaches aesthetics on the philosophy programme of the Department of Humanities; Anna Pakes and Bonnie Rowell are from the Department of Dance, and have a longstanding interest in the application of analytic philosophy to dance, as well as the intersections between this and other philosophical traditions and dance studies. (shrink)

The research climate plays a key role in fostering integrity in research. However, little is known about what constitutes a responsible research climate. We investigated academic researchers’ perceptions on this through focus group interviews. We recruited researchers from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the Amsterdam University Medical Center to participate in focus group discussions that consisted of researchers from similar academic ranks and disciplinary fields. We asked participants to reflect on the characteristics of a responsible research climate, the barriers they (...) perceived and which interventions they thought fruitful to improve the research climate. Discussions were recorded and transcribed at verbatim. We used inductive content analysis to analyse the focus group transcripts. We conducted 12 focus groups with 61 researchers in total. We identified fair evaluation, openness, sufficient time, integrity, trust and freedom to be mentioned as important characteristics of a responsible research climate. Main perceived barriers were lack of support, unfair evaluation policies, normalization of overwork and insufficient supervision of early career researchers. Possible interventions suggested by the participants centered around improving support, discussing expectations and improving the quality of supervision. Some of the elements of a responsible research climate identified by participants are reflected in national and international codes of conduct, such as trust and openness. Although it may seem hard to change the research climate, we believe that the realisation that the research climate is suboptimal should provide the impetus for change informed by researchers’ experiences and opinions. (shrink)

The essays in this volume were written when John Henry Newman was a Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. He wrote the first, on biblical miracles "The Miracles of Scripture," in 1825-26, as a relatively young man; the other, "The Miracles of Early Ecclesiastical History," was written in 1842-43. A comparison of the two essays displays a shift in Newman's theological stances. In the earlier essay, Newman argues in accordance with the theology of evidence of his time, maintaining that the age (...) of miracles was limited to those recorded in the Old Testament scriptures and in the Gospels and Acts. He asserts that biblical miracles served to demonstrate the divine inspiration of biblical revelation and to attest to the divinity of Christ. However, with the end of the apostolic age, the age of miracles came to an end; miracles reported from the early ages of the Church Newman dismissed as suspicious and possibly fraudulent. With this view, Newman entered into an ongoing debate between the skepticism of Hume and Paine and its continuation in the utilitarianism of Bentham, on the one hand, and the views of Christian apologists rebutting Hume's arguments, on the other. In "The Miracles of Early Ecclesiastical History," Newman can be seen as coming closer to accepting the doctrines of the Catholic Church. He rejects the stance he took in "The Miracles of Scripture," now arguing for a continuity of sacred history between the biblical and ecclesiastical periods. He had clearly abandoned the position of "evidence theologians" that miracles ended after the time of the Apostles. Newman's movement between the writing of the two essays is essentially a growing into a deeper awareness of the Church as a divine society in whose life miracles and supernatural gifts were to be expected. (shrink)

In this paper, we explore different possible explanations for research misconduct (especially falsification and fabrication), and investigate whether they are compatible. We suggest that to explain research misconduct, we should pay attention to three factors: (1) the beliefs and desires of the misconductor, (2) contextual affordances, (3) and unconscious biases or influences. We draw on the three different narratives (individual, institutional, system of science) of research misconduct as proposed by Sovacool to review six different explanations. Four theories start from the (...) individual: Rational Choice theory, Bad Apple theory, General Strain Theory and Prospect Theory. Organizational Justice Theory focuses on institutional factors, while New Public Management targets the system of science. For each theory, we illustrate the kinds of facts that must be known in order for explanations based on them to have minimal plausibility. We suggest that none can constitute a full explanation. Finally, we explore how the different possible explanations interrelate. We find that they are compatible, with the exception of explanations based on Rational Choice Theory and Prospect Theory respectively, which are incompatible with one another. For illustrative purposes we examine the case of Diederik Stapel. (shrink)