What is a woman? The definition of this central concept of feminism has lately become especially controversial and politically charged. “Ameliorative Inquirists” have rolled up their sleeves to reengineer our ordinary concept of womanhood, with a goal of including in the definition all and only those who identify as women, both “cis” and “trans.” This has proven to be a formidable challenge. Every proposal so far has failed to draw the boundaries of womanhood in a way acceptable to the Ameliorative (...) Inquirists, since not all those who identify as women count as women on these proposals, and some who count as women on these proposals don’t identify as women. This is the Trans Inclusion Problem. Is there any solution? Can there be? Recently, Katharine Jenkins, pointing to the work of Mari Mikkola, suggests that the Trans Inclusion Problem can be “deflated” rather than solved. We will investigate this proposal, and show that, unfortunately, Jenkins is mistaken: Mikkola’s project will not help us answer the Trans Inclusion Problem. After that, we’ll look at Robin Dembroff’s suggestion that we “imitate” the linguistic practices of trans inclusive and queer communities, and we will evaluate whether this would help us solve the Trans Inclusion Problem. Unfortunately, this strategy also fails to solve the problem. By the end, we’ll have a better appreciation of the challenges faced by Ameliorative Inquirists in their project of redefining “woman,” and clearer view of why the Trans Inclusion Problem cannot, in fact, be solved. That’s primarily because, no matter what it means to be a woman, it’s one thing to be a woman, and another thing to identify as a woman. (shrink)

The Life Worth Living investigates the exclusion of and discrimination against disabled people across the history of Western moral philosophy. Building on decades of activism and scholarship, Reynolds shows how longstanding views of disability are misguided and unjust, and he lays out a vision for an anti-ableist moral future. The introduction and first chapter are available to download here. -/- Table of Contents: Introduction: The Ableist Conflation. Part I: Pain. 1. Theories of Pain. 2. A Phenomenology of Chronic Pain. (...) Part II: Disability. 3. Theories of Disability. 4. A Phenomenology of Multiple Sclerosis. Part III: Ability. 5. Theories of Ability. 6. A Phenomenology of Ability. Conclusion: An Anti-Ableist Future. (shrink)

As neither a classical naturalist nor a non-naturalist, Merleau-Ponty appears to be a moderate or liberal naturalist. But can a phenomenologist really be a naturalist, even a liberal one? A lot hinges on how we tease this out, both as to whether it is plausible to claim Merleau-Ponty as a liberal naturalist (I argue it is), and as to whether it is an attractive and coherent position. Indeed, despite its important challenges to orthodox naturalism, there are arguably two traps to (...) avoid. If it becomes too liberal, we get: dualism or an ontological pluralism that is difficult to distinguish from a constructivism; or, in seeking to sidestep that metaphysical dilemma, there is sometimes an insistence on an overly neat methodological separation between description/understanding and explanation that is belied in practice (both scientific and philosophical). It is doubtful that such positions can legitimately claim to be naturalist in orientation, liberal or not. Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy avoids these traps, however, and it is thus a useful resource for contemporary work trying to navigate between scientific naturalism and non-naturalism. (shrink)

The familiar Cartesian sceptical arguments all involve an explanation of our experiences. An account of the persuasive power of the sceptical arguments should explain why this is so. This supports a diagnosis of the error in Cartesian sceptical arguments according to which they mislead us into regarding our perceptual beliefs as if they were justified as inferences to the best explanation. I argue that they have instead a perceptual justification that does not involve inference to the best explanation and that (...) should not be put in doubt by the sceptical hypotheses. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore the approaches to methodological abstraction and self-alienation developed respectively in Karl Mannheim’s early sociology of intellectuals and in Edmund Husserl’s late transcendental phenomenology. In Mannheim’s early and experimental works, the resistance to abstraction and alienation is located in a stratum of intellectuals able to meaningfully combine diverse cultural currents in a social process of cultivation (Bildung). In Husserl, to contrast, this resistance is grasped as a constant crisis in the methods of pursuing philosophical truth. While (...) these approaches seem difficult to reconcile, I suggest in closing that this difficulty can be related to their shared emphasis on a theoretical response to the practical and historical reality of self-alienation. (shrink)

On September 26th, 2023, the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD) officially designated disabled people as a health disparity population, marking the most significant event for disabled people's health as it relates to the NIH. In this paper, I discuss the larger socio-political context as well as the clinical import of this historic decision.

Over the years, companies have adopted hiring algorithms because they promise wider job candidate pools, lower recruitment costs and less human bias. Despite these promises, they also bring perils. Using them can inflict unintentional harms on individual human rights. These include the five human rights to work, equality and nondiscrimination, privacy, free expression and free association. Despite the human rights harms of hiring algorithms, the AI ethics literature has predominantly focused on abstract ethical principles. This is problematic for two reasons. (...) First, AI principles have been criticized for being vague and not actionable. Second, the use of vague ethical principles to discuss algorithmic risks does not provide any accountability. This lack of accountability creates an algorithmic accountability gap. Closing this gap is crucial because, without accountability, the use of hiring algorithms can lead to discrimination and unequal access to employment opportunities. This paper makes two contributions to the AI ethics literature. First, it frames the ethical risks of hiring algorithms using international human rights law as a universal standard for determining algorithmic accountability. Second, it evaluates four types of algorithmic impact assessments in terms of how effectively they address the five human rights of job applicants implicated in hiring algorithms. It determines which of the assessments can help companies audit their hiring algorithms and close the algorithmic accountability gap. (shrink)

Despite being assailed for decades by disability activists and disability studies scholars spanning the humanities and social sciences, the medical model of disability—which conceptualizes disability as an individual tragedy or misfortune due to genetic or environmental insult—still today structures many cases of patient–practitioner communication. Synthesizing and recasting work done across critical disability studies and philosophy of disability, I argue that the reason the medical model of disability remains so gallingly entrenched is due to what I call the “ableist conflation” of (...) disability with pain and suffering. In an effort to better equip healthcare practitioners and those invested in health communication to challenge disability stigma, discrimination, and oppression, I lay out the logic of the ableist conflation and interrogate examples of its use. I argue that insofar as the semiosis of pain and suffering is structured by the lived experience of unwelcome bodily transition or variation, experiences of pain inform the ableist conflation by preemptively tying such variability and its attendant disequilibrium to disability. I conclude by discussing how philosophy of disability and critical disability studies might better inform health communication concerning disability, offering a number of conceptual distinctions toward that end. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that the concept of normality in medical research and clinical practice is inextricable from the concept of ambiguity. I make this argument in the context of Edmund Pellegrino's call for a renewed reflection on medicine’s basic concepts and by drawing on work in critical disability studies concerning Deafness and body integrity identity disorder. If medical practitioners and philosophers of medicine wish to improve their understanding of the meaning of medicine as well as its concrete practice, (...) I contend that they should take seriously the import and centrality of ambiguity for biomedicine. (shrink)

This paper examines the differences and affinities between Karl Popper’s critical rationalism and Theodor Adorno’s critical theory through renewed attention to the original documents of their 1961 debate. While commentaries often describe the Popper-Adorno encounter as a theoretical disappointment, I reveal a confrontation between conceptually opposed programs of social research. Though both theorists are committed to critique as a political and epistemological struggle for human freedom, their conceptions of this struggle are starkly different. In the original seminar papers, we find (...) a conflict between critique as a practice of social rationality (Popper) and a critique of social rationality itself (Adorno). The versions of critical rationalism and critical theory meeting in this debate thus emphasize opposite dimensions of a reflexive practice of immanent critique. In closing, I suggest dissolving this conceptual tension by recovering the educational orientation of critique. (shrink)

One challenge in providing an adequate definition of physical disability is unifying the heterogeneous bodily conditions that count as disabilities. We examine recent proposals by Elizabeth Barnes (2016), and Dana Howard and Sean Aas (2018), and show how this debate has reached an impasse. Barnes’ account struggles to deliver principled unification of the category of disability, whilst Howard and Aas’ account risks inappropriately sidelining the body. We argue that this impasse can be broken using a novel concept: marginalised functioning. Marginalised (...) functioning concerns the relationship between a person’s bodily capacities and their social world: specifically, their ability to function in line with the default norms about how people can typically physically function that influence the structuring of social space. We argue that attending to marginalised functioning allows us to develop, not one, but three different models of disability, all of which—whilst having different strengths and weaknesses—unify the category of disability without sidelining the body. (shrink)

Drawing upon the life and work of S. Kay Toombs, I explore the impact and import of phenomenological accounts of disability for the existentialist tradition. Through the case of multiple sclerosis, a noncongenital, late-onset, and degenerative disability, I show how the general structures that emerge from its lived experience largely support a mere-difference view of disability and highlight the need for an equitably habitable world. I further argue that phenomenological accounts of disability demonstrate accessibility to be the defining feature of (...) what it means to be embodied as we are. I conclude with a discussion of the more general philosophical relationship between disability, embodiment, and existentialism. (shrink)

Introductory and advanced textbooks in bioethics focus almost entirely on issues that disproportionately affect disabled people and that centrally deal with becoming or being disabled. However, such textbooks typically omit critical philosophical reflection on disability, lack engagement with decades of empirical and theoretical scholarship spanning the social sciences and humanities in the multidisciplinary field of disability studies, and avoid serious consideration of the history of disability activism in shaping social, legal, political, and medical understandings of disability over the last fifty (...) years. For example, longstanding discussions on topics such as euthanasia, physician aid-in-dying, pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, prenatal testing, selective abortion, enhancement, patient autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, and health care rationing all tend to be premised on shared and implicit assumptions regarding disability, especially in relation to quality of life, yet with too little recognition of the way that “disability” is itself a topic of substantial research and scholarly disagreement across multiple fields. This is not merely a concern for academic and medical education; as an applied field tied to one of the largest economic sectors of most industrialized nations, bioethics has a direct impact on healthcare education, practice, policy, and, thereby, the health outcomes of existing and future populations. It is in light of these pressing issues that the Disability Bioethics Reader is the first reader to introduce students to core bioethical issues and concepts through the lens of critical disability studies and philosophy of disability. The Disability Bioethics Reader will include over thirty-five chapters covering key areas such as: critical histories and state-of-the-field analyses of modern medicine, bioethics, disability studies, and philosophy of medicine; methods in bioethics; concerns at the edge- and end-of-life; enhancement; disability, quality of life, and well-being; prenatal testing and abortion; invisible disabilities; chronic illness; healthcare justice; genetics and genomics; intellectual disability and neurodiversity; ethics and diagnosis; and epistemic injustice in healthcare. (shrink)

What words we use, and what meanings they have, is important. We shouldn't use slurs; we should use 'rape' to include spousal rape (for centuries we didn’t); we should have a word which picks out the sexual harassment suffered by people in the workplace and elsewhere (for centuries we didn’t). Sometimes we need to change the word-meaning pairs in circulation, either by getting rid of the pair completely (slurs), changing the meaning (as we did with 'rape'), or adding brand new (...) word-meaning pairs (as with 'sexual harassment'). A problem, though, is how to do this. One might worry that any attempt to change language in this way will lead to widespread miscommunication and confusion. I argue that this is indeed so, but that's a feature, not a bug of attempting to change word-meaning pairs. The miscommunications and confusion such changes cause can lead us, via a process I call transformative communicative disruption, to reflect on our language and its use, and this can be further, rather than hinder, our goal of improving language. (shrink)

Most interpreters of Heidegger’s reflections on the body maintain that—whether early, middle, or late in the Gesamtausgabe—Dasein’s or the mortal’s openness to being/beyng is the ground of the fleshly or bodily (das Leibliche), but not the reverse. In this paper, I argue that there is evidence from Heidegger’s own oeuvre demonstrating that this relationship is instead mutually reciprocal. That is to say, I contend that corporeal variability is constitutive of Dasein’s openness to being just as Dasein’s openness to being is (...) constitutive of its corporeal variability. Understood in this way, Heidegger’s thinking puts forward what I call a corpoietic understanding of the body and of the meaning of ability. I show that, despite the ableist assumptions at play in much of Heidegger’s work, such an understanding is nevertheless grounded in the idea of access, a central concept in philosophy of disability and disability studies. After developing this idea of ability as access, I close by addressing the larger political stakes of using Heidegger’s work to think about embodiment and disability given the Third Reich’s mass slaughter of people with disabilities. (shrink)

Some commentators have condemned Kant’s moral project from a feminist perspective based on Kant’s apparently dim view of women as being innately morally deficient. Here I will argue that although his remarks concerning women are unsettling at first glance, a more detailed and closer examination shows that Kant’s view of women is actually far more complex and less unsettling than that attributed to him by various feminist critics. My argument, then, undercuts the justification for the severe feminist critique of Kant’s (...) moral project. (shrink)

This short encyclopedia entry defines the concept of the normate.

In this paper I attempt to trace an entanglement of an event documented in my PhD research which contests dominant modes of enquiry. It is experimental research which resists the human subject as the most important aspect of research, the only one with agency or intentionality. In particular, I analyse the process of the making of the circle, and how integral it is in contributing to building the Community of Enquiry, the pedagogy of Philosophy with Children. I offer a critical (...) posthuman analysis which engages with the material-discursive entanglements of the making of the circle. I move beyond the linguistic turn by paying attention to the intra-actions in between human and more-than-human, place, the circle and the chairs. I show how the mainly authoritarian adult-child relationships prevalent in most South African schools, can be disrupted through this pedagogical approach. This research takes place with a group of Grade 2 learners in a government school in South Africa. (shrink)

In this paper I return to Hubert Dreyfus’ old but influential critique of artificial intelligence, redirecting it towards contemporary predictive processing models of the mind (PP). I focus on Dreyfus’ arguments about the “frame problem” for artificial cognitive systems, and his contrasting account of embodied human skills and expertise. The frame problem presents as a prima facie problem for practical work in AI and robotics, but also for computational views of the mind in general, including for PP. Indeed, some of (...) the issues it presents seem more acute for PP, insofar as it seeks to unify all cognition and intelligence, and aims to do so without admitting any cognitive processes or mechanisms outside of the scope of the theory. I contend, however, that there is an unresolved problem for PP concerning whether it can both explain all cognition and intelligent behavior as minimizing prediction error with just the core formal elements of the PP toolbox, and also adequately comprehend (or explain away) some of the apparent cognitive differences between biological and prediction-based artificial intelligence, notably in regard to establishing relevance and flexible context-switching, precisely the features of interest to Dreyfus’ work on embodied indexicality, habits/skills, and abductive inference. I address several influential philosophical versions of PP, including the work of Jakob Hohwy and Andy Clark, as well as more enactive-oriented interpretations of active inference coming from a broadly Fristonian perspective. (shrink)

In the essay “Cézanne’s Doubt,” Merleau-Ponty explores the relationship between Paul Cézanne’s art and his embodiment. The doubt in question is ultimately about the meaning of his disabilities. Should Cézanne’s disabilities or impairments shape how we interpret his art or should they instead be treated as incidental, as mere biographical data? Although Merleau-Ponty's essay isn’t intended to be phenomenological, its line of questioning is as much about lived experience as it is about art criticism, art history, and aesthetics. I here (...) offer a reading of “Cézanne’s Doubt” as an exploration of one of the more fundamental issues for phenomenological methodology: the relationship between normality and the normate. I first defend this phenomenological and disability-centric or crip reading of the essay. I then argue that insofar as one takes oneself to be “normal” and insofar as doing so underwrites phenomenological inquiry, the problematic of the normate, not just that of normality, is central to phenomenology. (shrink)

[This piece is written for those working in social gerontology and aging studies, with the aim of bringing insights from disability studies and philosophy of disability to bear on enduring debates in those fields.] The guiding question of humanistic age-studies—What does it mean to grow old?—cannot be answered without reflecting on disability. This is not simply because growing old invariably means becoming impaired in various ways, but also because the discriminations and stigmas involved in ageism are often rooted in ableism. (...) We here draw on research in the philosophy of disability as well as the interdisciplinary field of disability studies to explore the relationship between ageism and ableism. (shrink)

Testimony by disabled people concerning the relationship between their experiences and overall well-being has long been an object of social scientific and humanistic study. Often discussed in terms of “the disability paradox,” these studies contrast the intuitive horribleness of certain impaired states against the testimonial evidence suggesting that people in such states do not in fact experience their lives as horrible. Explanations for why such testimonial evidence is suspect range from claims about adaptive preferences to issues of qualitative research methodology. (...) In this paper, I argue that the problem lies not with the evidence, but the intuitions in question. Using the disability paradox as a case study, I further argue against the use of the concept of intuitive horribleness in social epistemology and beyond. I contend that testimonial and hermeneutical injustices are baked into most deployments of the concept, and even if one were to justify its use in select cases, it should be accompanied with prima facie suspicion. In conclusion, I discuss the implications of this analysis for the literature on transformative experience and also for the stakes of multi-cultural, historically informed philosophical inquiry more generally. (shrink)

This chapter canvases a number of ways that issues surrounding disability intersect with social epistemology. We begin with a discussion of how social epistemology as a field and debates concerning epistemic injustice in particular would benefit from further (a) engaging the fields of disability studies and philosophy of disability and (b) more directly addressing the problem of ableism. In section two, we turn to issues of testimony, “intuitive horribleness,” and their relationship to debates concerning disability and well-being. We address how (...) the regular lack of uptake of disabled people’s testimony can lead to a number of structural rather than merely individual epistemic injustices, and we also consider how the very nature of some disabilities make testimonial issues more complicated. We conclude by discussing various norms of social interaction and how they can systematically disadvantage Autistic people in particular with respect to all the issues discussed herein. (shrink)

On 26 July 2016, Satoshi Uematsu murdered 19 and injured 26 at a caregiving facility in Sagamihara, Japan, making it the country’s worst mass killing since WWII. In this article, I offer an analysis of the Sagamihara 19 massacre. I draw on the work of Julia Kristeva and Emmanuel Levinas to argue that claims about disability experience are insufficient to justify normative projects. In short, disability is normatively ambiguous.

Phenomenology has been described as a “non-argumentocentric” way of doing philosophy, reflecting that the philosophical focus is on generating adequate descriptions of experience. But it should not be described as an argument-free zone, regardless of whether this is intended as a descriptive claim about the work of the “usual suspects” or a normative claim about how phenomenology ought to be properly practiced. If phenomenology is always at least partly in the business of arguments, then it is worth giving further attention (...) to the role and form of phenomenological argumentation, how it interacts with its more strictly descriptive component, and the status of phenomenological claims regarding conditions for various kinds of experience. I contend that different versions of phenomenological reasoning encroach upon argument forms that are commonly thought to be antithetical to phenomenology, notably abductive reasoning, understood in terms of its role in both hypothesis generation and in terms of justification. This paper identifies two main steps to making this case. The first step takes seriously the consequences of the intrinsically dialectical aspect of phenomenology in intersection with other modes of philosophy, the natural attitude, and non-philosophy. The second step focuses on transcendental reflection and arguments about the conditions/structures they contain. Together, these two steps aim to rescue phenomenology from the objection that it has an “ostrich epistemology” with regard to the ostensible purity of description, the intuition of essences, or the “conditions” ascertained through transcendental reflection. (shrink)

This text provides a brief portrait of teacher induction programs in place in the school boards in Quebec and an analysis of three major support systems used. The analysis is based on both the descriptive documents integration programs posted on the website of the Carrefour national de l’insertion professionnelle en enseignement (CNIPE) as well as a review of research. Ce texte présente un bref portrait des programmes d’insertion professionnelle mis en place dans les commissions scolaires québécoises ainsi qu’une analyse de (...) trois des principaux dispositifs de soutien utilisés. L’analyse se base à la fois sur les documents descriptifs des programmes d’insertion mis en ligne sur le site web du Carrefour national de l’insertion professionnelle en enseignement (CNIPE) ainsi que sur une recension des recherches. (shrink)

As COVID-19 spread, clinicians warned of mental illness epidemics within the coronavirus pandemic. Funding for digital mental health is surging and researchers are calling for widespread adoption to address the mental health sequalae of COVID-19. -/- We consider whether these technologies improve mental health outcomes and whether they exacerbate existing health inequalities laid bare by the pandemic. We argue the evidence for efficacy is weak and the likelihood of increasing inequalities is high. -/- First, we review recent trends in digital (...) mental health. Next, we turn to the clinical literature to show that many technologies proposed as a response to COVID-19 are unlikely to improve outcomes. Then, we argue that even evidence-based technologies run the risk of increasing health disparities. We conclude by suggesting that policymakers should not allocate limited resources to the development of many digital mental health tools and should focus instead on evidence-based solutions to address mental health inequalities. (shrink)

This paper argues that epistemic errors rooted in group- or identity- based biases, especially those pertaining to disability, are undertheorized in the literature on medical error. After sketching dominant taxonomies of medical error, we turn to the field of social epistemology to understand the role that epistemic schemas play in contributing to medical errors that disproportionately affect patients from marginalized social groups. We examine the effects of this unequal distribution through a detailed case study of ableism. There are four primary (...) mechanisms through which the epistemic schema of ableism distorts communication between nondisabled physicians and disabled patients: testimonial injustice, epistemic overconfidence, epistemic erasure, and epistemic derailing. Measures against epistemic injustices in general and against schema-based medical errors in particular are ultimately issues of justice that must be better addressed at all levels of health care practice. (shrink)

Call for Written evidence - Risk Assessment and Risk Planning.

We argue that relating to myself as me provides, as such, a reason to care about myself: grasping that an event involves me, instead of another, makes it matter in a special way. Further, this self-concern is not simply a matter of seeing in myself some instrumental value for other ends. We use as our foil a recent skeptical challenge to this view offered in Setiya 2015. We think the case against self-concern is powered by unwarrantedly narrow construals of three (...) key notions. One is the notion of a first-personal way of relating to oneself. A narrow account of the first person in terms of special epistemic relations to oneself makes it easy to overlook a source of non-instrumental reasons of self-concern, located in the special relation a subject has to herself as agent. Two is the notion of what it is to be a reason. And, three, is the notion of self-concern itself. We show that the skeptical case rests in part on a slide towards neighbouring but distinct notions of egoism and selfishness. We also argue that Setiya’s notion of self-love, offered to capture the pre-theoretical intuition of self-concern, cannot do it justice. (shrink)

Charles Darwin hat eindrucksvoll gezeigt, dass der Mensch ebenso wie alle anderen Lebewesen ein Produkt der biologischen Evolution ist. Die sich an Darwin anschließende Forschung hat außerdem plausibel gemacht, dass sich nicht nur viele der körperlichen Merkmale des Menschen, sondern auch (zumindest einige) seiner Verhaltensdispositionen in adaptiven Selektionsprozessen herausgebildet haben. Die Vorstellung, dass auch die menschliche Moralität evolutionär bedingt ist, scheint daher auf den ersten Blick ganz überzeugend. Schließlich hat die Evolutionstheorie in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten in vielen Bereichen (auch außerhalb (...) der Biologie) ihre weitreichende Bedeutung unter Beweis gestellt. Warum sollte, so könnte man beispielsweise fragen, gerade die Fähigkeit des Menschen, moralische Normen aufzustellen und gemäß ihnen zu handeln, nicht evolutionär erklärt werden können? Und warum sollte eine solche evolutionäre Erklärung der menschlichen Moralität irrelevant für die Rechtfertigung moralischer Normen sein? Warum sollte die Ethik eine Bastion der Philosophen bleiben, für die evolutionsbiologische Forschungsergebnisse über den Menschen und seine nächsten Verwandten keinerlei Relevanz besitzen? (shrink)

Devant le constat du déclin toujours plus rapide de la diversité biologique et les limites des res- sources disponibles pour l’enrayer, il est nécessaire de déterminer quels moyens devraient être engagés dans sa protection. Pour ce faire, une méthode efficace serait d’évaluer les bénéfices tirés de la biodiversité afin d’estimer rationnellement les coûts légitimes de sa protection. L’évaluation économique, qui se présente d’emblée sur un mode quantitatif, serait alors un outil précieux. Dans ce texte, nous présentons différentes méthodes d’évaluation économique (...) de la biodiversité ainsi que certaines de leurs limites méthodologiques. Par la suite, nous montrons qu’en dépit de ses avantages pratiques, l’évaluation économique échoue à représenter l’ensemble des valeurs en jeu dans la protection de la biodiversité. Nous décrivons alors trois types de valeurs incommen- surables avec des bénéfices économiques : la valeur de legs, qui renvoie aux obligations de trans- mission du patrimoine naturel dont nous avons hérité ; la valeur d’existence, qui renvoie à la considération morale d’intérêts autres que ceux des êtres humains ; la valeur de transformation, qui renvoie à la capacité d’examiner et de critiquer nos préférences et inclinaisons afin d’inclure celles-ci dans une vision du monde rationnelle et cohérente. Pour conclure, nous plaidons en faveur de l’élaboration de méthodes de concertation et d’évaluation participatives et pluralistes permettant de rendre compte de la diversité et de l’hétérogénéité des valeurs de la biodiversité. (shrink)

Despite its short historical moment in the sun, behaviorism has become something akin to a theoria non grata, a position that dare not be explicitly endorsed. The reasons for this are complex, of course, and they include sociological factors which we cannot consider here, but to put it briefly: many have doubted the ambition to establish law-like relationships between mental states and behavior that dispense with any sort of mentalistic or intentional idiom, judging that explanations of intelligent behavior require reference (...) to qualia and/or mental events. Today, when behaviorism is discussed at all, it is usually in a negative manner, either as an attempt to discredit an opponent’s view via a reductio, or by enabling a position to distinguish its identity and positive claims by reference to what it is (allegedly) not. In this paper, however, we argue that the ghost of behaviorism is present in influential, contemporary work in the field of embodied and enactive cognition, and even in aspects of the phenomenological tradition that these theorists draw on. Rather than take this to be a problem for these views as some have, we argue that once the behaviorist dimensions are clarified and distinguished from the straw-man version of the view, it is in fact an asset, one which will help with task of setting forth a scientifically reputable version of enactivism and/or philosophical behaviorism that is nonetheless not brain-centric but behavior-centric. While this is a bit like “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” strategy, as Shaun Gallagher notes (2019), with the shared enemy of behaviorism and enactivism being classical Cartesian views and/or orthodox cognitivism in its various guises, the task of this paper is to render this alliance philosophically plausible. Doi: 10.1007/s11229-019-02432-1. (shrink)

This is a contribution to the encyclopedia of systems biology on dispositions.

Stories evoke emotions in their hearers. Do they evoke emotions in their tellers as well? Tellers can tell stories from the inside as if they were characters in the world of the tale or they can tell stories from the outside as if they were perceiving the taleworld from elsewhere. From the outside, the teller can represent the emotion a character feels; from the inside, the teller can express the emotion the character feels. In either instance, tellers can be moved (...) by the story they tell. When they are, they can experience their emotions as a suffusion of sensation that springs forth in their bodies. The body’s experience of its sensation can appear in the gestures that accompany the telling. On the occasion presented here, the teller represents her emotion in metaphorical gestures that figure her body as the container of a fluid substance that threatens to overflow its boundaries. Her gestures disclose and elaborate this metaphoricity while at the same time disclosing and elaborating the sensations that motivate the metaphor. (shrink)

This paper studies the conflict between critical rationalism and critical theory in Karl Popper and Theodor Adorno’s 1961 debate by analyzing their shared rejection of Karl Mannheim’s sociology of knowledge. Despite the divergences in their respective projects of critical social research, Popper and Adorno agree that Mannheim’s sociology of knowledge is uncritical. By investigating their respective assessments of this research program I reveal a deeper similarity between critical rationalism and critical theory. Though both agree on the importance of critique, they (...) are less concerned with the development of critical consciousness as a focus of this project. In this way, Mannheim’s sociology of knowledge, particularly in its formative stages, revolves around a set of problems relatively inaccessible to critical rationalism and critical theory, since it is centrally concerned with identifying and cultivating the possibility of critique in society. In closing, I gesture to the importance of political education in Mannheim’s early work, suggesting that a return to these experimental texts will yield resources for political thought today. (shrink)

In order to conduct medical examinations, physicians transform patients from social subjects into medical objects. The routines associated with conducting medical examinations constitute rituals for effecting this transformation: moving from public space to private space; changing into ritual costumes; taking up ritual positions in an examination room; conducting ritual verbal and physical examinations. The transformations endow participants with a different ontological status from the one they hold in everyday life. They address the phenomenological problem of how a self is inserted (...) into a body. (shrink)

Most readers of Sartre focus only on the works written at the peak of his influence as a public intellectual in the 1940s, notably "Being and Nothingness". "Jean-Paul Sartre: Key Concepts" aims to reassess Sartre and to introduce readers to the full breadth of his philosophy. Bringing together leading international scholars, the book examines concepts from across Sartre's career, from his initial views on the "inner life" of conscious experience, to his later conceptions of hope as the binding agent for (...) a common humanity. The book will be invaluable to readers looking for a comprehensive assessment of Sartre's thinking - from his early influences to the development of his key concepts, to his legacy. (shrink)

Beginning with Freud’s treatment of identification as an ambivalent process, we explore identification’s polarization between narcissistic idealization and melancholic division. While narcissistic identification can be seen as a strategy adopted by the ego to avoid the educational development of its drives and to maintain itself either in whole or in part in an infantile state, melancholic identification activates a tension between the ego-ideal and the real ego at the expense of the latter. After discussing the ambivalence of identification, we review (...) Freud’s discussion of mass formations as group identifications, arguing that the work of facilitating a productive sublimation of the drives cannot be reduced to a strengthening of the artificial masses represented by social institutions such as the church and the educational system. Instead, the difference between mass formations allowing for collective sublimation and those suffering from narcissistic or melancholic blockages must be found in the productive qualities of the mass itself. In closing, we outline a few ways in which we might begin to understand the political contribution of masses to the maturation of human drives. (shrink)

Recent years have seen renewed interest in the semantics of generics. And a relatively mainstream view in this work is that the semantics of generics must appeal to kinds. But what are kinds? Can we learn anything about their nature by looking at how semantic theories of generics appeal to them? In this article, we overview recent work on the semantics of generics and consider their consequences for our understanding of the metaphysics of kinds.

Marie Oldfield, Pro Bono Economics & Refugee Council. Over half the total applications for asylum the UK receives each year are initially rejected, yet nearly a third of these initial rejections are subsequently overturned on appeal. This process that fails to get decisions right first time imposes significant costs, not just on the applicants themselves, but also more widely on UK taxpayers. Asylum seekers are not entitled to welfare benefits nor employment except in some limited cases, and are often placed (...) in unsuitable conditions with lack of appropriate support to prepare their case for asylum. These unfortunate circumstances mean that they are unable to gather and present all the required evidence first time, even when the case for asylum is legitimate. As a result, the application is rejected and thus begins a cycle of appeals that might eventually lead to a successful outcome for the asylum seeker but will, in the process, burden the taxpayer with unnecessary administrative cost and cause the asylum seeker needless distress and prevent them from accessing suitable economic opportunities. • Our study estimates that there are approximately 4,000 initial rejections that are successfully appealed each year and, with each appeal incurring direct administrative costs of around £1,000, the price tag of incorrect initial decisions adds up to a hefty £4 million per year in unnecessary administrative costs alone. • There are other costs, too, that negatively impact asylum seekers and taxpayers, albeit in a more indirect manner. The longer the appeals process is dragged out, the more delay there is to successful asylum seekers entering the labour market which means lost economic activity and forgone tax revenue for the Exchequer. Long periods of unemployment also result in skills attrition and lower the probability of the asylum seeker successfully entering the labour market in the future. • A lengthy appeals process heightens stress and worsens mental health in asylum seekers, a group arguably already more vulnerable on this front. Unnecessary human suffering aside, there is also a monetary cost borne by the taxpayer should NHS mental health services become involved. Thus, there is a pressing and viable case for providing asylum seekers a stable environment in which to complete their applications for asylum. This would increase the likelihood of reaching correct decisions in the first instance, avoid unnecessary administrative costs of an arduous appeals process, enable successful asylum seekers to access the labour market and contribute to the Exchequer, and avoid placing extra demands on already strained NHS mental health services. (shrink)

With an increased emphasis on upstream activity and Defence Engagement, it has become increasingly more important for the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) and government to understand the relationship between conflict and regional instability. As part of this process, the Historical and Operational Data Analysis Team (HODA) in Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) was tasked to look at factors that influenced the regional spread of internal conflicts to help aid the decision making of government. Conflict contagion is the process (...) by which a conflict in one state (State A) influences the outbreak of conflict in another state (State B). The aim of looking at these factors was to produce a tool to assist in the cost/benefit analysis of intervening in future conflicts. The task was carried out by quantitatively studying a selection of contagion and non-contagion case studies over a set of 14 numerical variables that covered structural, political, socioeconomic and cultural factors of both States A and B. All case studies took place after the end of the Cold War. The dataset used contained both binary and continuous data. A range of statistical techniques were used including correlation, regression and principal component analyses along with graphical analytical methods. Unfortunately creating a tool to predict contagion has proven difficult and so the scope of the study was changed-as no statistically relevant link was found. However, it was shown that some links do exists between the variables and the existence of contagion, and it also appears it is a combination of variables which has an effect on the likelihood of contagion. Conflict contagion is a rare event and was only recorded in less than 1% of cases present in the dataset. Of the variables analysed, the most significant factor was the number of refugees present in State B who originated in State A for the year before the case study. It is recommended that further work be conducted. It is possible that a more detailed investigation, using a broader range of techniques and/or a wider selection of variables might be successful in assessing the likelihood of conflict contagion. (shrink)

Graduates' employability indicates the excellent education and relevant preparation they obtained from their respective degrees. Tracer studies have enabled higher education institutions to profile their graduates while also reflecting on the quality of education they provide. With the foregoing, a tracer study determined the demographic and academic profile of teacher education graduates from 2017 to 2020 in a state university in the West Philippines. It also ascertained the advanced studies they attended after college, their employment data, the relevance of college (...) preparation with their current employment, difficulties they encountered while securing employment and in their present job, and recommendations to strengthen the teacher education program. The study utilized a descriptive survey research design with 80 non-random samples chosen based on availability. The survey was based on the Philippine Commission on Higher Education with modifications elucidated from previous studies. Results showed that graduates took the teacher education program with a strong passion for the teaching profession. More graduates received honors and awards, passed the licensure examinations for teachers, attended advanced studies for professional development, and are employable. Besides, the graduates’ college preparation is relevant to their current employment. Further, difficulties and problems encountered and recommendations to strengthen the teacher education program were noted. These findings may serve as a baseline for curriculum review and give suggestions for future tracer studies. (shrink)

Artificial Intelligence is becoming widespread and as we continue ask ‘can we implement this’ we neglect to ask ‘should we implement this’. There are various frameworks and conceptual journeys one should take to ensure a robust AI product; context is one of the vital parts of this. AI is now expected to make decisions, from deciding who gets a credit card to cancer diagnosis. These decisions affect most, if not all, of society. As developers if we do not understand or (...) use fundamental modelling principles then we can cause real harm to society. Recently more serious effects of AI have been observed. Dehumanisation is the human reaction to overused anthropomorphism and lack of social contact caused by excessive interaction with, or addiction to, technology. This can cause humans to devalue technology and to devalue other humans. This is a contradiction of the use of ‘social robots’ and ‘chatbots’, indicating that the negative effects of this technology would outweigh any perceived positive effects. Also, within cyberspace, anthropomorphism and similar techniques based on deep philosophical principles can, and are, being used to alter the behaviour of humans. These techniques are used to manipulate human behaviours at a basic level in the human mind. As these types of techniques are becoming more widespread, it is clear that we are entering unchartered territory that holds a vast array of consequences for society. (shrink)

The historical relationship between health care professionals and people with disabilities is fraught, a fact all the more troubling in light of the distinctive roles clinicians play in both establishing and responding to that which is considered normal or abnormal by society at large. Those who wish to improve their clinical practice might struggle, however, to keep up with developments across numerous disability communities as well as the ever-growing body of disability studies scholarship. To assist with this goal, I offer (...) an overview of recent disability theory, outline a set of responsibilities clinicians have to disability communities, and provide recommendations for clinicians who hope to justly treat patients with disabilities and improve their care and health outcomes. (shrink)

Beginning with the influential discussion of the dialectic of progress found in Amy Allen’s The End of Progress, this paper outlines some difficulties encountered by critical theories of normative justification drawing on the early Frankfurt School. Characterizing Adorno and Horkheimer’s critical social theory as a dialectical reflection eschewing questions of normative foundations, I relate their well-known treatment of the dialectic of enlightenment reason and myth to their critique of capitalist society as a negative totality. By exploring the concepts of historical (...) development used by Adorno and Horkheimer to describe both the progressive domination of capitalism, and the formation and cultivation of reflective consciousness, I trace the importance of progression and its inseparable relationship to regression in these early versions of critical theory. The dialectical social theory found here recognizes the persistence of social contradictions on both a methodological level and on the level of theory’s development and expression, a connection potentially obscured by a division of historical progress according to its temporal orientation. Particularly in Adorno’s later work, an opposition to the negative social totality requires notions of cultivation and learning which work against the prevailing forms of conceptual thinking, including the concern for the stability of rational foundations. (shrink)