This paper critically examines coincidence arguments and evolutionary debunking arguments against non-naturalist realism in metaethics. It advances a version of these arguments that goes roughly like this: Given a non-naturalist, realist metaethic, it would be cosmically coincidental if our first order normative beliefs were true. This coincidence undermines any prima facie justification enjoyed by those beliefs.

States restrict immigration on a massive scale. Governments fortify their borders with walls and fences, authorize border patrols, imprison migrants in detention centers, and deport large numbers of foreigners. Unjust Borders: Individuals and the Ethics of Immigration argues that immigration restrictions are systematically unjust and examines how individual actors should respond to this injustice. Javier Hidalgo maintains that individuals can rightfully resist immigration restrictions and often have strong moral reasons to subvert these laws. This book makes the case that unauthorized (...) migrants can permissibly evade, deceive, and use defensive force against immigration agents, that smugglers can aid migrants in crossing borders, and that citizens should disobey laws that compel them to harm immigrants. Unjust Borders is a meditation on how individuals should act in the midst of pervasive injustice. (shrink)

I suspect the answer to the question in the title of this paper is no. But the scope of my paper will be considerably more limited: I will be concerned with whether certain types of considerations that are commonly cited in favor of dynamic semantics do in fact push us towards a dynamic semantics. Ultimately, I will argue that the evidence points to a dynamics of discourse that is best treated pragmatically, rather than as part of the semantics.

Corruptionism is the view that following physical death, the human being ceases to exist but their soul persists in the afterlife. Survivalism holds that both the human being and their soul persist in the afterlife, as distinct entities, with the soul constituting the human. Each position has its defenders, most of whom appeal both to metaphysical considerations and to the authority of St Thomas Aquinas. Corruptionists claim that survivalism violates a basic principle of any plausible mereology, while survivalists tend to (...) reject the principle, though without as much detail as one would like. In this paper I examine both the key exegetical issues and the mereological question, arguing that Aquinas cannot be shown to have supported the principle in question, and that the principle should be rejected on independent grounds. If correct, some key planks in support of survivalism are established, with others to await further examination. (shrink)

The appearance of consciousness in the universe remains one of the major mysteries unsolved by science or philosophy. Absent an agreed-upon definition of consciousness or even a convenient system to test theories of consciousness, a confusing heterogeneity of theories proliferate. In pursuit of clarifying this complicated discourse, we here interpret various frameworks for the scientific and philosophical study of consciousness through the lens of social insect evolutionary biology. To do so, we first discuss the notion of a forward test versus (...) a reverse test, analogous to the normal and revolutionary phases of the scientific process. Contemporary theories of consciousness are forward tests for consciousness, in that they strive to become a means to classify the level of consciousness of arbitrary states and systems. Yet no such theory of consciousness has earned sufficient confidence such that it might be actually used as a forward test in ambiguous settings. What is needed now is thus a legitimate reverse test for theories of consciousness, to provide internal and external calibration of different frameworks. A reverse test for consciousness would ideally look like a method for referencing theories of consciousness to a tractable model system. We introduce the Ant Colony Test as a rigorous reverse test for consciousness. We show that social insect colonies, though disaggregated collectives, fulfill many of the prerequisites for conscious awareness met by humans and honey bee workers. A long lineage of philosophically-neutral neurobehavioral, evolutionary, and ecological studies on social insect colonies can thus be redeployed for the study of consciousness in general. We suggest that the ACT can provide insight into the nature of consciousness, and highlight the ant colony as a model system for ethically performing clarifying experiments about consciousness. (shrink)

Contemporary republicans have adopted a less-than-charitable attitude toward private beneficence, especially when it is directed to the poor, worrying that rich patrons may be in a position to exercise arbitrary power over their impoverished clients. These concerns have led them to support impartial public provision by way of state welfare programs, including an unconditional basic income (UBI). In contrast to this administrative model of public welfare, I will propose a competitive model in which the state regulates and subsidizes a decentralized (...) and nonstatist provision of support for the poor. This model will fix the historically objectionable features of private provision by having the state prevent collusion among private charities, deliver information to recipients about alternative sources of assistance, and give substantial grants to charities as well as tax incentives and vouchers to donors. I will contend that such an approach would do a better job of minimizing domination of the poor than traditional welfare states and may prove more politically feasible than a UBI, at least in the near term in certain national contexts. (shrink)

Sweden features near the top of most gender-equality rankings. The World Economic Forum rates it as having one of the narrowest gender gaps in the world. But Sweden is not only a good place to be a woman: it also appears to be an idyll for new dads. Close to 90% of Swedish fathers take paternity leave. In 2013, some 340,000 dads took a total of 12 million days’ leave, equivalent to about seven weeks each. Women take even more leave (...) days to spend time with their children, but the gap is shrinking. Why do Swedish dads take so much time off work to raise their children? (shrink)

This article focuses on foundational issues in dynamic and static semantics, specifically on what is conceptually at stake between the dynamic framework and the truth-conditional framework, and consequently what kinds of evidence support each framework. The article examines two questions. First, it explores the consequences of taking the proposition as central semantic notion as characteristic of static semantics, and argues that this is not as limiting in accounting for discourse dynamics as many think. Specifically, it explores what it means for (...) a static semantics to incorporate the notion of context change potential in a dynamic pragmatics and denies that this conception of static semantics requires that all updates to the context be eliminative and distributive. Second, it argues that the central difference between the two frameworks is whether semantics or pragmatics accounts for dynamics, and explores what this means for the oft-heard claim that dynamic semantics blurs the semantics/pragmatics distinction. (shrink)

This discussion treats a set of familiar social derelictions as consequences of the perversion of a universalistic moral theory in the service of an ill-considered or insufficiently examined personal agenda.The set includes racism, sexism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, and class elitism, among other similar pathologies, under the general heading of discrimination. The perversion of moral theory from which these derelictions arise, I argue, involves restricting its scope of application to some preferred subgroup of the moral community of human beings. -/- The following (...) analysis of higher-order discrimination suggests that we often select the individuals who constitute such subgroups for reasons that we ourselves would reject on moral grounds were we to examine them carefully, but that we choose instead to put our rational resources in the service of avoiding any such examination at all costs. The implication is that arguments that truncate the scope of moral theory in fact justify bestowing the gift of moral treatment on a select few who deserve it no more than the many from whom we withhold it. Therefore, it would be precipitous to conclude that universalistic moral theory can be legitimately restricted in its practical scope of application in any way at all. (shrink)

This study identifies global factors conditioning the global problematics of the direction of social development. Global threats were evaluated and defined as dangerous processes, phenomena, and situations that cause harm to health, safety, well-being, and the lives of all humanity, and require removal. The essence of global risks was defined. These risks were defined as events or conditions that may cause a significant negative effect for several countries or spheres within a strategic period if they occur. Global problems were conceptualized. (...) These problems were defined as phenomena, matters, and situations that are not completely understandable, interesting, actual, require solving and regulation, and in addition do not have unified solutions. Current global challenges were analyzed, defined as strategic guidelines that cause transformational changes and are receiving attention from humanity. Global trends were defined as courses of social development. The composition and role of global actors were described, and defined as international organizations, leading states, regional organizations, powerful corporations, institutional investors, large cities, and well-known personalities. The directions of positive courses of social development were developed by means of using the authors’ mechanism of solving the global problematics. (shrink)

This paper analyses the National Populist Challenges to Europe’s Center Right. It assesses the cases of the UK, Germany and France. It poses three questions for Europe: How will political integration be achieved and maintained? What policies will foster economic inclusion in the Eurozone? And, third, what are the best means to achieve economic solvency and growth. The paper make a case that neoliberal economic policies over the past decades have undermined some nations' public sector and have also contributed to (...) tensions between the geographical east and west of Europe. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the increasing role of tourism in the world economy. The dynamics of international tourism indicators is investigated. The main global innovations in the tourism industry are identified: the growth of tourism types; the application of qualitatively new solutions of scientific and methodological and applied character; growing of tourism influence on the society; the existence of synergistic effect in the tourist industry as a result of combination of subjects efforts at all management levels; changing of the (...) role of internal and external factors that encourage innovative tourism development. In the article, the interaction of global processes on tourism innovations is defined. These processes are: intellectualization, informatization, cooperation, formation of the global tourism market, liberalization of the national tourism markets, increased competition and the spread of transnationalization. (shrink)

This thesis focuses on the use of intelligent tutoring system for education and training of students specialized in electricity in the field of technical and vocational education. The use of modern systems in training and education will have a great positive impact in improving the level of students receiving training and education; this will improve the level of the local economy by producing students of professionals who are able to engage in society efficiently, especially for those who have specialized in (...) electricity. It is known that students in electrical specialties face many problems because of time and cost. Learning and training is not as easy as you imagine, so intelligence is how to overcome these limitations effectively. Motivating the Intelligent Tutorial System (ITS) for this type of training. This system consists of a student model, which in turn will contain lessons, exercises and examples that will be used by the student in addition to the user interface model which makes the teacher to be able to manage lessons, examples, and questions and make changes to the system. Expert System (ES) model representing the Artificial Intelligence (AI) here has been used to determine the level of the student and gives him the results, directions and levels. The program was implemented and was used by trainees to show the extent of its impact. The students expressed their surprise and admiration in this way of education as the system used focuses on individual education which can be used at any time and without restrictions. After this experience, the dedicated (ITS) system needs to be developed in several ways such as to be used on mobile systems and web systems in addition to linking some of the specialized programs in the field of electricity. (shrink)

The study aimed to identify the reality of the use of social networks in the technical colleges in Palestine, where the variables of social networks were included. The analytical descriptive method was used in the study. A questionnaire consisting of (12) items was randomly distributed to college workers Technology in the Gaza Strip. The sample of the study consisted of (205) employees of these colleges. The response rate was 74.5%. The results showed a high degree of approval for the dimensions (...) of the social networks and a relative weight (74.15%) according to the perspective of the employees of the technical colleges in the Gaza Strip. The results of the study showed that there is a high level of social networking areas (site management and Website Content) in the technical colleges in the Gaza Strip. The field of site management ranked first with a relative weight of 74.91%, and second and last (Content Site) with a relative weight (73.38%). The results showed that there were differences between colleges in the use of social networks where the results showed that the most common colleges used these networks (UCAS) and the least used is (GTC). The results showed no differences between male and female employees in the use of social networks in technical colleges. The researchers suggest a number of recommendations, including: the need to raise awareness of the importance of Facebook and other social networking sites, through the holding of courses for employees in technical colleges, and to identify the ways to optimize the use of such sites, and the benefits of this use, and reflected positively on technical colleges. And the adoption of dealing with the various social networking sites as a reality, and the Palestinian and Arab technical colleges, use them in accordance with the objectives of technical colleges. Advise the Department of Technical Colleges to devote time to their presence on social networks to follow the public and respond to their queries. There is a need for the attention of decision-makers in technical colleges in social sites, because they are considered an important and effective means of communication, and the link between beneficiaries and decision-makers. There is a need to promote the use of modern electronic means of work and the need to increase the link of customers to the college through electronic services. (shrink)

I want to examine the implications of a metaphysical thesis which is presupposed in various objections to Rawls' theory of justice.Although their criticisms differ in many respects, they concur in employing what I shall refer to as the continuity thesis. This consists of the following claims conjointly: (1) The parties in the original position (henceforth the OP) are, and know themselves to be, fully mature persons who will be among the members of the well-ordered society (henceforth the WOS) which is (...) generated by their choice of principles of justice. (2) The OP is a conscious event among others, integrated (compatibly with the constraints on knowledge and motivation imposed on the parties) into the regular continuity of experience that comprises each of their ongoing constitutes lives. (3) The parties in the OP thus are, and regard themselves as, psychologically continuing persons, partially determined in personality and interests by prior experiences, capable of recollection and regret concerning the past, anticipation and apprehensiveness regarding the future, and so on. Although the continuity thesis as stated above is not at odds with any of the conditions that define the OP, its exegetical validity is a matter for discussion. I shall be concerned to argue that if it is indeed contained in or a consequence of Rawls' theory, then it casts into doubt the capacity of the OP to generate or justify any principles of justice at all. On the other hand, if the continuity thesis is viewed as dispensable and unnecessary to the Rawlsian enterprise, then Rawls is correct in maintaining the irrelevance of the question of personal identity to the construction of his moral theory. In this case, the contract-theoretic, instrumentalist justification for the two principles of justice (henceforth the 2PJ) needs to be supplanted by a modified conception of wide reflective equilibrium. The considerations that form the bulk of this discussion then may be understood as providing a rationale for Rawls' recent revisions in the model of justification on which his theory of justice rests, and for his increasing emphasis on us as moral mediators between the OP and the WOS. Now I want to consider the question of whether or not, given the textual evidence, anything like the continuity thesis is stated or implied by Rawls, and what problems for his theory, if any, turn on a positive or negative answer to this question. -/- . (shrink)

The concept of neutrosophic locally compact and neutrosophic compact open topology are introduced and some interesting propositions are discussed.

The paper explores the way in which we can make sense of the seemingly contradictory presentations of God and the gods in tragic literature by looking to the thought of Martin Heidegger. The duplicity of the gods in tragedy is found to be a function of the uncertainty and questionworthiness of being.

Current disputes over the nature and purpose of the university are rooted in a philosophical divide between theory and practice. Academics often defend the concept of a university devoted to purely theoretical activities. Politicians and wider society tend to argue that the university should take on more practical concerns. I critique two typical defenses of the theoretical concept—one historical and one based on the value of pure research—and show that neither the theoretical nor the practical concept of a university accommodates (...) all the important goals expected of university research and teaching. Using the classical pragmatist argument against a sharp division between theory and practice, I show how we can move beyond the debate between the theoretical and practical concepts of a university, while maintaining a place for pure and applied research, liberal and vocational education, and social impact through both economic applications and criticism aimed at promoting social justice. (shrink)

Normative dualism between descriptions of the mental and the physical is still a problem for many philosophers that provokes more and more attempts to justify it, or, on the contrary, to overcome it by means of reduction. The problem of a special normative status of mental states is usually considered in isolation from the concept of truth. Moreover, the definition of truth is often construed only as a part of the problem of normativity: in this case, truth is only a (...) kind of norm, for example, a goal of scientific research. Donald Davidson, however, believed that truth is not the norm and that, on the contrary, norms are possible only through the use of the primitive and original concept of truth already available to us. In this paper, we propose that if one develops an idea of such a conceptual dependence between truth and norms in a certain way, then it will become possible to solve the problem of a normative gap between our descriptions of the mental and the physical. In other words, if the assimilation of the concept of truth precedes the learning of norms pertaining to the mental and the physical, then the solution for the problem of the gap between these norms can be directly related to conditions and differences in the use of the notion of truth. (shrink)

This review offers an overview of Sandis's book and raises a few questions about it.

Positivist medical historians, guided by the savoir of modern western biomedicine, have long depicted medieval medicine as an aberration along the continuum of scientific and medical progress. Historical epistemology, founded in the ideas of Cavailles, Foucault, Davidson, and Hacking, however, allows the historian to disrupt this false continuum and to unchain medieval medicine from modern medicine. Postmodernist approaches, such as those sourced in Lyotard, Barthes, and Derrida, allow the historian to further deconstruct medieval and modern medical discourse, revealing a multitude (...) of narrative lenses spinning around biomedical and biocultural strands. In liberating these two medical systems and setting them within the distinct historical and epistemological contexts that both shaped and were shaped by them, the historian can revision the theories, practices, and culture of medieval medicine without having to anachronistically justify them according to modern medical discourse. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence is one of the most rapidly evolving fields today. It is used in the majority of computer science applications nowadays. Expert systems are one of the most valuable types of AI; they are used to deliver predictions and decisions in order to make scientific, medical, and even architectural challenges easier to address; they will eventually take the place of a human expert. Without having to meet with a genuine human specialist, the user will be able to get a (...) precise solution or diagnose to his problem. This study provides an illustration of how computer systems can be used in agriculture. In order to construct an expert system that can forecast a disease based on its symptoms, we chose a Coriander plant and five of its recognized ailments. CLIPS was used to develop the system. This article contains a full summary of the work that has been done. (shrink)

My aim in this discussion is to argue, not only that government should provide funding for the arts, but a fortiori that it should provide funding for unconventional, disruptive works of art.

What makes science trustworthy to the public? This chapter examines one proposed answer: the trustworthiness of science is based at least in part on its independence from the idiosyncratic values, interests, and ideas of individual scientists. That is, science is trustworthy to the extent that following the scientific process would result in the same conclusions, regardless of the particular scientists involved. We analyze this "idiosyncrasy-free ideal" for science by looking at philosophical debates about inductive risk, focusing on two recent proposals (...) which offer different methods of avoiding idiosyncrasy: the high epistemic standards proposal and the democratic values proposal. (shrink)

Background: Community-based education (CBE) involves educating the head (cognitive), heart (affective), and the hand (practical) by utilizing tools that enable us to broaden and interrogate our value systems. This article reports on the use of virtue ethics (VE) theory for understanding the principles that create, maintain and sustain a socially accountable community placement programme for undergraduate medical students. Our research questions driving this secondary analysis were; what are the goods which are internal to the successful practice of CBE in medicine, (...) and what are the virtues that are likely to promote and sustain them? -/- Methods: We conducted a secondary theoretically informed thematic analysis of the primary data based on MacIntyre’s virtue ethics theory as the conceptual framework. -/- Results: Virtue ethics is an ethical approach that emphasizes the role of character and virtue in shaping moral behavior; when individuals engage in practices (such as CBE), goods internal to those practices (such as a collaborative attitude) strengthen the practices themselves, but also augment those individuals’ virtues, and that of their community (such as empathy). We identified several goods that are internal to the practice of CBE and accompanying virtues as important for the development, implementation and sustainability of a socially accountable community placement programme. A service-oriented mind-set, a deep understanding of community needs, a transformed mind, and a collaborative approach emerged as goods internal to the practice of a socially accountable CBE. The virtues needed to sustain the identified internal goods included empathy and compassion, connectedness, accountability, engagement [sustained relationship], cooperation, perseverance, and willingness to be an agent of change. -/- Conclusion: This study found that MacIntyre’s virtue ethics theory provided a useful theoretical lens for understanding the principles that create, maintain and sustain CBE practice. (shrink)

This paper traces two contradicting beliefs about death and immortality in the writings of Rabbi Hayyim Hirschensohn, and examines these opposing beliefs in his Halakhic ruling, in the case of Autopsies. The paper opens by conceptualizing two possible attitudes regarding the relation between this-world and the ʽother-world’, and by analyzing two main beliefs regarding death and immortality in their relation to the body-spirit distinction (the naturalistic and the spiritualistic approach). It demonstrates how Hirschensohn was holding these two different views. The (...) paper then moves to examine whether his halakhic ruling may help us in understanding which approach was Hirschensohn’s favorable belief, by investigating his halakhic ruling regarding autopsies. Hirschensohn permits to perform such surgeries, however subject to some halakhic limitations. The paper concludes that the naturalistic belief regarding death appears to be the more dominant one in his thought. Finally, I point out a few consequences of this paper, for addressing some contemporary ethical dilemmas regarding human corpses. (shrink)

Weighing competing obligations and achieving the “greatest balance” of right over wrong guides an individual, an agency or a country in determining what ought to be done in an ethically challenging situation. Conducting controlled human infection model (CHIM) studies in India is one such situation. The ethical challenge in conducting a CHIM study lies in completing the difficult task of introducing standardised, attenuated strains of micro-organisms into normal healthy volunteers, at the same time ensuring the safety of these healthy individuals (...) from potential and completely informed risks in a fashion that is transparent and accountable. The bar is further raised against the background of already fragile public confidence in biomedical research in India; especially when “deliberate” introduction of microbial agents into healthy individuals is involved, with the larger altruistic objective of gain to society as a whole. -/- This paper discusses the uses of CHIM studies with respect to the larger scientific Indian research enterprise of the 21st century. It further explores etic and emic perspectives in conducting such trials in India and seeks to generate an ethical coherence to the justification for conducting CHIM studies in India. The paper deliberates on ethical issues arising out of conducting CHIM studies and reflects on how developing the capacity for CHIM studies in India is likely to strengthen the health research and development sector in the country. -/- . (shrink)

aristotle closes the second common book of his ethical treatises by considering a number of puzzles about wisdom and φρόνησις,1 devoting the bulk of his attention to a puzzle about the usefulness of the latter. Briefly, the puzzle is that if φρόνησις is useful insofar as it enables us to act virtuously, it will be useless both to the virtuous person, who naturally acts well without possessing it, and to the non-virtuous person, so long as someone else tells her how (...) to act. Either way, it would seem, possessing φρόνησις is useless. There is agreement among scholars that Aristotle’s reply depends on the following biconditional claim: Virtue-Φρόνησις... (shrink)

This article criticizes radical labor republicanism on republican grounds. I show that its demand for universal workplace democracy via workers’ cooperatives conflicts with republican freedom along three different dimensions: first, freedom to choose an occupation…and not to choose one; second, freedom within the very cooperatives that workers are to democratically govern; and third, freedom within the newly proletarian state. In the conclusion, I ask whether these criticisms apply, at least in part, to the more modest, incrementalist strand of labor republicanism. (...) To the extent that they do, delaboring republicanism might be the best response. (shrink)

This article defends the conclusion that the soccer World Cup in Qatar should not be boycotted by rich countries from the Global North. This conclusion is underpinned by considerations about the economic background conditions in guest workers’ home countries. Three arguments are considered for the view that the World Cup should be boycotted. It is argued that each of these arguments is unsound. Section 7 contains a discussion of an argument for a boycott that centers on the process through which (...) Qatar was awarded the World Cup. This argument is rejected. The article lists several ways in which guest workers in Qatar are wronged, but this fact about how guest workers are treated does not justify a boycott by rich countries from the Global North. (shrink)

As these opening quotes acknowledge, the Prisoner’s Dilemma (PD) represents a core puzzle within the formal mathematics of game theory.3 Its rise in conspicuity is evident figure 2.1 above demonstrating a relatively steady rise in incidences of the phrase’s usage between 1960 to 1995, with a stable presence persisting into the twenty first century. This famous two-person “game,” with a stock narrative cast in terms of two prisoners who each independently must choose whether to remain silent or speak, each advancing (...) self-interest at the expense of the other and thereby achieving a mutually suboptimal outcome, mires any social interaction it is applied to into perplexity. The logic of this game proves the inverse of Adam Smith’s invisible hand: individuals acting on self interest will achieve a mutually suboptimal outcome. However, as this chapter illuminates, the assumptions underlying game theory drive this conclusion. (shrink)

Faith has many aspects. One of them is whether absolute logical proof for God’s existence is a prerequisite for the proper establishment and individual acceptance of a religious system. The treatment of this question, examined here in the Jewish context of Rabbi Prof. Eliezer Berkovits, has been strongly influenced in the modern era by the radical foundationalism and radical skepticism of Descartes, who rooted in the Western mind the notion that religion and religious issues are “all or nothing” questions. Cartesianism, (...) which surprisingly became the basis of modern secularism, was criticized by the classical American pragmatists. Peirce, James and Dewey all rejected the attempt to achieve infallible absolute knowledge, as well as the presumptuousness of establishing such a knowledge by means of casting Cartesian hyperbolic doubt. They advocated an alternative approach which was more holistic and humane. This paper lays out Descartes’s approach and the pragmatists’ critique. Despite the place that pragmatic considerations hold in Jewish tradition, some thinkers reject the relevance of these ideas. Yet Berkovits’s thought suggest a different path. He rejected Descartes’ radical skepticism and his radical foundationalism, in favor of a moderate foundationalism, which allows for a belief in God alongside constructive doubts. Similar to Peirce’s conception of the fixation of belief, Berkovits views local doubts (distinct from the hyperbolic doubt) as necessary for thought. Berkovits’s understanding of the biblical human-divine encounter, following Rosenzweig, Buber, and Heschel, is conceptualized here as “encounter theology”. Berkovits criticizes the propositionalist attempts to prove God’s existence logically, as well as the presumptuousness of basing religious belief on the teleological world-order. However, Berkovits’s conception of the ‘caring God’ is not provable, and thus defined as a pragmatic ‘postulate’. The article concludes by considering Berkovits’s “encounter theology”. In contrast to the approach described by Haym Soloveitchik, of halakhic stringency and lack of subjective experience of God’s face, Berkovits’s approach is dialogic through and through. (shrink)

Neuroeducation as an amalgamation of neuroscience, cognitive science and educational psychology has the explicit aim of improving classroom teaching and learning and has repeatedly stressed the role of the teacher in student motivation and learning. This article briefly reviews the nature of human learning from the perspective of neuroeducation and presents four factors of successful learning as a consequence of this line of research. These four factors relate to the credibility of the teacher, individual differences, the role of a positive (...) classroom climate and the activation of previous knowledge. (shrink)

This article examines A.J. Heschel’s “Theology of pathos” in light of the critique Eliezer Berkovits raised against it. Heschel’s theology of pathos is the notion of God as the “most moved mover”, who cares deeply for humans, and thus highly influencing their prophetic motivation for human-social improvement. Berkovits, expressing the negative-transcendent theology of Maimonides, assessed that Heschel’s theology of pathos is not systematic, is anthropomorphic, and reflects a foreign Christian influence. However, when checking Berkovits’s own views as a thinker, it (...) turns out that he formulated some immanent theological notions that were overlapping those of Heschel, for example in attributing God the personal trait of caring. Surprisingly, most Heschel’s scholars did not consider this point. This riddle addressed here in two ways: (1) Psychological and Social, on which I understand Berkovits’s critique as a way of coping with his own religious perplexities, and in a wider sense, it is asserted that trans-denominational critique may be a discursive opportunity for mutual corrigibility. (2) Theological, since Heschel and Berkovits indeed faced a similar theological challenge, of rejecting any description of God as anthropomorphism. I thus offer a constructive theological argument for providing a justification to the immanent theologies of both Heschel and Berkovits. (shrink)

Tracking and goal setting are popular approaches in the personal health and fitness industry. In this paper we use a similar approach to assist users in their journey for a more sustainable lifestyle, starting with food. We employ Action Design Research (ADR) methodology to develop an application and subsequently propose design principles for developing blockchain-based applications for assisting users on their path to eating environmentally friendly food. The path to a sustainable lifestyle can be hard as individuals often do not (...) realize their personal impact towards achieving a net zero carbon future. To address this shortcoming, this study conducts an ADR experiment to create affordances for users to learn, create impact and realize that they are not alone in this journey thus motivating users to a sustainable lifestyle. The design principles that emerged from the project are design for categories and labels, design for measuring collective impact, and design for rewards and redemption. (shrink)

There are three questions associated with Simpson’s paradox (SP): (i) Why is SP paradoxical? (ii) What conditions generate SP? and (iii) How to proceed when confronted with SP? An adequate analysis of the paradox starts by distinguishing these three questions. Then, by developing a formal account of SP, and substantiating it with a counterexample to causal accounts, we argue that there are no causal factors at play in answering questions (i) and (ii). Causality enters only in connection with action.

Although they were never to meet and corresponded only briefly, Catharine Macaulay and Mary Wollstonecraft shared a mutual admiration and a strong intellectual bond. Macaulay’s work had a profound and lasting effect on Wollstonecraft, and she developed and expanded on many of Macaulay’s ideas. While she often took these in a different direction, there remains a great synergy between their ideas to the extent that we can understand Wollstonecraft’s own feminist arguments by approaching them through the frameworks and ideas that (...) Macaulay provided. These included the principles of classical republicanism, particularly in its understanding of the values of freedom, equality and virtue, and an understanding of reason as grounded in immutable principles that apply equally to both sexes. On the question of women’s freedom and social equality with men, I argue that though Macaulay sets up the problem in far richer and more detailed philosophical terms, in the end it is Wollstonecraft that has the more compelling account of its far-reaching social implications and of how this might be addressed. (shrink)

We hope to show that the overall protreptic plan of Aristotle's ethical writings is based on the plan he used in his published work Protrepticus (Exhortation to Philosophy), by highlighting those passages that primarily offer hortatory or protreptic motivation rather than dialectical argumentation and analysis, and by illustrating several ways that Aristotle adapts certain arguments and examples from his Protrepticus. In this essay we confine our attention to the books definitely attributable to the Nicomachean Ethics (thus excluding the common books).

This article assesses how autonomy and machine learning impact the existential risk of nuclear war. It situates the problem of cyber security, which proceeds by stealth, within the larger context of nuclear deterrence, which is effective when it functions with transparency and credibility. Cyber vulnerabilities poses new weaknesses to the strategic stability provided by nuclear deterrence. This article offers best practices for the use of computer and information technologies integrated into nuclear weapons systems. Focusing on nuclear command and control, avoiding (...) autonomy and machine learning is recommended as one means to reduce the existential risk of unintended nuclear conflict. (shrink)

Heidegger’s “Evening Conversation: In a Prisoner of War Camp in Russia, between a Younger and an Older Man”, one of three dialogues composed by Heidegger after the defeat of National Socialist Germany published in Country Path Conversations explores the being-historical situation and fate of the German people by turning to the early Daoist text of the Zhuangzi. My article traces how Heidegger interprets fundamental concepts from the Zhuangzi, mediated by way of Richard Wilhelm’s translation Das wahre Buch vom südlichen Blütenland, (...) such as naturalness, letting/releasement, the unnecessary and the useless in the context of his hermeneutical and political situation. I consider to what extent this dialogue, along with his other discussions of the Zhuangzi and intensive engagement with the Daodejing from 1943 to 1950, constitute a “Daoist turn” in Heidegger’s thinking that helped shape his Postwar thought. (shrink)

The paper argues that the moral philosophy of Thomas Hobbes is unified by a complex conception of reason that imposes consistency norms of both rationality and reasonableness. Hobbes’s conceptions of rightness as reciprocity, and moral goodness as sociability belong to an original and attractive moral theory that is neither teleological nor classically deontological, nor as interpreters have variously argued, subjectivist, contractarian, egoist, or dependent on divine command.