This paper introduces a body of research on Organizational Behavior and Industrial/organizational Psychology that expands the range of empirical evidence relevant to the ongoing character-situation debate. This body of research, mostly neglected by moral philosophers, provides important insights to move the debate forward. First, the OB/io scholarship provides empirical evidence to show that social environments like organizations have significant power to shape the character traits of their members. This scholarship also describes some of the mechanisms through which this process of (...) reshaping character takes place. Second, the character-situation debate has narrowly focused on situational influences that affect behavior episodically and haphazardly. The OB/io research, however, highlights the importance of distinguishing such situational influences from influences that, like organizational influences, shape our character traits because they are continuous and coordinated. Third, the OB/io literature suggests that most individuals display character traits that, while local to the organization, can be consistent across situations. This puts pressure on the accounts of character proposed by traditional virtue ethics and situationism and provides empirical support to interactionist models based on cognitive-affective processing system theories of personality. Finally, the OB/io literature raises important challenges to the possibility of achieving virtue, provides valuable and untapped resources to cultivate character, and suggests new avenues of normative and empirical research. (shrink)

Scholars who favor shareholder primacy usually claim either that managers should not fulfill corporate duties of beneficence or that, if they are required to fulfill them, they do so by going against their obligations to shareholders. Distinguishing between structurally different types of duties of beneficence and recognizing the full force of the normative demands imposed on managers reveal that this view needs to be qualified. Although it is correct to think that managers, when acting on behalf of shareholders, are not (...) required to fulfill wide duties of charity, they are nevertheless required to fulfill a variety of narrow duties of beneficence. What is more, the obligation to fulfill these duties arises precisely because they are acting on behalf of shareholders. As such, this article 1) refines our understanding of the duties of corporate beneficence and 2) helps to identify which duties of beneficence are imposed on managers when they are acting on behalf of shareholders. (shrink)

Mary Wollstonecraft argues that women must be independent citizens, but that they cannot be that unless they fulfill certain duties as mothers. This is problematic in a number of ways, as argued by Laura Brace in a 2000 article. However, I argue that if we understand Wollstonecraft's concept of independence in a republican, rather than a liberal context, and at the same time pay close attention to her discussion of motherhood, a feminist reading of Wollstonecraft is not only possible but (...) enriching. I will attempt to show, in particular, that the seeds of a feminist argument for co-parenting are to be found in the Vindication of the Rights of Woman. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:The distinction between what I call nonelective obligations and discretionary obligations, a distinction that focuses on one particular thread of the distinction between perfect and imperfect duties, helps us to identify the obligations that carry over from principals to agents. Clarity on this issue is necessary to identify the moral obligations within “shareholder primacy”, which conceives of managers as agents of shareholders. My main claim is that the principal-agent relation requires agents to fulfill nonelective obligations, but it does not always (...) require discharging discretionary obligations. I show that the requirement to fulfill nonelective obligations is more far-reaching than has been acknowledged by most defenders and critics of shareholder primacy. But I also show that managers are not bound by certain discretionary obligations like charity, showing that their moral obligations are more circumscribed than the obligations that apply to human beings in general. (shrink)

Duties of beneficence are said to allow for leeway to discharge them. By distinguishing between two different types of leeway, Mejia identified three structurally different duties of beneficence. In this Commentary I deploy those distinctions to clarify the nature of a fourth type of duty of beneficence, one prompted by a global pandemic, a duty with a peculiar, and seldom recognized, conceptual logic. I provide some guidelines that should orient managers when they take themselves to be fulfilling such a duty (...) on behalf of shareholders. (shrink)

In this chapter we use methods of corpus linguistics to investigate the ways in which mathematicians describe their work as explanatory in their research papers. We analyse use of the words explain/explanation (and various related words and expressions) in a large corpus of texts containing research papers in mathematics and in physical sciences, comparing this with their use in corpora of general, day-to-day English. We find that although mathematicians do use this family of words, such use is considerably less prevalent (...) in mathematics papers than in physics papers or in general English. Furthermore, we find that the proportion with which mathematicians use expressions related to ‘explaining why’ and ‘explaining how’ is significantly different to the equivalent proportion in physics and in general English. We discuss possible accounts for these differences. (shrink)

This article synthesizes the results of several interviews with argumentation scholars from across the American continents to address three questions regarding the connections in argumentation studies between North and South/Central America: “What motivated the study of argumentation in the Americas?” “What commonalities, if any, exist in argumentation studies across the Americas?” and “What should the future of argumentation studies in the Americas look like?” Using these interviews in combination with existing textual sources, the article also provides motivated suggestions for directions (...) for the future of the community in the field. (shrink)

El ambiente artificial en el que se despliega la vida en el planeta potencia un conjunto de interrogantes –algunos ya clásicos, otros novedosos– sobre los modos de existencia de los artefactos, sistemas y objetos técnicos que permean cada una de nuestras acciones. Parte importante de estos interrogantes se ocupa de las transformaciones que este ambiente artificial genera en la experiencia moral, política y cognitiva de los individuos, instituciones y sociedades. El Glosario de filosofía de la técnica elabora un mapa amplio, (...) ecléctico y heterogéneo, pero a la vez riguroso, a partir de las discusiones actuales en torno a la técnica en Latinoamérica y el ámbito hispanoparlante; abarca las discusiones canónicas dentro del campo de la filosofía de la técnica, pero también brinda un importante espacio a cuestiones emergentes, más recientes, con menos recorrido histórico, así como a conceptos que se desprenden de las agendas de indagación del ámbito local, muchas veces ausentes en las compilaciones impulsadas por el norte global y las modas académicas y editoriales. El panorama que presenta este volumen excede lo estrictamente filosófico (y sus distintas disciplinas) para incluir teoría de los medios, sociología, antropología, investigación en artes, letras y ciencias de la educación, entre otros abordajes posibles de la complejidad de la técnica como problema central de nuestros días. (shrink)

This paper reconstructs Peter Carruthers’s arguments for criticizing the test focused on the metacognitive capacities of non-humans animals. It is possible to discuss metacognition or there are other mechanisms that being is used by animals in the metacognitive test? This paper offers an overview about the dispute about the metacognitive capacities(metaperception and metamemory) of the animals. The structure of this paper is the following: the first part presents the most relevant arguments that Carruthers offers to discuss and criticize the experiments (...) focused on animal metacognition. The second part it reconstructs the arguments against the Carruthers’s interpretation for explaining the metacognitive test. The third part it makes a balance between the Carruthers’s approach and his critic. Finally, the fourth part, in concluding that despite to the critics, the Carrtuhers’s arguments surpass these difficulties. (shrink)

Animal technique has occupied a marginal position in reflections on technique, and in the philosophical literature there is no strict definition of it. However, it is of great importance to understand the limits and the distinctive features of our own technique. This work argues that it is possible to establish a solid definition of animal technique based on two definitions of human technique (prosthetic notion of technique and material culture) and one particular dimension of human tools (cognitive tools). This paper (...) takes a naturalistic approach that enables to review different study cases focused on animals’ capacity to make and use tools. (shrink)

We examine the notion of cognitive artifact and its possible application to the animal technic. Although the issue of animal technic is not very much discussed, the case studies focused on the capacity of using and manufacturing tools suggest that some animals deploy cognitive skills. Could the tools employed by animals be considered genuine cases of cognitive artifacts? In this paper we propose a definition of “cognitive artifact” based on the notion of “proper function,” which allows us to develop a (...) gradual scale where we place different kinds of artifacts according to the prevalence of the cognitive function (in opposition to the prac-tical one). Applying this scale to the non-human sphere, we defend the idea that there exists a range of non-human technical phenomena of use and artifacts and tools manufacturing, and that some of this artifacts have an incipient proper cognitive function. In order to defend these theses, we examine the examples of the cobwebs, the nests and the honeycombs. (shrink)

El objetivo tradicional de la unidad de cuidados intensivos (UCI) es disminuir la mortalidad y morbilidad de los pacientes en estado crítico. A pesar de los avances médicos y tecnológicos, la UCI continúa siendo un lugar común en donde la muerte ocurre, por lo que en la actualidad el equipo de salud de la UCI debe estar familiarizado con los cuidados paliativos y su legislación en México. Preservar la dignidad del paciente, evitar el daño y mantener una comunicación adecuada entre (...) los miembros del equipo de salud y los familiares es fundamental. No existe una técnica única y universal aceptada para la atención de los pacientes en estado terminal en las UCI, por lo que se debe individualizar cada caso y definir objetivos de atención junto con el paciente o sus familiares dentro del marco legal vigente en México. (shrink)

In 2011 we proposed that the modern advances in neurosciences would eventually push the field of psychology to an hour of truth as concerns its identity: indeed, what is psychology, if psychological functions and instances can be tied to characterized brain patterns (Bazan, 2011)? As Axel Cleeremans opens this Grand Challenge with a comparable question1, and as there is growing disagreement with the “I am my brain” paradigm, we think that the topic is indeed, 5 years later, crucially at stake. (...) We had, in 2011, contextualized this question, as one driven by the advances in biology—anatomy in the sixteenth century, (neuro-)physiology in the nineteenth century and neurosciences today. Indeed, with each major advance, decisive moments came for psychology: in the sixteenth century, the name psychologia was launched, in the nineteenth century, psychology became a full-blown scientific field, and today, its specific identity is being questioned (Bazan, 2015). It now appears indeed that it is neuroscientists themselves, who formulate the possibility of a science of representational life, which is autonomous as regards to its biological substrates. For example, the neuroscientist Etienne Koechlin in a conference in Paris on February 2nd, 2016, gave as an alternative definition for neuroscience “the mechanisms and computational operations which govern the mental representations independently from their material substrate and its content2”. We will further propose that this autonomy is to be regarded as an organizational autonomy. (shrink)

This study draws on deontic justice theory to examine an unexplored socioemotional micro-foundation of corporate social responsibility (CSR), namely anticipated guilt, in an effort to improve our understanding of employees’ moral reactions to their organization’s CSR. We empirically investigate whether environmental CSR induces anticipated guilt (i.e., concerns about future guilt for not contributing to organizational CSR) leading to organizational environmental citizenship behavior. We also consider two boundary conditions related to the social nature of anticipated guilt: line manager support for the (...) environment and negative environmental group norms. To test our hypotheses, we analyzed data from a convenience sample of 503 managers working in Mexican organizations, using Latent Moderated Structural equation modeling. Overall, our results support the deontic argument that employees care about CSR because CSR embodies moral concerns. Specifically, our findings show that efforts to avoid a guilty conscience increase when the line manager provides increased resources and control to act for the environment, and when group members do not care for the environment, suggesting that employees feel they have to compensate for their group’s moral failure. (shrink)

En este segundo documento nos ocupamos del aborto realizado por motivos terapéuticos o, dicho más brevemente, del aborto terapéutico. En la Argentina, el aborto plantea serios desafíos para la salud pública, ya que, pese a estar prohibido, se practica de forma clandestina y, muchas veces, insegura, poniendo en riesgo la vida y la salud de las mujeres. Por esta razón, creemos que la sociedad y el Estado deben debatir este problema y encontrar soluciones que resguarden los derechos de las mujeres. (...) El artículo 86, inciso 1, del Código Penal argentino expresamente despenaliza el aborto cuando corre peligro la vida o la salud de la mujer. En estos casos, se habla de aborto terapéutico. Esta disposición legal no suele aplicarse ni por los médicos ni por los profesionales que trabajan en la justicia, ya sea por desconocimiento o por razones ideológicas. Más aún, en muchos casos, las interpretaciones del Código Penal se apartan de su letra y restringen arbitrariamente su aplicación. Por estas razones, nos parece importante analizar este problema y proveer información sobre los aspectos legales y éticos involucrados en el aborto terapéutico en la Argentina. Este documento comienza con el relato de un caso hipotético, elaborado a partir de experiencias reales, con el objetivo de acercar al público a una situación concreta. Intercaladas en el cuerpo del relato, se desarrollan algunas reflexiones acerca de las implicaciones médicas, éticas y legales del caso. A continuación, se presenta un apartado referido al marco legal en el que se deben encuadrar los casos de aborto no punible. El documento sigue con una serie de breves recomendaciones destinadas tanto a los profesionales que trabajan en el sistema judicial como a los profesionales de la salud. Por último, se incluye un apéndice que contiene los principios que rigen la interpretación en materia penal y el glosario médico y legal, donde se pueden buscar las palabras resaltadas a lo largo del documento. (shrink)

In Logique du Fantasme, Lacan argues that the compulsion to repeat does not obey the same discharge logic as homeostatic processes. Repetition installs a realm that is categorically different from the one related to homeostatic pleasure seeking, a properly subjective one, one in which the mark “stands for,” “takes the place of,” what we have ventured to call “an event,” and what only in the movement of return, in what Lacan calls a “thinking of repetition,” confirms and ever reconfirms this (...) point of no return, which is also a qualitative cut and a structural loss. The kind of “standing for” Lacan intends here with the concept of repetition is certainly not something like an image or a faithful description. No, what Lacan wishes to stress is that this mark is situated at another level, at another place, it is “entstellt,” and as such, it is punctually impinging upon the bodily dynamics without rendering the event, without having an external meta-point of view, but cutting across registers according to a logics that is not the homeostatic memory logics. This paper elaborates on this distinction on the basis of a confrontation with what Freud says about the pleasure principle and its beyond in Beyond the Pleasure Principle, and also takes inspiration from Freud’s Project for a Scientific Psychology. We argue that Lacan’s theory of enjoyment takes up and generalizes what Freud was after in Beyond the Pleasure Principle with the Wiederholungszwang, and pushes Freud’s thoughts to a more articulated point: to the point where a subject is considered to speak only when it has allowed the other, through discourse, to have impacted and cut into his bodily pleasure dynamics. (shrink)

This paper focuses on how building human potentialities in education can enhance learning competencies in students for the development of the self and the society. Human potential refers to a possibility human beings are capable of achieving. Montessori believes that the traditional system of education directs students to learn through memorization and recitation techniques and does not lay much emphasis on helping students to bring out their maximum potential. What goal can we attribute to education today? Our focus shall be (...) to answer the questions, what are the favorable conditions under which education can help to build human potentialities? Is Montessori’s view essential in enhancing creativity and building the necessary competencies of the learners in our society today? Education is a natural process carried out by the human individual. It is not what the teacher gives and is not acquired by listening to words but by experiences upon the environment. Montessori opts that education should help the learners develop confidence in their emerging abilities and offer them the opportunity to gain independence in daily tasks. The pedagogic significance of this work serves as a guide for the educational system in Africa and Cameroon in particular. It serves as a guide for curriculum developers and policy makers to bring out programs that will enhance the building of individual competencies for eventual development. Thus Montessori’s idea of education to build human potentialities is indispensible to our educational system today. (shrink)

The present collection of translations arises from our work within Writing Urban Places, a network of researchers interested in the different ways citizens appropriate meaningful built environments through stories, and in doing so are also better able to integrate with others. A key locus in this respect is what our network has termed the ‘mid-sized’ [or ‘intermediate’] European city. Often afforded only cursory attention in the discussion of both culture and society, overlooked in favour of more usual suspects, such urban (...) places allow for a more de-centred, and on occasions regionally focused, view of urban practices, even as they play host to a significant element of contemporary European life and experience. The quest for meaningfulness and appropriation of the urban environment through co-creative, adaptive, and transformative processes (many of which have a textual quality) became central to the theoretical framework of this initiative. Between the individual places in which such processes could be observed and documented, we hypothesized, arises the problem of intermediation – the move from place to place, and its techniques. Translation, more than a textual practice among others, emerged as a structuring consideration of the project at a European scale. Other Destinations is the outcome of this collective process presented here, offering entry into this work to an English-language readership for the first time. We hope that, even as they bring their cities of origin somewhat closer to a new readership, those readers will be uprooted and moved some distance in the direction of these ‘other destinations.’ -/- The edited volume Other Destinations. Translating the Mid-sized European City thus features English translations of 15 21st century (mainly) literary texts published in different media (books, podcasts, journals, online/social media) originally written in languages other than English and that have not previously been translated into English. The selected texts cover the topic of mid-sized European cities, where mid-sized does not solely refer to the size in terms of geographical scope or the number of inhabitants, but also to their socio-historical context of urban identity where these cities are neither metropolises nor small towns, but “other”, lesser-known European cities. The texts selected to be translated in this edited volume cover cities like Volos, Canakkale, Varna, Plovdiv, Durres, Tirana, Porto, Den Haag, Osijek, Salzburg, Naples, Zrenjanin, Loule and others…. The publication intends to enhance the dissemination and accessibility to an international readership of texts about overlooked urban contexts, “other”, lesser-known European cities, their stories and signifying practices in order to develop a better awareness of these cities, their self-constructions, and their responses to the challenges of the present. (shrink)

We defend a noetic account of intramathematical explanation. On this view, a piece of mathematics is explanatory just in case it produces understanding of an appropriate type. We motivate the view by presenting some appealing features of noeticism. We then discuss and criticize the most prominent extant version of noeticism, due to Inglis and Mejía Ramos, which identifies explanatory understanding with the possession of well-organized cognitive schemas. Finally, we present a novel noetic account. On our view, explanatory understanding arises from (...) meeting specific explanatory objectives. We defend a cluster-concept account of explanatory objectives and identify four important subfamilies within the relevant network of resemblance relations. The resulting view is objectivist (in the sense that it takes explanatory success to be a matter of observer-independent fact), broader in scope than why-question-based accounts, compatible with empirical findings on experts’ explanatory judgments, and capable of generalizing (with appropriate provisos) to scientific explanation as a whole. It thus fulfills Friedman’s half-century-old demand for a general and objectivist theory which accounts for the link between explanation and understanding. (shrink)

"Rubén Sierra: una filosofía ocasionalista" explora la relación de este filósofo colombiano con algunos rasgos del ocasionalismo: la búsqueda de matices más que de generalidades; el uso de un lenguaje común para referirse a las circunstancias; la expectativa de cambio de las situaciones indeseadas a partir de la denuncia y la apertura a la refutación.