There have been numerous initiatives to increase access to higher education for those residing in marginalised locales in Wales. However, entrance in itself does not guarantee success and it is important for educators and policy makers to explore issues of retention. Classed and relational positionings often conflict with non-traditional students' education trajectories and sometimes contribute to their withdrawal from academia. In response to this challenge the current paper focuses on the accounts of non-traditional students in Communities First[1] areas who took (...) an undergraduate social science module with The Open University in Wales. Importantly, rather than reading these barriers to progression as students' individual difficulties, the paper considers how educational cultures can create and perpetuate disadvantage. Exploring students' accounts of pedagogy and administration, the paper focuses on online provision in distance learning and offers a range of strategies that could potentially improve the delivery of an Open University module and students' experiences in future presentations. (shrink)

Although immigrants have been found to be particularly likely to engage in entrepreneurial activities in their host countries, very often their ability to do so is restricted by a range of challenges, including having limited access to finances. As a consequence, proactive immigrant entrepreneurs establish informal financial associations, which are known as stokvels in South Africa, in order to compensate for the general lack of available capital for their business ventures. Accordingly, this paper has sought to ascertain the role, which (...) stokvels play in the startups and the growth of Cameroonian-owned businesses, and also the strategies which they employ. A mixed-methods approach was adopted to conduct the study and purposive sampling was employed to obtain a research sample of 123 participants to respond to the survey questionnaire and 10 to take part in one-on-one in-depth interviews. The data was analysed through the use of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software, which generated findings in the form of descriptive statistics. The results suggest that most emerging immigrant entrepreneurs struggle to obtain sufficient startup capital. It also emerged from the findings that stokvels played an equally significant role in providing the capital, which was necessary for the growth of their businesses. On the basis of the assumption that widening access to finance would improve both the startups and the growth of immigrant-owned businesses, the authors of this paper advocate for inclusive policy initiatives, which consider the unique characteristics of the immigrant entrepreneur. In addition, it is hoped that this paper will make a valid contribution to the discourse concerning inclusive finance and be of interest to policymakers and academics. (shrink)

Political theory and philosophy need to widen their view of the space in which what matters politically takes place, and I suggest that integrating the conditions of sustainability of all affected—that is, all participants in nature's relations—is a necessary first step in this direction. New materialists and posthumanists have challenged how nature and politics have traditionally been construed. While acknowledging the significance of their contributions, I critically examine the ethical and political implications of their ontological project. I focus particularly on (...) how the decentering of human agency that they advocate for raises a set of concerns that need to be addressed in developing an appropriate ecological ethics. I argue that the latter must be attuned to the vulnerability of living beings who participate in relationships that sustain life on earth. This brings me to conclude that qualitative distinctions between the worlds ofbiosandtechneare necessary. This is because we need to think critically about ways of evaluating types of relationships so that we can assess them and establish which are worth nurturing and protecting and which are not. (shrink)

In spite of the concerted drive by most countries towards gender equality, the reality is that women still remain underutilised in certain spheres of professional endeavours, and entrepreneurship is no exception. Widening the gap between female and male participation in entrepreneurial activities is reinforced by customs, beliefs, culture and religion. Using the patriarchal perceptions that dissuade women from pursuing a business opportunity as the backdrop, this study sought to ascertain how it feels to be a woman entrepreneur in (...) a male-dominated society such as Rwanda. The study involved 398 women entrepreneurs who were purposely drawn to complete the survey questionnaire that was the basis of the quantitative approach adopted. The data was analysed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences(SPSS) software. The results suggest that women entrepreneurs worked lesser than men due to family issues; female-owned businesses are smaller in size than male businesses, and women find it difficult reaching the decision to start a business. The implication is that women's businesses suffer most and thus limiting their ability to contribute to the socio-economic development of a country as they would through employment and poverty reduction. By working together, government and stakeholders may eradicate any form of discrimination in business that is associated with gender. (shrink)

Broadening access to both computational and educational resources is crit- ical to diffusing machine learning (ML) innovation. However, today, most ML resources and experts are siloed in a few countries and organizations. In this article, we describe our pedagogical approach to increasing access to applied ML through a massive open online course (MOOC) on Tiny Machine Learning (TinyML). We suggest that TinyML, applied ML on resource-constrained embedded devices, is an attractive means to widen access because TinyML leverages low-cost and globally (...) accessible hardware and encourages the development of complete, self-contained applications, from data collection to deployment. To this end, a collaboration between academia and industry produced a four part MOOC that provides application-oriented instruction on how to develop solutions using TinyML. The series is openly available on the edX MOOC platform, has no prerequisites beyond basic programming, and is designed for global learners from a variety of backgrounds. It introduces real-world applications, ML algorithms, data-set engineering, and the ethi- cal considerations of these technologies through hands-on programming and deployment of TinyML applications in both the cloud and on their own microcontrollers. To facili- tate continued learning, community building, and collaboration beyond the courses, we launched a standalone website, a forum, a chat, and an optional course-project com- petition. We also open-sourced the course materials, hoping they will inspire the next generation of ML practitioners and educators and further broaden access to cutting-edge ML technologies. (shrink)

Contrary to the tendency to harmony, consensus and alignment among stakeholders in most of the literature on participation and partnership in corporate social responsibility and responsible innovation practices, in this chapter we ask which concept of participation and partnership is able to account for stakeholder engagement while acknowledging and appreciating their fundamentally different judgements, value frames and viewpoints. To this end, we reflect on a non-reductive and ethical approach to stakeholder engagement, collaboration and partnership, inspired by the philosophy (...) of Emmanuel Levinas. We contrast a cognitive approach with an ethical approach to stakeholder engagement, collaboration and partnership, and explore four characteristics of this ethical approach. Based on the ethical approach to stakeholder engagement, collaboration and partnership, we also provide a three-stage framework for partnership formation in CSR and RI practices. (shrink)

Appropriate information and consent has been one of the most intensely discussed topics within the context of biobank research. In parallel to the normative debate, many socio-empirical studies have been conducted to gather experiences, preferences and views of patients, healthy research participants and further stakeholders. However, there is scarcity of literature which connects the normative debate about justifications for different consent models with findings gained in empirical research. In this paper we discuss findings of a limited review of socio-empirical research (...) on patients’ and healthy research participants’ experiences and views regarding consent to biobank research in light of ethical principles for appropriate information and consent. (shrink)

This study evaluated the relationship between participative management practices and institutional goal attainment among Nigerian universities, with University of Calabar in focus. To achieve the purpose of the study, two research questions and two null hypotheses where developed to guide the study. The descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. The population and sample of the study was one hundred and twenty-two (122) deans of faculties and heads of departments using the census approach. An instrument titled Participative Management (...) Practices and Institutional Goal Attainment Questionnaire (PMPIGAQ) was used for data collection. The instrument was validated by three experts in Higher Education Administration and Measurement and Evaluation. The instrument yielded Cronbach’s reliability alpha ranging from α=.75-86. Data were collected and analyzed through mean, Standard deviation, Pearson Product Moment Correlation Analysis. The results of the study showed that there is a significant relationship between participation in decision making, participation in planning and institutional goal attainment. It was recommended that managers of universities should promote participatory management practices to enhance high morale, commitment and enthusiasm among staff in the pursuit and attainment of institutional goals. (shrink)

Today’s exponential advancement of information and communication technologies is reconfiguring participatory urban development practices. The use of digital technology implies new forms of decentralised governance, collaborative knowledge production, and social activism. The digital transformation has the potential to overcome shortcomings in citizen participation, make participatory processes more deliberative, and enable collaborative approaches for making cities. While digital tools such as digital mapping, e‐participation platforms, location‐based games, and social media offer new opportunities for the various actors and may act (...) as a catalyst for renegotiating urban space and collective goods, digitalisation can also perpetuate or even attenuate existing inequalities and exclusion. This editorial introduces the thematic issue “Citizen Participation, Digital Agency, and Urban Development” which focuses on the trajectories and (dis)continuities of citizen participation through digitalisation and elaborates this with examples from Europe and Asia on how the digital transformation impacts, challenges, or reproduces hegemonic power relations in urban development. (shrink)

Norenzayan and colleagues suggest that Big Gods can be replaced by Big Governments. We examine forms of social and self-monitoring and ritual practice that emerged in Classical China, heterarchical societies like those that emerged in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, and the contemporary Zapatista movement of Chiapas, and we recommend widening the hypothesis space to include these alternative forms of social organization.

The topic of my thesis is individual and collective responsibility for collectively caused systemic harms, with climate change as the case study. Can an individual be responsible for these harms, and if so, how? Furthermore, what does it mean to say that a collective is responsible? A related question, and the second main theme, is how ignorance and knowledge affect our responsibility. -/- My aim is to show that despite the various complexities involved, an individual can have responsibility to address (...) climate change. I argue that climate change is not a problem just for states and international bodies, but also for individuals. There are three possible sources of moral responsibility for individuals in relation to climate change harms: direct responsibility (individuals qua individuals), shared responsibility as members (individuals qua members of collective agents), and shared responsibility as constituents (individuals qua constituents of unorganised collectives). -/- Accounts that deny individual responsibility fail to either take our interdependent reality seriously or fail to understand marginal participation (or in the case direct responsibility, fail to appreciate the nature of the climate change phenomenon). Individuals can be complicit in climate change harms, either as members of collective agents (e.g. as citizens of states or employees of a corporation) or as constituents of unorganised collectives (e.g. as consumers or polluters). -/- Although I focus on individual complicity, I do not deny the obligations of collective agents. However, nation-states, governments, and international bodies are not the only relevant collective agents in climate ethics: other collective agents, such as corporations, matter also and can have obligations concerning making sure that their activities are as carbon-neutral as possible. In addition, those corporations that have engaged in lobbying against climate regulation through creating and disseminating misleading information have acquired themselves additional obligations to mitigate climate change and compensate for the harm they have caused. Even so, the ethical claims can only be understood by individual members of these collective agents because only they can feel the pull of moral claims. I suggest that we could distinguish between what one must possess in order to be capable of making moral claims (i.e. moral agency conditions), and what it means to have the ability to exhibit such claims through one’s conduct. -/- Individual direct responsibility is to not to increase the probable risk of serious harm to other people, at least as long as we can do so at a less than significant cost to ourselves. It is limited to relatively wealthy individuals. Offsetting is not a reliable way to meet this duty; we need to look at the emissions from our lifestyle choices (within the available infrastructure). Shared responsibility qua members of collective agents is the key individual responsibility, and it presses especially on those occupying key positions within key collective agents. Saying that, our shared responsibility qua constituents of unorganised collectives has the potential to be decisive in whether some action is taken or not, either through a set of actions that can signal certain acceptance or support, or as a form of political support from the grass roots. (shrink)

The democratic boundary problem raises the question of who has democratic participation rights in a given polity and why. One possible solution to this problem is the all-affected principle, according to which a polity ought to enfranchise all persons whose interests are affected by the polity’s decisions in a morally significant way. While AAP offers a plausible principle of democratic enfranchisement, its supporters have so far not paid sufficient attention to economic participation rights. I argue that if one (...) commits oneself to AAP, one must also commit oneself to the view that political participation rights are not necessarily the only, and not necessarily the best, way to protect morally weighty interests. I also argue that economic participation rights raise important worries about democratic accountability, which is why their exercise must be constrained by a number of moral duties. (shrink)

Background: Patient participation in clinical ethics support services has been marked as an important issue. There seems to be a wide variety of practices globally, but extensive theoretical or empirical studies on the matter are missing. Scarce publications indicate that, in Europe, patient participation in CESS varies from region to region, and per type of support. Practices vary from being non-existent, to patients being a full conversation partner. This contrasts with North America, where PP seems more or less (...) standard. While PP seems to be on the rise in Europe, there is no data to confirm this. This study sought a deep understanding of both habits and the attitudes towards PP in the Netherlands, including respondents’ practical and normative perspectives on the matter. Methods and Results: We developed a national survey on PP for Dutch CESS staff. Our survey comprised a total of 25 open and close-ended questions, focused on four topics related to PP goals of CESS, status quo of PP, ideas and ideals concerning PP, and obstacles for PP. Discussion: The four most important findings were that: Patient participation in Dutch CESS is far from standard. Views on patient participation are very much intertwined with the goals of ethics support. Hesitations, fears and perceived obstacles for PP were not on principle and Most respondents see PP as a positive opportunity, yet requiring additional training, practical guidance and experience. Conclusions: Various normative reasons require PP. However, PP seems far from standard and somewhat rare in Dutch CESS settings. Our respondents did not raise many principled objections to PP. Instead, reasons for the lack of PP are intertwined with viewpoints on the goals of CESS, which seemingly focus on supporting health care professionals. Training and practical guidance was thought to be helpful for gaining experience for both CESS staff and HCPs. (shrink)

Following the social conception of moral agency, this paper claims that many beings commonly exempted from moral responsibility, like young children, adults with late-stage dementia, and nonhuman animals, may nevertheless qualify as participants in moral responsibility practices. Blame and other moral responsibility responses are understood according to the communicative emotion account of the reactive attitudes. To blame someone means having an emotion episode that acts as a vehicle for conveying a particular moral content. Therefore, moral agency is argued to be (...) manifested in communicative exchanges between a claimant and a defendant. While many human and nonhuman agents are justifiably exempted from ascriptions of moral responsibility, this does not necessarily exclude such agents from the community of moral agents altogether. Toddlers and dogs, for instance, seem capable of other-directed reactive attitudes, like resentment, and could, therefore, qualify as participants in moral responsibility practices with respect to the claimant position. Therefore, we may have reason to adopt a distinct claimant-directed participant stance to some beings, even if they fail to qualify as apt targets of blame. This expanded theoretical room for moral agency is argued to make explicit further normative considerations. (shrink)

This work shows differences in public participation in China and Western countries, conceptually and empirically. To do so, the different philosophical and public administration traditions are outlined. Main contributions are tables and dashboards to allow general comparisons and to differentiate contexts in both political settings, besides being useful for other settings. The tables included are: 1) Main features of context in China, 2) Deliberative democracy, 3) Main features of context in the west, 4) The Gil Dashboard helping to outline (...) the endogenous foundations for change both in China and the West. -/- democracy, rule of law, public participation, China, western countries . (shrink)

Precision medicine functions by grouping patients along genetic, molecular, and related ‘-omics’ factors. This stratification relies on large, growing databases of patient-volunteered information. Both private companies and government bodies incentivize patients to volunteer this genetic information appealing to the creation of collaborative patient partnerships and the concept of empowerment. This paper aims to address two related questions: (1) what is the actual nature of patient participation in precision medicine research? And (2) is this participation in precision medicine research (...) really that empowering for the average patient? I contend that firstly, the nature of this participation is best conceived of as merely contributory. Contributory participation, as it will be shown, falls short of collaboration. The partnership created by participation in precision medicine research is not one of sharing values, equal say in decisions, or shared benefit. Secondly, I contend that there are important caveats to claims that patient participation in precision medicine is empowering. Empowerment is hindered by the type of participation, the practical use or actionability of genetic data, genetic literacy, the cost of precision drugs for patients that qualify for them, and bioethical considerations of informed consent. (shrink)

Interactions are important in establishing deep and meaningful learning experiences for learners in a distance education setup. Of all the activities in an online classroom, the discussion forum proved to be the one that had the most interactions. A discussion forum lets learners interact with the content, peers, and teachers. Participation in these learning activities is one important factor. The more the learners participate, the more they learn. This paper uses the researcher’s experience in determining what participation is (...) in an online learning experience. After reviewing the experience, participation in a discussion forum is defined as a self-induced connection to the learning community to receive and share knowledge to bring a deeper understanding of a certain theory or phenomenon.” There are conditions for a behavior or action that can be considered participation. The more conditions the behavior met, the higher the level of participation it led. The conditions are the learner analyzes an abstract theory or concept and relates it to practice or experience; the learner views other people’s perspectives regarding the subject and synthesizes a stronger and deeper understanding of the acquired knowledge; the learner communicates the acquired understanding of a certain subject that induces a validation or further inquiry; lastly, the learner constructed a train of premeditated discourse that leads to the understanding of a certain subject. (shrink)

This article aims to make progress towards an account of social cohesion and participation in terms of which we can better understand how groups of people come to constitute stable social orders. It argues for a conceptual distinction between "inclusion" and "integration" and sheds new light on their theoretical relationship. While "integration" refers to group members' willingness to act in accordance with the given norms of a social structure, "inclusion" is linked to their participation opportunities. Although inclusion also (...) plays an essential role in integrating a normative order, levels of inclusiveness necessary for social cohesion may vary across different contexts. (shrink)

The current prevailing view is that participation in biomedical research is above and beyond the call of duty. While some commentators have offered reasons against this, we propose a novel public goods argument for an obligation to participate in biomedical research. Biomedical knowledge is a public good, available to any individual even if that individual does not contribute to it. Participation in research is a critical way to support an important public good. Consequently, all have a duty to (...) participate. The current social norm is that individuals participate only if they have a good reason to do so. The public goods argument implies that individuals should participate unless they have a good reason not to. Such a shift would be of great aid to the progress of biomedical research, eventually making society significantly healthier and longer lived. (shrink)

Typical philosophical discussions of physician-assisted death have focused on whether the practice can be permissible. We address a different question: assuming that pad can be morally permissible, how far does that permission extend? We will argue that granting requests for pad may be permissible even when the pad recipient can no longer speak for themselves. In particular, we argue against the ‘competency requirement’ that constrains pad-eligibility to presently-competent patients in most countries that have legalized pad. We think pad on terminally (...) ill, incapacitated patients can be morally permissible in cases where advance directives or suitable surrogate decision-makers are available, and should be legally permissible in such cases as well. We argue that this view should be accepted on pain of inconsistency: by allowing surrogate decision-makers to request withdrawal of life-sustaining care on behalf of patients and by allowing patients to request pad, we rule out any plausible justification for imposing a competency requirement on pad. (shrink)

In India with the 73rd amendment Act (1992) there resulted in transition of political power to the grass-root democracy. As stated by the Balwant Raj Meheta Committee we can find that decentralization of power has led the local bodies to take active participation in all socio economic and political decisions. Panchayat Raj Institutions (PRIs) provide the opportunity to the rural masses to involve themselves from grass-root level to achieve all the national challenges. For complete involvement of the society, (...) class='Hi'>participation of rural women is ensured with 33 percent women reservation. Accordingly we now find women are also elected as the member of PRIs. But it is often found that rural women lack in decision making in any aspects whether economic, social, political or family matters and are dictated by their male counterpart. Under such a situation how far rural women of Karimganj district of Assam can actively participate in grass root level democracy is studied. In Karimganj district nearly 92.67 percent of population are from rural areas and sex ratio being 961, shows clearly that women constitute a major portion of the rural population and their involvement in PRIs ensures their active participation in democracy on the one hand and development of the rural areas on the other hand. The present paper is based on primary and secondary data. By constructing awareness score and involvement score the present paper highlighted about the factors responsible for active participation of rural women of Karimganj district in PRIs. (shrink)

In “Flourish,” Martin Seligman maintained that the elements of well-being consist of “PERMA: positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment.” Although the question of what constitutes human flourishing or psychological well-being has remained a topic of continued debate among scholars, it has recently been argued in the literature that a paradigmatic or prototypical case of human psychological well-being would largely manifest most or all of the aforementioned PERMA factors. Further, in “A Neuroscientific Perspective on Music Therapy,” Stefan Koelsch also suggested (...) that “Music therapy can have effects that improve the psychological and physiological health of individuals,” so it seems plausible that engaging in practices of music can positively contribute to one living a more optimally flourishing life with greater psychological well-being. However, recent studies on music practice and participation have not yet been reviewed and integrated under the PERMA framework from positive psychology to further explore and explicate this possibility. This article therefore contributes to extant work by reviewing recent research on psychological well-being and music to offer support for the claim that music practice and participation can positively contribute to one living a flourishing life by positively influencing their emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment. (shrink)

The ontological turn or ontologically-oriented approach accentuates the key importance of intercultural variability in ontologies. Different ontologies produce different ways of experiencing the world, and therefore, participation in alternative realities is very desirable in anthropological and ethnological investigation. Just the participation in alternative realities itself enables researchers to experience alterity and ontoconceptual differences. The present study aims to demonstrate the power of ritual in alteration, and to show how co-experiencing rituals serves to uncover ontological categories and relations. We (...) argue that the experience of alterity in everyday activities is of a different quality than the experience of alterity when participating in rituals. Transcendent reality is accessible during rituals. It serves as source of potentialities. These potentialities are actualized in ritual and entangled with people's everyday existence. Furthermore, we argue that participating in ritual enables the researcher to step into the alterity of alterity, and to get nearer to the origins of ontologies. Ritual participation also invokes the extension of consciousness and provides a collectively shared cognition, opening up the ontological dimension and enabling access to existential experiences and concepts. In these settings, relations between people and the world can be recognized and investigated. (shrink)

What is the role of lay deliberation – if any – in health-care rationing, and administration more generally? Two potential answers are suggested by recent debates on the subject. The one, which I will call the technocratic answer, suggests that there is no distinctive role for lay participation once ordinary democratic politics have set the goals and priorities which reform should implement. Determining how best to achieve those ends, and then actually achieving them, this view suggests, is a matter (...) for experts, armed with the best evidence available to them, both of the subject area involved, and of management and administrative excellence. -/- By contrast, the second, deliberative, view holds that lay deliberation has an important role in the administration and execution of government policy, both because these latter inevitably have a political element which needs to reflect democratic norms and values, and because lay people are, themselves, a source of information, even of wisdom, that experts will want to use in fulfilling their professional responsibilities. Recent debates on the value of lay participation in healthcare provision can illuminate the strengths and weaknesses of both approaches, as can the experience of NICE. So, I will start by examining two articles by Albert Weale, which attempt to clarify the role that lay deliberation should have in healthcare, before turning to the dilemmas for both the technocratic and deliberative views which emerge from the experience of NICE. (shrink)

The idea that payment for research participation can be coercive appears widespread among research ethics committee members, researchers, and regulatory bodies. Yet analysis of the concept of coercion by philosophers and bioethicists has mostly concluded that payment does not coerce, because coercion necessarily involves threats, not offers. In this article we aim to resolve this disagreement by distinguishing between two distinct but overlapping concepts of coercion. Consent-undermining coercion marks out certain actions as impermissible and certain agreements as unenforceable. By (...) contrast, coercion as subjection indicates a way in which someone’s interests can be partially set back in virtue of being subject to another’s foreign will. While offers of payment do not normally constitute consent-undermining coercion, they do sometimes constitute coercion as subjection. We offer an analysis of coercion as subjection and propose three possible practical responses to worries about the coerciveness of payment. (shrink)

The inclusion of attendance and participation in course grade calculations is ubiquitous in postsecondary syllabi, but can penalize the silent or anxious student unfairly. I outline the obstacles posed by social anxiety, then describe an assignment developed with the twin goals of assisting students with obstacles to participating in spoken class discussions, and rewarding methods of participation other than oral interaction. When homework assignments habituating practices of writing well-justified questions regarding well-documented passages in reading assignments are the explicit (...) project of weekly class meetings, participation increases on the part of all students. My focus shifted away from concern that I must get students to talk more, and turned instead to ensuring their marks reflected their learning rather than their speaking. Students’ improved engagement as a result of the assignment bears out evidence in the literature for active learning and for alternatives to taking attendance and quantifying participation. (shrink)

Low back pain (LBP) carries a high risk of chronicization and disability, greatly impacting the overall demand for care and costs, and its treatment is at risk of scarce adherence. This work introduces a new scenario based on the use of a mobile health tool, the Dress-KINESIS, to support the traditional rehabilitation approach. The tool proposes targeted self-manageable exercise plans for improving pain and disability, but it also monitors their efficacy. Since LBP prevention is the key strategy, the tool also (...) collects real-patient syndromic information, shares valid educational messages and fosters self-determined motivation to exercise. Our analysis is based on a comparison of the performance of the traditional rehabilitation process for non-specific LBP patients and some different scenarios, designed by including the Dress-KINESIS’s support in the original process. The results of the simulations show that the integrated approach leads to a better capacity for taking on patients while maintaining the same physiotherapists’ effort and costs, and it decreases healthcare costs during the two years following LBP onset. These findings suggest that the healthcare system should shift the paradigm towards citizens’ participation and the digital support, with the aim of improving its efficiency and citizens’ quality of life. (shrink)

A pervasive feature of democracy is disagreement. And in general, when we encounter disagreement from someone who is at least more reliable than chance, this puts some pressure on us to moderate our beliefs. But this raises the specter of asymmetric compliance—it’s not obvious what to do when we moderate our beliefs but the other party refuses to do so. Whereas an elegant solution is available when it comes to how we can to respond to our higher-order evidence while still (...) preserving democratic fairness, I argue that no such solution is forthcoming when we consider zetetic intransigence—that is, asymmetric compliance with regards to how we inquire, or gather evidence. The upshot is that democratic participation can involve messy tradeoffs with no entirely satisfactory resolution. (shrink)

This article seeks to constructively retrieve Anselm’s theology of the Holy Spirit by responding to a recent criticism of his doctrine of atonement. This criticism is called the question of efficacy and focuses particularly on how Anselm holds humanity to participate in and receive the divine gift of atonement. In short, this paper argues that the Spirit’s prevenient and subsequent grace allow for an individual to respond freely and in faith to Christ’s work, resulting in three individually necessary and jointly (...) sufficient conditions for union to be restored with God and human flourishing to obtain in Anselm’s thinking. In order to argue this, the paper proceeds in four sections. First, it discusses the question of efficacy. Second, it discusses the Spirit’s work in relation to an individual initially accepting Christ’s Gift. The paper then proceeds by discussing the subsequent work of the Spirit and redemptive role of faith that are inherently tied to the initial work. The paper then concludes by analyzing alternative approaches to this question of efficacy. (shrink)

In the Centuries of Theology I.48–50, Maximus states that there are two kinds of works that belong to God: one which corresponds to beings having a temporal, finite beginning, and one which corresponds to perfections of beings which have no beginning and are therefore eternal. Maximus labels the latter as participated beings (ὄντα μεθεκτά) and the former as participating beings (ὄντα μετέχοντα), with God transcending both as their cause. The structure of God-as-cause, participated beings, and participating beings matches Proclus’ three-fold (...) structure of participation with the ontological categories of unparticipated, participated, and participating. While Maximus borrows the basic language and structure from Proclus, he makes certain minor but significant differences, particularly in how the participated beings both relate to their source in God and in their status of existence. This paper thus sets out to analyze I.48–50 in the general context of the Centuries of Theology, considering how Maximus conceives of the ontological distinctions between God and God’s works. A comparison with Proclus’ understanding of participation follows, particularly from Proclus’ Elements of Theology Prop. 23, which succinctly states the three-term distinction of participation. The resulting comparison shows that Proclus’ framework of participation is flattened for Maximus, where the participated works represent multiple properties distinct in kind from the unparticipated, while God fits analogously in the status of the unparticipated. The underlying ontology supports Maximus’ implicit denial that such participated entities represent distinct divinities, as they do for Proclus, while Maximus’ assertion of God’s transcendence is still secured with the ontological distinction between the participated works and their unparticipated cause. (shrink)

What does it take to see how autistic people participate in social interactions? And what does it take to support and invite more participation? Western medicine and cognitive science tend to think of autism mainly in terms of social and communicative deficits. But research shows that autistic people can interact with a skill and sophistication that are hard to see when starting from a deficit idea. Research also shows that not only autistic people, but also their non-autistic interaction partners (...) can have difficulties interacting with each other. To do justice to these findings, we need a different approach to autistic interactions—one that helps everyone see, invite, and support better participation. I introduce such an approach, based on the enactive theory of participatory sense-making and supported by insights from indigenous epistemologies. This approach helps counteract the homogenising tendencies of the “global mental health” movement, which attempts to erase rather than recognise difference, and often precludes respectful engagements. Based in the lived experiences of people in their socio-cultural-material and interactive contexts, I put forward an engaged—even engaging—epistemology for understanding how we interact across difference. From this perspective, we see participatory sense-making at work across the scientific, diagnostic, therapeutic, and everyday interactions of autistic and non-autistic people, and how everyone can invite and support more of it. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence is now capable of generating sophisticated and compelling images from simple text prompts. In this paper, I focus specifically on how artists might make use of AI to create art. Most existing discourse analogizes AI to a tool or collaborator; this focuses our attention on AI’s contribution to the production of an artistically significant output. I propose an alternative approach, the exploration paradigm, which suggests that artists instead relate to AI as a participant: artists create a space for (...) interaction with the AI algorithm by way of their prompts, thereby allowing them to explore the way that the algorithm “sees” and “represents.” AI art practiced in this fashion bears a striking resemblance to contemporary conceptual and participatory art. Viewing AI art in this way has implications for the appreciation of style in AI art; concerns about novelty and originality; and the assignment of artistic credit and copyright. (shrink)

It is argued that at a sufficiently deep level the conventional quantitative approach to the study of nature faces difficult problems, and that biological processes should be seen as more fundamental, in a way that can be elaborated on the basis of Peircean semiotics and Yardley's Circular Theory. In such a world-view, Wheeler's observer-participation and emergent law arise naturally, rather than having to be imposed artificially. This points the way to a deeper understanding of nature, where meaning has a (...) fundamental role to play that is invisible to quantitative science. (shrink)

Whilе thе rоbust аnd pоsitivе аssоciаtiоn bеtwееn еducаtiоn аnd pоliticаl еngаgеmеnt hаs bееn widеly dоcumеntеd, thе dirеct cаusаl link is still а subjеct оf dеbаtе. This study cоntributеs tо thе оngоing dеbаtе by еxаmining whеthеr thеrе еxists а cаusаl еffеct оf еducаtiоn оn pоliticаl еngаgеmеnt. Explоiting thе plаusibly еxоgеnоus vаriаtiоn in еducаtiоn inducеd by thе cоmpulsоry schооling rеfоrms аcrоss 39 cоuntriеs, wе find thаt еducаtiоn cultivаtеs pоliticаl intеrеst, prоmоtеs thе аcquisitiоn оf pоliticаl knоwlеdgе, аnd fоstеrs suppоrtivе аttitudеs tоwаrds pоliticаl frееdоms. (...) Nеvеrthеlеss, thе bеttеr еducаtеd аrе nо mоrе likеly tо vоtе in еlеctiоns nоr аdоpt аny spеcific pоsitiоn in thе lеft-right pоliticаl spеctrum. (shrink)

After the collapse of the totalitarian regimes, participation into public matters has been an objective of democratic theory. Judging by a variety of instances from the sixties to today, it can be said that finding new means for encouraging audiences to participate in their works has become the major concern for contemporary art as well. Therefore, we can say that the problem of participation is the focal point of art and politics.

In nature validation for physiological and emotional bonding becomes a mode for supporting social connectivity. Similarly, in the blockchain ecosystem, cryptographic validation becomes the substrate for all interactions. In the dialogue between human and artificial intelligence (AI) agents, between the real and the virtual, one can distinguish threads of physical or mental entanglements allowing different modes of participation. One could even suggest that in all types of realities there exist frameworks that are to some extent equivalent and act as (...) validation mechanisms for behavioural interweaving. Relevant to our own experience as an Editorial Organism, in this issue of Technoetic Arts we explore modes of participation and collaboration through different lenses by including guest-edited sections and stand-alone articles. (shrink)

Trust has a great potential for furthering our understanding of organizational change and learning. This potential however remains largely untapped. It is argued that two reasons as for why this potential remains unrealized are: (i) A narrow conceptualization of change as implementation and (ii) an emphasis on direct and aggregated effects of individual trust to the exclusion of other effects. It is further suggested that our understanding of the effects of trust on organizational change, should benefit from including effects of (...) trust on the formulation stage. It should also benefit from exploring the structuring effects of trust in organizations. Throughout this chapter, ways to extend current research on trust in organizations are suggested. The chapter also provides examples of relevant contributions where available. In order to capture organizational effects of trust, it is suggested that trust should be studied over longer time intervals, and include several referents of trust, spanning both horizontal and vertical relationships in the organization. (shrink)

Group process methods for problem solving and planning are now widely used in organizations in the United States. Such methods, which involve active participation by employees, are not often used in Russia. We believe these methods would help Russia move from a centrally planned, authoritarian style of management to a more participatory, information-sharing style of management. Accordingly, two training sessions were held with faculty members at universities in Irkutsk and Novosibirsk. This article describes how these meetings were arranged, the (...) results of the planning activities, and the implications of participatory methods of decision making for organizations in Russia and in other transitional economies. (shrink)

When I ask students how they feel about group projects, the response is often negative. This is usually a result of bad experiences with problematic group members, such as free riders who do not contribute or members who bulldoze their ideas through while disregarding their peers. After many semesters mediating disputes within such groups, I have found that issues often stem from concerns about “saving face”. This leads to a lack of much-needed communication. In this article, I offer three methods (...) to facilitate effective group work by improving participation and communication between student peers. (shrink)

I shall argue that in some wars both sides are (as a collective) justified, that is, they can both satisfy valid jus ad bellum requirements. Moreover, in some wars – but not in all – the individual soldiers on the unjustified side (that is, on the side without jus ad bellum) may nevertheless kill soldiers (and also civilians as a side-effect) on the justified side, even if the enemy soldiers always abide by jus in bello constraints. Traditional just war theory (...) and self-proclaimed “revisionist” just war theory think otherwise since the former focuses on the law enforcement or public authority justification for inflicting harm and the latter on the self-defense justification. These are both intrinsically asymmetrical justifications: there is no justified self-defense (properly understood) against justified self-defense, nor is there justified law-enforcement against justified law-enforcement. However, there can, as I will show, be justified self-defense against force that is justified by a necessity justification, and there can be force justified by a necessity justification being used against force that is also justified by a necessity justification. The necessity justification is not intrinsically asymmetrical, and it is an indispensable justification in the context of war. Moreover, with regard to some forms of inflicting harm on others one may give special weight to one’s own interests and the interests of those to whom one has special responsibilities when assessing the proportionality of those acts. That is, the proportionality calculation may be agent-relative. This is in particular so in the case of foreseeably preventing innocent and non-threatening people from being saved (for instance, by shooting down a tactical bomber who would have saved them by destroying an ammunitions factory) but less so in the case of the intentional or foreseeable direct harming of innocent and non-threatening people (dropping bombs on people standing near an ammunitions factory). In the light of these considerations, I will then answer the question as to when soldiers may justifiably participate in war (and when not). (shrink)

This article examines Karol Wojtyła’s concept of participation and alienation by starting the discussion on his personalist anthropology, leading to his structure of the human community. Wojtyła’s personalist anthropology reveals to us the nature of the human person as a unique, unrepeatable personal subjectivity. According to Wojtyła, the human act takes us to the knowledge and understanding of the person’s interiority and simultaneously allows us to have a glimpse of the human person’s specific complexity. Then, I analyze the correlation (...) between person-action in living and acting with other persons. Here, I attempt to demonstrate that if our existence has to acquire any human significance, it is that, rather than alienation, which makes such a unique experience possible. Finally, I explored the impact of the failure to grasp a genuine understanding of the human person and the capacity to participate in the humanity of other persons, setting a profound sense of alienation that dehumanizes us to our very core. This paper aims to answer the following questions: Given the actions that can be performed ‘together with others,’ how does the person’s acting with others affect the dynamic correlation of the action with the person? What is the significance of this participation for the personalistic value of the action? Why is alienation antithetical to participation? (shrink)

The principles which can justify significantly risky nontherapeutic research on children are a combination of: (1) direct or indirect benefits to the child participants now and/or in the future (and these benefits need not necessarily be medical, they can also be socioeconomic or otherwise non-medical); (2) a high standard of informed consent that fundamentally focuses on the child participant's understanding (and capacity for understanding) of relevant features of informed consent. Researchers, parents and guardians, as well as child participants themselves, have (...) different roles and obligations towards one another. This is not an issue of seeking to find excuses to expose children to risk, but rather an issue of seeking the least risky and most ethical way to do so if and when required by public health emergencies or to achieve directly beneficial scientific breakthroughs. (shrink)

Taking into consideration the extremely harsh public health conditions faced by the majority of the world population, the Health Impact Fund (HIF) proposal seeks to make the intellectual property regimes more in line with human rights obligations. While prioritizing access to medicines and research on neglected diseases, the HIF makes many compromises in order to be conceived as politically feasible and to retain a compensation character that makes its implementation justified solely on basis of negative duties. Despite that current global (...) health realities make such steps reasonable, the paper looks up the negative effects on one overlooked human right: the right to participate in scientific advancement. (shrink)

In the Doctrine of Virtue Kant divides duties of love into three categories: beneficent activity , gratitude and Teilnehmung – commonly referred to as the duty of sympathy . In this paper I will argue that the content and scope of the third duty of love has been underestimated by both critics and defenders of Kant's ethical theory. The account which pervades the secondary literature maintains that the third duty of love includes only two components: an obligation to make use (...) of our natural receptivity to sympathetic feelings as a means to fulfilling other duties of love, and an indirect duty to cultivate these feelings. As a result, Kant's duty of sympathy has been widely regarded as a duty whose value is derived from the way in which it serves other duties, in particular, the duty of beneficent activity, which obliges agents ‘to promote according to one's means the happiness of others in need’ . Teilnehmung has thus assumed something of a second-class status among the duties to others. My aim in this paper is to demonstrate that the prevailing account of Kant's third duty of love is incomplete. (shrink)

Most regulations and guidelines require that potential research participants be told a great deal of information during the consent process. Many of these documents, and most of the scholars who consider the consent process, assume that all this information must be disclosed because it must all be understood. However, a wide range of studies surveying apparently competent participants in clinical trials around the world show that many do not understand key aspects of what they have been told. The standard view (...) of the conditions for valid consent therefore implies that these people have failed to give valid consent to research participation. In this paper we argue that the standard view is false. The primary function of the requirement that researchers disclose information about a study is the avoidance of illegitimate control over someone’s consent decision, which is a form of fraud.We derive the content and manner of appropriate disclosure by analysing the ways in which the manipulation of information can invalidate consent. Our analysis shows that the informational requirements for valid consent are conceptually distinct and thus unlikely to have identical contents. This implies that consent can be valid when not everything that ought to be disclosed by the person asking for consent is understood by the person who proffers it. (shrink)

Understanding the relationship between wilderness outings and the resulting experience has been a central theme in resource-based, outdoor recreation research for nearly 50 years. The authors provide a review and synthesis of literature that examines how people, over time, build relationships with wilderness places and express their identities as consequences of multiple, ongoing wilderness engagements (i.e., continued participation). The paper reviews studies of everyday places and those specifically protected for wilderness and backcountry qualities. Beginning with early origins and working (...) through contemporary research the authors synthesize what diverse social scientists have learned about the long-term and continual nature of wilderness participation and its impact on the formation of identity. The thrust of the paper points researchers, planners, and managers in non-traditional directions and reframes goals and objectives for visitor planning and management in wilderness and other protected areas. (shrink)

Given the importance of the principle of causality for the demonstration of God’s existence, this paper attempts to justify the evidence and necessity of the principle of causality, by following Fr. Fabro’s Thomistic defense—based on the notion of participation—but adding a particular emphasis on the notion of “being which is not per se,” this latter as an explanatory notion of the notion of “being which is by participation.” The introductory remarks touch upon two misunderstandings regarding the notion of (...) participation employed as a subject of the principle of causality: the first, considering “participated being” as a synonym of “received being,” and the second, the confusion, regarding the notion of being by participation, between its notional dependence on the notion of being as a whole and its real dependence on the real intensive Being. Then, in the first point, the defense of the principle of causality is distinguished from other related problems, like the particular applications of this principle. In the second and main point, we try to justify the necessity of being caused in the being which is experienced as being by participation, as follows: 1) that which is something by participation is not this something per se; 2) now, that which is not per se, either is not or is per aliud, 3) Therefore, that which is something by participation is per aliud. In the third and last point, we endeavor to justify the Thomism of our defense and of our emphasis on this notion of “being which is not per se” by considering two texts of St. Thomas. (shrink)

Student’s classroom participation in English language teaching: The case of Gozamen General Secondary School in Grade 10-A -/- Author / Authors : Atalay Mesfin Aneteneh Page no. 204-217 Discipline : Education Script/language : Roman/ English Category : Research paper/Action research Keywords: English, Teaching Elementary, Training, Action research.