An inordinate number of low wage workers in essential industries are Black, Hispanic, or Latino, immigrants or refugees — groups beset by centuries of discrimination and burdened with disproportionate but preventable harms during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Meat is a multi-billion-dollar industry that relies on people performing risky physical work inside meat-processing facilities over long shifts in close proximity. These workers are socially disempowered, and many are members of groups beset by historic and ongoing structural discrimination. The combination of working conditions and worker characteristics facilitate the spread of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Workers have been expected to put their health and lives at risk during the pandemic because of government and industry pressures to keep (...) this “essential industry” producing. Numerous interventions can significantly reduce the risks to workers and their communities; however, the industry’s implementation has been sporadic and inconsistent. With a focus on the U.S. context, this paper offers an ethical framework for infection prevention and control recommendations grounded in public health values of health and safety, interdependence and solidarity, and health equity and justice, with particular attention to considerations of reciprocity, equitable burden sharing, harm reduction, and health promotion. Meat-processing workers are owed an approach that protects their health relative to the risks of harms to them, their families, and their communities. Sacrifices from businesses benefitting financially from essential industry status are ethically warranted and should acknowledge the risks assumed by workers in the context of existing structural inequities. (shrink)

This paper explores the wartime creation of veterinary expertise in cattle breeding, and its contribution to the transition between two very different types of agriculture. During the interwar period, falling prices and steep competition from imports caused farmers to adopt a ‘low input, low output’ approach. To cut costs, they usually butchered, marketed or doctored diseased cows in preference to seeking veterinary aid. World War II forced a greater dependence on domestic food production, and inspired wide-ranging state-directed attempts to increase (...) agricultural output. However, the weak connection between veterinary services and livestock productivity meant that the drive for greater milk yields did not automatically translate into a demand for improved veterinary health care. Rather veterinary expertise had to be actively created and made relevant to the new context. Leaders of the profession secured this goal through establishing a government-backed ‘scheme for the control of certain diseases of dairy cows’. Drawing on pre-existing but rarely applied reproductive technologies, the scheme provided the opportunities and education necessary for more extensive veterinary interventions in cattle breeding. I show how its operation transformed understandings of fertility, raised veterinarians to the status of experts, won them the patronage of farmers and the state, and facilitated the shift to a productivity-oriented agriculture. (shrink)

Control stimuli are key for understanding the extent to which face processing relies on holistic processing, and affective evaluation versus the encoding of low-level image properties. Luminance polarity reversal combined with face inversion is a popular tool for severely disrupting the recognition of face controls. However, recent findings demonstrate visibility-recognition trade-offs for LP-reversed faces, where these face controls sometimes appear more salient despite being harder to recognize. The present report brings together findings from image analysis, simple stimuli, and behavioral data (...) for facial recognition and visibility, in an attempt to disentangle instances where LP-reversed control faces are associated with a performance bias in terms of their perceived salience. These findings have important implications for studies of subjective face appearance, and highlight that future research must be aware of behavioral artifacts due to the possibility of trade-off effects. (shrink)

The process of dehumanization, or thinking of others as less than human, is a phenomenon with significant societal implications. According to Haslam's model, two concepts of humanness derive from comparing humans with either animals or machines: individuals may be dehumanized by likening them to either animals or machines, or humanized by emphasizing differences from animals or machines. Recent work in cognitive neuroscience emphasizes understanding cognitive processes in terms of interactions between distributed cortical networks. It has been found that reasoning about (...) internal mental states is associated with activation of the default mode network and deactivation of the task positive network ; whereas reasoning about mechanical processes produces the opposite pattern. We conducted two neuroimaging studies. The first examined the neural bases of dehumanization and its relation to these two brain networks, using images and voice-over social narratives which either implicitly contrasted or implicitly likened humans to either animals or machines. The second study addressed a discrepancy between findings from the first study and prior work on the neural correlates of dehumanization: using a design similar to prior work we examined neural responses to pictures of humans, animals and machines, presented without any social context. In both studies, human and humanizing conditions were associated with relatively high activity in the DMN and relatively low activity in the TPN. However, the non-human and dehumanizing conditions deviated in different ways: they demonstrated more marked changes either in the DMN or in the TPN. Notably, differences between the animal dehumanizing and humanizing conditions were most evident in regions associated with mechanistic reasoning, not in the mentalizing network. Conjunction analysis of contrasts from both paradigms revealed that only one region was consistently more active when participants saw human, a medial parietal region regarded as the central hub of the DMN. These findings provide a neural basis for Haslam's distinction between two types of dehumanization, and suggest that the DMN and TPN play opposing roles in creating a sense of moral concern. (shrink)

IntroductionThe National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines acknowledge the importance of the parent–infant relationship for child development but highlight the need for further research to establish reliable tools for assessment, particularly for parents of children under 1 year. This study explores the acceptability and psychometric properties of a co-developed tool, ‘Me and My Baby’.Study designA cross-sectional design was applied. The MaMB was administered universally with mothers during routine 6–8-week Health Visitor contacts. The sample comprised 467 mothers. Dimensionality of (...) instrument responses were evaluated via exploratory and confirmatory ordinal factor analyses. Item response modeling was conducted via a Rasch calibration to evaluate how the tool conformed to principles of ‘fundamental measurement’. Tool acceptability was evaluated via completion rates and comparing ‘completers’ and ‘non-completers’ demographic differences on age, parity, ethnicity, and English as an additional language. Free-text comments were summarized. Data sharing agreements and data management were compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation, and University of York data management policies.ResultsHigh completion rates suggested the MaMB was acceptable. Psychometric analyses showed the response data to be an excellent fit to a unidimensional confirmatory factor analytic model. All items loaded statistically significantly and substantially on a single underlying factor. The item response modeling showed that most MaMB items fitted the Rasch model. item reliability was high yet the test yielded little information on each respondent, as highlighted by the relatively low ‘person separation index’ of 0.1.Conclusion and next stepsMaMB reliably measures a single construct, likely to be infant bonding. However, further validation work is needed, preferably with ‘enriched population samples’ to include higher-need/risk families. The MaMB tool may benefit from reduced response categories and some modest item wording amendments. Following further validation and reliability appraisal the MaMB may ultimately be used with fathers/other primary caregivers and be potentially useful in research, universal health settings as part of a referral pathway, and clinical practice, to identify dyads in need of additional support/interventions. (shrink)

Conditions of low and high perceived control often lead to boredom, albeit for different reasons. Whereas, high perceived control may be experienced as boring because the situation lacks challenge, low perceived control may be experienced as boring because the situation precludes effective engagement. In two experiments we test this proposed quadratic relationship. In the first experiment we had participants play different versions of the children's game “rock-paper-scissors” in which they arbitrarily won or lost. Despite having only dichotomous conditions, participants reported (...) experiencing a broad range of levels of perceived control. Consistent with our predictions, boredom was highest at low and high levels of perceived control. Experiment 2 tested the notion that the mere prospect of gaining control may mitigate boredom. Participants given to believe that they could gain control over the game of rock, paper, scissors were less bored than those who believed there was no possibility of winning at greater than chance levels. This suggests that beliefs concerning prospective control, rather than a given level of perceived control per se, may predict engagement and boredom. (shrink)

Youths with disruptive behavior disorders and psychopathic traits showed reduced amygdala responses to fearful expressions under low attentional load but no indications of increased recruitment of regions implicated in top- down attentional control. These findings suggest that the emotional deficit observed in youths with disruptive behavior disorders and psychopathic traits is primary and not secondary to increased top- down attention to nonemotional stimulus features.

ABSTRACTDespite interest in exercise as a treatment for anxiety disorders the mechanism behind the anxiolytic effects of exercise is unclear. Two observations motivate the present work. First, engagement of attention control during increased working memory load can decrease anxiety. Second, exercise can improve attention control. Therefore, exercise could boost the anxiolytic effects of increased WM load via its strengthening of attention control. Anxiety was induced by threat of shock and was quantified with anxiety-potentiated startle. Thirty-five healthy volunteers participated in two (...) types of activity, exercise and control-activity. After each activity, participants completed a WM task at low- and high-load during safe and threat. Results were not consistent with the hypothesis: exercise vs. control-activity increased APS in high-load. However, this incre... (shrink)

Playtime in urban cities has become an indoor activity for children due to limited access to natural outdoor environments. This product of urbanization makes the case for the introduction of biophilic design. However, playrooms are often neglected as a possibility in designing a natural space indoors. Interior designers and other specialists lack a reliable tool to identify and incorporate biophilic features into the design of these indoor environments in urban settings. The Biophilic Interior Design Matrix (BID-M) developed by McGee and (...) Marshall-Baker quantifies 52 of Kellert’s biophilic design attributes to assess their presence and absence within interior spaces. We expanded its use by testing the matrix in a new type of space, urban playrooms, and coded images of 45 children’s playrooms within Manhattan residential buildings in New York City, including assessing a larger sample and reliability rate compared to McGee and Marshall-Baker’s research. Inter-rater reliability of the overall design matrix and individual matrix items was measured with percent agreement and free-marginal multirater kappa. Reliability testing showed overall good reliability of the overall design matrix. Several matrix items had low reliability between raters. Our findings show that the BID-M needs to be modified to better assess urban interior spaces for children. (shrink)

Introduction: Screen-based and mobile technology has grown at an unprecedented rate. However, little is understood about whether increased screen-use affects executive functioning, the range of mental processes that aid goal attainment and facilitate the selection of appropriate behaviors. To examine this, a systematic review was conducted.Method: This systematic review is reported in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses statement. A comprehensive literature search was conducted using Web of Science, MEDLINE, PsycINFO and Scopus databases to identify (...) articles published between 2007 and March 2020, examining the use of mobile technologies on aspects of EF in healthy adults aged 18–35 years. In total 6079 articles were screened by title, and 39 screened by full text. Eight eligible papers were identified for inclusion. Our methods were pre-registered on the PROSPERO international prospective register of systematic reviews.Results: A total of 438 participants were included across the eight studies. Five of the eight studies examined more than one EF. Five studies measured inhibition, and four studies measured decision-making. Smartphone use was negatively associated with inhibition and decision-making. Working memory performance was found to be improved by increased time engaging in video games and by refraining from smartphone use prior to bedtime. Quality assessments indicated high risk of methodological biases across the studies and a low quality of evidence for determining the relationship between technology use and executive functioning.Conclusions: This review highlights the scarcity of the literature in this area. It presents a call for rigorous and objective research to further our understanding of the impact of mobile technology on different aspects of executive function. (shrink)

Conversions: A Philosophic Memoir belongs to the tradition of Augustine and Rousseau: the "confession" of a life that is a quest for truth. It is in large part the story of two major episodes from Abigail Rosenthal's early adulthood, bought putting personal identity dramatically at risk. As a young Fulbright scholar in Paris, Rosenthal met and entered reluctantly into a love affair with a young Greek communist philosopher who believed (along with many Parisian intellectuals of that era) that force (...) and deception were justified by a utopian vision of world history. In the inevitable collision of values—between Jew and Greek, liberal and revolutionary, theist and atheist, woman and man in unequal truggle—they separated. Suffering in the aftermath, she at last turned for help to a young African American woman graduate student whom she met in London. This woman's Gnostic Christian rejection of personal and cultural history eventually left Rosenthal without defense against her new mentor's remarkable use of charisma, ridicule, and moralistic reproach to usurp the author's life story. These stratagems of mind control reached a climactic phase in Portugal, where the two went—Rosenthal to paint the other woman to write—in what would turn out to be the terrifying reverse of a summer idyll. With the U.S. State Department, the Portuguese Policía Internacional devised an extraordinary rescue. This arresting narrative, which deals with relations between blacks and whites, Christians and Jews, and men and women, delivers its own philosophic theory of the individual in history. Author note: Abigail L. Rosenthal is Professor of Philosophy at Brooklyn College of The City University of New York and the author of A Good Look at Evil (Temple). (shrink)

In the past three decades, feminist scholars have produced an extraordinary rich body of theoretical writing in humanities and social science disciplines. This revised and updated second edition of Theorizing Feminism: Parallel Trends in the Humanities and Social Sciences, is a genuinely interdisciplinary anthology of significant contributions to feminist theory.This timely reader is creatively edited, and contains insightful introductory material. It illuminates the historical development of feminist theory as well as the current state of the field. Emphasizing common themes and (...) interests in the humanities and social sciences, the editors have chosen topics that remain relevant to current debates, reflect the interests of a diverse community of thinkers, and have been central to feminist theory in many disciplines.The contributors include leading figures from the fields of psychology, literary criticism, sociology, philosophy, anthropology, art history, law, and economics. This is the ideal text for any advanced course on interdisciplinary feminist theory, one that fills a long-standing gap in feminist pedagogy. (shrink)

Background Human brain organoids are a valuable research tool for studying brain development, physiology, and pathology. Yet, a host of potential ethical concerns are inherent in their creation. There is a growing group of bioethicists who acknowledge the moral imperative to develop brain organoid technologies and call for caution in this research. Although a relatively new technology, brain organoids and their uses are already being discussed in media literature. Media literature informs the public and policymakers but has the potential for (...) utopian or dystopian distortions. Thus, it is important to understand how this technology is portrayed to the public. Methods To investigate how brain organoids are displayed to the public, we conducted a systematic review of media literature indexed in the Nexis Uni database from 2013–2019. News and media source articles passing exclusion criteria (_n_ = 93) were scored to evaluate tone and relevant themes. Themes were validated with a pilot sample before being applied to the dataset. Thematic analysis assessed article tone, reported potential for the technology, and the scientific, social, and ethical contexts surrounding brain organoids research. Results Brain organoid publications became more frequent from 2013 to 2019. We observed increases in positively and negatively toned articles, suggesting growing polarization. While many sources discuss realistic applications of brain organoids, others suggest treatment and cures beyond the scope of the current technology. This could work to overhype the technology and disillusion patients and families by offering false hope. In the ethical narrative we observe a preoccupation with issues such as development of artificial consciousness and “humanization” of organoid-animal chimeras. Issues of regulation, ownership, and accuracy of the organoid models are rarely discussed. Conclusions Given the power that media have to inform or misinform the public, it is important this literature provides an accurate and balanced reflection of the therapeutic potential and associated ethical issues regarding brain organoid research. Our study suggests increasing polarization, coupled with misplaced and unfounded ethical concern. Given the inhibitory effects of public fear or disillusion on research funding, it is important media literature provides an accurate reflection of brain organoids. (shrink)

La Nota Roja en México es una manifestación periodística bien consolidada en la cultura en México, cada año se venden miles de ejemplares en los lugares más cotidianos de esta sociedad. Así pues, este trabajo tiene como objetivo principal presentar un debate que resulta fundamental para la teoría de los modelos de mundo: la necesidad de “reconstrucción del contexto” que nace de la discusión que se plantea en Crítica y sabotaje con los planteamientos derridianos (Firma acontecimiento contexto. La Diseminación) y (...) que se trabajarán a propósito del periodismo. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Psychological or political criticism of the parent‐child relation presupposes a normative account of that relation. Such an account is here provided. The normative account can shed most light when the parent‐child relation is presented recognizably, not in Utopian disguise. The purposes of reasonable people partly depend on their interpretations of those of their parents. This is so whether such people accept or reject any particular parental purposes. The filial art sticks to the project of working out the enacted interpretation—until (...) it gets it approximately right. There is a corresponding parental art, neither compensatory nor sacrificial. (shrink)

Establishing healthy dietary habits in childhood is crucial in preventing long-term repercussions, as a lack of dietary variety in childhood leads to enduring impacts on both physical and cognitive health. Poor conceptual knowledge about food has recently been shown to be a driving factor of food rejection. The majority of studies that have investigated the development of food knowledge along with food rejection have mainly focused on one subtype of conceptual knowledge about food, namely taxonomic categories. However, taxonomic categorization is (...) not the only way to understand the food domain. We also heavily rely on other conceptual structures, namely thematic associations, in which objects are grouped because they share spatial-temporal properties or exhibit a complementary relationship. We rely on such thematic associations between food items, which may not fall into the same taxon, to determine the acceptability of food combinations. However, the development of children's ability to master these relations has not been systematically investigated, nor alongside the phenomenon of food rejection. The present research aims to fill this gap by investigating the development of conceptual food knowledge and the putative relationship between children's food rejection and both thematic and taxonomic food knowledge. A proportional analogy task, with a choice between taxonomic and thematic food associates, was conducted on children between 3 and 7-years-old. The children were systematically presented with either a thematic or taxonomic food base pair and then asked to extend the example type of relation to select the respective thematic or taxonomic match to the target. Our results revealed, for the first time, that increased levels of food rejection were significantly predictive of poorer food identification and decreased thematic understanding. These findings entitle us to hypothesize that knowledge-based food education programs to foster dietary variety in young children, should not only aim to improve taxonomic understanding of food, but also thematic relations. (shrink)

The notion of survivance is central to Derrida’s later thinking. Much of that thinking, for example in addressing the non–human in The Animal That Therefore I Am and The Beast and the Sovereign, is more precisely a thinking of the human in relation to the animal. Taking inspiration from the recent turn towards biodeconstruction, this essay works through the implications of survivance beyond the human-animal by considering the synergy between biological and textual survivance. And in so doing, this essay outlines (...) a new way of conceptualizing the living self as a composite form made up of many non-human and even textual others. (shrink)

Many models of motivation suggest that goals can be arranged in a hierarchy, ranging from higher-level goals that represent desired end-states to lower-level means that operate in the service of those goals. We present a hierarchical model that distinguishes between three levels—goals, strategies, and tactics—and between approach/avoidance and regulatory focus motivations at different levels. We focus our discussion on how this hierarchical framework sheds light on the different ways that success and failure are defined within the promotion and prevention systems (...) outlined in regulatory focus theory. Specifically, we review research that demonstrates that differences in what “counts” as success versus failure in these systems have important implications for motivational strength, emotional responses, and risky behavior. (shrink)

In this paper I explore the way that mental illness stigma impacts epistemic credibility in people who have mental illness. While any kind of stigma has the potential to discredit a person’s epistemic agency, in the case of mental illness the basis for discrediting is in some cases and to some extent justifiable, for impairments in rationality, control, and reality perception can indeed be obstacles to participating appropriately in epistemic activities such as normal conversation and public discourse. People with mental (...) illness are still potentially subject to epistemic injustices, however, especially when we rely on stereotypes and fail to make complicated and nuanced judgments which are more accurate. In this paper, I explain some of the ways that people with mental illness may be subject to epistemic injustices, and I propose some suggestions for how epistemic injustice can be avoided. (shrink)

Phenomenologically speaking, we perceive the present, recall the past, and anticipate the future. We offer an account of the temporal content of the perceptual present that distinguishes it from the recalled past and the anticipated future. We distinguish two views: the Token Reflexive Account and the Minimal Account. We offer reasons to reject the Token Reflexive Account, and defend the Minimal Account, according to which the temporal content of the perceptual present is exhausted by its direct reference to the interval (...) of time over which it occurs. (shrink)

Good decision-making requires reliable information. In medicine, relevant information comes from clinical trials and other forms of scientific research. In business, one source is in corporate annual financial statements. As for-profit, publicly traded companies whose business is discovering, manufacturing, and marketing drugs, pharmaceutical companies sit at the nexus of these two fields. Determining the safety and efficacy of a pharmaceutical product and determining the profitability of a complex enterprise are similarly difficult tasks: each is fraught with deeply ambiguous information that (...) requires sophisticated judgment to interpret reasonably. (shrink)

The distinctly contemporary proliferation of pornography and hate speech poses a challenge to liberalism's traditional ideal of a 'marketplace of ideas' facilitated by state neutrality about the content of speech. This new study argues that the liberal state ought to depart from neutrality to meet this challenge.

The problem of the manipulation of data that arises when there is both opportunity and incentive to mislead is better accepted and studied — though by no means solved — in financial accounting than in medicine. This article analyzes pharmaceutical company manipulation of medical research as part of a broader problem of corporate manipulation of data in the creation of accounting profits. The article explores how our understanding of accounting fraud and misinformation helps us understand the risk of similar information (...) manipulation in the medical sciences. This understanding provides a framework for considering how best to improve the quality of medical research and analysis in light of the current system of medical information production. I offer three possible responses: (1) use of the Dodd-Frank whistleblower provisions to encourage reporting of medical research fraud; (2) a two-step academic journal review process for clinical trials; and (3) publicly subsidized trial-failure insurance. These would improve the release of negative information about drugs, thereby increasing the reliability of positive information. (shrink)

SummaryJudith Montefiore's life has attracted attention principally by association with that of her husband Sir Moses Montefiore (1784–1885), the pre-eminent Jewish figure of his age. This article emphasises instead Judith's pioneering role as a Jewish woman travel-writer and influential female voice in the world of Jewish letters and international Jewish politics. To Jews in the Holy Cities of Palestine and the ghettos and shtetls of Eastern Europe, Judith was—like her husband—a beacon of hope, an example to follow and an instrument (...) of change. Her activities drew on a rich vein of Jewish tradition and a series of profound encounters with Middle Eastern and, to a lesser extent, Eastern European Jewries, which shaped her spiritual world. These paradoxes are easily conceptualised by the contrast between Judith's different worlds: the Jewish world that underpinned her marriage, structured her spirituality and infused her life with meaning, and the world of the English gentry and dissenting middle classes, with whom she mixed socially, and whose spiritual style, values, expectations, and mode of life shaped her in other, equally profound ways. This article argues, however, that it was the interaction and cross-fertilisation between these different worlds that enabled Judith to carve her distinctive path in life. (shrink)

This paper argues that most conceptualizations of citizenship limit the purview of the discourse to static categories. ‘Citizenship’ is commonly seen as an ideal type, presuming a largely legal relationship between an inidividual and a single nation-state – more precisely only one type of nation-state, the advanced capitalist post-war model. Alternatively, we suggest a re-conceptualization of citizenship as a negotiated relationship, one which is subject therefore to change, and acted upon collectively within social, political and economic relations of conflict. This (...) dynamic process of negotiation takes place within a context which is shaped by gendered, racial and class structures and ideologies; it also involves international hierarchies among states. Citizenship is therefore negotiated on global as well as national levels. This conceptualization is demonstrated by way of identifying one particular set of experiences of negotiated citizenship, involving foreign domestic workers in Canada. As non-citizens originating from Third World conditions, this is a case involving women of colour workers, highly prone to abusive conditions, and under the direction of employers who are more affluent First World citizens and predominantly white women. Original survey data based on interviews with Caribbean and Filipino domestic workers in Canada are used to demonstrate the varied, creative and effective strategies of two distinctive groups of non-citizens as they attempt to negotiate citizenship rights in restrictive national and international conditions. (shrink)

The international protest surrounding the Copenhagen Zoo’s recent decision to kill a healthy giraffe in the name of population management reveals a deep moral tension between contemporary zoological display practices—which induce zoo-goers to view certain animals as individuals, quasi-persons, or friends—and the traditional objectives of zoos, which ask us only to view animals as specimens. I argue that these zoological display practices give rise to moral obligations on the part of zoos to their visitors, and thus ground indirect duties on (...) behalf of zoos to their animals. I conclude that zoos might take on interspecies friendship as a new zoological objective. (shrink)

With no statutory definition of death, the accepted medical definition relies on brain stem death criteria as a definitive measure of diagnosing death. However, the use of brain stem death criteria in this way is precarious and causes widespread confusion amongst both medical and lay communities. Through critical analysis, this paper considers the insufficiencies of brain stem death. It concludes that brain stem death cannot be successfully equated with either biological death or the loss of integrated bodily function. The overemphasis (...) of the brain-stem and its consequences leaves the criteria open to significant philosophical critique. Further, in some circumstances, the use of brain stem death criteria causes substantial emotional conflict for families and relatives. Accordingly, a more holistic and comprehensive definition of death is required. (shrink)

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many have become increasingly dissatisfied with how science funding is distributed. Traditional grant funding processes are seen as stifling the creativity of researchers, in addition to being bureaucratic, slow, and inefficient. Consequently, there have been increasing popular calls to make “fast funding” – fast, unbureaucratic grant applications – a new standard for scientific funding. Though this approach to funding, implemented by Fast Grants, has been successful as a pandemic response strategy, we believe there (...) are serious costs to its wide-scale adoption, particularly for transparency and equity, and that the purported benefits – increased creativity and efficiency – are unlikely to materialize. While traditional funding mechanisms are certainly not perfect, scientific communities should think twice before adopting fast funding as a new standard for funding. (shrink)

Empathy is a construct that is notoriously difficult to define. Murphy and colleagues argue for leaning into the construct's inherent fuzziness and reverting to what they term a classical definition informed by the observations of philosophers and clinicians: as a dynamic, “unfolding process of imaginatively experiencing the subjective consciousness of another person, sensing, understanding, and structuring the world as if one were that person.” Although consistent with some historical conceptualizations, this definition risks incorporating so many processes it would make empathy (...) difficult to operationalize or distinguish from any generally socially sensitive interaction. Defining empathy instead as the attempted representation, or simulation, of another's subjective internal experiences would increase its clarity and empirical utility. (shrink)

People who have mental health diagnoses are often subject to sanist microaggressions in which pejorative terms to describe mental illness are used to represent that which is discreditable. Such microaggressions reflect and perpetrate stigma against severe mental illness, often held unconsciously as implicit bias. In this article, I examine the sanist attitudes that underlie sanist microaggressions, analyzing some of the cognitive biases that support mental illness stigma. Then I consider what responsibility we have with respect to microaggressions. I argue that (...) all people share in a collective responsibility to engage in acts of epistemic resistance that challenge sanist attitudes so that it is easier for bystanders who witness microaggressions, and targets of microaggressions in particular, to identify microaggressions and to point out biased behavior. The act of pointing out bias is best understood as an act of epistemic resistance that is more effective and meaningful in the context of other acts of epistemic resistance. Ultimately, whether to point out bias is an individual decision that one must make after weighing the risks involved; engaging in a range of acts of epistemic resistance, on the other hand, is a moral responsibility everyone shares. (shrink)

Empathy is a construct that is notoriously difficult to define. Murphy and colleagues argue for leaning into the construct's inherent fuzziness and reverting to what they term a classical definition informed by the observations of philosophers and clinicians: as a dynamic, “unfolding process of imaginatively experiencing the subjective consciousness of another person, sensing, understanding, and structuring the world as if one were that person.” Although consistent with some historical conceptualizations, this definition risks incorporating so many processes it would make empathy (...) difficult to operationalize or distinguish from any generally socially sensitive interaction. Defining empathy instead as the attempted representation, or simulation, of another's subjective internal experiences would increase its clarity and empirical utility. (shrink)

Typically, the quantification and management of population as a reason of state is associated with modernity. As scholars, we tend to take this for granted, especially in our post-Foucauldian theor...

This paper presents the results of a research done to investigate the effectiveness of Philosophy for Children, a pedagogy employing philosophical dialogue in a community of inquiry, in a Philippine primary school. Quantitative analysis of critical thinking skills identified by Sharp and Splitter as reasoning; concept analysis; and meaning-making revealed that there was a considerable increase in the frequency of the children’s use of such critical thinking skills over the course of fifteen sessions of dialogical inquiry. Moreover, qualitative analysis of (...) excerpts from the dialogue transcripts accounted for the refinement of the children’s use of the critical thinking skills. This pioneering work thus calls for further research that will implement P4C in other grade levels and to explore other indicators of development in children’s thinking. Further, it recommends that primary schools adopt P4C in Philippine basic education curriculum and that teacher education institutions provide teacher training and include P4C for pre-service training. (shrink)