A bold new book that proves our bodies and surroundings know more than our brains do.

Nietzsche’s conception of eros and its role in the development of philosophers is similar to the conception of those same topics espoused by Diotima in Plato’s Symposium. Nietzsche and Diotima agree that eros is an insatiable desire to possess the beautiful, that eros aims at immortality through reproduction, and that philosophy requires an ascent beyond sexual desire to “higher” forms of eros, which nevertheless are still modeled on heterosexual reproduction. Understanding these facets of Nietzsche’s view leads to an apparent contradiction (...) in that Nietzsche thinks of philosophy on the model of reproduction and ascribes to the philosopher both the female and the male roles in heterosexual reproduction. I argue that this ambivalence reflects Nietzsche’s view that practicing philosophy requires balancing two conflicting philosophical tendencies: on the one hand, pursuit of truth, which involves dissatisfaction with oneself; on the other hand, creation, which involves acknowledgment of one’s own capacity and value. (shrink)

Rates of deceased organ donation in the UK fall well short of those reported from other parts of the world, and result in unnecessary deaths and avoidable morbidity. A particular feature of the UK problem is that its total potential for donation is lower than the actual number of donors reported in the highest-donating countries. This implies that while the identification, referral and conversion of recognized potential deceased donors is an important component of any strategic effort to increase donation, more (...) fundamental is an understanding of why some countries have a greater potential for donation, particularly donation after brain death. While it is possible that these differences reflect a difference in the incidence catastrophic brain injury or the outcomes from it, it is also possible that it reflects different approaches to the care that such patients receive when they are dying. (shrink)

Responding to Randall and Gibson''s (1990) call for more rigorous methodologies in empirically-based ethics research, this paper develops propositions — based on both previous ethics research as well as the larger organizational behavior literature — examining the impact of attitudes, leadership, presence/absence of ethical codes and organizational size on corporate ethical behavior. The results, which come from a mail survey of 149 companies in a major U.S. service industry, indicate that attitudes and organizational size are the best predictors of ethical (...) behavior. Leadership and ethical codes contribute little to predicting ethical behavior. The paper concludes with an assessment of the relevant propositions, as well as a delineation of future research needs. (shrink)

concepts are defined as concepts that cannot be experienced directly through the sensorimotor modalities. Explaining our understanding of such concepts poses a challenge to neurocognitive models of knowledge. One account of how these concepts come to be represented is that sensorimotor representations of grounded experiences are reactivated in a way that is constitutive of the abstract concept. In the present experiment, we investigated how sensorimotor information might constitute GOD-related concepts, and whether a person’s self-reported religiosity modulated this grounding. To do (...) so, we manipulated both the state of the body and the state of stimuli in two tasks that required conceptual categorization of abstract words. Linear Mixed Effects model fitting procedures were used to determine which manipulated factors best predicted response latency and accuracy in both tasks. We successfully replicated previous research demonstrating faster categorization of GOD-related words when they were presented at the top of the screen. Importantly, results demonstrated that the kneeling posture manipulation enhanced this effect, as did religiosity, as participants who scored higher in religiosity showed a greater effect of the posture manipulation on the speed with which word categorization occurred when those words were presented in the higher visuospatial presentation condition. Overall, we interpreted our findings to suggest that directly manipulating sensorimotor information can facilitate the categorization of abstract concepts, supporting the notion that this information in part constitutes the representation of abstract concepts. (shrink)

There is scarce research on the interaction between psychosocial working conditions and being a target of workplace bullying with individual characteristics as a moderator. We therefore examined 3,363 employees from 60 Danish workplaces to test whether sense of coherence moderates the relationship between the job demand-control model and bullying. This work is exploratory in nature, as no previous study to assess this moderation was found. Hierarchical linear regressions showed that demand-control model was significantly associated with bullying. Sense of coherence displayed (...) a significant though practically negligible moderating effect. This suggests that negative psychosocial working conditions are associated with bullying independently of personal characteristics, at least in terms of sense of coherence. (shrink)

This comprehensive anthology offers over 40 readings that are critical to the understanding of anthropological theory and the development of anthropology as an academic discipline. The fourth edition maintains a strong focus on the "four-field" roots of the discipline in North America but has been reorganized with a new section on twenty-first-century theory, including coverage of postcolonial and public anthropology. New key terms and introductions accompany each reading and a revamped glossary makes the book more student-friendly. Used on its own, (...) or together with the overview text A History of Anthropological Theory, Fourth Edition, this anthology offers a flexible and unrivaled introduction to anthropological theory that reflects not only the history but also the changing nature of the discipline today. For additional resources, visit the "Teaching Theory" page at www.utpteachingculture.com. (shrink)

Much of health promotion is premised on the notion that health-related behaviours are under individual control, and strongly influenced by intra-psychic factors, including knowledge and attitudes. The emphasis placed on such factors has led to a neglect of the social and material context in which the individual is situated. This paper describes a number of psychological theories which have influenced health promotion, and suggests ways in which a wider set of psychological theories and methods, which take into account social and (...) material factors, may more usefully inform health promotion initiatives. (shrink)

Introduction The provision of abortion services in the Republic of Ireland is legally restricted. Recent legislation that has been implemented allows for abortion if there is a real and substantial risk to the woman's life, but in general Irish women must travel abroad for abortion services. The aims of this study were to investigate the clinical experiences of Irish obstetric non-consultant hospital doctors that work in this environment and to assess their attitudes towards termination of pregnancy. Methods We conducted an (...) online cross-sectional descriptive survey of 184 Irish obstetric NCHDs. Quantitate and qualitative analysis was performed. Results There was a 28% response rate. 88% of respondents thought that ToP should be permitted for fatal fetal abnormality if the parents choose, 96% if the woman's health is severely affected and 86% in cases of rape and incest. Over 90% of respondents believed a woman's health suffers because of the need to travel abroad to undergo a ToP. Physical, psychological and social reasons were explored. The research also highlights that obstetric trainees are actively involved in the provision of preabortion and postabortion care. Conclusions The clinical experiences and opinions of the respondents suggest that the current legal availability of abortion in Ireland is insufficient to guide best clinical practice and does not represent the views of those that provide obstetric care. (shrink)

Cognitive scientists have focused too narrowly on the acquisition of data and on the methods to extract patterns from those data. We argue that a successful science of the mind requires widening our focus to include the problems being solved by cognitive processes. Frameworks that characterize cognitive processes in terms of instrumental problem‐solving, such as those within the evolutionary social sciences, become necessary if we wish to discover more accurate descriptions of those processes.

COVID-19 lockdown presented a novel opportunity to study the experiences of people attempting to maintain friendships in the context of worldwide, government-enforced physical distancing and lockdown. Here we report on an experiential, idiographic qualitative project with a purposive sample of Scottish students. Data was collected via one-to-one on-line interviews with nine student participants. Data was transcribed and analyzed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Analysis highlighted three group-level experiential themes and associated subthemes. Participants’ shared experiences of maintaining friendships were reflected in a (...) dynamic process by which ‘changes to communication’ were associated with experiences of ‘effort and balance’ across friendships. Participants reported becoming particularly aware of the psychological processes involved in maintaining friendships, in turn, this was associated with ‘reflection and growth.’ These experiential findings resonate well with several longstanding classic theories; however, they also speak to the particularities of the context in which the study was conducted. They suggest the need for a pandemic psychology that moves beyond the typical focus on the direct impacts of infectious disease to address the wider psychosocial impacts with equal vigor. (shrink)

The theoretical and empirical link between leadership and workplace bullying needs further elaboration. The aim of the study is to examine the relationship between quality of leadership and the occurrence of workplace bullying 2 years later. Furthermore, we aim to examine a possible mechanism from leadership to bullying using social community at work as mediator. Using survey data that were collected at two different points in time among 1664 workers from 60 Danish workplaces, we examined the total, direct and indirect (...) effects between quality of leadership and workplace bullying. Our results indicate that quality of leadership plays a role in establishing working conditions that lead to workplace bullying. Furthermore, social community at work fully mediates the effect of poor quality of leadership on workplace bullying. This longitudinal study adds to previous cross-sectional studies on the substantial role played by leaders in the bullying process. Within the leadership–bullying relationship, social community at work acts as a full mediator, adding a significant contribution to the discussion of mechanisms involved in the bullying process. Plausible explanations of this mechanism and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

Is Goodness Without God Good Enough contains a lively debate between William Lane Craig and Paul Kurtz on the relationship between God and ethics, followed by seven new essays that both comment on the debate and advance the broader discussion of this important issue. Written in an accessible style by eminent scholars, this book will appeal to students and academics alike.

‘Pupil voice’ is a movement within state education in England that is associated with democracy, change, participation and the raising of educational standards. While receiving much attention from educators and policy makers, less attention has been paid to the theory behind the concept of pupil voice. An obvious point of theoretical departure is the work of Jürgen Habermas, who over a number of decades has endeavoured to develop a theory of democracy that places strong significance on language, communication and discourse. (...) This paper is an attempt to gauge the usefulness of Habermas’ approach to understanding the theory of pupil voice, in particular how his theory of universal pragmatics lends itself to a ‘philosophy of between’, a philosophy that finds echoes in the conflicted nature of schooling that ‘pupil voice’ is supposed to rectify to some extent. The paper also explores the drawbacks of a Habermasian approach, in particular his overreliance on rationality as a way of understanding communication. Lacan’s concept of the objet petit a is introduced as an alternative way of understanding pupil voice. (shrink)

Within the Computer Science community, many ethical issues have emerged as significant and critical concerns. Computer ethics is an academic field in its own right and there are unique ethical issues associated with information technology. It encompasses a range of issues and concerns including privacy and agency around personal information, Artificial Intelligence and pervasive technology, the Internet of Things and surveillance applications. As computing technology impacts society at an ever growing pace, there are growing calls for more computer ethics content (...) to be included in Computer Science curricula. In this paper we present the results of a survey that polled faculty from Computer Science and related disciplines about teaching practices for computer ethics at their institutions. The survey was completed by respondents from 61 universities across 23 European countries. Participants were surveyed on whether or not computer ethics is taught to Computer Science students at each institution, the reasons why computer ethics is or is not taught, how computer ethics is taught, the background of staff who teach computer ethics and the scope of computer ethics curricula. This paper presents and discusses the results of the survey. (shrink)

Philosophy is shaped by life and life is shaped by philosophy. This is reflected in The Philosophical I, a collection of 16 autobiographical essays by prominent philosophers.

The question 'Why should I obey the law?' introduces a contemporary puzzle that is as old as philosophy itself. The puzzle is especially troublesome if we think of cases in which breaking the law is not otherwise wrongful, and in which the chances of getting caught are negligible. Philosophers from Socrates to H.L.A. Hart have struggled to give reasoned support to the idea that we do have a general moral duty to obey the law but, more recently, the greater number (...) of learned voices has expressed doubt that there is any such duty, at least as traditionally conceived. (shrink)

The paper aims to explain how Paul Ricœur’s phenomenological and hermeneutic approach offers an original theory of the self as self-attestation. Considering useful an approach that combines the psychological uses of the notion of self with a reflection on one’s capacity to design himself/herself as a person, the paper offers a thorough analysis of Ricœur’s work Soi-même comme un autre / Oneself as Another. The main purpose of this analysis is to highlight that, drawing a clear distinction between two (...) forms of identity (la mêmeté/sameness and l’ipséité/selfhood) and proposing a dialectic between the self and the other, Ricœur grounds his theory on a notion of self which includes one’s acceptance of the other. (shrink)