Initial responses to questionnaires used to assess participants' understanding of informed consent for malaria vaccine trials conducted in the United States and Mali were tallied. Total scores were analyzed by age, sex, literacy (if known), and location. Ninety-two percent (92%) of answers by United States participants and 85% of answers by Malian participants were correct. Questions more likely to be answered incorrectly in Mali related to risk, and to the type of vaccine. For adult participants, independent predictors of higher scores (...) were younger age and female sex in the United States, and male sex in Mali. Scores in the United States were higher than in Mali (P = 0.005). Despite this difference participants at both sites were well informed overall. Although interpretation must be qualified because questionnaires were not intended as research tools and were not standardized among sites, these results do not support concerns about systematic low understanding among research participants in developing versus developed countries. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to introduce an exceptional document preserved at the Louvre Museum under the mark MAO 2098. The manuscript is a calligraphic genealogical scroll relating to the Ḫwāğas, members of a Sufi Naqšbandi lineage of East Turkestan which was extremely powerful during the 17th and the 18th centuries. Striving to join the dots literally as well as figuratively, I propose to read the šağara in several different ways. Most obviously, the text provides some limited new information (...) on members of the Āfāqi branch of the Ḫwāğa family. At the same time, we can read the text as a communicative device serving to advance two intertwined social practices: family strategies and the construction of power. Produced within a forum of competition with other aristocratic households, prestigious Sufi lineages in particular, the scroll serves to highlight both the Šarīfian origin of the family and the hereditary succession of its spiritual leaders. At the same time, the manuscript’s remarkable aesthetic qualities served to impress upon those who saw in it the numinous force of the Ḫwāğas’ supernatural authority. (shrink)

1. Shizen -- 2. Chisei -- 3. Chitsujo -- 4. Jikan -- 5. Bi.

The newly updated Right and Wrong 2nd Edition is an accessible introduction to the major traditions in western philosophical ethics, written in a lively and engaging style. It is designed for entry-level ethics courses and includes real-life ethical scenarios chosen to appeal directly to students. Greatly expanded and improved, this successful text introduces students to the major ethical traditions, and provides a simple methodology for resolving ethical dilemmas Treats teleological and deontological approaches to ethics as the two most important traditions, (...) but now includes chapters on virtue ethics and the ethics of care The very accessible writing style speaks directly to students’ own experience Draws examples from three types of real-life ethical scenarios submitted by students: academic dishonesty, partying, and personal relationships Provides a concise treatment of this notoriously complex subject, perfect for entry-level ethics and applied ethics courses. (shrink)

People are motivated by shared social values that, when held with moral conviction, can serve as compelling mandates capable of facilitating support for ideological violence. The current study examined this dark side of morality by identifying specific cognitive and neural mechanisms associated with beliefs about the appropriateness of sociopolitical violence, and determining the extent to which the engagement of these mechanisms was predicted by moral convictions. Participants reported their moral convictions about a variety of sociopolitical issues prior to undergoing functional (...) MRI scanning. During scanning, they were asked to evaluate the appropriateness of violent protests that were ostensibly congruent or incongruent with their views about sociopolitical issues. Complementary univariate and multivariate analytical strategies comparing neural responses to congruent and incongruent violence identified neural mechanisms implicated in processing salience and in the encoding of subjective value. As predicted, neuro-hemodynamic response was modulated parametrically by individuals’ beliefs about the appropriateness of congruent relative to incongruent sociopolitical violence in ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and by moral conviction in ventral striatum. Overall moral conviction was predicted by neural response to congruent relative to incongruent violence in amygdala. Together, these findings indicate that moral conviction about sociopolitical issues serves to increase their subjective value, overriding natural aversion to interpersonal harm. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Personhood: A Start Are Dolphins Persons? Language and the Hand Personhood Redefined Conclusion: What Kind of Beings Are Dolphins?

This chapter contains section titled: Problem‐solving Summary: problem solving ‐ Gory, Kuczaj, Pryor, Grover, DRC Language Comprehension Commands: FETCH, IN, MIMIC.

This chapter contains section titled: Human Consciousness Nonhumans, Consciousness and Appropriate Treatment Dolphin consciousness Do Dolphins Recognize Other Minds? Moving on: Inner World and Choice Do Dolphins Have Emotions? Do Dolphins Think? Conclusion: Dolphin onsciousness and Moral Standing.

This chapter contains section titled: Human Adaptations to the Water: An Exercise in Imagination Life in the ocean: the importance of other people Dolphin Intelligence in the Wild Dolphin Communication Social Intelligence and Group Cohesion Dolphins and Sex The Cognitive and Affective Skills Involved in Group Living Conclusion: Dolphin Intelligence.

This chapter contains section titled: “Human” Versus “Person” Human, Person and Ethics Philosophical Ethics Ethics and Nonhumans “Alien Intelligence” Two Questions.

This chapter contains section titled: “Interspecies ethics” The Dolphin/Tuna Controversy Dolphins in Captivity So What Do We Do? The Ethics of Human/Dolphin Contact: Two Final Thoughts.

This chapter contains section titled: Basic Facts about Dolphins Adaptations to Living in the Water The Dolphin Brain The Human Brain The Human Brain: Summary The Dolphin Brain Compared to the Human Brain The Dolphin Brain: Summary.

The current major models of coexistence of species on the same resources are briefly summarized. It is then shown that analysis of supposedly competitive systems in terms of the physical four dimensions of phase-space is sufficient to understand the causes for coexistence and for competitive exclusion. Thus, the multiple dimensions of niche theory are reduced to factors which define the magnitudes of the phase-spatial system, in particular the boundaries of population spaces and of periods of activity. Excluding possible cooperative interaction (...) between consumers, it appears that coexistence of species on thesame kind of limiting resource is possible only in cases of compartmentalization either in space, or in time, of resource consumption, i.e. if each consumer species disposes of a separate resource supply. Three criteria were found to be decisive for successful compartmentalization (i.e. for coexistence): 1. the vector of the resource flow; 2. relative mobility between consumers and resource units; 3. dependence or independence of resource flow on previous consumption. The traditional terminology of niche theory and of competition theory in general proved to be inadequate for analytical treatment of problems of coexistence. (shrink)

For courses in Business Ethics A fresh approach to the assumptions that underlie business practices Two recent events — the 2008 economic meltdown and the ongoing concentration of the nation's wealth in the hands of a very small percentage of the population — have led many people to question a number of basic assumptions about business, corporations, and the workings of contemporary free-market capitalism in a global economy. Written as a dialogue between Socrates and a hypothetical contemporary CEO,Socrates Comes to (...) Wall Street leads students to think critically about perspectives and practices that are taken as “givens” in most American business schools and corporations. Employing this original and provocative approach, author Thomas White seeks to encourage the next generation of business leaders to be more astute about the implications of their actions, and to act more prudently and more fairly than we have seen in the recent past. (shrink)