In this study, we examine the influence of senior leadership on firms’ corporate social responsibility. We integrate upper echelons research that has investigated either the influence of the CEO or the top management team on CSR. We contend that functional experience complementarity between CEOs and TMTs in formulating and implementing CSR strategy may underlie differentiated strategies in CSR. We find that when CEOs who have predominant experience in output functions are complemented by TMTs with a lower proportion of members who (...) have experience in output functions, there is a pronounced effect on the community, product, and diversity dimensions of CSR. In turn, when output-oriented CEOs are complemented by output-oriented TMTs, we observe an effect on the employee relations dimension of CSR. Interestingly, we find no influence of CEO-TMT complementarity on the environment dimension of CSR. In general, our empirical results support the relevance of the interaction between CEOs and their TMTs in defining their firms’ CSR profile. (shrink)

Both G.F.W. Hegel and Carl Schmitt took seriously the problem of political sovereignty entailed by liberal political theories. In Dictatorship (1919) and Political Theology (1922), Schmitt rejects liberal political theories that argue for the immediate unity of democracy and legality i.e., popular sovereignty, because he thinks they cannot secure political sovereignty. In the Philosophy of Right, Hegel denounces popular sovereignty for similar reasons. Yet given Schmitt’s negative assessment of Hegel their positions are seldom related to one another. I argue in (...) this paper that Schmitt’s analysis of liberal political theories is similar to Hegel’s analysis of Rousseau’s liberal ideas. I contend, however, that Schmitt’s solution, which collapses the distinction between the executive and the legislative power in favor of the former, fails to secure political sovereignty. Contrary to Schmitt, Hegel conceives of the liberal predicament as a basic determination of any political state that rests on the division of the legislative and executive power. Hegel argues that the constitutional monarchy is a genuine instantiation of political sovereignty that can maintain not only the division of these powers, but also their unity. In this regard, I argue that Hegel’s conception of the division of powers provides a more convincing theory of the problem afflicting modern states than Schmitt’s and at least deserves to be taken more seriously by critics of Schmitt’s solution such as Hannah Arendt, Leo Strauss, Jurgen Habermas, Andreas Kalyvas and Chantal Mouffe. (shrink)

We provide a novel Bayesian justification of inference to the best explanation. More specifically, we present conditions under which explanatory considerations can provide a significant confirmatory boost for hypotheses that provide the best explanation of the relevant evidence. Furthermore, we show that the proposed Bayesian model of IBE is able to deal naturally with the best known criticisms of IBE such as van Fraassen?s?bad lot? argument.

Aristotle was the founder not only of logic but also of modal logic. In the Prior Analytics he developed a complex system of modal syllogistic which, while influential, has been disputed since antiquity--and is today widely regarded as incoherent. Combining analytic rigor with keen sensitivity to historical context, Marko Malink makes clear that the modal syllogistic forms a consistent, integrated system of logic, one that is closely related to other areas of Aristotle's philosophy. Aristotle's modal syllogistic differs significantly from modern (...) modal logic. Malink considers the key to understanding the Aristotelian version to be the notion of predication discussed in the Topics--specifically, its theory of predicables and the ten categories. The predicables introduce a distinction between essential and nonessential predication. In contrast, the categories distinguish between substantial and nonsubstantial predication. Malink builds on these insights in developing a semantics for Aristotle's modal propositions, one that verifies the ancient philosopher's claims of the validity and invalidity of modal inferences. While it acknowledges some limitations of this reconstruction, Aristotle's Modal Syllogistic brims with bold ideas, richly supported by close readings of the Greek texts. (shrink)

We prove, by a probabilistic argument, that a class of ω-categorical structures, on which algebraic closure defines a pregeometry, has the finite submodel property. This class includes any expansion of a pure set or of a vector space, projective space or affine space over a finite field such that the new relations are sufficiently independent of each other and over the original structure. In particular, the random graph belongs to this class, since it is a sufficiently independent expansion of an (...) infinite set, with no structure. The class also contains structures for which the pregeometry given by algebraic closure is non-trivial. (shrink)

Over forty years have passed since the death of Jean-Paul Sartre, still, his oeuvre stands out as a paramount achievement in existential-phenomenological thought. Among the numerous ideas and challenges he offered to contemporary continental philosophy, the problem of authenticity deserves a special place, for it connects many of existentialism’s key concerns. The ever reforming conceptualization of authenticity had spread from the mid-1930s (La transcendance de l’égo) till Sartre’s posthumously published Cahiers pour une morale that appeared in the early 1980s, and (...) it had a profound impact not only on ethical and literary theories, but also on psychiatry and psychotherapy. The present essay’s undertaking is to closely follow the trajectory of this celebrated concept, to contextualize its development in accordance with Sartre’s shifting philosophical as well as ethical projects over the years, and to point out some of the affinities this concept might have with East Asian thought, and with Buddhism in particular. (shrink)

Despite the fact that bioethics is, basically, an interdisciplinary scientific field, it is deeply intertwined with less objectivistic, yet important, threads of morality and religion. From the beginning, in the United States, the language of bioethics has been shaped by theologians and people who do not neglect the religious approaches of particular scientific issues. This paper examines the possibility of using religious and nonreligious terminologies in the bioethical discourse, paying close attention to the American bioethical debate. I shall argue that (...) no democratic, pluralistic societies of today should favor only one jargon of a sole moral tradition, as this attitude leads to the discrimination of others that are also affected by such discourse. Mutual tolerance is the way that can provide a violence-free territory for the discussion about different value-based moral systems and traditions (such as Christianity and Islam or, in a broader perspective, religion and irreligious humanism). (shrink)

In my paper, I propose to investigate the philosophical underpinnings of representative indigenous Japanese psychotherapeutic approaches, particularly that of Morita and Naikan therapies, that have, at their foundations, distinctly Buddhist psychological tenets, and that offer to deal with mental health issues in a manifestly different way compared with their western counterparts. I offer a comprehensive account of how the characterizations of madness and mental illness have been shifting over the last two hundred years in Japanese society and culture, and how (...) this has affected mental health care in Japan. Finally, the ways in which modern day thinkers, such as Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki and Keiji Nishitani have been re-shaping the concepts of the self in Japanese religion and philosophy while, at the same time, taking care to remain faithful to the original East Asian sensibilities will also be expounded and connected to the themes of mental health and mental illness. (shrink)

This article examines the possible roots of the sixth-century astrologer/astronomer, Varāhamihira. Ritual instructions from astrological texts on the yātrā are compared with the preliminary services of the Atharvaveda Śāntikalpa to demonstrate that much of the astrological ritual system can be seen as an adaptation of Atharvan śānti ritual. This analysis illuminates both the possible interchange between Vedic and Jyotiḥśāstric ritual systems and Varāhamihira’s considerable expertise as a ritualist.

Śaiva Rites of Expiation: A First Edition and Translation of Trilocanaśiva’s Twelfth-Century Prāyaścittasamuccaya. Edited and translated by R. Sathyanarayanan, with an introduction by Dominic Goddall. Collection Indologie, vol. 127. Pondicherry: Institut Française de Pondichéry; École Française d’Extrême Orient, 2015. Pp. 651.

What are the similarities and the differences of icons from the same workshop depicting the same subject? An important portable icon with the representation of the Dormition of the Virgin, hitherto unknown, preserved today in the Art Collection of the University of Göttingen, helps answering this question. The studydeals with the fascinating journey of this icon from Venetian-dominated Crete in the 15th century to Germany of the 18th century. Furthermore, this paper shows that the icon of Göttingen belongs to a (...) group of a numerous icons that they all derive from the same icon-workshop of the renowned Cretan painters Andreas and Nikolaos Ritzos in Candia. Finally, it turned out that this icon was also the inspiration for Cretan painters of the 17th CE such as Emmanuel Lambardos and Viktor. (shrink)

: One of the outcomes from low self-confidence of basketball is aggressive behavior. Helpless feeling caused by low self-confidence could turn an athlete using aggressive behavior as alternate behavior in the interaction with the opponent during a game. The level of the aggression can be seen in the injury rate in that particular sport. This research objective is to find out the relation between self-confidence and the appearance of the aggressive behavior in basketball player. It involves 64 athletes in West (...) Jakarta between 17 to 28 years old. Data that was measured by questionnaires has shown there is a negative association between self-confidence and aggressive behavior in basketball athlete.  . (shrink)

This daily diary study examined the within-person coupling between four emotion regulation strategies and both subjective well-being and perceived stress in daily life of geriatric nurses. Participants (N = 89) described how they regulated their emotions in terms of cognitive reappraisal and suppression. They also indicated their subjective well-being and level of perceived stress each day over three weeks. At the within-person level, cognitive reappraisal intended to increase positive emotions was positively associated with higher subjective well-being and negatively associated with (...) perceived stress. Suppression of the expression of positive emotions was negatively associated with subjective well-being and positively associated with perceived stress. However, cognitive reappraisal intended to down-regulate negative emotions and suppression as a strategy to inhibit the expression of negative emotions were not associated with daily well-being or perceived stress. Off-days were rated as days with higher subjective well-being and lower perceived stress in contrast to working days. At the between-person level, individuals who reported more daily negative affect reported increased suppression of positive emotions, corroborating the within-person findings. Moreover, findings indicated that nurses with more years of experience in the job reported higher subjective well-being and less perceived stress. These results provide insights into important daily emotional processes of geriatric nurses, both at workdays and in their leisure time. (shrink)

The article explores the specific conception of art developed by Danko Grlić, a prominent member of the Yugoslav Praxis School. Grlić conceptualised art beyond both aesthetic norms and technological determinism. Within the context of praxis philosophy, a distinct theory of the subject and a Marxist humanist approach, he reconceptualised art as a distinct type of praxis, a revolutionary and creative practice of changing existing living conditions. The article explains how his unique understanding of art leads Grlić to analyse, criticise and (...) refute various Marxist approaches to art: art as an ideology, art as a reflection of the objective world, art as sociological analysis. Moreover, while sharing many ideas and conceptions with Walter Benjamin’s materialist conception of art, Grlić reached the point where he became critical due to Benjamin’s belief in technology concerning processes of emancipation, which Grlić viewed with scepticism. (shrink)

This paper deals with the problem of the subject in Bachelard?s concept of surrationalism. Focusing on the epistemological character of surrational creativity, the issue of the subject is approached through the analysis of the relationship between subjectivity and objectivity in the surrational act. Comparing the character of novelty in surrealism and surrationalism, the paper introduces Bachelard?s distinction between formal and material imagination, with the latter further discussed through the prepositions?against? [contre] and?in? [dans]. Bachelard?s theory of the internal dialectic - the (...) theory of subdivision of the subject - is analyzed through his concept of reverie. The last chapter deals with the dialectic between the apodictic and the assertoric subject, aiming to reconsider the idea of interiority and repose. (shrink)

In this new book, Marko Zlomislić argues that Slavoj Žižek's work does not contain any sort of radical emancipatory project, especially as it passes through the ideology of communism and Lacanian psychoanalysis. The evidence for the failure of communism is vast and includes the more than six hundred mass graves recently located in Žižek's homeland of Slovenia. Zlomislić demonstrates that the way out of the capitalist dilemma is not a repetition of communism but a return to the late medieval notion (...) of haecceity or "individual thisness" that was rejected by modernity. Haecceity, or the indescribable and indefinite here and now of the person, shows that the late medieval Franciscans were already "postmodernists." It is no wonder that the totalitarianism of the modernist Hegel is embraced by thinkers such as Žižek, Badiou, Hardt, Negri, and Laclau and was already rejected by Leibnitz, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Levinas, Deleuze, and Derrida. This important book shows that Žižek's work must be rejected because it does not uphold the dignity, worth, and uniqueness of the person. (shrink)

In their 2010 paper, Dizadji-Bahmani, Frigg, and Hartmann argue that the generalized version of the Nagel–Schaffner model that they have developed is the right one for intertheoretic reduction, i.e. the kind of reduction that involves theories with largely overlapping domains of application. Drawing on the GNS, DFH presented a Bayesian analysis of the confirmatory relation between the reducing theory and the reduced theory and argued that, post-reduction, evidence confirming the reducing theory also confirms the reduced theory and evidence confirming the (...) reduced theory also confirms the reducing theory, which meets the expectations one has about theories with largely overlapping domains. In this paper, I argue that the Bayesian analysis presented by DFH faces difficulties. In particular, I argue that the conditional probabilities that DFH introduce to model the bridge law entail consequences that run against the GNS. However, I also argue that, given slight modifications of the analysis that are in agreement with the GNS, one is able to account for these difficulties and, moreover, one is able to more rigorously analyse the confirmatory relation between the reducing and the reduced theory. (shrink)

The aim of this work is to show, first of all, how landscape cannot but stand out on the horizon of a cognitive flux that affects every aspect of our being in the world (or, better said, of our being in the world) world). A special role will be reserved for aesthetic mediation, to be understood as a n act that regulates the epistemic negotiation between what is in the center and what is ”in the surroundings”. In this sense, the (...) work will start from bio cognitive assumptions on the species specific ways in which an organism circumscribes and enriches its world, and will then finally arrive at considerations that should, in our hopes, demonstrate how aisthesis is, in fact, the conceptual category that best lends itself to describing this process, in virtue of the particular gnoseological value it assigns to the se nsitive body and its extension extension. (shrink)

Recently it has been argued that certain neuropsychological findings on the decision-making, instrumental learning, and moral understanding in psychopathic offenders offer reasons to consider them not criminally responsible, due to certain epistemic and volitional impairments. We reply to this family of arguments, that collectively we call the irresponsibility of the psychopath argument. This type of argument has a premise that describes or prescribes the deficiencies that grant or should grant partial or complete criminal exculpation. The other premise contends that neuropsychological (...) evidence shows that psychopaths have incapacitates that are sufficient to ascribe complete or partially exculpatory deficiencies. The focus of our criticism is this latter premise. We argue that it requires that psychopathy should correlate significantly with certain rational incapacities that manifest across contexts. We show that the available neuropsychological data do not support the claim that psychopaths have such general exculpatory incapacities. (shrink)

The author analyses an approach within the framework of urban sociology, characteristic to Chicago School. This approach combined certain biological premises in understanding the city with the typical sociological approach, seeing the city as a superorganism and a product of nature, which is why it is called the ecological theory of the city. In this regard, the connection between biology and sociology, as well as the theory of Robert Ezra Park and Ernest Watson Burgess, as typical representatives of this sociological (...) trend, will be the subject of special analysis, aiming to bring the reader closer to the ecological approach in urban sociology. The topic of particular interest is Park’s idea of the city as a product of nature, with symbiotic substructure and cultural superstructure, as well as Burgess’s idea of city growth and the theory of the concentric zones of city structure. Other issues of the ecological theory of the city were also analysed. (shrink)

This paper examines the social theory of Lester Frank Ward, one of the most significant representatives of early American social theory, with particular attention to his conception of the state, which can be described as Hegelian. The first part of the paper gives a brief overview of early American social theory: its basic features, the issues that were the focus of attention during this period in the development of sociology in the US, and its most significant representatives. The basic features (...) of Ward’s social theory are then presented and examined in more detail. It is pointed out that it is: conceptual and essentially based on the natural sciences; based on the distinction between pure and applied sociology; systematic; supportive of progressive and pro-social reforms. It was directed against the individualist tradition. His theory was based on the belief that the human mind can direct social progress and that the order based on social inequalities, which is a product of the laissez-faire doctrine, cannot guarantee freedom and prosperity. The fundamental institution capable of doing so is the state. Therefore, the central part of this paper is devoted to his conception of the state and makes a comparison with Hegel’s theory of the ethical state contained in Hegel’s philosophy of objective spirit – philosophy of law and philosophy of history. It concludes by pointing out that Ward’s theory indicated the general direction of development of social circumstances towards the era of collectivism, and was also atypical of American social theory in some of its features. (shrink)

The issue whether psychopathic offenders are practically rational has attracted philosophical attention. The problem is relevant in theoretical discussions on moral psychology and in those concerning the appropriate social response to the crimes of these individuals. We argue that classical and current experiments concerning the instrumental learning in psychopaths cannot directly support the conclusion that they have impaired instrumental rationality, construed as the ability for transferring the motivation by means-ends reasoning. In fact, we defend the different claim that these experiments (...) appear to show that psychopaths in certain circumstances are not aware of the relevant means for their ends. Moreover, we suggest how further empirical research could help to settle the issue. (shrink)

Effective and specifically targeted social and therapeutic responses for antisocial personality disorders and psychopathy are scarce. Some authors maintain that this scarcity should be overcome by revising current syndrome - based classifications of these conditions and devising better biocognitive classifications of antisocial individuals. The inspiration for the latter classifications has been embedded in the Research domain criteria approach (RDoC). RDoC - type approaches to psychiatric research aim at transforming diagnosis, provide valid measures of disorders, aid clinical practice, and improve health (...) outcomes by integrating the data on the genetic, neural, cognitive, and affective systems underlying psychiatric conditions. In the first part of the paper, we discuss the benefits of such approaches in comparison to the dominant syndrome-based ones and review recent attempts at building biocognitive classifications of antisocial individuals. Other researchers, how ever, have objected that biocognitive approaches in psychiatry are committed to an untenable form of explanatory. (shrink)

In their paper “Is psychopathy a mental disease?”, Thomas Nadelhoffer and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong argue that according to any plausible account of mental disorder, neural and psychological abnormalities correlated with psychopathy should be regarded as signs of a mental disorder. I oppose this conclusion by arguing that at least on a naturalistically grounded account, such as Wakefield’s ‘Harmful Dysfunction’ view, currently available empirical data and evolutionary considerations indicate that psychopathy is not a mental disorder.

The prediction error minimization framework denotes a family of views that aim at providing a unified theory of perception, cognition, and action. In this paper, I discuss some of the theoretical limitations of PEM. It appears that PEM cannot provide a satisfactory explanation of motivated reasoning, as instantiated in phenomena such as self-deception, because its cognitive ontology does not have a separate category for motivational states such as desires. However, it might be thought that this objection confuses levels of explanation. (...) Self-deception is a personal level phenomenon, while PEM offers subpersonal explanations of psychological abilities. Thus, the paper examines how subpersonal explanations couched in the PEM framework can be thought of as related to personal level explanations underlying self-deception. In this regard, three views on the relation between personal and subpersonal explanations are investigated: the autonomist, the functionalist, and the co-evolutionary perspective. I argue that, depending on which view of the relation between the personal and subpersonal is adopted, the PEM paradigm faces a dilemma: either its explanatory ambitions should be reduced to the subpersonal domain, or it cannot provide a satisfactory account of motivated reasoning as instantiated in self-deception. (shrink)

This paper considers the question of whether the influential distinction between levels of explanation introduced by David Marr can be used as a general framework for contemplating levels of explanation in cognitive sciences. Marr introduced three levels at which we can explain cognitive processes: the computational, algorithmic, and implementational levels. Some argue that Marr’s levels of explanation can only be applied to modular cognitive systems. However, since many psychological processes are non-modular, it seems that Marr’s levels of explanation cannot explain (...) such psychological processes. To show that the latter claim is not convincing, the paper draws upon an influential paradigm from cognitive sciences that is based on the principle of free energy. Based on this paradigm, the paper argues that even non-modular psychological processes can be computationally analyzed and algorithmically implemented. The conclusion of the paper is that, at least under the assumption that the func- tion of the mind is to minimize free energy, Marr’s levels of explanation can be successfully used as a general framework for understanding psychological processes at different levels of description. (shrink)

Attempts to explain behavior genetically face two major problems: the application of the concept of genetic coding and the theoretical possibility of decomposing behavior. This paper argues that using the notion of genetic coding is appropriate in explanations of protein synthesis but inadequate and even misleading in the context of explanations of behavior. Genes should be regarded as disparate components of mechanisms that account for behavior rather than as codes for behavioral phenotypes. Such mechanistic explanations, however, presuppose the possibility of (...) decomposing behavioral phenotypes, which is strongly disputed by researchers holding an interactionist view of behavior. It is argued that these researchers fail to distinguish etiological from constitutive decomposition, and that their objections apply to the former but not to the latter kind. Constitutive decomposition might identify genes as disparate components and open up the possibility of explaining behavior mechanistically by isolating causal paths from genes to behavior. Finally, research on the single gene disorder phenylketonuria is introduced to illustrate and test these views. With respect to this disorder it is demonstrated that applying the concept of genetic coding would be inappropriate and misguiding, while nonetheless the phenotype is decomposable and can be explained mechanistically by singling out a genetic causal path.t is demonstrated that applying the concept of genetic coding would be inappropriate and misguiding, while nonetheless the phenotype is decomposable and can be explained mechanistically by singling out a genetic causal path. (shrink)

In response to Albrecht et al.’s (J Agric Environ Ethics 26(4):827–845, 2013) discussion on the ethics of assisted migration, we emphasize the issues of risk and scientific uncertainty as an inextricable part of a comprehensive ethical evaluation. Insisting on a separation of risk and ethical considerations, although arguably common in many policy contexts, is at best misguided and at worst damaging.

Risk decisions often appear unsatisfactory after a calamity has taken place. This holds even when they are products of systematic risk analysis. Yet, if relevant considerations available to be known pre-accident were adequately taken into account and safety measures implemented accordingly, nobody seems morally blameworthy. In this paper, I advance a two-way argument. Firstly, I show how analysis of post-accident apologizing sheds new light on vexed tensions in ethical assessment of risk impositions. This amounts to exposing conflicting moral intuitions in (...) risk decisions, discussing problematic tenets in risk analysis as well as outlining three lines of arguments that destabilize the very notion of correct risk analysis. The analysis indicates that bringing different discussions of moral blameworthiness together facilitates resolving the tensions. It also calls for further and early-on collaboration between risk theorists and ethicists in order to carry these insights to risk analysis. Secondly, I argue that analysis of risk decisions, in part, reveals a discrepancy between the definitional work done on apology and what is required by ethics. Virtually every suggestion for the gold standard for apology involves moral blameworthiness as a necessary condition. I highlight different kinds of cases in which nobody is culpable, but an apology can be morally fitting or required. It would be nonsensical to say that, in these cases, one ought to apologize, but in a disingenuous manner. (shrink)

The SynBioSecurity argument says that synthetic biology introduces new risks of intentional misuse of synthetic pathogens and that, therefore, there is a need for extra regulations and oversight. This paper provides an analysis of the argument, sets forth a new version of it, and identifies three developments that raise biosecurity risks compared to the situation earlier. The developments include a spread of the required know-how, improved availability of the techniques, instruments and biological parts, and new technical possibilities such as “resurrecting” (...) disappeared pathogens. It is first shown that the general argument from SynBioSecurity needs to be qualified and that many improvements to biosecurity have already been implemented, most notably in the United States. Second, I suggest a new strain of the argument: the situation that most branches of synthetic biology fall under the gene technology regulation in the European Union and that this regulation in its current form does not adequately address SynBioSecurity risks together provide a weighty reason to review and possibly refine the legislation as well as the supervisory practices. Ethically speaking, the rise in the relative risk of bioterrorism brings to the fore new extrinsic issues. (shrink)