A prefrontal control system that is less mature than the limbic reward system in adolescence is thought to impede self-regulatory abilities, which could contribute to poor dietary choices and obesity. We, therefore, aimed to examine whether structural morphology of the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala are associated with dietary decisions and obesity in children and adolescents. Seventy-one individuals between the ages of 8–22 years participated in this study; each participant completed a computer-based food choice task and a T1- and T2-weighted (...) structural brain scans. Two indices of obesity were assessed, including age- and sex-specific body mass index and waist-to-height ratio. The behavioral task included rating 60 food stimuli for tastiness, healthiness, and liking. Based on each participant’s self-ratings, 100 binary food choices were then made utilizing a computer mouse. Dietary “self-control” was calculated as the proportion of trials where the individual chose the healthier food item over the total number of trials. Cortical thickness and amygdala subnuclei volumes were quantified using FreeSurfer 6.0 and CIT168 atlas, respectively. We found that WHtR was negatively associated with the thickness of bilateral superior frontal, left superior temporal, right insula, and right inferior temporal regions. We also found WHtR to be positively associated with the volume of the central nucleus region of the amygdala, after adjusting for the hemisphere, age, sex, and intracranial volumes. A similar data pattern was observed when BMIz was used. Moreover, we found that across all participants, thinner right superior frontal cortex and larger left CEN volumes predicted lower dietary self-control. These results suggest that differential development of the PFC and amygdala relate to obesity and dietary self-control. Further longitudinal studies are merited to determine causal relationships among altered PFC to amygdala neural circuitry, dietary self-control, and obesity. (shrink)

Classic analysis of the subject and the development of personal probability; one of the greatest controversies in modern statistcal thought.

Since Mueller’s 1958 article calling Hegelian dialectics a “legend,” it has been fashionable to deny that Hegel used thesis-antithesis-synthesis dialectics. But in truth, Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit has 28 dialectics hidden on four outline levels, and The Philosophy of History has 10 more on three outline levels. In Phenomenology’s macrodialectic, Hegel’s nonsupernatural Spirit–all reality, everything in the universe, including man and artificial objects–advances from unconscious + union (thesis) to conscious + separation (antithesis) to a synthesis of conscious (from the antithesis) (...) + union (from the thesis). Previous interpretations of Phenomenology have missed this dialectic: they have assumed that Spirit’s journey begins with consciousness, whereas the journey actually begins in the primordial state of nature, before man arrives and provides Spirit with its Mind (the collective mind of man). Mind then misperceives itself as a multitude of separate alien “objects”–things other than itself. The macrodialectic and all other dialectics are based on Christianity’s Johannine separation-and-return mythology; all Hegelian dialectics separate from a concept in the thesis, going to that something’s opposite (antithesis), and then return to the thesis concept. Thus, in Hegel’s master-and-slave dialectic (God = master, man = slave), man advances from potential + freedom to actual + bondage (religiosity) to actual + freedom (atheism). Only Marx and Tillich understood Hegelian dialectics. Marx’s basic dialectic (one of four) saw history separating from and returning to Communism, going from communal ownership + poverty (primitive communism, or gens) to private ownership + wealth (slavery, feudalism, capitalism) to communal ownership + wealth (final communism). Tillich’s basic dialectic (one of many) separates from and returns to God, advancing from Yes to God + Yes to supernaturalism (theism) to No to God + No to supernaturalism (atheism) to Yes to God + No to supernaturalism (humanism: humanity is the nonsupernatural “God above the God of theism”). (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Why Some Pornography May Be ArtMimi VasilakiIn "Why Pornography Can't Be Art,"1 Christy Mag Uidhir argues, as the title declares, that pornography cannot be art and thus that pornography is not art. According to Uidhir, this is because of the different ways in which pornography and art relate to contents and purposes. His argument for the impossibility of something being both art and pornography at the same time runs (...) roughly as follows. If something is pornography, then it has the purpose of sexually arousing (some audience) and that purpose is manner-inspecific. If something is art, then if it has a purpose, then that purpose is manner-specific. So when the purpose is sexual arousal, then it is manner-specific. Thus sexual arousal by art is manner-specific and sexual arousal by pornography is manner-inspecific. Therefore, Uidhir concludes, something cannot be both art and pornography.Here I argue that although this conclusion seems plausible, Uidhir fails to make a strong case for it because he does not establish that the purposes of art are necessarily "manner-specific" as opposed to the purpose of pornography, which is necessarily "manner-inspecific." That is, the paper does not make it plausible either that pornography has manner-inspecific purposes or that art has a manner-specific purpose.IUidhir's exclusivity doctrine is intrinsically implausible. Let us take for example a work mentioned in the article, Red Butt from Jeff Koons's [End Page 228] kitsch photo series of "Made in Heaven." Uidhir writes, "part and parcel of understanding Red Butt is recognizing that it depicts a sexual act involving Jeff Koons and Cicciolina.... Failure to do so precludes satisfaction of the purpose of the work" (p. 198). Here he rightly says that the audience cannot interpret the work without the prior knowledge of who is depicted in Red Butt: the audience must recognize the sexual act and the subjects of the photo as the artist and his wife. In other words, the role of knowledge of context in understanding art is connected with the claim that manner-specificity is essential to the purpose of art. In the case of Red Butt, the appeal to extra-visual and contextual information enables fuller understanding of the artwork. However, in fact, the wider audience (rather than the art critics) perceives the trash aesthetics of Red Butt while being ignorant of Koons's biography and this aesthetic irony might precisely be one of the purposes of the work. Even if it is true that the audience's recognition of the artist's intentional self-parody requires knowledge of who is depicted in the photos, we don't know if Koons intends his work to be understood (solely) in reference to or through this knowledge. It is plausible that Koons intended to blur the distinction between art and pornography by attempting to create art that is pornography. If we accept that pornography can never be art then if Koons intends to create art that is also pornography then he attempts the impossible; if we, on the other hand, allow for the possibility for an artwork to be both art and pornography and if we accept that Koons has succeeded in creating art that is pornography, then we can interpret Red Butt in the most natural way and say he has succeeded in creating both art and pornography. It seems therefore that regardless of the context, it is left to the audience to negotiate and finally decide, if they wish to, whether to appreciate Koons as pornography or as art (or both) despite the lines between these being unclear. This very ambiguity is part of the purpose of the work, which is lost on Uidhir's account.His exclusive model cannot account for artists whose explicit intention is to defy dichotomies by doing art and pornography at the same time. For example Annie Sprinkle, in reply to the question of whether she is doing art or pornography, insists against critics and defenders alike that she is "both an artist and a whore."2 Uidhir's position must be that, in effect, contrary to what she intends and believes, Sprinkle by definition cannot do both... (shrink)

Feminism is Queer is an introduction to the intimately related disciplines of gender and queer theory. While guiding the reader through complex theory, the author develops the original position of "queer feminism," which presents queer theory as continuous with feminist theory. While there have been significant conceptual tensions between second wave feminism and traditional lesbian and gay studies, queer theory offers a paradigm for understanding gender, sex, and sexuality that avoids the conflict in order to develop solidarity among those interested (...) in feminist theory and those interested in lesbian and gay rights. This accessible and comprehensive textbook carefully explains nuanced theoretical terminology and includes extensive suggested further reading to provide the reader with a full and thorough understanding of both disciplines.--Publisher information. (shrink)

The author offers perspectives that can assist healthcare managers in achieving the highest ethical standards as they face their roles as healthcare providers, employers, and community service organizations. He also examines how to comply with relevant laws and regulations, provide high quality patient care with limited resources, and more.

According to an orthodox view, the capacity for conscious experience (sentience) is relevant to the distribution of moral status and value. However, physicalism about consciousness might threaten the normative relevance of sentience. According to the indeterminacy argument, sentience is metaphysically indeterminate while indeterminacy of sentience is incompatible with its normative relevance. According to the introspective argument (by François Kammerer), the unreliability of our conscious introspection undercuts the justification for belief in the normative relevance of consciousness. I defend the normative relevance (...) of sentience against these objections. First, I demonstrate that physicalists only have to concede a limited amount of indeterminacy of sentience. This moderate indeterminacy is in harmony with the role of sentience in determining moral status. Second, I argue that physicalism gives us no reason to expect that introspection is unreliable with respect to the normative relevance of consciousness. (shrink)

Although Ayn Rand and her philosophy have influenced many nascent feminists, particularly those of the individualist inclination, Rand was openly hostile to the feminist movement and declared that she would not vote for a woman for president. The author analyzes Rand's position and reasoning about a woman president, finding it contradictory to the rational principles Rand professed.

Maybe I Should: Case Studies on Ethics for Student Affairs Professionals addresses everyday ethical dilemmas faced by graduate students and new professionals in student affairs/higher education. This edition offers all new cases situated in multiple functional areas with a framework for analyzing these challenging situations.

Background: It has been reported that type 2 diabetes is associated with olfactory identification impairments and cognitive decline. However, the relationship between OI impairments and cognitive decline is largely unknown in T2DM patients.Methods: Sixty-eight T2DM patients and 68 healthy controls underwent 3D-T1 MRI scans, olfactory and cognitive assessments. The cortical thickness of olfaction-related brain regions, olfactory and cognitive scores were compared between groups. Correlation analyses were carried out among cognition, olfaction, and cortical thickness of olfaction-related brain regions.Results: First, the cognitive (...) and olfactory test scores of T2DM patients were lower than healthy subjects. Second, higher olfactory scores were associated with increased cortical thickness in the left parahippocampal gyrus and bilateral insula in T2DM. Third, higher olfactory scores were associated with higher cognitive performance in T2DM. Fourth, some cognitive performances were related to cortical thickness in the left parahippocampal gyrus and left insula in T2DM.Conclusion: These findings indicated that olfactory dysfunction may be useful for future applications that attempt to predict cognitive decline or develop tailored therapies in T2DM patients. (shrink)

X chromosome inactivation is the mammalian answer to the dilemma of dosage compensation between males and females. The study of this fascinating form of chromosome-wide gene regulation has yielded surprising insights into early development and cellular memory. In the past few months, three papers1-3 reported unexpected findings about the paternal X chromosome (Xp). All three studies agree that the Xp is imprinted to become inactive earlier than ever suspected during embryonic development. Although apparently incomplete, this early form of inactivation insures (...) dosage compensation throughout development. Silencing of the Xp persists in cells of extraembryonic tissues, but it is erased and followed by random X inactivation in cells of the embryo proper. These findings challenge several aspects of the current view of X inactivation during early development and may have profound impact on studies of pluripotency and epigenetics. BioEssays 26:821–824, 2004. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Once focused primarily on European and Chinese history, South Korea's world history courses are moving toward a global approach that spans multiple regions. In the midst of this curricular shift, we examined how Korean teachers conceptualize world history for themselves and for their instruction. We interviewed eight Korean teachers using card-sorting tasks and a think aloud methodology. Findings revealed that all participants sorted the cards differently when considering instruction compared to when they sorted cards for their own understanding, suggesting the (...) role of teachers as instructional gatekeepers even in a country with a centralized National Curriculum. The Korean teachers discussed three instructional challenges in making these changes: connecting world historical events to students’ present lives, unpacking for students events that spanned across large amounts of time and space, and managing students’ preconceived notions or attitudes about different cultures. The ways in which participants dealt with these challenges differed. Additionally, in-service teachers made more complex connections between events and focused less on regions than did pre-service teachers. We discuss the cultural tools that Korean participants used in making instructional decisions as well as implications for curriculum development and teacher education for world history in South Korea and beyond. (shrink)

Following aluminum as part of a material culture of speed and lightness, this article examines how assemblages of energy and metals connect built environments, ways of life, and ideologies of acceleration. Aluminum can be theorized as a circulatory matrix that forms an energy culture. Through a discussion of speed and social justice, the history of aluminium-based socioecologies reveals how the materiality of energy forms assemblages of objects, infrastructures, and practices. The article then traces the aluminum industry’s involvement in the production (...) and distribution of energy itself both at the national scale of power grids and in the emergence of transnational transfers of energy, such as hydropowered smelters in Iceland. Finally, this analysis of deeply embedded energy cultures calls for a transnational approach to the accelerated socioecologies of aluminum production and consumption; and for energy transition theories to pay closer attention to the figured worlds and figuring work of the military-industrial complex. (shrink)

The global seafood industry is a vital source of food, income, livelihoods, and culture. Seafood demand is steadily rising due to growth in the global human population, affluence, and per capita consumption. Seafood supply is also growing, despite declining wild fish stocks, with phenomenal advances in aquaculture, that is, the cultivation of aquatic organisms. Aquaculture supplied 42 % of the world’s fish in 2012 and is forecast to eclipse capture fisheries production by 2030. The balance between these two seafood production (...) systems has profound implications for global food security, income distribution, and ecological sustainability. Here, a qualitative analysis of the ethics and sustainability of capture fisheries and aquaculture is presented. An innovative practical ethics approach is introduced which adapts the ethical matrix, a conceptual tool for analyzing the wellbeing, autonomy, and justice of different interest groups, and Rapfish, a rapid appraisal technique used to evaluate the sustainability of fisheries along six performance modalities, including ethics. Using case studies of global large- and small-scale capture fisheries and generalized carnivorous and omnivorous aquaculture systems, I show that human institutions and social actors interact in complex governance processes to influence seafood ethics and sustainability. (shrink)

Analyzes the meaning expressed in music, the social and psychological sources of meaning, and the methods of musical communication This is a book meant for ...

Car cultures have social, material and, above all, affective dimensions that are overlooked in current strategies to influence car-driving decisions. Car consumption is never simply about rational economic choices, but is as much about aesthetic, emotional and sensory responses to driving, as well as patterns of kinship, sociability, habitation and work. Through a close examination of the aesthetic and especially kinaesthetic dimensions of automobility, this article locates car cultures (and their associated feelings) within a broader physical/material relational setting that includes (...) both human bodies and car bodies, and the relations between them and the spaces through which they move (or fail to move). Drawing on both the phenomenology of car use and new approaches in the sociology of emotions, it is argued that everyday car cultures are implicated in a deep context of affective and embodied relations between people, machines and spaces of mobility and dwelling in which emotions and the senses play a key part – the emotional geographies of car use. Feelings for, of and within cars (‘automotive emotions’) come to be socially and culturally generated across three scales involved in the circulations and displacements performed by cars, roads and drivers: embodied sensibilities and kinaesthetic performances; familial and sociable practices of ‘caring’ through car use; and regional and national car cultures that form around particular systems of automobility. By showing how people feel about and in cars, and how the feel of different car cultures generates habitual forms of automobilized life and different dispositions towards driving, it is argued that we will be in a better position to re-evaluate the ethical dimensions of car consumption and the moral economies of car use. (shrink)

This article provides an empirical example and an analytic argument for how queer theory can be useful for sociological inquiries of gender relations. Using data collected through participant observation of a rock music subculture, the author addresses the importance of conceptualizing sexuality and gender as analytically distinct. There are five major findings drawn from this analysis. First, members of this subculture queered sexuality despite identifying as heterosexual. Second, there is a dissonance between how members talked about sexuality and how they (...) enacted sexuality. Third, queering sexuality opened space for subverting hegemonic gender relations. Fourth, some forms of gender resistance relied on and reinscribed hegemonic sexual relations. Fifth, only by analyzing sexuality at multiple levels of analysis was this play of resistance and hegemony revealed. Both empirical and theoretical implications are suggested. (shrink)

Many researchers and intellectuals warn about extreme risks from artificial intelligence. However, these warnings typically came without systematic arguments in support. This paper provides an argument that AI will lead to the permanent disempowerment of humanity, e.g. human extinction, by 2100. It rests on four substantive premises which it motivates and defends: first, the speed of advances in AI capability, as well as the capability level current systems have already reached, suggest that it is practically possible to build AI systems (...) capable of disempowering humanity by 2100. Second, due to incentives and coordination problems, if it is possible to build such AI, it will be built. Third, since it appears to be a hard technical problem to build AI which is aligned with the goals of its designers, and many actors might build powerful AI, misaligned powerful AI will be built. Fourth, because disempowering humanity is useful for a large range of misaligned goals, such AI will try to disempower humanity. If AI is capable of disempowering humanity and tries to disempower humanity by 2100, then humanity will be disempowered by 2100. This conclusion has immense moral and prudential significance. (shrink)

New energy vehicle policies have greatly promoted the growth of the NEV industry in China, while also attracting a lot of investor attention. Using Chinese NEV concept stocks and related industrial policies, including purchase tax incentives and promotion and application policies, issued from 2011 to 2020 as the research setting, this paper adopts a panel data model to examine the impact of policy announcement on the volatility of NEV concept stocks, as well as the mediating role of investor attention in (...) transmitting the impact. We find that NEV P&A policies have a significant and positive impact on NEV concept stock volatility, while PTI policies do not have a significant impact. Moreover, investor attention plays a partial mediating role in transmitting the impact of P&A policies on NEV stock market by increasing the stock volatility risk. Furthermore, there is heterogeneous effect of equity ownership in the relationship between policy announcement and investor attention on the volatility of NEV concept stocks; non-state-owned firms are more sensitive to the NEV P&A policies than state-owned firms. By analyzing the relationship between policy announcement and concept stock volatility, this paper enriches the research on NEV concept stocks and provides policy implications for the NEV industry. (shrink)

This landmark anthology is the first to engage critically the writings of Ayn Rand from feminist perspectives. The interdisciplinary feminist strategies of re-reading Rand range from the lightness of camp to the darkness of de Sade, from postandrogyny to poststructuralism. A highly charged dialogue on Rand's legacy provides the forum for a reexamination of feminism and its relationship to egoism, individualism, and capitalism. Rand's place in contemporary feminism is assessed through comparisons with other twentieth-century feminists, such as de Beauvoir, Wolf, (...) Paglia, Eisler, and Gilligan. What results is as provocative in its implications for Rand's system as it is for feminism. (shrink)

Which artificial intelligence (AI) systems are agents? To answer this question, I propose a multidimensional account of agency. According to this account, a system's agency profile is jointly determined by its level of goal-directedness and autonomy as well as is abilities for directly impacting the surrounding world, long-term planning and acting for reasons. Rooted in extant theories of agency, this account enables fine-grained, nuanced comparative characterizations of artificial agency. I show that this account has multiple important virtues and is more (...) informative than alternatives. More speculatively, it may help to illuminate two important emerging questions in AI ethics: 1. Can agency contribute to the moral status of non-human beings, and how? 2. When and why might AI systems exhibit power-seeking behaviour and does this pose an existential risk to humanity? (shrink)

The science of animal consciousness investigates (i) which animal species are conscious (the distribution question) and (ii) how conscious experience differs in detail between species (the quality question). We propose a framework which clearly distinguishes both questions and tackles both of them. This two-tier account distinguishes consciousness along ten dimensions and suggests cognitive capacities which serve as distinct operationalizations for each dimension. The two-tier account achieves three valuable aims: First, it separates strong and weak indicators of the presence of consciousness. (...) Second, these indicators include not only different specific contents but also differences in the way particular contents are processed (by processes of learning, reasoning or abstraction). Third, evidence of consciousness from each dimension can be combined to derive the distinctive multi-dimensional consciousness profile of various species. Thus, the two-tier account shows how the kind of conscious experience of different species can be systematically compared. (shrink)

In this posthumously published novel, Layers, Nathaniel Branden exhibits his talent as not only a philosopher and psychotherapist, but also a writer of fiction. The plot primarily involves the story of Nicholas Holland, a published author and leading therapist, as he interacts with Andrew Berringer, to whom he has come for therapy.

Lisa Duggan’s book, Mean Girl: Ayn Rand and the Culture of Greed, offers an extremely negative portrait of Rand’s ideas as the height of meanness and greed and the perfect embodiment for the political era of Donald Trump. Its unbalanced and hostile presentation of Rand’s philosophy and impact is not for those who seek a more objective approach to Objectivism.

In Selfish Women, Lisa Downing deals with two women who had to battle the sexist stereotypes of their times: Ayn Rand and Margaret Thatcher. Her focus on Rand and Margaret Thatcher as women of “self-fulness” challenges conventional feminist conceptions that leave little room for the power of individuality. This book makes a significant contribution to such fields as women's studies, sociology, and political science.

Most conceptions of public and private life within political and social theory do not adequately consider the networks or fluidities involved in contemporary social relations. The distinction of public and private is often conceived of as statically `regional' in character. This article, following an extensive analysis of the multiple meanings of the `public' and `private', criticizes such a static conception and maintains that massive changes are occurring in the nature of both public and private life and especially of the relations (...) between them. We consider flows and networks that enable mobility between and across apparent publics and privates. These mobilities are both physical and informational. We consider the transformations of public and private life that have arisen from `complex' configurations of place and space: the dominant system of car-centred automobility whose spatial fluidities are simultaneously private and public; and various globalizations through the exposure of `private' lives on public screens and the public screening of mediatized events. These mobile, machinic examples demonstrate the limitations of the static, regional conceptualizations of public and private life developed within much social and political theory, and suggest that this divide may need relegation to the dustbin of history. (shrink)

Este artigo confronta a identidade americana monoculturalista e postula uma identidade multicultural e multirracial, moldada pela história da imigração. Além disso, ele disseca o sonho americano sob a lente de imigrantes WASPs e não-WASPs, particularmente em meados do século XIX. Ao correlacionar a dualidade cultural e a dupla consciência por meio de WASPs, imigrantes, nativistas e culturalistas afro-americanos, o artigo afirma uma identidade cultural americana maleável e em evolução, constantemente moldada por ondas sucessivas de imigrantes.

Abstract“Force dynamics” refers to a previously neglected semantic category—how entities interact with respect to force. This category includes such concepts as: the exertion of force, resistance to such exertion and the overcoming of such resistance, blockage of a force and the removal of such blockage, and so forth. Force dynamics is a generalization over the traditional linguistic notion of “causative”: it analyzes “causing” into finer primitives and sets it naturally within a framework that also includes “letting,”“hindering,”“helping,” and still further notions. (...) Force dynamics, moreover, appears to be the semantic category that uniquely characterizes the grammatical category of modals, in both their basic and epistemic usages. In addition, on the basis of force dynamic parameters, numerous lexical items fall into systematic semantic patterns, and there exhibit parallelisms between physical and psychosocial reference. Further, from research on the relation of semantic structure to general cognitive structure, it appears that the concepts of force interaction that are encoded within language closely parallel concepts that appear both in early science and in naive physics and psychology. Overall, force dynamics thus emerges as a fundamental notional system that structures conceptual material pertaining to force interaction in a common way across a linguistic range: the physical, psychological, social, inferential, discourse, and mental-model domains of reference and conception. (shrink)

Explores the continuities and discontinuities in the work of Henri Bergson and Gilles Deleuze.

A poetic study of a singular form of urban industrial art and its place in American culture. They lie underfoot, embellished and gleaming. They seal off and provide entry to an underground world of conduits, water mains, power lines, and sewers. They appear by the thousands in our cities, but very few people ever look at them or think about them as art. At once completely ordinary and totally unexpected, manhole covers present an infinite variety of design in the commonplace (...) as well as a record of defunct utility companies, forgotten business firms, and obsolete foundries. Manhole Covers documents this singular form of urban industrial art and its place in American culture. Mimi and Robert Melnick first revealed their obsession with street hardware twenty years ago in a remarkable little book called Manhole Covers of Los Angeles. Printed in a small format and a limited edition, it quickly went out of print and is now a scarce collector's item. But that was just an introduction to their larger project, which has come to fruition in this book of 200 photographs and an extended narrative documenting manhole covers throughout the United States and discussing the history of their use, manufacture, and function. A subject that at first seems straightforward and commonplace becomes redolent and poetic in the Melnicks' hands, for their hieroglyphic reading of manhole covers reveals a chapter of urban history that can only be recovered from the logos and markings of these early disks. There are square lids, convex lids, perforated lids. And the older ones wear an astonishingly diverse range of anything-but-blank faces expressed in raised crosses, waffle grids, cut-out diamonds, radial stars, floral patterns, and honeycomb treads. The diversity of design corresponds to an equally diverse typology of form and function, as indicated by their evocative labels: handholes, vents, coalholes, grates, lampholes, storm drains, steam covers, meter lids, traffic buttons. (shrink)

The Postlude, written for this edition, looks back at the predictions made more than twenty-five years ago and speculates about what the coming decades may hold ...

This chapter contains sections titled: Pleasure as Power Feminist Porn Discussion Notes.