Designing a Good Life: A Matrix for the Technological Mediation of Morality

Technologies fulfill a social role in the sense that they influence the moral actions of people, often in unintended and unforeseen ways. Scientists and engineers are already accepting much responsibility for the technological, economical and environmental aspects of their work. This article asks them to take an extra step, and now also consider the social role of their products. The aim is to enable engineers to take a prospective responsibility for the future social roles of their technologies by providing them with a matrix that helps to explore in advance how emerging technologies might plausibly affect the reasons behind people’s (moral) actions. On the horizontal axis of the matrix, we distinguished the three basic types of reasons that play a role in practical judgment: what is the case, what can be done and what should be done. On the vertical axis we distinguished the morally relevant classes of issues: stakeholders, consequences and the good life. To illustrate how this matrix may work in practice, the final section applies the matrix to the case of the Google PowerMeter.     

Treatment of Missing Data: Beyond Ends and Means

The ethical decision making process behind the treatment of missing data has yet to be examined in the research literature in any discipline. The purpose of the current paper is to begin to discuss this decision-making process in view of a Foucauldian framework. The paper suggests how the ethical treatment of missing data should be considered from the adoption of this theoretical framework.     

福柯与《临床医学的诞生》

《临床医学的诞生》是20世纪法国著名学者福柯的一部医学史研究专著,主要从空间、语言和死亡三个方面探讨了现代医学也就是临床医学诞生的可能性条件,兼具历史与批判的性质。它揭示了隐藏在医学话语背后的权力关系,反映了福柯瓦解传统、颠覆理性的新型历史观。     

日本企业伦理:特点、缺陷及未来趋势

在回答了“企业伦理为何必要”的基础上,本文重点分析了日本企业伦理的内容,将它归结为企业集团主义、勤劳精神、职分观念等三个方面。日本企业伦理的形成始于明治维新,但在二战后的民主改革中才最终定型。它一方面适应了日本社会,并推动了日本企业的复兴;另一方面,又包含着深层的危机与矛盾。20世纪90年代以后,日本经济的不景气、日本企业经营不善都是这些问题的暴露。日本企业对此将如何应答?这将决定日本企业伦理的发展趋势。     

The exemplarities of artworks: Heidegger, <Emphasis Type="Italic">Shoes</Emphasis>, and <Emphasis Type="Italic">Pixar</Emphasis>

Heidegger’s essays “The Origin of the Work of Art” and “The Question Concerning Technology” provide a revealing insight into the importance of exemplarity to artworks. Originally the notion that exemplarity is essential to art is Kantian: As Kant puts it, since originality can produce “original nonsense, [beautiful art’s] products must be models, i.e. exemplary.” However, what Heidegger recognizes is that even if exemplarity allows us to take art seriously in spite of its excesses, it exposes the artwork to new dangers: on the one hand, to the “world withdrawal of the work” as occurs in consignment to the museum shelf, and on the other, to the conditions of Enframing as “challenging-forth,” under which art is taken as a means to an end—dangers which point to the division of artworks between “fine” art and “popular” art. Since Heidegger’s approach favors the former, we will try to gain new critical insight by considering his arguments in the light of a “popular” work that allows us to formulate an exemplarity of popular art as the necessary complement to that of traditional art. By means of an understanding of the exemplarities (in the plural) of artworks, we will be able to reconsider the significance of Heidegger’s notions of reliability, Enframing, and poiesis for our current technological conditions.

The Art of Becoming Human: Morality in Kant and Confucius

Kant and Confucius maintain that the art of becoming human is synonymous with the unending process of becoming moral. According to Kant, I must imagine a world in which the universality of my maxims were possible, while realizing that if such a world existed, then morality would disappear. Morality is an impossible possibility because it always meets resistance in our encounter with nature. According to Confucius, human beings become moral by integrating themselves into the already meaningful natural order that is tian 天. Like Kant, he upholds the dignity of human beings. For Kant this dignity rests on the autonomy of each human being’s reason, while for Confucius it is dependent upon our interconnection with each other, demanding ongoing self-extension. Despite these differences, the two thinkers would concur that our efforts at humanization are unceasing and that we may never fully live up to our human potential.     

"中国马克思主义哲学"理论体系的实存应予肯定--兼答徐素华先生

徐素华先生文章把我提出的“中国马克思主义哲学”等同于他所说的“党的指导思想形态”,“在中国的马克思主义哲学”等同于他所说的“学术研究形态”,这不符合我的本意。“马克思主义哲学合法性问题”的讨论确实存在。“中国马克思主义哲学”是在中国实践中学习、运用,在总结实践经验、发扬中国优秀哲学文化、升华人民群众智慧的基础上发展了的马克思主义哲学。它是中国哲学的一个现代形态。它既是一个创新的哲学理论体系,又是党的指导思想的哲学基础。     

Critique,Ethics, and the Apparatus of Experience: A Foucauldian Framework

The paper explores examples of contemporary experience in order to demonstrate the moralisation of new areas of behaviour (especially in relation to environmental issues).It sketches a Foucauldian framework for understanding the historical transformation of experience,in terms of the "apparatus of experience." On that basis,it presents a novel account of critique,in which critique is seen as the potentially transformational,experiential practice of re-experiencing the contemporary apparatuses of experience.In other words,critique is "experience squared." It is this re-experiencing of our everyday experience that permits us,to a certain extent,to "get over ourselves" and thus to reflect critically on the processes of moralisation and de-moralisation in which we participate.     

Empiricism,probability, and knowledge of arithmetic: A preliminary defense

The topic of this paper is our knowledge of the natural numbers, and in particular, our knowledge of the basic axioms for the natural numbers, namely the Peano axioms. The thesis defended in this paper is that knowledge of these axioms may be gained by recourse to judgments of probability. While considerations of probability have come to the forefront in recent epistemology, it seems safe to say that the thesis defended here is heterodox from the vantage point of traditional philosophy of mathematics. So this paper focuses on providing a preliminary defense of this thesis, in that it focuses on responding to several objections. Some of these objections are from the classical literature, such as Frege's concern about indiscernibility and circularity (Section 2.1), while other are more recent, such as Baker's concern about the unreliability of small samplings in the setting of arithmetic (Section 2.2). Another family of objections suggests that we simply do not have access to probability assignments in the setting of arithmetic, either due to issues related to the ω-rule (Section 3.1) or to the non-computability and non-continuity of probability assignments (Section 3.2). Articulating these objections and the responses to them involves developing some non-trivial results on probability assignments (Appendix A–Appendix C), such as a forcing argument to establish the existence of continuous probability assignments that may be computably approximated (Theorem 4 Appendix B). In the concluding section, two problems for future work are discussed: developing the source of arithmetical confirmation and responding to the probabilistic liar.     

A Behavioral Analysis of Morality and Value

Morality has long been conceived as divinely instituted, so otherworldly, rules meant not to describe or explain behavior but to guide it towards an absolute good. The philosophical formulation of this theory by Plato was later grafted onto Christian thought by Augustine and Aquinas. The equally ancient theory of the Greek sophist Protagoras (that the good is relative to personal preferences and morality to man-made social customs) was forgotten until revived in the 18th and 19th centuries by such empiricists as David Hume and J. S. Mill. Then it was dismissed again in the 20th century by G. E. Moore and W. D. Ross as naturalistic fallacy, that is, conflation of what is with what ought to be. However, those who took this dismissive attitude themselves made the reverse mistake of conflating what ideally ought to be with what actually is. In other words, they mistook ideals for actualities. As B. F. Skinner (1971) said in Beyond Freedom and Dignity, sorting things out requires behaviorist parsing of the good (the personally reinforcing) and duty (the socially reinforced).     

"得荃忘鱼"、渔父哲学与当代道德"救亡"

明末顾炎武曾把易姓改号称为“亡国”,而把道德沦丧称为“亡天下”;清末严复写《救亡决论》一文,为民族救亡大声疾呼。今天中国虽无“亡国”之忧,却有“亡天下”之虞,“得荃忘鱼”的病象,“渔父哲学”的盛行,厚黑之道的猖獗,使“道德救亡”已成为当前中国最迫切的现实课题,中国不应回避也不能头痛医头脚痛医脚地对待这个问题,只有清理历史传统、改造社会生态才是“道德救亡”的唯一出路。     

Sociosexual Orientation,Commitment, and Infidelity: A Mediation Analysis

ABSTRACT

Individuals with an unrestricted sociosexual orientation (SO) are less committed to their romantic relationships and more likely to engage in infidelity. Furthermore, commitment is negatively associated with tendencies to cheat. However, no previous research has examined the possible mediating role of commitment in the relationship between SO and infidelity. The current study examined whether commitment mediated the relationship between SO and willingness to engage in three types of cheating behaviors (Ambiguous, Deceptive, and Explicit). Results suggested that commitment partially mediated the relationship between SO and infidelity, such that unrestricted individuals had lower commitment, which in turn led to a greater likelihood of cheating. Implications of this association and directions for future research are discussed.     

Towards a reflexive framework for development: technology transfer after the empirical turn

The purpose of this essay is to: (1) detail how recent trends in philosophical theory have made it possible for philosophers of technology to critically discuss technology transfer; (2) demonstrate that economic standards of assessment are conducive to obscuring the hidden tradeoffs that technological practices, such as mobile phone use in Bangladesh, can engender; and (3) provide the basis of an alternative model that can reflexively addresses dimensions of technology transfer that neo-classical economic accounts occlude.     

毛泽东早期伦理思想的集中展现——《〈伦理学原理〉批注》记读

《<伦理学原理>批注》是青年毛泽东“修身课”、“哲学课”的学习体会和总结,其中关于强调伦理道德重在实践的观点,主张以事实论善恶、辨是非的观点,道德的阶级性和时代性的观点,道德、理想要坚持知、信、行相统一的观点等等,对我们今天贯彻公民道德实施纲要都有重要的指导意义。     

Technology in Medicine: Ontology,Epistemology, Ethics and Social Philosophy at the Crossroads

In reference to the different approaches in philosophy(of medicine) of the nature of (medical) technology,this article introduces the topic of this specialissue of Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics, that is,the way the different forms of medical technologyfunction in everyday medical practice. The authorselaborate on the active role technology plays inshaping our views on disease, illness, and the body,whence in shaping our world.     

Towards a Philosophy of Software Development: 40 Years after the Birth of Software Engineering

Over the past four decades, software engineering has emerged as a discipline in its own right, though it has roots both in computer science and in classical engineering. Its philosophical foundations and premises are not yet well understood. In recent times, members of the software engineering community have started to search for such foundations. In particular, the philosophies of Kuhn and Popper have been used by philosophically-minded software engineers in search of a deeper understanding of their discipline. It seems, however, that professional philosophers of science are not yet aware of this new discourse within the field of software engineering. Therefore, this article aims to reflect critically upon recent software engineers’ attempts towards a philosophy of software engineering and to introduce our own philosophical thoughts in this context. Finally, we invite the professional philosophers of science to participate in this interesting new discourse.

A Critical Theory of the Self: Wittgenstein,Nietzsche, Foucault

Critical thinking, considered as a version of informallogic, must consider emotions and personal attitudesin assessing assertions and conclusions in anyanalysis of discourse. It must therefore presupposesome notion of the self. Critical theory may be seenas providing a substantive and non-neutral positionfor the exercise of critical thinking. It thereforemust presuppose some notion of the self. This paperargues for a Foucauldean position on the self toextend critical theory and provide a particularposition on the self for critical thinking. Thisposition on the self is developed from moretraditional accounts of the self from Descartes toSchopenhauer, Nietzsche and Wittgenstein.     

Mapping the Terrain of a Foucauldian Ethics: A Response to the Surveillance of Schooling

Educators find themselves in the midst of arising tide of urban school reform marked byevermore centrally designed and monitoredsystems of accountability. In response to thislooming high-stakes gaze of surveillance, thisessay offers an ethics of educationalleadership predicated upon taking up thechallenge of creatively and courageouslyauthoring one's ethical self. It seeks tocontribute to mapping an ethical terrain whichcan support the production of pedagogicalpractices, initiatives, and agendas asdistinctive, bold responses to theproliferation of one-dimensional,technicist-driven efforts which narrowlycalculate and assess student learning, teacherwork, school effectiveness, and which offeranemic, foreclosed readings of a possiblefuture. My claim is that a consideration ofFoucault's ethics draws us closer torecognizing what such a project would mean andask of the educator as leader.     

The Technological Factor: Redemption, Nature, and the Image of God

This paper begins from the premise that being in the image of God refers humanity neither to nature nor to its technology but to God. Two positions are thereby rejected: (1) that nature should be treated as a source of salvation (Heidegger), and (2) that redemptive significance may be ascribed to technology (Cole-Turner, Hefner). Instead, theological judgments concerning technologyrequire the reconstruction of theological anthropology. To this end, the image of God ( imago dei ) is reconceived in terms of sociality , temporality , and spatiality to show how humanity may be understood as imaging God in a technological society.