Interpersonal Forgiveness Within the Helping Professions: An Attempt to Resolve Differences of Opinion

Lakatos's (1978) philosophy of science is used as a guide for resolving published authors' differences of opinion about interpersonal forgiveness. We first review the ancient writings and current philosophical works regarding interpersonal forgiveness. With these ideas as a foundation we then critique six published papers on forgiveness, all of which have counseling implications. It is suggested that the works are not yet grounded in the foundational writings on forgiveness. The works, thus, may need some refinement in the area of definition, or proposed consequences for a forgiver, or in the processes used to bring about forgiveness in clients. A process model of interpersonal forgiveness then is described. Implications for the use of interpersonal forgiveness within counseling are drawn.     

Developing and Using Educational and Psychological Tests and Measures: The Unificationist Perspective

This article presents a critical review of traditional testing practices and offers the unificationist perspective as the next logical step in the evolution of psychological and educational measurement. Building on the notion that any activity involving testing should be unified under the rubric of the scientific method, the unificationist view is defined and contrasted to traditional test validation strategies. Implications for test development and for the use of tests and measures in counseling (e.g., interest inventories, personality measures) are delineated from the unificationist perspective.     

Detecting salary discrimination against male and female managers

This paper reports two experiments that examine factors influencing the detection of salary discrimination in organizations. Subjects were presented with information about the qualifications and salaries of female and male managers in 10 departments of an hypothetical company and were asked to judge the fairness of these salaries. It was hypothesized that the amount of information and the format in which it is presented influence fairness judgments. Moreover it was hypothesized that males and females differ in their fairness judgments. The two experiments corroborate these hypotheses. The results are interpreted in terms of two possible information processing biases: encoding bias and attributional bias.     

Redefining ‘Intrinsic’*

Several alleged counterexamples to the definition of ‘intrinsic’ proposed in Rae Langton and David Lewis,‘Defining “Intrinsic”’, are unconvincing. Yet there are reasons for dissatisfaction, and room for improvement. One desirable change is to raise the standard of non‐disjunctiveness, thereby putting less burden on contentious judgements of comparative naturalness. A second is to deal with spurious independence by throwing out just the disjunctive troublemakers, instead of throwing out disjunctive properties wholesale, and afterward reinstating those impeccably intrinsic disjunctive properties that are not troublemakers. (The second of these changes makes the first more affordable.) A third, suggested by Brian Weatherson, would be to invoke the general principle that the intrinsic and the extrinsic characters of things are independent, rather than relying just on one special case of this principle; but it is none too obvious how to do this.     

On Spiritual Edgework: The Logic of Extreme Ritual Performances

Religion as a social form is constructed to provide adherents with a sense of empowerment and control. Rituals that involve a risk of physical or psychological injury or even death therefore would appear anomalous and indeed are frequently the objects of social scientific and journalistic denigration. Firewalking and serpent handling exemplify such rituals. I argue that these two radical ritual practices, which I term spiritual edgework , provide a valuable sociological window on how radical ritual practices are socially constructed. The social construction process involves the identification of a mythically relevant edge that offers: both contingency and certainty; individual and collective preparation for the impending edgework during which tensions are elevated for later ritual resolution; a ritualized process for successfully navigating the edge; and postedgework accounts that neutralize potential disconfirming injuries or deaths.     

KARL RAHNER AND THE EXTRA‐TERRESTRIAL INTELLIGENCE QUESTION

The prospect of extra‐terrestrial intelligence has become a central topic of scientific investigation and popular speculation. This has generated questions of ethical and theological significance that now receive growing coverage. Throughout his writings, Karl Rahner remained open to the prospect that the process of cosmic evolution had yielded sentient life form in other galaxies. He argued against any theological veto on this notion, while also distinguishing the existential significance of such life forms from that of angels. Furthermore, the possibility of multiple incarnations is raised though not affirmed. With its christological intensity, his theology seems to militate against any repetition of the incarnation. This essay examines some of the arguments for and against the possibility of multiple incarnations, before assessing the current state of the extra‐terrestrial intelligence debate. In the light of inconclusive scientific findings, the cautionary position of Rahner is re‐affirmed.