Skeptical theism,moral skepticism,and epistemic propriety

Respondents to the argument from evil who follow Michael Bergmann’s development of skeptical theism hold that our failure to determine God’s reasons for permitting evil does not disconfirm theism (i.e. render theism less probable on the evidence of evil than it would be if merely evaluated against our background knowledge) at all. They claim that such a thesis follows from the very plausible claim that (ST) we have no good reason to think our access to the realm of value is representative of the full realm of value. There are two interpretations of ST’s strength, the stronger of which leads skeptical theists into moral skepticism and the weaker of which fails to rebut the argument from evil. As I demonstrate, skeptical theists avoid the charge of moral skepticism while also successfully rebutting the argument from evil only by embracing an equivocation between these two interpretations of ST. Thus, as I argue, skeptical theists are caught in a troubling dilemma: they must choose between moral skepticism and failure to adequately respond to the argument from evil.     

In defence of modal essentialism

Kit Fine’s arguments in Essence and Modality are widely accepted as being a decisive blow against modal essentialism. A selection of replies exist that have done little to counter the general view that modally construed essence is out of touch with what we really mean when we make essentialist claims. I argue that Fine’s arguments fail to strike a decisive blow, and I suggest a new interpretation of the debate that shows why Fine’s arguments fall short of achieving their goal.     

Ambiguity and explanation

This paper presents evidence that ‘because’ is importantly ambiguous between two closely related senses covering what are usually called causal explanations, on the one hand, and grounding or metaphysical explanations, on the other hand. To this end, it introduces the lexical categories of monosemy, polysemy and homonymy; describes a test for polysemy; and discusses the results of the test when applied to ‘because’. It also shows how to understand so-called hybrid explanations in light of the semantic facts established by the analysis.     

Testing the Situationism Scale in Europe: Scale validation,self‐regulation and regional differences

The term situationism refers to an individual's belief about the importance of a behaviour's context. This study tested whether the degree of situationism expressed by individuals in various regions of Europe was consistent with self‐regulation and cross‐cultural theories. The English version of a Situationism Scale (measuring beliefs about the relation between the environment and one's own behaviour) was translated into five additional languages: Dutch, German, Hungarian, Italian and Slovenian. Young adults (N = 1106, M_Age = 22.9 years, 79% female) across Europe responded to one of the six language versions of the scale as part of a larger survey. Results indicated that: new language versions were psychometrically valid; there was a positive relation between situationism and the use of situation‐control strategies; and situationism was higher for individuals from regions that are Eastern European and relatively more interdependent, compared with individuals from regions that are Western European and relatively less interdependent. As the first evaluation of the Situationism Scale outside America, this study supports the Scale's validity and suggests not only may some effects of situationism be universal, but between‐ and within‐culture differences in situationism exist. Overall, when making judgments and decisions about the self, cultural background and individual differences in situationism may come into play.     

Gender and leadership aspiration: Interpersonal and collective elements of cooperative climate differentially influence women and men

Female leaders remain a minority. Because leadership aspiration is a predictor of advancement, understanding stimulating conditions is important. A neglected perspective is the impact of organizational climate. We propose that cooperative climate can engender individuals’ motivation to contribute to the organization through leadership, and that leadership aspiration of women and men is differentially sensitive to interpersonal and collective aspects of cooperative climate. We argue that women are more disposed toward relational self‐construal and men toward collective self‐construal, and hence women's leadership aspiration is more influenced by the interpersonal element of cooperative climate whereas men's leadership aspiration by the collective element of cooperative climate. Results of a survey of N = 404 employed men and women supported both hypotheses.     

So close and yet so far away: A psychological distance account of the effectiveness of leader appeals

Contradictory recommendations persist on how leaders best communicate goals to followers. Whereas scholars of visionary leadership recommend emphasizing the desirability of preferred end‐states, scholars of goal setting argue that the perceived feasibility of a goal determines motivation. This paper proposes and tests a synthesis based on construal level theory. Under relatively high (i.e., abstract) levels of construal, such as when leader–follower distance is relatively large, leader appeals that emphasize desirability (i.e., desirable appeals) are more likely to be effective than appeals that emphasize feasibility (i.e., feasible appeals). Under relatively low (i.e., concrete) levels of construal, such as when leader–follower distance is relatively small, feasible appeals are more likely to be effective. Two experimental studies in two different countries provide support for our predictions.     

Aversive functions of response effort: Fact or artifact?

Historically, effort has been viewed as aversive. Most supporting evidence comes from studies demonstrating increased force/effort requirements reduce operant responding. Changes in force/effort requirements, however, are often accompanied by changes in response definition when mechanical devices are used to define the response. As a consequence, responses measured at one point in a study may go unmeasured at other points. In an alternative approach, we used a continuous measurement strategy that provided a means to fix the threshold force defining the response class and simultaneously allowed independent manipulation of the force criteria required to produce reinforcement. Rats pressed a force transducer according to a fixed‐ratio 5 schedule of food delivery. The criterion force was systematically increased and decreased; the threshold for response detection was constant. When response rates included only criterion responses, overall rate decreased when force requirements increased. By contrast, when all responses, both those meeting force criteria and those that did not (above the threshold but below the criteria for reinforcement) were included in the rate calculation, increases in force increased response rate. Increases in force criteria also increased the maximum force (g) and time‐integral of force (g‐s) of operant behavior. Control conditions showed increases in responding could be explained by the emergence of subcriterion responses, irrespective of force. We conclude that prior results showing effort decreases response rates are due to an artifact arising from inadvertent changes in response definitions. Increases in effort may better be understood as changes in the response:reinforcer payoff owing to the emergence of a subcriterion response class.