424 research outputs found
Theoria, Theos, and Therapeia in Aristotle\u27s Ethical Endings
My basic complaint is that itâs not at all obvious that maximizing the theoretical activity of our most divine element does full justice to the richly textured environment provided by the first 9 1/2 books of the NE, which seemed to call for focused development of the full range of our human potential, combining moral and intellectual virtues along with provision for adequate supplies of external goods. The older language of the seemingly endless debate about whether or not the NE settles for an inclusive or dominant-end conception of eudaimonia has been redescribed - in Michael Pakalukâs new terminology - as the choice between Collection and Selection. Pakaluk sees an almost deliberately sustained ambiguity at the heart of the NE in his recent introduction to that work. He concludes his book by saying that both options are embraced in the end, but in an order that is unsatisfying since it does not adequately provide the reasons why contemplationâs credentials for top prize âdo not carry over and explain, with complete persuasiveness, why the activities of the other virtues are counted as happiness at allâ (p. 329). For, it has been frequently observed that even if the NE were to be judged in the end â with Richardson Lear et al. â as selectionist in picking out contemplative energeia (theoria) as primary happiness with the life of that other (i.e. moral) virtue only secondarily eudaimon, the same could hardly be said for the EE; or, so it would appear⌠But, when we get to the EEâs last chapter, god pops up again and this time even more obviously as the object of our contemplation and service although without all the âbells and whistlesâ about how superior theoria is to praxis or any explicit claims that our nous is our best part, linking us to the divine. This sudden appearance of god at the end, however, clearly reminds Kenny of the old Catechism answer to the biggest of why questions. Q: âWhy did God make you?â A: ââŚto know him, love him and serve him in this life, and be happy with him forever in the nextâ. Kenny went on to remark that the EE account, âseems, when decoded, to be remarkably similar: the key to virtue is to know, love and serve God; and that knowledge, love, and service constitute happiness in this life, whether it be mortal or immortalâ. My question, however, is that when we compare the NE & EE endings with âgod-talkâ in mind, what differences/similarities show up? How significant are they
Is ιγιθον a pros hen equivocal in Aristotle\u27s Ethics?
Is agathon a pros hen equivocal? EN does not unambiguously endorse this idea, and it is difficult to defend. EE remains silent on the question
Eudemian Ethical Method
Are there any distinctive contributions that the EE, as opposed to the NE, makes to the study of ethical method? The fact that the Eudemian environment is particularly hospitable to endoxic method by comparison with the NE is surely worthy of note, even extended examination. We look first at undoubtedly NE passages for methodological remarks, noting how spare such as can be found really are when compared with undoubtedly EE material. Eventually we shall be in position to suggest that it is the EE and not the NE which must be given the credit for containing the fullest account of a fully self-conscious employment of endoxic method in ethics, the same general method that commentators are so ready to see at work in other important Aristotelian works such as the Physics and Metaphysics
Moral Realism and the Search for Ideological Truth: A Philosophical-Psychological Collaboration
Scholars of ideology in social-scientific disciplines, including psychology, sociology, and political science, stand to benefit from taking seriously the philosophical contributions of Professor Peter Railton. This is because Railton provides much-needed conceptual precisionâand a rare sense of epistemological and moral clarityâto a topic that is notoriously slippery and prone to relativistic musing and the drawing of false equivalences. In an essay entitled âMorality, Ideology, and Reflection: Or, the Duck Sits Yet,â Railton (2000/2003) aptly identified the purpose of ideological analysis as the unmasking of ânonepistemicâ interestsâthat is, interests other than truth-seeking, accuracy, or warrant âthat contribute to the development, adoption, and dissemination of political and religious belief systems
Quasistatic Scale-free Networks
A network is formed using the sites of an one-dimensional lattice in the
shape of a ring as nodes and each node with the initial degree .
links are then introduced to this network, each link starts from a distinct
node, the other end being connected to any other node with degree randomly
selected with an attachment probability proportional to . Tuning
the control parameter we observe a transition where the average degree
of the largest node changes its variation from to
at a specific transition point of . The network is scale-free i.e.,
the nodal degree distribution has a power law decay for .Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure
Modulated Scale-free Network in the Euclidean Space
A random network is grown by introducing at unit rate randomly selected nodes
on the Euclidean space. A node is randomly connected to its -th predecessor
of degree with a directed link of length using a probability
proportional to . Our numerical study indicates that the
network is Scale-free for all values of and the degree
distribution decays stretched exponentially for the other values of .
The link length distribution follows a power law:
where is calculated exactly for the whole range of values of .Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. To be published in Physical Review
Diclofenac Prolongs Repolarization in Ventricular Muscle with Impaired Repolarization Reserve
Background: The aim of the present work was to characterize the electrophysiological effects of the non-steroidal anti-
inflammatory drug diclofenac and to study the possible proarrhythmic potency of the drug in ventricular muscle.
Methods: Ion currents were recorded using voltage clamp technique in canine single ventricular cells and action potentials
were obtained from canine ventricular preparations using microelectrodes. The proarrhythmic potency of the drug was
investigated in an anaesthetized rabbit proarrhythmia model.
Results: Action potentials were slightly lengthened in ventricular muscle but were shortened in Purkinje fibers by diclofenac
(20 mM). The maximum upstroke velocity was decreased in both preparations. Larger repolarization prolongation was
observed when repolarization reserve was impaired by previous BaCl 2 application. Diclofenac (3 mg/kg) did not prolong
while dofetilide (25 mg/kg) significantly lengthened the QT c interval in anaesthetized rabbits. The addition of diclofenac
following reduction of repolarization reserve by dofetilide further prolonged QT c . Diclofenac alone did not induce Torsades
de Pointes ventricular tachycardia (TdP) while TdP incidence following dofetilide was 20%. However, the combination of
diclofenac and dofetilide significantly increased TdP incidence (62%). In single ventricular cells diclofenac (30 mM) decreased
the amplitude of rapid (I Kr ) and slow (I Ks ) delayed rectifier currents thereby attenuating repolarization reserve. L-type calcium
current (I Ca ) was slightly diminished, but the transient outward (I to ) and inward rectifier (I K1 ) potassium currents were not
influenced.
Conclusions: Diclofenac at therapeutic concentrations and even at high dose does not prolong repolarization markedly and
does not increase the risk of arrhythmia in normal heart. However, high dose diclofenac treatment may lengthen
repolarization and enhance proarrhythmic risk in hearts with reduced repolarization reserve
Fine Ash-Bearing Particles as a Major Aerosol Component in Biomass Burning Smoke
Biomass burning (BB) events are occurring globally with increasing frequency, and their emissions are having more impacts on human health and climate. Large ash particles are recognized as a BB product with major influences on soil and water environments. However, fine-ash particles, which have diameters smaller than several microns and characteristic morphologies and compositions (mainly Ca and Mg carbonates), have not yet been explicitly considered as a major BB aerosol component either in field observations or climate models. This study measured BB aerosol samples using transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and ion chromatography during the Fire Influence on Regional to Global Environments and Air Quality (FIREX-AQ) campaign. We show that significant amounts of fine ash-bearing particles are transported \u3e100 km from their fire sources. Our environmental chamber experiments suggest that they can act as cloud condensation and ice nuclei. We also found considerable amounts of fine ash-bearing particles in the TEM samples collected during previous campaigns (Biomass Burning Observation Project and Megacity Initiative: Local and Global Research Observations). These ash particles are commonly mixed with organic matter and make up âź8% and 5% of BB smoke by number and mass, respectively, in samples collected during the FIREX-AQ campaign. The measured ash-mass concentrations are approximately five times and six times greater than those of BB black carbon and potassium, respectively, scaling to an estimated global emission of 11.6 Tg yrâ1 with a range of 8.8â16.3 Tg yrâ1. Better characterization and constraints on these fine ash-bearing particles will improve BB aerosol measurements and strengthen assessments of BB impacts on human health and climate
The Legitimacy of Inequality: Integrating the Perspectives of System Justification and Social Judgment : The Legitimacy of Inequality
To explain the legitimation of inequality among the members of a social system, we blend system justification theory and the theory of social judgment. We identify adaptation and replacement as two major mechanisms of inequality legitimation and examine their influence in the unique setting of a natural experiment, the reunification of socialist East Germany and capitalist West Germany. We show that the new members of a society in which inequality is broadly endorsed and perceived as enduring will adapt to this perception and come to view inequality as acceptable. This process of adaptation reflects the subtle but powerful influence of collective legitimacy on an individual's tacit approval of inequality. Inequality also becomes legitimate as older cohorts are replaced by younger cohorts; however, this effect is weaker than the effect of adaptation. We contribute to the literature by demonstrating that developing and testing a theory of how inequality becomes legitimized can provide new insights into the ideational antecedents of inequality
Diversity and composition of tropical butterflies along an Afromontane agricultural gradient in the Jimma Highlands, Ethiopia
Afromontane landscapes are typically characterized by a mosaic of smallholder farms and the biodiversity impacts of these practices will vary in accordance to local management and landscape context. Here, we assess how tropical butterfly diversity is maintained across an agricultural landscape in the Jimma Highlands of Ethiopia. We used transect surveys to sample understory butterfly communities within degraded natural forest, semi-managed coffee forest (SMCF), exotic timber plantations, open woodland, croplands and pasture. Surveys were conducted in 29 one-hectare plots and repeated five times between January and June 2013. We found that natural forest supports higher butterfly diversity than all agricultural plots (measured with Hill's numbers). SMCF and timber plantations retain relatively high abundance and diversity, but these metrics drop off sharply in open woodland, cropland and pasture. SMCF and timber plantations share the majority of their species with natural forest and support an equivalent abundance of forest-dependent species, with no increase in widespread species. There was some incongruence in the responses of families and sub-families, notably that Lycaenidae are strongly associated with open woodland and pasture. Adult butterflies clearly utilize forested agricultural practices such as SMCF and timber plantations, but species diversity declines steeply with distance from natural forest suggesting that earlier life-stages may depend on host plants and/or microclimatic conditions that are lost under agricultural management. From a management perspective, the protection of natural forest remains a priority for tropical butterfly conservation, but understanding functioning of the wider landscape mosaic is important as SMCF and timber plantations may act as habitat corridors that facilitate movement between forest fragments
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