What Can Philosophers Learn from Psychopathy?

Many spectacular claims about psychopaths are circulated. This contribution aims at providing the reader with the more complex reality of the phenomenon (or phenomena), and to point to issues of particular interest to philosophers working in moral psychology and moral theory. I first discuss the current evidence regarding psychopaths’ deficient empathy and decision-making skills. I then explore what difference it makes to our thinking whether we regard their deficit dimensionally (as involving abilities that are on or off) and whether we focus on primary or secondary psychopathy. My conclusion is that most grand claims about psychopathy settling long-standing debates in moral philosophy and psychology are overblown, but there is much to be learnt from this disorder when it comes to formulating modern theories of moral psychology

Statements of Interest: Addendum to the Testimony of 9 To 5, the National Association of Working Women, et al. Before the Commission on the Future of Worker-Management Relations

Addendum_Lichtman_et_al_040694.pdf: 179 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Intellectual Property Rights and Innovation: Evidence from the Human Genome

Do intellectual property (IP) rights on existing technologies hinder subsequent innovation? Using newly-collected data on the sequencing of the human genome by the public Human Genome Project and the private rm Celera, this paper estimates the impact of Celera's gene-level IP on subsequent scienti c research and product development. Genes initially sequenced by Celera were held with IP for up to two years, but moved into the public domain once re-sequenced by the public e ort. Across a range of empirical speci cations, I nd evidence that Celera's IP led to reductions in subsequent scienti c research and product development on the order of 20 to 30 percent. Taken together, these results suggest that Celera's short-term IP had persistent negative e ects on subsequent innovation relative to a counterfactual of Celera genes having always been in the public domain

Local trapping as predator control in rural Alaska: limiting factors in Allakaket and Alatna and the potential for increased community involvement in wildlife management

For a community to be involved in natural resources management that community must have the capacity to make management actions. The capacity for a community to be involved in natural resources management or to take management action might be dependent on a wide variety of factors, largely based upon the resource and asset base available to a community. Aerial wolf control as a wildlife management strategy in the state of Alaska is a controversial endeavor. In the rural villages of Allakaket and Alatna wolf trapping was traditionally a commonly practiced subsistence activity but local levels of wolf trapping are currently very low. The State of Alaska began performing aerial wolf control around Allakaket and Alatna in February 2013 per the request of local residents but the program took more than a decade to come to fruition. To investigate the factors that have led to the decline in local wolf trapping in Allakaket and Alatna and to determine if local trapping could be increased as a means of predator control this study adopted a modified analytic induction methodology. Four propositions and hypotheses were developed regarding the decline in local trapping and the potential to increase local wolf trapping. The propositions and hypotheses were based on the ideas that 1) a community must possess the capacity to take action in order to do so, 2) The benefits of action must outweigh the costs, 3 ) local norms and values must support an action for it to occur, and 4) management roles, responsibilities, and power-dynamics between communities and management agencies can affect the action of a community. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 residents of Allakaket and Alatna to gather data relevant to the propositions and hypotheses. A codebook was developed and Randolph's Free-Marginal Multirater Kappa was calculated with acceptable levels of inter-coder reliability resulting for each code (k >̲ .80). Codes were used to organize data from each interview, which were then used to test the hypotheses. Local norms and values do not appear to be limiting local trapping, the community recognizes the benefits of local trapping to outweigh the costs, and the community also recognizes itself to have a responsibility to take management action, so management power dynamics do not appear to be limiting trapping. The community may not have the full capacity to increase local trapping as a form of local wolf control, as the resources or motivation to organize an increase in local trapping are not being realized within the community. Furthermore, a generation gap was identified that appears to be limiting the ability of the community to connect potential trapping students with teachers to revive and perpetuate the local tradition of trapping

Open Fire: A Portrait of Gun Control in U.S. and International Newspaper Articles after the 2011 Arizona Mass Shooting

This research sought to explore media framing theory, first introduced by Erving Goffman, which asserts that the media portray certain items in a way that affects awareness, salience and tone of those items. There has long been debate about media framing especially as it pertains to the framing of violent events. Mass shootings are of particular interest because of the graphic and often senseless nature of the crime. This study looked particularly at the 2011 Tucson, Arizona mass shooting. A content analysis of articles between February 7, 2010, and November 8, 2011, was conducted to explore media framing of gun control after the Tucson, Arizona mass shooting involving U. S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords. Results showed an equal amount of articles with a negative or neutral tone, with the tone shifting to being more frequently neutral after the shooting. The topic shifted toward legislation, adding further support to media framing theory. These findings have impacts for media and public relations

“Dear Tupac, You speak to me.” Recruiting hip-hop as curriculum at a school for pregnant and parenting teens

This is the Author's final draft. The published version may be found at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10665680802612642This article provides a rich representation of how in-school practices that recruit students’ “out-of-school” literacies, such as hip-hop, can be used as critical bridges in students’ learning. Hip-hop, conceptualized in this article as an “outof- school” literacy, works as a vehicle for curricular change at Eastview School for Pregnant and Parenting Teens. In so doing, such literacy learning can be a tool for social action. Because the literacy learning of “at risk” students, as the students who attend Eastview School for Pregnant and Parenting Teens are labeled, is often described through remedial or basic skills models of instruction, it is imperative that researchers document curricular change that challenges prevailing assumptions about the learning of “at risk” students