Intending to Benefit from Wrongdoing

Some believe that the mere beneficiaries of wrongdoing of others ought to disgorge their tainted benefits. Others deny that claim. Both sides of this debate concentrate on unavoidable beneficiaries of the wrongdoing of others, who are presumed themselves to be innocent by virtue of the fact they have neither contributed to the wrong nor could they have avoided receiving the benefit. But as we show, this presumption is mistaken for unavoidable beneficiaries who intend in certain ways to benefit from wrongdoing, and who have therefore done something wrong in forming and acting on such an intention.Australian Research Council DP110100175

Thinking alone and thinking together

The central observation of this paper is that belief ascriptions with plural subjects can be interpreted non-distributively, so that beliefs can be truthfully attributed to a plurality that cannot be attributed to any of the individuals that it comprises. Moreover, the beliefs of a plurality appear to be predictable from the beliefs of its associated individuals. Two potential analyses are offered for the relationship between the beliefs of individuals and those of pluralities. Both of these analyses, which are meant to negotiate the agreements and disagreements between individual experiencers, run into issues differentiating between relevant and irrelevant disagreement. To resolve these issues I invoke a notion of "aboutness", which filters out contextually irrelevant beliefs

A conservative theory of gradable modality

In the tradition of modal semantics stemming from the work of Kratzer (1981, 1991), several attempts have been made to analyze adjectives like important, which are both modal and gradable. I show that existing theories of such gradable modal adjectives (GMAs) in this framework do not allow for comparisons across distinct sets or prioritizations of premises, as the basis for comparison in these theories is too closely wedded to the particular choice and ranking of priorities. To fix this, I include modal degrees in the ontology, with sets of premises being relativized to those degrees. What results is a theory that allows comparison across sets of priorities, while still retaining the premise-based world ordering and quantification that lies at the heart of Kratzer's approach. This theory is then extended to account for existentially-quantifying GMAs like permissible, as well as entailment relations between modal auxiliaries and GMAs

From Single Cell to Plants: Mesophyll Protoplasts as a Versatile System for Investigating Plant Cell Reprogramming

Plants are sessile organisms that have a remarkable developmental plasticity, which ensures their optimal adaptation to environmental stresses. Plant cell totipotency is an extreme example of such plasticity, whereby somatic cells have the potential to form plants via direct shoot organogenesis or somatic embryogenesis in response to various exogenous and/or endogenous signals. Protoplasts provide one of the most suitable systems for investigating molecular mechanisms of totipotency, because they are e ectively single cell populations. In this review, we consider the current state of knowledge of the mechanisms that induce cell proliferation from individual, di erentiated somatic plant cells. We highlight initial explant metabolic status, ploidy level and isolation procedure as determinants of successful cell reprogramming. We also discuss the importance of auxin signalling and its interaction with stress-regulated pathways in governing cell cycle induction and further stages of plant cell totipotency

Across the Divide

The School of Education at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee coordinated a precollege program with rural, urban, and suburban high schools students to explore issues of race, class and geography to ameliorate the divide that often exists when high school students from monocultural communities move to more culturally diverse institutions of higher education. Through this program, participants engaged with each other via a common curriculum while participating in school projects and joint discussions. The goal of the program was to influence changes in the behavior of college-bound students, behaviors that often result in conflicts on campus when diverse cultures co-exist in new settings. Findings reveal that when institutions of higher education help connect and facilitate discussions among high school students, the potential benefits are high. Exposing high school students to diversity issues, while introducing them to a college experience, helps prepare them to ultimately take an active role in their communities

Rethinking corporate agency in business, philosophy and law

While researchers in business ethics, moral philosophy and jurisprudence have advanced the study of corporate agency, there have been very few attempts to bring together insights from these and other disciplines in the pages of the Journal of Business Ethics. By introducing to an audience of business ethics scholars the work of outstanding authors working outside the field this interdisciplinary special issue addresses this lacuna. Its aim is to encourage the formulation of innovative arguments that reinvigorate the study of corporate agency and stimulate further cross-fertilization of ideas between business ethics, law, philosophy and other disciplines.PostprintNon peer reviewe

Detection of Active Caspase-3 in Mouse Models of Stroke and Alzheimer\u27s Disease with a Novel Dual Positron Emission Tomography/Fluorescent Tracer [68Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA.

Apoptosis is a feature of stroke and Alzheimer\u27s disease (AD), yet there is no accepted method to detect or follow apoptosis in the brain in vivo. We developed a bifunctional tracer [Ga-68]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA containing a cell-penetrating peptide separated from fluorescent Oregon Green and Ga-68-bound labels by the caspase-3 recognition peptide DEVD. We hypothesized that this design would allow [Ga-68]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA to accumulate in apoptotic cells. In vitro, Ga-TC3-OGDOTA labeled apoptotic neurons following exposure to camptothecin, oxygen-glucose deprivation, and -amyloid oligomers. In vivo, PET showed accumulation of [Ga-68]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA in the brain of mouse models of stroke or AD. Optical clearing revealed colocalization of [Ga-68]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA and cleaved caspase-3 in brain cells. In stroke, [Ga-68]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA accumulated in neurons in the penumbra area, whereas in AD mice [Ga-68]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA was found in single cells in the forebrain and diffusely around amyloid plaques. In summary, this bifunctional tracer is selectively associated with apoptotic cells in vitro and in vivo in brain disease models and represents a novel tool for apoptosis detection that can be used in neurodegenerative diseases

Detection of active caspase-3 in mouse models of stroke and Alzheimer\u27s disease with a novel dual positron emission tomography/fluorescent tracer [ \u3csup\u3e68\u3c/sup\u3e Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA

© 2019 Valeriy G. Ostapchenko et al. Apoptosis is a feature of stroke and Alzheimer\u27s disease (AD), yet there is no accepted method to detect or follow apoptosis in the brain in vivo. We developed a bifunctional tracer [ 68 Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA containing a cell-penetrating peptide separated from fluorescent Oregon Green and 68 Ga-bound labels by the caspase-3 recognition peptide DEVD. We hypothesized that this design would allow [ 68 Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA to accumulate in apoptotic cells. In vitro, Ga-TC3-OGDOTA labeled apoptotic neurons following exposure to camptothecin, oxygen-glucose deprivation, and β-amyloid oligomers. In vivo, PET showed accumulation of [ 68 Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA in the brain of mouse models of stroke or AD. Optical clearing revealed colocalization of [ 68 Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA and cleaved caspase-3 in brain cells. In stroke, [ 68 Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA accumulated in neurons in the penumbra area, whereas in AD mice [ 68 Ga]Ga-TC3-OGDOTA was found in single cells in the forebrain and diffusely around amyloid plaques. In summary, this bifunctional tracer is selectively associated with apoptotic cells in vitro and in vivo in brain disease models and represents a novel tool for apoptosis detection that can be used in neurodegenerative diseases