Innate Sense Research Articles

The neurobiology of moral sense: facts or hypotheses?

One of the most intriguing frontiers of current neuroscientific research is represented by the investigation of the possible neural substrates of morality. The assumption is that in humans an innate moral sense would exist. If this is true, with no doubt it should be regulated by specific brain mechanisms selected over the course of evolution, as they would promote our species’ survival. In the last decade, an increasing number of studies have been carried out to explore the neural bases of human morality.The aim of this paper is to present a comprehensive review of the data regarding the neurobiological origin of the moral sense, through a Medline search of English-language articles from 1980 to February 2012.The available findings would suggest that there might be a main integrative centre for the innate morality, in particular the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, with its multiple connections with the limbic lobe, thalamus and brainstem. The subjective moral sense would be the result of an integration of multiple automatic responses, mainly associated with social emotions and interpretation of others’ behaviours and intentions.Since converging observations outline how lesions of the proposed neural networks may underlie some personality changes and criminal behaviours, the implications of the studies in this field encompass many areas of the scientific domain.

“毁不灭性”：儒家哀伤应对的构成要素与作用机制<br>Discussion of a Confucian Theory on Bereavement

面对亲人亡故，儒家持有“毁不灭性”的主张。“毁不灭性”的构成要素包括儒家天道–性–仁的终极观，以德永存的永恒观，以“礼”侍亲的伦理原则和习俗，中庸的处事原则。这一学说不仅提供了生命意义–死亡的信念与认知框架，“礼”为中心，亲族–乡亲参与的传统丧葬习俗具有哀伤心理释放、行为调整和社会支持功能。“毁不灭性”可以引入心理健康科学，经过心理学化后，可能发育为具有中国文化气质性质现代哀伤应对理论。 This article discusses the psychological mechanism of the Confucian theory on bereavement, “Huibumiexing” (the not carrying emaciation to such an extent to affect life) that argues against grieving excessively to the point of hurting the virtual nature in ethical life. Such an argument is based on the theory of Confucian spirituality and the related viewpoints. According to the Confucian principle of Filial Piety, grief is one’s natural ethical reaction. However, it should be expressed in proper ways and to proper extent. Spiritually, Confucianism maintains that human being is formed through the way of Heaven (Tiandao). Man has the responsibility to develop his innate sense of benevolence to the stage of stateliness and kingliness. From the perspective of Confucianism, life and death are as natural as the rise and fall of the moon and sun. Grief should be expressed on the principle of Zhongyong (the golden mean). The funeral ritual custom called “QiQi” (seven seven days), which involves the participation of kin and neighbors, functions as social support and behavior therapy. This bereavement theory in Confucianism, including its explanation of grief, recognition to grief, and cultural behavior therapy, can be adaptively included in clinical psychology to further develop Chinese bereavement theory.

Review: Variety, Archaeology, and Ornament: Renaissance Architectural Prints from Column to Cornice

Variety, Archaeology, and Ornament: Renaissance Architectural Prints from Column to Cornice . University of Virginia Art Museum. 26 August–18 December 2011. This genesis of this compelling exhibition is a collection of twenty-three mid-sixteenth-century architectural prints acquired by the University of Virginia some thirty years ago. The prints are of various capitals and bases, some quite elaborate but matching none of the canonical orders with which we are most familiar. While several can be linked to known ancient monuments, others are from sources unknown, and some appear to be inventions. Their engraver is identified only by the initials G.A., with a tiny image of a caltrop (a small spiked weapon spread on the ground to inhibit the advance of mounted troops). Master G.A. may be Giovanni Agucchi, a mid-sixteenth-century Italian engraver, but the attribution remains conjectural. The prints are a reminder of how single-leaf architectural prints accelerated the spread of information on classical architecture during the formative years of the Italian Renaissance. The printed image was just then coming into its own and made knowledge of Roman antiquity widely accessible to an eager audience as never before. Moreover, the prints are evidence of how this particular master, along with numerous others, quickly absorbed and shared the richness and variety of the wealth of ancient architectural details scattered about. Using Master G.A. prints as a foundation, the …

Achieving universal health coverage in low-income settings

The goal of universal health coverage is deeply embedded in politics, ethics, and international law. Article 25 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for health, including medical care, and the right to security in the event of sickness or disability. 1 UN General AssemblyUniversal Declaration of Human Rights, 10 December 1948, 217 A (III). http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3ae6b3712c.html Google Scholar Motherhood and childhood are to be afforded special care and assistance. In the same year, the Constitution of the World Health Organization came into force, declaring that “The enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition.” 2 WHO. Constitution of the World Health Organization as adopted by the International Health Conference, New York, June 19–July 22, 1946. Google Scholar The struggle for universal health coverageCertain concepts resonate so naturally with the innate sense of dignity and justice within the hearts of men and women that they seem an insuppressible right. That health care should be accessible to all is surely one such concept. Yet in the past, this notion has struggled against barriers of self-interest and poor understanding. Building on several previous Lancet Series that have examined health and health systems in Mexico, China, India, southeast Asia, Brazil, and Japan, today we try to challenge those barriers with a collection of papers that make the ethical, political, economic, and health arguments in favour of universal health coverage (UHC), and which will be presented in New York on Sept 26, to coincide with the UN General Assembly. Full-Text PDF Universal health coverage: the third global health transition?As the world's nations gather for the UN meetings in September, 2012, real momentum on achievement of universal health coverage—aimed at giving everyone the health services they need without causing financial hardship—is no longer a distant dream. The 25 wealthiest nations all now have some form of universal coverage (apart from the USA, where political opposition remains strong, despite a recent supportive Supreme Court decision).1 Several middle-income countries, including Brazil, Mexico, and Thailand do as well. Full-Text PDF Universal health coverage: good health, good economicsUnderpinning the trends examined in The Lancet's Series on universal health coverage are several points that deserve deeper appreciation. Call them EPIC—a fitting acronym, in view of the epic transition now underway as the world moves towards universal coverage. Full-Text PDF Universal health coverage is a development issueThe recent Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, took place 20 years after the first global conference on the environment and development and 10 years after the World Summit on Sustainable Development. Although much of the discussion focused on the environment, poverty reduction, and sustaining economic growth, the resultant resolution contained an important paragraph for the global health community: Full-Text PDF User fees in universal health systemsThe Lancet's Series on universal health coverage (UHC) offers a timely and comprehensive overview of the implementation and effect of this policy globally. Despite gains, many people still need to pay a high proportion of total health expenditure out of pocket (Sept 8, p 944).1 Patients' costs must be reduced to further improve health and provide financial protection in health systems with UHC. Full-Text PDF

Universal health coverage: good health, good economics

Underpinning the trends examined in The Lancet's Series on universal health coverage are several points that deserve deeper appreciation. Call them EPIC—a fitting acronym, in view of the epic transition now underway as the world moves towards universal coverage. The struggle for universal health coverageCertain concepts resonate so naturally with the innate sense of dignity and justice within the hearts of men and women that they seem an insuppressible right. That health care should be accessible to all is surely one such concept. Yet in the past, this notion has struggled against barriers of self-interest and poor understanding. Building on several previous Lancet Series that have examined health and health systems in Mexico, China, India, southeast Asia, Brazil, and Japan, today we try to challenge those barriers with a collection of papers that make the ethical, political, economic, and health arguments in favour of universal health coverage (UHC), and which will be presented in New York on Sept 26, to coincide with the UN General Assembly. Full-Text PDF Does progress towards universal health coverage improve population health?Many commentators, including WHO, have advocated progress towards universal health coverage on the grounds that it leads to improvements in population health. In this report we review the most robust cross-country empirical evidence on the links between expansions in coverage and population health outcomes, with a focus on the health effects of extended risk pooling and prepayment as key indicators of progress towards universal coverage across health systems. The evidence suggests that broader health coverage generally leads to better access to necessary care and improved population health, particularly for poor people. Full-Text PDF Political and economic aspects of the transition to universal health coverageCountries have reached universal health coverage by different paths and with varying health systems. Nonetheless, the trajectory toward universal health coverage regularly has three common features. The first is a political process driven by a variety of social forces to create public programmes or regulations that expand access to care, improve equity, and pool financial risks. The second is a growth in incomes and a concomitant rise in health spending, which buys more health services for more people. Full-Text PDF Moving towards universal health coverage: health insurance reforms in nine developing countries in Africa and AsiaWe analyse nine low-income and lower-middle-income countries in Africa and Asia that have implemented national health insurance reforms designed to move towards universal health coverage. Using the functions-of-health-systems framework, we describe these countries' approaches to raising prepaid revenues, pooling risk, and purchasing services. Then, using the coverage-box framework, we assess their progress across three dimensions of coverage: who, what services, and what proportion of health costs are covered. Full-Text PDF Achieving universal health coverage in low-income settingsThe goal of universal health coverage is deeply embedded in politics, ethics, and international law. Article 25 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for health, including medical care, and the right to security in the event of sickness or disability.1 Motherhood and childhood are to be afforded special care and assistance. In the same year, the Constitution of the World Health Organization came into force, declaring that “The enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition.”2 Full-Text PDF

Embodied Human Intersubjectivity: Imaginative Agency, To Share Meaning

Abstract Human beings move coherently as individual selves, body and mind adapted to perform complex activities with imagination, knowledge, and skill; perceiving the environment by engaging it with discrimination and care. Human beings live intersubjectively in communitiesl each with the rituals, beliefs, and language of a culture, along with a history of affective relationships and agreed habits for acting in cooperation. These attachments and cultural habits depend upon an ability to sense the intentions, interests, and feelings of other human selves through sympathetic response to motives and emotions as displayed in the shapes and rhythms of body movement: an ability that infants possess from birth. No brain theory explains this ‘felt immediacy’ of others’ life experience, which philosophers of the Scottish Enlightenment accepted as proof that human beings are ‘innately sympathetic’. An innate time sense, capacity to ‘attune’ to the dynamics of body movement, and ability to recognise serial ordering in ‘stories’ all appear essential. A theory of ‘communicative musicality’ employs key parameters of pulse, quality of movement, and narrative, applying them to poetry, music, dance, the prosody and rhetoric of language, and the regulation of skillful practices of all kinds. These elements - present in foetal movements and engaged in through joyful intersubjective ‘story-telling’ from birth - give direct information on how the human brain orchestrates reflex functions to move the body with sensations of grace and efficiency. Their age-related development leads to mastery of language and cultural rituals. They conduct all cognitive functions and all meaning making.

Phoebe S. Leboy, Groundbreaking Activist for Women in STEM

Phoebe Starfield Leboy, scientist and tireless advocate for women in science and engineering, passed away on June 16, 2012, at the age of 75, after a lengthy battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s disease). Professor Leboy was a rare creature when she joined the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine in 1967, one of only a few women among many men. She was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure only 3 short years later, and to the rank of Professor in 1976. For 21 years, she remained the only tenured woman in the School of Dental Medicine. Professor Leboy had a distinguished career in two unrelated areas of research. Her early career focused on nucleic acid modifications, presaging the recent explosion of work in the new field of epigenetics. Her later work focused on bone-forming adult stem cells, and made her a pioneer in the field of what is now known as regenerative medicine. However, perhaps her greatest scientific impact was through her activism for other women scientists. Her advocacy for women began in 1970, with formation of Women for Equal Opportunity at the University of Pennsylvania, an organization that Professor Leboy chaired. The organization was formed in response to the University’s failure to develop a federally mandated affirmative action plan, the need for which was dramatically demonstrated by the finding that in 1971, only 7% of faculty positions were held by women. After a series of rapes on campus, Professor Leboy organized a sit-in at the central administration building of the University. Ultimately, negotiations led to numerous advances that made Penn a model for other academic institutions in its programs for women, with founding of the Penn Women’s Center, a Women’s Studies Program, victim support and special services, and increased campus safety for women. Penn Professor Janice Madden summarized, ‘‘Over the 40 years that I have been at Penn, Phoebe has contributed to every single milestone—be it policy, program, or other achievement—for women faculty.’’ In 2001, in response to an initiative by the Ford Foundation, presidents, chancellors, provosts, and several leading scholars from nine top research universities met at MIT to engage in an unprecedented discussion on barriers to success for women faculty in science and engineering. The group, now known as the MIT9, released a statement agreeing to analyze salaries and university resources provided to women faculty. MIT Professor Nancy Hopkins remembers Dr. Leboy as an integral part of MIT9: ‘‘[Phoebe] was fearless in speaking out and in turning what can be contentious issues into issues of simple common sense and common decency. I don’t know what makes a person possess such a powerful innate sense of fairness as Phoebe has or that equips them with the courage to act on their convictions with risk and no obvious professional benefit to themselves. But I do know that at least hundreds and more probably thousands of women scientists owe the ease of their life in science to the courageous and brilliant efforts of Phoebe Leboy.’’ The group has continued to meet annually, and has since broadened its focus to include both women faculty and underrepresented minorities in STEM fields. Upon retirement from the University, Professor Leboy took her advocacy for women on the road, becoming President of the Association for Women in Science. She continued to work throughout her illness to promote women and underrepresented minorities in STEM fields. At the time of her death, she held a grant from the National Science Foundation on gender inequity in science, and was actively publishing the findings of this research. In recognition of her leadership, the Association for Women in Science has created the Phoebe S. Leboy Public Policy Fellowship, and the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research established the Phoebe Leboy Professional Development Award.

Peter Corning: The fair society: the science of human nature and the pursuit of social justice

By definition, ambitious books think big. Peter Corning’s new book, The Fair Society, takes “thinking big” to a whole new level. Corning aims to provide a definition of the social contract that accounts for human nature and our biological needs. Corning also argues that we need a new definition of the social contract that takes account of human nature and our biological needs. It wasn’t always clear which of those two propositions Corning was aiming to tackle, or if he perhaps meant both in some interchangeable sense. Corning begins by giving the reader some examples of situations that most people would find unfair, such as wage discrimination (e.g., paying two people differently for doing the exact same work with the exact same level of competence). Next Corning attempts tomake sense ofwhy it is that people think anything is unfair, but also whypeople in different cultures around theworldfindcertain similar things to beunfair. In subsequent chapters he outlines research in evolutionary psychology and economics (much of it crossover work that tests models of economic rationality with crosscultural comparison groups) that gives rise to a provocative idea: humans have an innate sense of right and wrong, or fairness, and it is universal. Corning then takes the reader on a whirlwind, albeit hurried, tour of moral philosophy past and present and gives a variety of reasons why he thinks capitalism and socialism have led people astray when considering distributions of wealth. Capitalism is unfair because it makes no provisions, by itself, to care for those left behind in the economic dust. The reason capitalism is implicitly unfair has nothing to do with abstract arguments of the sort advanced by John Rawls in his monumental A Theory of Justice, but has to do with the fact that society is a survival endeavor. We don’t live in societies necessarily to trade skills we don’t have for those that others do have. Rather, we live in societies to help each other stay alive. This may well be the most important

SalmonellaPromotes ASC Oligomerization-dependent Caspase-1 Activation

Innate immune cells sense and respond to the cytoplasmic infection of bacterial pathogens through NLRP3, NLRC4 or AIM2 inflammasome depending on the unique molecular pattern of invading pathogens. The infection of flagellin- or type III secretion system (T3SS)-containing Gram-negative bacteria such as Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium (S. typhimurium) or Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa) triggers NLRC4-dependent caspase-1 activation leading to the secretion of proinflammatory cytokines such as interleukin-1-beta (IL-1β) and IL-18. Previous studies have shown that apoptosis-associated speck-like protein containing a CARD (ASC) is also required for Salmonella-induced caspase-1 activation, but it is still unclear how ASC contributes to the activation of NLRC4 inflammasome in response to S. typhimurium infection. In this study, we demonstrate that S. typhimurium triggers the formation of ASC oligomer in a potassium depletion-independent manner as determined by in vitro crosslinking and in situ fluorescence imaging. Remarkably, inhibition of potassium efflux failed to block Salmonella-promoted caspase-1 activation and macrophage cell death. These results collectively suggest that ASC is substantially oligomerized to facilitate the activation of caspase-1 in response to S. typhimurium infection. Contrary to NLRP3 inflammasome, intracellular potassium depletion is not critical for NLRC4 inflammasome signaling by S. typhimurium.

Arbitral Proceedings and Principles of Natural Justice

In India, there is no particular statute, laying down the minimum standard, which the judicial or quasi judicial bodies must follow while exercising their decision making powers. The principles of natural justice have been developed by the courts, in order to secure fairness in judicial functions. These principles are the Common Law counterpart of the ‘due process of law’ in the Constitution of the United States. The doctrine of natural justice pervades the procedural law of arbitration as its observance is the pragmatic requirement of fair play in action. In a case before the United States Supreme Court, a Jackson J. said: ‘Procedural fairness and regularity are indispensable essence of liberty. Severe substantive laws can be endured if they are fairly and impartially applied’. ‘The doctrine of natural justice seeks not only to secure justice but also to prevent miscarriage of justice.’ An arbitral tribunal is not bound by the procedure set out in the Code. It is for the parties to agree on a procedure, and if the parties are silent, then the arbitrator has to prescribe the procedure. The procedure so prescribed, however, should be in consonance with the principles of natural justice. The violation of principles of natural justice would amount to be contrary to the public policy of India. The arbitral tribunal discharging quasi judicial functions is expected to be fair and impartial in the arbitral proceedings. Principles of Natural Justice have been defined to mean 'fair play in action.' They constitute the basic elements of a fair hearing, having ties roots in the innate sense of man for fair play and justice, which is not the preserve of any particular race or country but is shared in common by all men. This article asserts that such a statutory provision being violative of the principles of natural justice should be struck down as being unconstitutional and bad in law. The procedure has to be modified by providing an option for referring the matter to a Court of law or other institutional arbitration bodies consisting of unbiased judges and arbitrators respectively.

The fair society: the science of human nature and the pursuit of social justice

We've been told, again and again, that life is unfair. But what if we're wrong simply to resign ourselves to this situation? What if we have the power-and more, the duty-to change society for the better? We do. And our very nature inclines us to do so. That's the provocative argument Peter Corning makes in The Fair Society. Drawing on the evidence from our evolutionary history and the emergent science of human nature, Corning shows that we have an innate sense of fairness. While these impulses can easily be subverted by greed and demagoguery, they can also be harnessed for good. Corning brings together the latest findings from the behavioral and biological sciences to help us understand how to move beyond the Madoffs and Enrons in our midst in order to lay the foundation for a new social contract-a Biosocial Contract built on a deep understanding of human nature and a commitment to fairness. He then proposes a sweeping set of economic and political reforms based on three principles of fairness-equality, equity, and reciprocity-that together could transform our society and our world. At this crisis point for capitalism, Corning reveals that the proper response to bank bailouts and financial chicanery isn't to get mad-it's to get fair.

A personal tribute to Robert G Edwards

[Based on an article by the author published in The Tribune (Delhi/Chandigarh) on 2 January 2011] Just after Bob Edwards had set up Bourn Hall near Cambridge to treat infertility cases requiring IVF, the technique for which he received the Nobel Prize last year, he drove me to the then heavily guarded building, and chuckled. All around, he said, were TV cameras poised on the top of the adjoining buildings to record what was happening inside Bourn Hall, and I would become a marked man! Bob had been a celebrity in Britain and elsewhere for some 3 years, not only for having given IVF to the infertile couples but also ignoring the church-going crowd that felt that man had no right to interfere if God had made a couple infertile. He realized that if any organic malfunctioning could be considered a disease, infertility was the most widely prevalent disease around the world, affecting 10 to 15% couples of child-bearing age, and he had given new hope to them. In fact, today, advances based on Bob Edwards’ work between 1970 and 1980 have made it possible for 85% of infertile couples to have a child. So he put all his money in the Bourn Clinic. It was a risk few would have taken, for the success rate of IVF at that time was less than 10%. Louise Brown, the first test-tube baby that he and the late Patrick Steptoe had delivered on 25th July 1978, was their first success after many failures. But Bob Edwards recognized that nothing worthwhile in this world was ever accomplished without taking a risk, believing in oneself, and going that extra mile that others didn’t dare to walk. Bourn Hall became a landmark, and the techniques that Bob had pioneered spawned a host of new, related technologies. Infertility clinics (good or bad) started sprouting around the corner everywhere over the next three decades, especially in India which even today has no regulation to control them. This mushrooming was anathema to the innate sense of ethics and morality in Bob. So when he started his second journal Reproductive BioMedicine Online (the first being Human Reproduction), he asked me to write an article on ethical issues in modern biological technologies, especially ART. It was published in September 2003. IVF and related techniques were by then well accepted. As I wrote, the scope for unethical behaviour and practices by ART practitioners was immense, and was being exploited fully in India. Inspired by Bob, there is now a Bill for accreditation and supervision of ART clinics, ready to be put up to the Indian Parliament. In all that he did, Bob showed that patience, selfconfidence, and a real commitment to the legitimate interests of the people based on strong ethics and highly developed professionalism, pays in the long run. I have watched the modern biological revolution from close quarters since its beginning in 1953, and I believe that there are not many who have during this period succeeded on so many counts as Bob has. However, the fact remains that success is never the outcome of just one individual’s effort and no one is, I am sure, more aware of it than Bob Edwards. The person he would be missing the most at this time, besides Patrick Steptoe, is CR Austin, known to his friends as Bunny. Bunny moved to Cambridge as the Darwin Professor of Animal Morphology in the Physiological Laboratory of the University in the 1960s. Bob joined him there having been with Bunny at the National Institute for Medical Research. It was I believe on the fourth floor of the Physiological Laboratory that he developed the technique of capacitating the human sperm in vitro and then using the capacitated sperm to fertilize a human egg also in vitro what we know today as IVF. I remember many delightful evenings spent at Bunny’s Manor House near Cambridge with Bob and Ruth. It was there that I learnt about Bob’s fascination with fast cars and fast driving, violating every rule of the road, which very few Britishers do. He could persuade me to be driven by him, I think only once! Bob has been a Fellow of Churchill College in Cambridge, and my wife and I remember dining at the College as Bob’s guests in 1986. There was never a dull moment when he was around, and he always livened the dinner table.

The importance of aesthetic surroundings: a study interviewing experts within different aesthetic fields

The purpose of this article is to present and discuss the results from interviews of experts within various aesthetic fields. This study aimed to describe experts' evaluation and wishes for aesthetics in hospitals. The scope is aesthetics in the hospital environment and surroundings. An underlying assumption was that the field of aesthetics is a neglected area in many hospital environments. The strength of the manuscript and what is new is the information concerning the expert, as patient, evaluation of aesthetics in hospital environment and surroundings and data on how the experts would prefer things to be. The basis is a corpus of 16 semi-structured individual qualitative interviews that were performed by the first author. The 16 informants were experts in different aesthetic fields. The interviews revealed the following: (i) Aesthetics and design are practically absent in the Norwegian general hospitals. (ii) The aesthetic surroundings are very important for the health and well-being of the patients. (iii) The aesthetic area has many aspects. Guidelines are worked out based on the expert/patient focus, their wishes and recommendations and based on a conviction that certain objective, basic and general criteria do exist for basing an aesthetic environment on an innate and shared common sense.

THE MORAL BASIS OF PROSPERITY AND OPPRESSION: ALTRUISM, OTHER-REGARDING BEHAVIOUR AND IDENTITY

Much of economics is built on the assumption that individuals are driven by self-interest and economic development is an outcome of the free play of such individuals. On the few occasions that the existence of altruism is recognized in economics, the tendency is to build this from the axiom of individual selfishness. The aim of this paper is to break from this tradition and to treat as a primitive that individuals are endowed with the ‘cooperative spirit’, which allows them to work in their collective interest, even when that may not be in their self-interest. The paper tracks the interface between altruism and group identity. By using the basic structure of a Prisoner's Dilemma game among randomly picked individuals and building into it assumptions of general or in-group altruism, the paper demonstrates how our selfish rationality interacts with our innate sense of cooperation. The model is used to outline circumstances under which cooperation will occur and circumstances where it will break down. The paper also studies how sub-groups of a society can form cooperative blocks, whether to simply do better for themselves or exploit others.

The innate sense of the body develops to become a public affair by 2–3 years

Infants from birth do express a sense of their own body as a differentiated entity among other entities in the world, an entity that is situated, physically bounded, organized, and agent in the environment. Quickly however, this implicit sense of self develops to become explicit, conceptual, and more importantly, public and social. This development would correlate with the maturation of specific prefrontal cortex regions. By 2 years of age, children begin to perceive and represent the embodied self through the evaluative, possibly coveting eyes of others. They become self-conscious. This developmental transition is further exemplified with the parallel emergence of an explicit sense of possession. By the second birthday, the “me” is extended to include the “mine”, giving children new embodied power to share, exchange, and give.

Using a Socratic Dialogue to Tackle Thorny Issues of Psychiatry

Medical students often experience significant cognitive dissonance as they attempt to understand psychiatry. After the security of lab values and medical tests that characterize much of medical practice, the ambiguity of seemingly subjectively obtained information characteristic of psychiatry often leaves students somewhat uncomfortable with how psychiatric diagnoses are made and understood. This is, at its root, an issue of epistemology: How do we know what we say we know? Psychiatry can seem "fuzzy" to medical students, and it behooves psychiatry educators to explicitly address this discomfort but, at the same time, not apologize for the differences between psychiatry and "the rest of medicine." In this article, the author strives to emphasize that this kind of epistemological challenge is ancient and esteemed, represented to some extent in the writings of Plato (who believed that we measure the world by comparing our experience with our innate sense of what we know is true) and Aristotle (who insisted that what we know is based largely on what we can measurably experience). Using humor, an imagined conversation among these ancient philosophers and a modern psychiatrist-medical educator might help to dispel some of the discomfort that psychiatry education sometimes engenders among future physicians. The author presents an example of such a conversation. After a brief discussion of the epistemological differences characteristic of Platonic and Aristotelian views, students could be shown a script similar to the example script and then asked to discuss and debate the arguments elucidated. Perhaps even better, students could be asked to write their own debates based on how Plato or Aristotle would be expected to behave.

The Scientific Analysis of Politics: Important Contributions from Some Overlooked Sources

What are the best approaches and methodologies toward a scientific study of politics? During the professional lifetimes of most readers of Political Research Quarterly, that question has received a variety of answers, with the debate frequently generating more heat than light. While the minisymposium presented here does not attempt to resolve the important issues surrounding these challenges, it does suggest a body of work that is often overlooked in these discussions. In particular, the contributors suggest several areas of literature from other sciences, including ethology, biology, behavior genetics, evolutionary psychology and cognitive neuroscience, that could benefit analysts working on a wide range of topics within political science and broaden the boundaries of acceptable political science research modalities. While theoretical and methodological traditions in political science have typically stressed the importance of socialization and learning in human political behavior, the approaches offered here encourage a more serious consideration of the interaction of the environment with the innate side of human nature. To be clear, we do not discount in any way the critical role played by socialization in instructing and informing human political behavior. Rather, we wish to emphasize the importance of incorporating more biological information into our explanations of the sources and operation of these activities as well. We do not mean to reactivate a no longer productive debate about nature versus nurture, since it now seems clear that both forces operate in tandem in ways that are inextricably intertwined. Rather, by encompassing both facets - nature and nurture - into an integrated perspective, we believe it is possible to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of human political behavior. With this goal in mind, we offer a series of papers that provides a fresh approach to the study of politics from a serious evolutionary psychological and biological framework. symposium contains four papers that suggest how diverse theories, approaches and/or tools of biology and psychology - broadly defined - can prove useful to scholars concerned with the analysis of political behavior. first paper, Mutual Interests: Case for Increasing Dialogue between Political Science and Neuroscience by Rose McDermott (2009) explores recent work in cognitive neuroscience to suggest how evolutionary models can help illuminate topics of interest in political science. second paper, Is There a Party in Your Genes? by Peter K. Hatemi, John R. Alford, John R. Ribbing, Nicholas G. Martin, and Lindon J. Eaves (2009), explores the relationship between genetics and the strength of partisan attachments, as distinct from party identification. In similar fashion, Jamie Settle, Christopher Dawes and James Fowler (2009) use twin studies to examine The Heritability of Partisan Attachments. final paper by Kristen Renwick Monroe, Adam Martin and Priyanka Ghosh (2009), Politics and An Innate Moral Sense: Scientific Evidence for an Old Theory? draws on work from animal ethology, child development, neuroscience, and primatology to address ethical issues involved in positing an innate moral sensibility. papers presented here thus employ a wide range of theoretical literatures, research methods, and empirical data more traditionally associated with biology or psychology to suggest how political scientists can gain additional purchase into investigations of enduring political problems if they broaden the theoretical, methodological and empirical boundaries of conventional research in political science. goals of this minisymposium are four-fold. We wish to: (1) introduce a potentially exciting area of research to new scholars; (2) widen the range of theoretical and methodological work deemed acceptable in political science; (3) confer professional legitimacy on work that explores endogenous approaches/ techniques/theories/bodies of literature in political science; and (4) broaden discourse about what is considered appropriate research in the scientific study of political activities. …

Appreciative inquiry: a fresh approach to continuous improvement in public services

How many of us are running out of ideas to improve performance and deliver elusive goals and targets? The demand to raise standards is never far away from political rhetoric, the drive to improve outcomes for stakeholders is a constant imperative of leadership, and inspection regimes hold us to account by confronting us with the deficit between progress and outstanding issues. But do we really think we have found the best approach to delivering this change? Have we developed a method which optimises the continuous improvement agenda in a way that enables services to thrive rather than feel overwhelmed by the needs we are trying to meet? How do we close the gap between our innate sense of idealism and the real‐world problems of which we are only too aware? There is a fresh approach which works well, by placing people at the centre of the change process. It is called appreciative inquiry. This article explains how it has been used by Liverpool Council to powerful effect.

Politics and an Innate Moral Sense

Part of a symposium arguing for increased interdisciplinary conversations, this article suggests how political scientists can benefit from recent scientific work in child development, evolutionary biology, behavioral economics, primatology, and linguistics. All offer empirical evidence suggesting human beings are born with a moral grammar hard-wired into their neural circuitry. The analysis challenges claims for cultural relativity and suggests psychological egoism and rational choice theory leave unexplained much political behavior because they rest on too narrow a conceptualization of basic human nature, omitting precisely the sociability that moral sense theory places as a fundamental part of our human nature.

The Blonde Goddess

The Blonde Goddess