bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Dignitarian Approach as a Program
Authors: Gilabert Pablo
Published: December 2018

This chapter outlines dignitarianism—or the dignitarian approach—as a general normative program. Dignitarianism states that at least some of the central norms concerning the treatment of individual entities depend on their inherent dignity—they require appropriate responses to it. After outlining the structure of dignitarian arguments, the chapter casts human rights as an exemplary instance of them. The chapter then addresses several philosophical issues regarding dignitarianism. It offers a broad view of human capacities and interests, an account of how dignitarianism helps bridge the justificatory gap between important interests and rights to their support, a deployment of moral contractualism as a device for defending dignitarian norms, an exploration of the relation between dignitarianism and ethical pluralism, and a presentation of dignitarian inquiry as a form of critical theory. The chapter concludes by outlining the main components and tasks of dignitarianism as a theoretical and practical program.
Partitioning the nominal domain
Authors: Déchaine Rose-Marie
Published: December 2018

Class qua gender is a mechanism for introducing a partition, i.e. noun classes, into the nominal domain. Treating class/gender as a partition function—a function that exhaustively and non-intersectively assigns all members of a set to a subset—provides insight into the range of variation attested in natural languages relative to the realization of class/gender. This set-theoretic analysis is embedded in a model of interface syntax that allows a given feature’s modus and locus of association to vary. Specifically, the locus of association of class/gender varies such that it can associate with any position in the nominal spine—including Root, n, Number, and D—with concomitant differences in morphology, syntax, and semantics. Also, the modus of association of class/gender can vary, such that it can associate with the nominal spine as a feature of a functional category, e.g. DCLASS, NumberCLASS, nCLASS, ROOTCLASS, or as an independent F-category in the nominal spine. In the latter case, it hosts a distinct F-head (Class), which can be positioned anywhere in the nominal spine. The model is assessed relative to two data sets: (i) the animacy-based gender partition of Plains Cree (central Algonquian): (ii) the classificatory gender (traditionally described as a noun-class system) of Shona (southern Bantu).
Limiting gender
Authors: Hammerly Christopher
Published: December 2018

Grammatical gender features, which are seen as having both a semantic and arbitrary form, have been argued to embody the interpretable-uninterpretable distinction: semantic gender is interpretable, and arbitrary gender is uninterpretable (Kramer 2014, 2015). Using French as a case study, Chapter 5 argues that all gender features (even those which have been seen as arbitrary) are necessarily interpretable at the LF interface. Even if a feature does not contribute compositionally to the meaning of a structure, it must be visible to provide the context for interpretation. This leads to an argument for the abandonment of the interpretable-uninterpretable distinction in the representation of features. Instead, the analysis contends that the mechanism of interpretation is responsible for differences in the semantic contribution of features: both heads and sub-structures can be taken as input to the interpretive mechanism. The interpretation of heads leads to compositional meaning, and the interpretation of sub-structures to non-compositional meaning. The system has the consequence of simplifying restrictions on gender specification such that they are solely linked to the availability of a semantic interpretation, rather than to a combination of phonological and semantic licensing conditions.
Kant, Wolff, and the Method of Philosophy
Authors: Gava Gabriele
Published: December 2018

Both in his pre-critical writings and in his critical works, Kant criticizes the Wolffian tradition for its use of the mathematical method in philosophy. The chapter argues that the apparent unambiguousness of this opposition between Kant and Wolff notwithstanding, the problem of ascertaining the relationship between Kant’s and Wolff’s methods in philosophy cannot be dismissed so quickly. Only a close consideration of Kant’s different remarks on Wolff’s approach and a comparison of the methods that Wolff and Kant actually used in philosophy can allow us to determine when Kant’s criticisms are justified and where the differences in their methodological proposals for philosophy actually lie. We see that Kant’s account of philosophical method in fact has some elements in common with the Wolffian paradigm, even though there are also relevant differences.
Cicero, Greek Learning, and the Making of a Roman Classic
Authors: Bishop Caroline
Published: December 2018

The Roman statesman, orator, and author Marcus Tullius Cicero is the embodiment of a classic. His works have been read continuously from antiquity to the present, his style is considered the model for classical Latin, and he deeply influenced Western ideas on the value of humanistic pursuits and the liberal arts. In Cicero, Greek Learning, and the Making of a Roman Classic, Caroline Bishop demonstrates that no one is more responsible for Cicero’s transformation into a classic than Cicero himself, and that in his literary works he laid the groundwork for the ways that he is still remembered today. Cicero achieved this goal, as Bishop shows, through his strategic use of the Greek classical canon. Cicero’s career coincided with the growth of Greek classicism, and he clearly grasped the benefits of the movement both for himself and for Roman literature. By selectively adapting classic texts from the Greek world—and incorporating into his adaptations the interpretation of the Hellenistic philosophers, poets, rhetoricians, and scientists who had helped enshrine these works as classics—Cicero could envision and create texts with classical authority for a parallel Roman canon. Bishop’s study ranges across a wide span of Cicero’s works, moving from his early translation of Aratus’ poetry (and its later reappearance through self-quotation) to Platonizing philosophy, Aristotelian rhetoric, Demosthenic oratory, and even a planned Greek-style letter collection. Part detailed intellectual history of Hellenistic Greece, part close study of Cicero’s literary works, this book offers a welcome new account of Greek intellectual life and its effect on Roman literature.
Civil History and Style in Thucydides
Authors: Raylor Timothy
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines Hobbes’s translation of Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War. Hobbes found in Thucydides’ account of the rise of the Athenian demagogues a case study in the dangers of rhetoric to the state. This interpretation he pointed up through annotation and illustration (including the title page cut by Thomas Cecill). Hobbes’s Thucydides bears witness to a distinctive attitude towards the truth of history, which is no longer to be found in the moral exemplars promoted by traditional humanism. It displays the influence of Bacon’s politic history, and reveals a commitment to anti-Ciceronian canons of style.
Discovery, Proof, and Style
Authors: Raylor Timothy
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines Hobbes’s understanding of the problem with rhetoric in philosophical and political reasoning. Although the problem is generally treated as stylistic or elocutionary (rhetoric allows a speaker to persuade someone of something that may not be strictly true), Hobbes saw it as more fundamentally a problem of inventio or discovery: the relaxed procedures of rhetorical proof compromise the reasoning process. The chapter examines Hobbes’s analysis of the undermining, by rhetorical reasoning, of the foundations of Western philosophy and political authority, and the exploitation by interested parties—especially the church—of inadequately defined and ambiguous terms such as ‘people’, ‘liberty’, ‘tyranny’, ‘conscience’, ‘hell’, ‘bishop’, and ‘excommunication’. Hobbes’s partial admission, in Leviathan, of certain elocutionary techniques to the communication of philosophical thought is shown to be limited in scope, falling well short of a full rapprochement between philosophy and rhetoric, and (as in his treatment of counsel) inconsistently maintained.
Historical sociologies
Authors: Bevir Mark , Blakely Jason
Published: December 2018

This chapter continues the examination of interpretive empirical research topics with a focus on large-scale, diachronic studies (or phenomena developing across time). Contrary to widespread belief, an interpretive approach to social science is not limited to the small-scale study of single cases. Anti-naturalism makes possible sweeping forms of historical sociology, meta-narrative, and genealogy that explore some of the most urgent domains of social scientific research today (including topics such as violence, religion, secularism, nationalism, economic history, and the state). As part of this analysis this chapter critically engages the work of top social scientists and theorists like Steven Pinker, Charles Taylor, E. O. Wilson, and Steven Levitt.
Ethics and democracy
Authors: Bevir Mark , Blakely Jason
Published: December 2018

An anti-naturalist approach overcomes the strict dichotomy between facts and values. Social scientists are free to take up ethically engaged research projects if they are so inclined. This chapter shows how political scientists working within an interpretive, anti-naturalist framework can legitimately take an interest in ethical critique, critical sociologies, and democratic theory. Indeed, anti-naturalist and interpretive philosophy offers social scientists: a better account of the status of values within social reality; an understanding of the ethical significance of the human past; and a critique of technocratic forms of political organization. Interpretive approaches are also linked to a more deliberative theory of democracy. All this implies social scientists have ethical and not just conceptual reasons for adopting an interpretive approach.
The Council of Nicaea and Its Early Reception
Authors: Smith Mark S.
Published: December 2018

This chapter sets the scene for the various appeals to Nicaea during the Nestorian controversy, by analysing the nature of Nicaea’s earlier reception. It begins by examining the Council of Nicaea itself, and the terminology of the Creed. It then explains how attempts to replace Nicaea with superior councils and creeds during the 340s and 350s were gradually eclipsed by the widespread acceptance of the Athanasian polemic of Nicaea’s unique authority and sole sufficiency. Athanasius’ spirited ‘re-reception’ of Nicaea, however, itself necessitated an uneasy reshaping of the Nicene past, and served to raise more sharply the dilemma of how the Nicene Creed’s status could be preserved amidst the increasing inadequacy of its text to speak into new doctrinal controversies. This analysis is extended into the early fifth century, and identifies a growing tension between the rhetorical focus on Nicaea’s textual sufficiency and the more fluid use of Nicene credal statements ‘on the ground’.
Preaching and Popular Christianity
Authors: Cook James Daniel
Published: December 2018

The vast homiletic corpus of John Chrysostom has received renewed attention in recent years as a source for the wider cultural and historical context within which his sermons were preached. Scholars have demonstrated the excitin potential his sermons have to shed light on aspects of daily life, popular attitudes and practices of lay piety. In short, Chrysostom’s sermons have been recognised as a valuable source for the study of ’popular Christianity’ at the end of the fourth century. This study, however, questions the validity of some recent conclusions. A narrative has been developed in which Chrysostom is often seen as at odds with the congregations to whom he preached. On this view, the Christianity of élites such as Chrysostom had made little inroads into popular thought beyond the fairly superficial, and congregations were still living with older, more culturally traditional views about religious beliefs which preachers were doing their utmost to overcome. This study argues that such a portrayal is based on a misreading of Chrysostom’s sermons and fails to explain satisfactorily the apparent popularity that Chrysostom enjoyed as a preacher. What this study sets out to do, therefore, is to reassess how we read Chrysostom’s sermons, with a particular focus on the stern language which permeated his preaching, and on which the image of the contrary congregation is largely based. In doing this, we recover a neglected portrayal of Chrysostom as a pastor and of preaching as a pastoral and liturgical activity, and it becomes clear that his use of critical language says more about how he understood his role as preacher than about the nature of popular Christianity in late-antique society. There thus emerges a very different picture of late–antique Christianity, in which Chrysostom’s congregations are rather more willing to listen and learn from their preacher than is often assumed.
Preaching and the Liturgy
Authors: Cook James Daniel
Published: December 2018

Chapter 6 turns to the immediate setting of the sermon, its place within a corporate act of worship. Although a number of studies have drawn attention to the possibilities sermons present for learning about the contemporary liturgy, very few approach the sermon itself as a liturgical event. This chapter argues that the sermon was not an interlude in the liturgy, as implied by studies which treat the sermon only as a window onto the liturgy, but an integral part of it, and of vital importance for fully appreciating what kind of activity preaching was. It was not merely the communication of knowledge and ideas, but formed part of a liturgy of worship. Furthermore, when seen in that context, Chrysostom’s critical and fear-inspiring language can be readily understood as arousing feelings of awe and contrition that were considered appropriate at a moment when the believer entered the presence of God.
Conclusion
Authors: Cook James Daniel
Published: December 2018

By expanding our understanding of preaching beyond it simply being an activity of communication and Christian formation, this volume has provided new insights into preaching as an activity in its own right and helped to explain the enthusiasm with which Chrysostom’s sermons were received. In this way, this study has (1) presented a new hermeneutic for reading Chrysostom’s sermons that is much more contextually based and theologically grounded than hitherto, and (2) has challenged current assumptions about how to use these texts as historical sources for popular Christianity in late antiquity. Consequently, the results of this study have a wider significance beyond the texts discussed, and this chapter outlines some potential avenues for further research.
Introduction
Authors: Altman Andrew , Watson Lori
Published: December 2018

For the past half century and more, the citizens of free and democratic societies have debated questions concerning the production, sale, and consumption of pornography. The debates have addressed such issues as whether there is a fundamental right to access pornography and whether such materials are sufficiently harmful to justify their legal regulation. This volume is a contribution to those debates. It proceeds from the premise that considerations of equality between women and men are foundational to any defensible view concerning whether and how to legally regulate pornography....
Sex, Speech, and Autonomy
Authors: Altman Andrew
Published: December 2018

Disagreements about pornography have revolved around questions of freedom of speech and expression. This chapter proposes to rethink those disagreements so that the right of sexual autonomy becomes a decisive consideration. The re-thinking is motivated by two ideas. First, much of the pornography that circulates in today’s society, especially on the Internet, is not plausibly regarded as protected by freedom of expression. Second, that very same pornography is used entirely for purposes of sexual arousal and release and so directly involves an individual’s authority to control his own sex life. Setting the stage for the subsequent argument that a right to pornography should be understood as an element of the right of sexual autonomy, this chapter examines the nature of rights and the reasons why the right to control one’s sex life is especially weighty.
Measures, Miracles, and Representations
Authors: Gorvine William M.
Published: December 2018

Chapter 5 takes up critical issues that both reflected and shaped the larger Bön community of which Tenpé Gyaltsen is a part, and for whom he primarily writes. The author considers how the biographies treat key elements of Shardza’s enduring legacy. These are depicted via traditional measures, such as Shardza’s material contributions to religious institutions, including the texts he authored; his successful training of disciples; and the holy relics and palpable faith engendered by his miraculous passing. Shardza’s legacy also includes his biographical image, constructed through particular categories and with an awareness of potentially contesting voices. This chapter reviews some of the most significant conceptual distinctions to set the parameters for understanding a Bön religious life in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Kham, and it concludes by reflecting on how these designations were used to situate Shardza within a particular religious landscape traced by his biographer.
Sources of History as Theology
Authors: Neele Adriaan C.
Published: December 2018

Much ink has been spilled about Edwards’s A History of the Work of Redemption, and one is reminded that “any discussion of what Edwards would have done in developing the Redemption sermon series into a mature treatise must be inconclusive.” This chapter attempts to look at Edwards’s proposed “body of divinity in an entire new method,” by offering a fresh evaluation of its continuity and discontinuity with early modern systems of divinity. Therefore, the chapter first gives a succinct overview of various thoughts on Edwards’s intended “body of divinity,” followed by an overview and examination of relevant works of seventeenth-century systematic theology. Thirdly, Mastricht’s treatment of the De dispensatione fœderis gratiæ (On the dispensations of the covenant of grace) will be considered in relation to Edwards’s Redemption Discourse, the three later notebooks about the “History of Redemption,” and the section of the letter to the Princeton Board.
When Unit-Based Measurement Ruled the World
Authors: Moscati Ivan
Published: December 2018

In order to illustrate the broad intellectual context within which the early discussions of utility measurement took place, chapter 1 reviews the history of the understanding of measurement in philosophy, physics, psychology, mathematics, and areas of economics before and beyond marginal utility theory. This review reveals that between 1870 and 1910, all these disciplines were dominated by the unit-based or, equivalently, ratio-scale conception of measurement. According to this conception, measuring the property of an object consists of comparing it with some other object that is taken as a unit and then assessing the numerical ratio between the unit and the object to be measured. This chapter also shows that late-nineteenth-century discussions of measurement in mathematics established the cardinal–ordinal terminology that later passed into economics. However, the mathematical concept of cardinal number is different from the economic concept of cardinal utility, which entered the scene only in the 1930s.
Fundamental Measurement, Sensation Differences, and the British Controversy on Psychological Measurement, 1910–1940
Authors: Moscati Ivan
Published: December 2018

Like chapter 1, chapter 4 broadens the narrative beyond utility measurement and reconstructs the discussions of measurement that took place in physics, philosophy, and psychology between 1910 and 1940. In physics and philosophy, the most influential discussion of measurement was presented in 1920 by Cambridge physicist Norman Robert Campbell. Campbell articulated a theory of fundamental and derived measurement that ultimately maintained the identification of measurement with unit-based measurement. In the 1920s, psychologists such as William Brown and Godfrey Thomson in England and Louis Leon Thurstone in the United States argued that some of their quantification techniques were capable of delivering unit-based measurement of sensations. Physicists denied this, and the resulting clash of views generated a controversy that engaged British physicists and psychologists from 1932 to 1940. The controversy ended in deadlock, with physicists and psychologists unable to find agreement on the meaning and the conditions of measurement.
Stevens and the Operational Definition of Measurement in Psychology, 1935–1950
Authors: Moscati Ivan
Published: December 2018

Chapter 8 broadens the narrative beyond utility measurement and discusses an important outcome of the 1930s British controversy over psychological measurement, namely the operational definition of measurement put forward by American psychologist Stanley Smith Stevens in 1946. For Stevens, measurement consists of the assignment of numbers to objects according to certain rules. Since there are various rules for assigning numbers to objects, there are various forms, or scales, of measurement. Each scale is identified by the empirical operations used to create it and by the class of mathematical transformations the numbers in each scale can be subjected to. From this operational viewpoint, unit-based measurement is just a particular, and quite restrictive, form of measurement. Stevens’s definition of measurement was broad enough to include the psychologists’ quantification practices as measurement and quickly became canonical in psychology. The final section of the chapter discusses drawbacks to Stevens’s operational theory of measurement.
The Expected Utility Theory and Measurement Theory of von Neumann and Morgenstern, 1944–1947
Authors: Moscati Ivan
Published: December 2018

Chapter 9 discusses the axiomatic version of expected utility theory (EUT), a theory of decision-making under risk, put forward by John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern in their book Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (1944). EUT was a changing factor in the history of utility measurement. In fact, while discussions of the measurability of utility before 1944 focused on the utility used to analyze decision-making between risk-free alternatives, after that year, discussions centered on the utility used to analyze decision-making between risky alternatives. In Theory of Games, the nature of the cardinal utility function u featured in von Neumann and Morgenstern’s EUT, and its relationship with the riskless utility function U of previous utility analysis remained ambiguous. Von Neumann and Morgenstern also put forward an axiomatic theory of measurement, which presents some similarities with Stanley Smith Stevens’s measurement theory but had no immediate impact on utility analysis.
From Chicago to Paris
Authors: Moscati Ivan
Published: December 2018

Chapter 11 studies the second phase of the debate on expected utility theory (EUT), which commenced in May 1950, when Paul Samuelson, Leonard J. Savage, Jacob Marschak, Milton Friedman, and William Baumol initiated an intense exchange of letters. These economists argued about the exact assumptions underlying EUT, quarreled over whether these assumptions are compelling requisites for rational behavior under risk, and debated the nature of the cardinal utility function u featured in EUT. This correspondence modified the views of all five economists and transformed Samuelson into a supporter of EUT. In a prominent conference in Paris in May 1952, Friedman, Savage, Marschak, and Samuelson advocated EUT in the face of attacks from Maurice Allais and other opponents of the theory. The Paris conference and the publication of an Econometrica symposium on EUT in October 1952 marked the emergence of EUT as the mainstream economic model of decision-making under risk.
Conventions, Operations, Predictions
Authors: Moscati Ivan
Published: December 2018

Chapter 12 analyzes the third phase of the debate on expected utility theory, from the end of 1952 to 1955. The issues concerning the nature of utility measurement gained an autonomous status in this phase. Milton Friedman, Leonard J. Savage, Robert Strotz, Armen Alchian, and Daniel Ellsberg argued that measuring utility consists of assigning numbers to objects by following a definite set of operations. While the particular way of assigning utility numbers to objects is largely arbitrary and conventional, the assigned numbers should allow economists to predict individuals’ choice behavior. This is similar to the operational conception advanced by psychologist Stanley Smith Stevens and definitively liberates utility measurement from its remaining ties with units and ratios. The novel view of measurement quickly became standard among mainstream utility theorists, and its success helps explain the peaceful cohabitation of cardinal and ordinal utility within utility analysis that began in the mid-1950s.
How to Find Your Footing in Bioethics
Authors: McMillan John
Published: December 2018

The early years of bioethics were preoccupied with the search for a theoretical foundation. That tendency has decreased somewhat but the conflation of moral theory with method in ethics continues to be an obstacle for those starting out in bioethics and obscures what is common to all approaches to bioethics. Moral theory is not as useful for ‘doing ethics’ as it first appears and it is much more helpful to direct effort into teaching people how to argue about ethics. By grasping a few basic skills in argument, newcomers to this area can draw upon their knowledge and expertise and do good bioethics without mastery of normative moral theory.
What Is Bioethics?
Authors: McMillan John
Published: December 2018

Bioethics is an interdisciplinary inquiry into ethical issues in the life sciences and biomedicine. The extent to which medical ethics should be seen as central to bioethics has been debated, but this is now the dominant view. The core aims and features of bioethics are that it involves bringing moral reason to bear, via three central activities—clinical consultation, bioethics and public policy and scholarly bioethics ethics—on morally pressing issues. This characterization of bioethics is one that includes an important spectrum from more philosophical bioethics to more empirical bioethics, and also includes those who favour a more missionary perspective.
Speculative Argument and Bioethics
Authors: McMillan John
Published: December 2018

Speculative reason is an important aspect of practical reason and one of the core activities in Socratic moral reason. Speculating, or posing ‘what if?’ questions when reasoning about ethics can take a number of forms and these are some of the most useful methodological tools for bioethics. Perhaps the most common form of speculative reason for bioethics is the argument from analogy, which involves comparing an ethical response to one situation with our response to another similar situation to see whether we are consistent in our ethical judgment. Speculative reason can aim at deepening our moral understanding by making the implications of ethical choices more vivid. A third form of speculative reason is what I call an intuition pump. Speculative reason is used to tease out intuitions about a possible but hypothetical situation in order to advance our ethical thinking about similar cases. Finally, speculative reason can have a more heuristic function in that it encourages us to think about an area of ethics in a different way.
Drawing Distinctions
Authors: McMillan John
Published: December 2018

Introducing or refining moral concepts is an important way of embellishing moral reason. Concepts that pick out distinctive moral issues more clearly are useful ways of furthering ethical debate. Concepts can be defined in a number of ways. In addition to introducing a new concept, arguments can be progressed by considering what must be the case about a concept that is in use in order for it to do the ethical work asked of it. This kind of strategy is what I call drawing ‘transcendental’ distinctions. This chapter describes how distinctions are drawn within slippery-slope arguments, how new concepts can be introduced for a specific moral purpose, and how existing concepts can be refined and theorized. Slippery-slope arguments are quite common in bioethics and, as I will show, can be difficult to sustain and are vulnerable to some common objections.
Introduction
Authors: O’Neill Martin , Orr Shepley
Published: December 2018

This chapter situates philosophical discussions of taxation with reference to the strongly contrasting approaches to tax, property, and justice embodied in Robert Nozick’s Anarchy, State, and Utopia, and John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice. The twelve chapters of the book are situated against the opposing philosophical poles provided by the libertarian and Rawlsian approaches to tax, and we describe in particular the further development of the Rawlsian view by Liam Murphy and Thomas Nagel in their book The Myth of Ownership: Taxes and Justice, which is a focal point for a number of the following chapters. We explain why and how taxation should be seen as central to political philosophy, given the importance of tax policy for both domestic and global justice, and given the close connections that taxation has to issues of property rights, democracy, public justification, state neutrality, stability, political psychology, and a range of other issues.
Welfarism, Libertarianism, and Fairness in the Economic Approach to Taxation
Authors: Fleurbaey Marc
Published: December 2018

The economic theory of income taxation has recently been eager to apply philosophically prominent approaches to the selection of the optimal tax on earnings. This chapter presents and compares the consequentialist–utilitarian approach to taxation developed by Mirrlees and defended by Murphy and Nagel, to the fair allocation approach, as adapted to taxation problems by Fleurbaey and Maniquet. The fairness approach does retain an element of libertarianism and gives some value to market earnings. The two approaches have different recommendations for taxation, especially regarding low incomes, which are given absolute priority under the fairness approach, and may be submitted to lower tax rates out of respect for the diversity of preferences among the least skilled workers.
Striving for the Middle Ground
Authors: Brennan Geoffrey
Published: December 2018

Does the fact that considerations of distributive justice entitle governments to interfere with the distribution (of income/wealth/consumption) that emerges from market interactions imply that the property rights structure on which that market distribution is based has no normative authority in structuring government/citizen interactions? That claim is one implied by Nagel and Murphy in their book The Myth of Ownership. Chapter 3 proposes that this claim is false; but insists that denying that claim does not entail denying the legitimacy of public redistribution through the tax-transfer process. One central claim is that the concept of horizontal equity—that individuals should pay taxes in relation to their aggregate returns from market activity—may be thought of as a principle that appropriately reconciles the competing normative claims of the private property rights structure on the one hand with other requirements of distributive justice.
Taxing or Taking? Property Rhetoric and the Justice of Taxation
Authors: Biron Laura
Published: December 2018

This chapter draws attention to a puzzle about the relevance of the concept of property to studies of taxation. On the one hand, rhetorical appeals to property rights are prevalent in popular debates about taxation. On the other hand, property theorists do not tend to apply their work directly to the analysis of taxation. Moreover, some theorists of taxation have suggested that the concept of property is neither important nor relevant to the study of taxation. What are we to make of this mismatch between popular rhetoric and theoretical argument? Chapter 4 illustrates some ways in which conceptual work on property is directly relevant to the study of taxation, and argues that taxation should occupy a more prominent place in the jurisprudence of property than it currently does.
Libertarianism and Taxation
Authors: Vallentyne Peter
Published: December 2018

Chapter 5 discusses the implications of libertarianism for just taxation. Libertarianism holds that agents fully own themselves and have certain moral powers to appropriate natural or abandoned resources. Some versions of libertarianism preclude the possibility of just taxation, but the author claims that other versions can, under very limited circumstances, endorse two kinds of taxes as just: taxes on right-infringers for the cost of rights-enforcement and taxes on anyone with an excess share of the value ownership rights over natural resources. Other kinds of taxation, such as income taxes, human resource (talents) taxes, and artifactual resource taxation are not just on any version of libertarianism.
Beggar Your Neighbour
Authors: Munoz-Dardé Véronique , Martin M. G. F.
Published: December 2018

This chapter looks at moral justifications for funding welfare benefits through general taxation rather than seeking to support it through charitable giving. That is, the parties to the debate are assumed to accept the moral imperative to support the destitute, and the political question is whether there is any requirement to do so through taxation. The chapter explores parallels between begging and the raising of charitable donations, highlighting not only the costs of begging on supplicants, but those that fall as well on the would-be donors. In the light of this, the chapter offers a justification for using taxation as a preferred way of raising resources for the provision of welfare benefits which has echoes of, but contrasts with, a famous proposal by Thomas Nagel.
The Case for a Progressive Benefits Tax
Authors: Fried Barbara H.
Published: December 2018

Libertarians have long argued for a “benefits tax,” which sets tax rates to approximate the shadow market price for the public goods each taxpayer consumes. Libertarians have assumed that because consumption of explicit public goods does not rise as fast as income or wealth, a benefits tax would likely be regressive. That is to say, the rich would pay taxes at a lower marginal rate than the middle class and the poor. Chapter 8 argues that, contrary to the libertarian assumption, a benefits tax could yield almost any rate structure, including a quite progressive one, depending on the definition applied to “public goods” and the structure of the shadow market in which it is imagined polities operate.
Moral Objections to Inheritance Tax
Authors: White Stuart
Published: December 2018

Taxation of wealth transfers across generations (‘inheritance tax’) is strongly supported by social justice considerations but is also politically and morally contentious. As well as citing concerns about the possible impact on motives to work and save, critics present several moral objections to inheritance tax: it allegedly entails ‘double taxation’; it taxes citizens differently according to how they use their wealth, violating equity; it penalizes the ‘virtuous’ use of personal wealth; and it targets the wrong problem, which is not unequal holdings of wealth as such but unequal consumption. This paper addresses each of these four criticisms, indicates their flaws and limitations, and shows that they do not rebut the case for inheritance tax on grounds of social justice.
The State and Tax Competition
Authors: Dietsch Peter
Published: December 2018

Governments increasingly use their fiscal policy to attract mobile capital from abroad. This tax competition puts a strain on the international fiscal system by undermining the capacity of states to make autonomous fiscal choices and by exacerbating inequalities. The existing regulatory framework is not able to address these challenges. Yet, what considerations should guide our efforts for reform? This chapter argues that a first necessary step consists in understanding the principles that justify the state as the principal locus of fiscal control in the first place. Building on an account of the legitimacy of the state and its fiscal powers, the chapter shows how tax competition is in tension with the principal objectives this account assigns to the state. It then outlines a normative response to tax competition that relies on both reforming jurisdictional rules and redistribution between states.
Abortion
Authors: Fredman Sandra
Published: December 2018

——Chapter seven examines abortion. A comparative approach reveals the pivotal role of the characterization of relevant rights. Is this an issue of the right to life, to privacy, or to equality? Running through these issues are the cross-cutting themes identified above, particularly the interaction between legislatures and courts. Section II demonstrates that legislatures and courts interact in different ways. In some jurisdictions, courts have struck down legislation prohibiting abortion; while in others, courts have done the reverse and invalidated legislation providing a right to abortiofn. In a third group, courts and legislatures have worked together, either to cement prohibitions, or to protect the right to abortion. Section III examines the right to life in relation to abortion; section IV considers privacy; while section V examines equality. Section VI assesses third-party rights, and particularly the ways in which conscientious objection is dealt with in different jurisdictions.
The Right to Health
Authors: Fredman Sandra
Published: December 2018

Is health a human right? Many would maintain that it is not. On this view health and ill-health are due to natural causes, not to State actions. Others are concerned that health raises too many polycentric problems to be dealt with through justiciable human rights. These contestations have shaped the way in which the right to health is understood. Section II sketches out the health context. Section III considers jurisdictions in which there is no express right to health, but a right has been derived from rights to life, personal integrity, or privacy. Section IV contrasts this approach with jurisdictions with an express right to health. Section V examines the role of the right to equality, while section VI focuses on reproductive health. The final section returns to the challenges of polycentricity and the extent to which a justiciable right can address systemic issues rather than individual rights to medication.
The Right to Education
Authors: Fredman Sandra
Published: December 2018

Education is a multiplier right. Without education, other rights cannot be fully enjoyed. Education is also an accelerator right: it equips people to enter the labour force and participate in public life. However, education is not only an instrumental right. It should primarily be regarded as an intrinsic right, valuable in its own terms. Section II considers how the freedom, social, and equality components of the right are reflected in different human rights instruments, contrasting these to education in the Sustainable Development Goals. Section III considers the meaning of ‘free and compulsory’ education and particularly the paradoxical nature of a compulsory right. Section IV examines the complex contestations between the freedom and equality dimensions of the right, especially in the context of parental choice as to the religious, moral, or political nature of the right to education. Section V is concerned with the extent to which a human rights approach to education can be used to achieve quality education.
Michael Ondaatje Tricks the Eye
Authors: Brittan Alice
Published: December 2018

Focusing on In the Skin of a Lion (1987), The English Patient (1992), and The Cat’s Table (2011), this chapter examines Ondaatje’s modernist, indeed Conradian, engagement with the unreliability of individual cognition and subjective impression. Ondaatje’s characters typically fail to recognize their view of the world depends on acts of “enframing.” Blindness to their situated perspectives leaves them vulnerable to political violence and social injustice, including colonialism and imperialism. The chapter argues that the modernist lesson is that perception is always a game of frames, so the eye needs to keep seeking the edge. The postcolonial lesson is that an eye that does not move becomes complicit with nationalism and empire building. Ondaatje’s efforts to look more closely at the hidden mechanisms that shape social life represent his attempt to apply the formal and thematic concerns of modernism to the politics of colonialism and the challenges of global modernity.
Intensive Balance Training for Adults With Incomplete Spinal Cord Injuries: Protocol for an Assessor-Blinded Randomized Clinical Trial
Authors: Unger Janelle , Chan Katherine , Scovil Carol Y , Craven B Catharine , Mansfield Avril , Masani Kei , Musselman Kristin E
Published: December 2018

Background

Impaired reactive balance control can lead to increased falls in people with neurological impairments. Perturbation-based balance training (PBT), which involves repetitive exposure to destabilizing external perturbations, improves the ability to take reactive steps in older adults and individuals who have had a stroke.

Objective

The objective is to investigate whether PBT or conventional intensive balance training (CIBT) results in greater improvements in reactive stepping ability in individuals with chronic incomplete spinal cord injury (iSCI).

Design

The design consists of an assessor-blind randomized clinical trial comparing the efficacy of 2 balance training programs (PBT and CIBT) matched for training duration (thrice weekly for 8 weeks).

Setting

A tertiary spinal cord injury rehabilitation center is used as the setting.

Participants

Participants include 24 adults with iSCI classified as a C or D on the American Spinal Association Impairment Scale, who are able to stand independently and exhibit moderate trunk control.

Intervention

Both PBT and CIBT involve 24 sessions, each 1 hour long, of individualized static and dynamic balance tasks. However, PBT includes external, unexpected balance perturbations provided manually by the trainer at a frequency of roughly 1 per training minute.

Measurements

The primary outcome is the ability to recover balance using a single step during the Lean-and-Release test, a novel method of assessing reactive balance. Secondary outcomes include a number of clinical balance and gait assessments, and the number of falls experienced in a 6-month follow-up period. Semi-structured interviews are conducted 3 months after training completion to gain insight into the participants’ perceptions of the impact of the interventions.

Limitations

A control group receiving “standard care” for balance training is not included.

Conclusions

This trial will provide physical therapists with insight into the efficacy of 2 forms of balance training for individuals with iSCI.
Teachers Teaching Teachers: The Role of Workplace Peer Effects in Financial Decisions
Authors: Maturana Gonzalo , Nickerson Jordan
Published: December 2018

This paper studies the role of workplace peers in the transmission of information pertinent to an important household financial decision: the mortgage refinancing choice. Exploiting commonalities in teaching schedules of school teachers in Texas to identify peer groups, we find that refinancing activity among teachers’ peers increases their likelihood of refinancing by 20.7%. The effect of peers increases with the potential savings realized upon refinancing and is stronger among younger teachers. Peers also affect teachers’ choice of lender. Overall, our findings suggest that peer interactions greatly reduce a household’s cost of acquiring and processing financial information.

Received March 6, 2017; editorial decision July 31, 2018 by Editor Itay Goldstein. Authors have furnished an Internet Appendix, which is available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online.
Implications and recommendations for addressing insomnia disorder
Authors: Duncan Cameron , Sheppard Kate
Published: December 2018

Sleep disorders, such as insomnia, are a common complication of many physical and mental health problems. This article reviews insomnia disorder, including assessment, comorbidities, and management. It is imperative that primary care providers understand how to provide the safest pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic treatments to patients with insomnia.
Prolonged Postoperative Ileus Significantly Increases the Cost of Inpatient Stay for Patients Undergoing Elective Colorectal Surgery: Results of a Multivariate Analysis of Prospective Data at a Single Institution
Authors: Mao Howe , Milne Tony G.E. , O’Grady Gregory , Vather Ryash , Edlin Richard , Bissett Ian
Published: December 2018

BACKGROUND:

Prolonged postoperative ileus is a common major complication after abdominal surgery. Retrospective data suggest that ileus doubles the cost of inpatient stay. However, current economic impact data are based on retrospective studies that rely on clinical coding to diagnose ileus.

OBJECTIVE:

The aim of this study was to determine the economic burden of ileus for patients undergoing elective colorectal surgery.

DESIGN:

Economic data were audited from a prospective database of patients who underwent surgery at Auckland City Hospital between September 2012 and June 2014.

SETTINGS:

Auckland City Hospital is a large tertiary referral center, using an enhanced recovery after surgery protocol.

PATIENTS:

Patients were prospectively diagnosed with prolonged postoperative ileus using a standardized definition.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES:

The cost of inpatient stay was analyzed with regard to patient demographics and operative and postoperative factors. A multivariate analysis was performed to determine the cost of ileus when accounting for other significant covariates.

RESULTS:

Economic data were attained from 325 patients, and 88 patients (27%) developed ileus. The median inpatient cost (New Zealand dollars) for patients with prolonged ileus, including complication rates and length of stay, was $27,981 (interquartile range= $20,198 to $42,174) compared with $16,317 (interquartile range = $10,620 to $23,722) for other patients, a 71% increase in cost (p < 0.005). Ileus increased all associated healthcare costs, including medical/nursing care, radiology, medication, laboratory costs, and allied health (p < 0.05). Multivariate analysis showed that ileus remained a significant financial burden (p < 0.005) when considering rates of major complications and length of stay.

LIMITATIONS:

This is a single-institution study, which may impact the generalizability of our results.

CONCLUSIONS:

Prolonged ileus causes a substantial financial burden on the healthcare system, in addition to greater complication rates and length of stay in these patients. This is the first study to assess the financial impact of prolonged ileus, diagnosed prospectively using a standardized definition. See Video Abstract at http://links.lww.com/DCR/A825.