What Counts as the Same?

2018 ◽  
pp. 5-32
Author(s):  
Adam B. Seligman ◽  
Robert P. Weller
Keyword(s):  
Decision Maker ◽  
Multiple Forms ◽  
Individual Decision ◽  
The Individual

This chapter begins by exploring the multiple forms and analytic purchases carried by memory, mimesis, and metaphor. It asks what we mean when we say that people share a culture. Rather than beginning with the assumption of the unity of culture or the priority of the individual decision maker, we focus on how people come to perceive things as shared. This is just one facet of our basic underlying question: What counts as the same? What lets two people, or two million people, feel that they have the same culture, or for that matter the same class, gender, race, religion, or any other category? This is not actually a question of how much we actually share but how and when we come to perceive that we share; not what is the same, but what counts as the same.

Torture and the Problem of Dirty Hands

2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamar Meisels
Keyword(s):  
Decision Maker ◽  
Moral Justification ◽  
Individual Decision ◽  
Dirty Hands ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
Contemporary Debate ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Consequentialist Theory ◽  
Moral Theories ◽  
The Individual

This paper looks at the contemporary debate over investigative torture in liberal democracies besieged by terrorism, from the viewpoint of the state leader, politician, judge or individual interrogator, called upon to make life-and-death decisions. It steers away from the classic debate between utilitarians and Kantians regarding moral justification, and, following Michael Walzer presents the issue as a specific case of "the problem of dirty hands in politics". Contra Walzer, the paper suggests, among other things, that the notion of dirty hands functions not only within moral theories that include absolute prohibitions but also within consequentialist theory, and that it is therefore far wider, practically illuminating and more applicable than Walzer originally assumed. Later it addresses Alan Dershowitz’s controversial suggestion requiring judicial "torture warrants", and argues that this too should be viewed in light of the notion of dirty hands rather than within the conventional debate over justifications. Finally, it suggests that, while torture may be morally unjustifiable on anything but purely consequentialist grounds, circumstances may offer the individual decision maker an excuse, rather than a justification, for resorting to torture under very restricted conditions.

Recognizing knowledge and learning in equilibrium models

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence A. Boland
Keyword(s):  
Decision Maker ◽  
Free Choice ◽  
Main Property ◽  
Methodological Individualism ◽  
Individual Decision ◽  
Equilibrium Models ◽  
The Individual

This chapter introduces Part II, discussing the limits of equilibrium models. This chapter discusses how the recognition of time and information within models results in the need to deal with expectations explicitly. This leads to the problem of explaining nature of a decision maker’s knowledge – is it quantity-based or quality based. That is, is knowledge like wealth or like health. The chapter also provides a discussion of the main property that every neoclassical equilibrium must provide. Specifically, an equilibrium model’s explanation of economic events must not violate methodological individualism. The chapter criticizes the presumption that methodological individualism must be compatibility with a psychology-based model of the individual decision maker. Using a psychology-based model of the individual can undermine the idea of completely free choice, which was the original appeal of the equilibrium models.

Utility Estimation of a Set of States of Health

1977 ◽  
Vol 16 (03) ◽  
pp. 168-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. I. Card ◽  
M. Rusinkiewicz ◽  
C. I. Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Visual Acuity ◽  
Utility Function ◽  
Decision Maker ◽  
The State ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Individual Decision ◽  
Middle State ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Utility Estimation

A decision maker was presented with three states of health, such that an imaginary patient was in the middle state while the two other states could be described as more preferred and less preferred. The decision maker was then asked to choose the minimal odds at which he would advise an operation which would result in success, the patient moving into the more preferred state, or failure, the patient moving into the less preferred state. Eight decision makers were tested in this way and each made 24 such wagers on a set of three states chosen from a total set of eight; each of these states differed unidimen sionally only in the visual acuity of the remaining eye in the imaginary patient. If the utility of I is arbitrarily assigned to the state of perfect vision, and the utility of 0 to the state of non-perception of light, estimates of the utilities of the intervening states can then be made. The utility function for each decision maker was constructed and was found to be linear against the logarithm of the visual acuity. From this it follows that if all decision makers, e.g. ophthalmic surgeons, show such linearity, they will all choose the same odds before deciding whether to operate and these odds are independent of the utilities which the individual decision maker attaches to the different states of health.

Utility Estimation of a Set of States of Health

1977 ◽  
Vol 16 (03) ◽  
pp. 168-175
Author(s):  
W. I. Card ◽  
M. Rusinkiewicz ◽  
C. I. Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Visual Acuity ◽  
Utility Function ◽  
Decision Maker ◽  
The State ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Individual Decision ◽  
Middle State ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Utility Estimation

A decision maker was presented with three states of health, such that an imaginary patient was in the middle state «‘hile the two other states could be described as more preferred and less preferred. The decision maker was then asked to choose the minimal odds at which he would advise an operation which would result in success, the patient moving into the more preferred state, or failure, the patient moving into the less preferred state. Eight decision makers were tested in this way and each made 24 such wagers on a set of three states chosen from a total set of eight; each of these states differed unidimen-sionally only in the visual acuity of the remaining eye in the imaginary patient. If the utility of 1 is arbitrarily assigned to the state of perfect vision, and the utility of 0 to the state of non-perception of light, estimates of the utilities of the intervening states can then be made. The utility function for each decision maker was constructed and was found to be linear against the logarithm of the visual acuity. From this it follows that if all decision makers, e.g. ophthalmic surgeons, show such linearity, they will all choose the same odds before deciding whether to operate and these odds are independent of the utilities which the individual decision maker attaches to the different states of health.

scholarly journals Introduction. Neuroeconomics: the promise and the profit

2008 ◽  
Vol 363 (1511) ◽  
pp. 3767-3769 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wolfram Schultz
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Decision Maker ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Neural Mechanisms ◽  
Individual Decision ◽  
Economic Decisions ◽  
Economic Decision Making ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Gains And Losses ◽  
The Brain

Neuroeconomics investigates the neural mechanisms underlying decisions about rewarding or punishing outcomes (‘economic’ decisions). It combines the knowledge about the behavioural phenomena of economic decisions with the mechanistic explanatory power of neuroscience. Thus, it is about the neurobiological foundations of economic decision making. It is hoped that by ‘opening the box’ we can understand how decisions about gains and losses are directed by the brain of the individual decision maker. Perhaps we can even learn why some decisions are apparently paradoxical or pathological. The knowledge could be used to create situations that avoid suboptimal decisions and harm.

Hermeneutic circle in development of methodological culture of future music teacher

2017 ◽  
pp. 154-158
Author(s):  
A. S. Koval
Keyword(s):  
Future Teacher ◽  
Music Teacher ◽  
Basic Principles ◽  
Hermeneutic Circle ◽  
High Culture ◽  
Text Understanding ◽  
Hermeneutic Approach ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Positive Effect

This article is devoted to the studying hermeneutic circle in the development of methodological culture of future music teacher. Under the conditions of globalization processes, tendencies of convergence of world cultures improvement of culturological training of student youth requires new approaches, in particular, culturological training of students of pedagogical specialties. The task of pedagogical education is to develop a teacher as a specialist and as a person of high culture, who has a special positive effect on the personality of school student. This article analyses the works of scientists dedicated to the issues of establishment and development of the hermeneutic approach in philosophical, psychological, and logical and gnosiological contexts. It is defined the essence of the concept of “hermeneutic circle” as one of the basic principles of the hermeneutic approach. There have been provided the examples of interpretation of the principle of hermeneutic circle by various scientists. Hermeneutic approach is applied in sciences such as pedagogy, psychology, economics, sociology etc. In pedagogical science the hermeneutic approach at the level of conceptual use was elaborated by A. Zakirova. She introduced the term “pedagogical hermeneutics”. Hermeneutic circle as a principle of text understanding is based on the interrelation of the part and the whole. Understanding of the whole consists of the understanding of the individual parts, and understanding of the parts requires understanding of the whole. The concepts of the part and the whole are correlated: the text is a part concerning the whole creative activity of the author, which in its turn is a part of the particular genre or literature in general, as well as the part of spiritual life and biography of the author. The idea of hermeneutic circle means also that there is no understanding of the text without certain prerequisites: understanding is preceded by some idea of what is yet to understand. There have been determined the peculiarities of the use of the principle of hermeneutic circle in the development of methodological culture of the future teacher of musical art. In light of hermeneutical trends, the penetration of which in the realm of musical art can be traced quite clearly, the use of the hermeneutic circle principle in the development of methodological culture of the future teacher of musical art appears not only in the narrow interpretation of the particular phenomenon or group of phenomena, but much wider — as a means of learning and understanding of the worldview by a person.

CREATING THE SITUATION OF SUCCESS IN THE HUMAN SCIENCES – A PREREQUISITE FOR THE HUMANIZATION OF EDUCATION

2020 ◽  
pp. 48-57
Author(s):  
Ayta Sakun ◽  
Tatiana Kadlubovich ◽  
Darina Chernyak
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Activity ◽  
Human Sciences ◽  
Creative Potential ◽  
Modern Education ◽  
Future Success ◽  
Cognitive Motivation ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Individual

The problem of success became relevant at the beginning of the XXI century. Everyone strives to succeed, to be confident in themselves and in the future. Success is recognized as one of the needs of the individual. Reforming modern education is designed to make it human-centered, effective, close to the practical needs of the learner. The humanization of education is impossible without creating situations of success in learning. Such situations activate a person's cognitive motivation, reveal his creative potential, make a person strong and confident. To create situations of success, teachers use a variety of methods and tools that enhance the cognitive activity of students.

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