Is There Value in Identifying Individual Genetic Predispositions to Violence?

2004 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Wasserman

In this article I want to ask what we should do, either collectively or individually, if we could identify by genetic and family profding the 12% of the male population likely to commit almost half the violent crime in our society. What if we could identify some individuals in that 12% not only at birth, but in utero, or before implantation? I will explain the source of these figures later; for now, I will use them only to provide a concrete example of the kind of predictive claims we can expect to be made with some frequency, and some scientific credibility, over the next generation. I will adopt an outlook that one commentator has called “pragmatic optimism,” but which could also be called technological optimism - the belief that a science or technology will achieve many or most of its advertised goals. My optimism will be directed towards human behavioral genetics, the source of predictions like the one I just offered; I will assume that this controversial discipline will achieve a substantial pan of its scientific ambition to identlfy genetic differences among individuals that help predict and possibly explain future behavior, psychological health, and cognitive skill. This optimism is very limited -it concerns the scientific success of behavioral genetics, not the social value of that success.

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giulia Perugia ◽  
Maike Paetzel-Prüsmann ◽  
Isabelle Hupont ◽  
Giovanna Varni ◽  
Mohamed Chetouani ◽  
...  

In this paper, we present a study aimed at understanding whether the embodiment and humanlikeness of an artificial agent can affect people’s spontaneous and instructed mimicry of its facial expressions. The study followed a mixed experimental design and revolved around an emotion recognition task. Participants were randomly assigned to one level of humanlikeness (between-subject variable: humanlike, characterlike, or morph facial texture of the artificial agents) and observed the facial expressions displayed by three artificial agents differing in embodiment (within-subject variable: video-recorded robot, physical robot, and virtual agent) and a human (control). To study both spontaneous and instructed facial mimicry, we divided the experimental sessions into two phases. In the first phase, we asked participants to observe and recognize the emotions displayed by the agents. In the second phase, we asked them to look at the agents’ facial expressions, replicate their dynamics as closely as possible, and then identify the observed emotions. In both cases, we assessed participants’ facial expressions with an automated Action Unit (AU) intensity detector. Contrary to our hypotheses, our results disclose that the agent that was perceived as the least uncanny, and most anthropomorphic, likable, and co-present, was the one spontaneously mimicked the least. Moreover, they show that instructed facial mimicry negatively predicts spontaneous facial mimicry. Further exploratory analyses revealed that spontaneous facial mimicry appeared when participants were less certain of the emotion they recognized. Hence, we postulate that an emotion recognition goal can flip the social value of facial mimicry as it transforms a likable artificial agent into a distractor. Further work is needed to corroborate this hypothesis. Nevertheless, our findings shed light on the functioning of human-agent and human-robot mimicry in emotion recognition tasks and help us to unravel the relationship between facial mimicry, liking, and rapport.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. e0247273
Author(s):  
Markus Christen ◽  
Darcia Narvaez ◽  
Julaine D. Zenk ◽  
Michael Villano ◽  
Charles R. Crowell ◽  
...  

Crews operating remotely piloted aircrafts (RPAs) in military operations may be among the few that truly experience tragic dilemmas similar to the famous Trolley Problem. In order to analyze decision-making and emotional conflict of RPA operators within Trolley-Problem-like dilemma situations, we created an RPA simulation that varied mission contexts (firefighter, military and surveillance as a control condition) and the social “value” of a potential victim. We found that participants (Air Force cadets and civilian students) were less likely to make the common utilitarian choice (sacrificing one to save five), when the value of the one increased, especially in the military context. However, in the firefighter context, this decision pattern was much less pronounced. The results demonstrate behavioral and justification differences when people are more invested in a particular context despite ostensibly similar dilemmas.


2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (02) ◽  
pp. 1894-1901
Author(s):  
Xujin Chen ◽  
Minming Li ◽  
Chenhao Wang

We study single-candidate voting embedded in a metric space, where both voters and candidates are points in the space, and the distances between voters and candidates specify the voters' preferences over candidates. In the voting, each voter is asked to submit her favorite candidate. Given the collection of favorite candidates, a mechanism for eliminating the least popular candidate finds a committee containing all candidates but the one to be eliminated. Each committee is associated with a social value that is the sum of the costs (utilities) it imposes (provides) to the voters. We design mechanisms for finding a committee to optimize the social value. We measure the quality of a mechanism by its distortion, defined as the worst-case ratio between the social value of the committee found by the mechanism and the optimal one. We establish new upper and lower bounds on the distortion of mechanisms in this single-candidate voting, for both general metrics and well-motivated special cases.


Caderno CRH ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (86) ◽  
pp. 419
Author(s):  
Attila Magno e Silva Barbosa ◽  
Mateus Bender

<div><p class="trans-title">No Brasil, as violências psicológicas no trabalho são atualmente caracterizadas como afrontas aos direitos fundamentais do trabalho, ao princípio da dignidade da pessoa humana e ao valor social do trabalho. Embora não haja uma legislação específica sobre violências psicológicas no ambiente de trabalho, o judiciário tem apresentado um recente e crescente reconhecimento jurídico do tema, norteando-se, principalmente, por princípios constitucionais e de proteção à saúde do trabalhador. O objetivo deste artigo é demonstrar como tem ocorrido o reconhecimento jurídico da proteção à saúde psicológica no ambiente de trabalho. Para tal, utilizamos o procedimento monográfico e nos baseamos na realização de pesquisa bibliográfica e jurisprudencial.</p><p class="trans-title"> </p><p class="trans-title"><strong>THE LEGAL RECOGNITION OF PSYCHOLOGICAL VIOLENCES IN LABOR RELATIONS IN BRAZIL</strong></p><p>Psychologically violence at work, in Brazil, has only recently been recognized as a transgression to the fundamental rights of work, to the principle of the dignity of the human person and to the social value of work. Although there is no specific legislation on psychological violence at the workplace, the judiciary has presented a recent and growing juridical recognition to the subject, being guided mainly by constitutional principles as well as by principles related to the protection of the health of the worker. The aim of this article is to discuss how has been occurred the legal recognition of the protection of the psychological health at the work environment. In order to reach the aim of this article, we analyse a specific monographic procedure as well as bibliographical and jurisprudential research.</p><p><strong>Key words: </strong>Psychologically violence at work; Moral harassment; Legal recognition</p><p class="trans-title"> </p></div><div><p class="trans-title"><strong>LA RECONNAISSANCE JURIDIQUE DES VIOLEN-CES PSYCHOLOGIQUES DANS LES RAPPORTS DE TRAVAIL AU BRÉSIL</strong></p><p>Au Brésil, les violences psychologiques au travail sont actuellement caractérisés comme un affront aux droits fondamentaux du travail, au principe de la dignité humaine et à la valeur sociale du travail. Bien qu’il n’existe pas de législation spécifique sur les violences psychologiques dans l’environnement de travail, le pouvoir judiciaire a présenté une reconnaissance juridique récente et croissante du thème, principalement guidée par des principes constitutionnels et de protection de la santé des travailleurs. Le but de cet article est démontrer le processus de reconnaissance juridique de la protection de la santé psychologique dans l’environnement de travail. Pour cela, nous avons utilisé la procédure monographique et recherches bibliographiques et jurisprudentielles.</p><p><strong>Key words: </strong>Violence psychologique au travail; Harcèlement moral; Reconnaissance juridique</p><p class="trans-title"><strong><br /></strong></p></div>


2013 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 209-218 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benoît Testé ◽  
Samantha Perrin

The present research examines the social value attributed to endorsing the belief in a just world for self (BJW-S) and for others (BJW-O) in a Western society. We conducted four studies in which we asked participants to assess a target who endorsed BJW-S vs. BJW-O either strongly or weakly. Results showed that endorsement of BJW-S was socially valued and had a greater effect on social utility judgments than it did on social desirability judgments. In contrast, the main effect of endorsement of BJW-O was to reduce the target’s social desirability. The results also showed that the effect of BJW-S on social utility is mediated by the target’s perceived individualism, whereas the effect of BJW-S and BJW-O on social desirability is mediated by the target’s perceived collectivism.


1970 ◽  
pp. 38-45
Author(s):  
May Abu Jaber

Violence against women (VAW) continues to exist as a pervasive, structural,systematic, and institutionalized violation of women’s basic human rights (UNDivision of Advancement for Women, 2006). It cuts across the boundaries of age, race, class, education, and religion which affect women of all ages and all backgrounds in every corner of the world. Such violence is used to control and subjugate women by instilling a sense of insecurity that keeps them “bound to the home, economically exploited and socially suppressed” (Mathu, 2008, p. 65). It is estimated that one out of every five women worldwide will be abused during her lifetime with rates reaching up to 70 percent in some countries (WHO, 2005). Whether this abuse is perpetrated by the state and its agents, by family members, or even by strangers, VAW is closely related to the regulation of sexuality in a gender specific (patriarchal) manner. This regulation is, on the one hand, maintained through the implementation of strict cultural, communal, and religious norms, and on the other hand, through particular legal measures that sustain these norms. Therefore, religious institutions, the media, the family/tribe, cultural networks, and the legal system continually disciplinewomen’s sexuality and punish those women (and in some instances men) who have transgressed or allegedly contravened the social boundaries of ‘appropriateness’ as delineated by each society. Such women/men may include lesbians/gays, women who appear ‘too masculine’ or men who appear ‘too feminine,’ women who try to exercise their rights freely or men who do not assert their rights as ‘real men’ should, women/men who have been sexually assaulted or raped, and women/men who challenge male/older male authority.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Zachary Nowak ◽  
Bradley M. Jones ◽  
Elisa Ascione

This article begins with a parody, a fictitious set of regulations for the production of “traditional” Italian polenta. Through analysis of primary and secondary historical sources we then discuss the various meanings of which polenta has been the bearer through time and space in order to emphasize the mutability of the modes of preparation, ingredients, and the social value of traditional food products. Finally, we situate polenta within its broader cultural, political, and economic contexts, underlining the uses and abuses of rendering foods as traditional—a process always incomplete, often contested, never organic. In stirring up the past and present of polenta and placing it within both the projects of Italian identity creation and the broader scholarly literature on culinary tradition and taste, we emphasize that for so-called traditional foods to be saved, they must be continually reinvented.


2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 158-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Min Zhou ◽  
Xiangyi Li

We consider cross-space consumption as a form of transnational practice among international migrants. In this paper, we develop the idea of the social value of consumption and use it to explain this particular form of transnationalism. We consider the act of consumption to have not only functional value that satisfies material needs but also a set of nonfunctional values, social value included, that confer symbolic meanings and social status. We argue that cross-space consumption enables international migrants to take advantage of differences in economic development, currency exchange rates, and social structures between countries of destination and origin to maximize their expression of social status and to perform or regain social status. Drawing on a multisited ethnographic study of consumption patterns in migrant hometowns in Fuzhou, China, and in-depth interviews with undocumented Chinese immigrants in New York and their left-behind family members, we find that, despite the vulnerabilities and precarious circumstances associated with the lack of citizenship rights in the host society, undocumented immigrants manage to realize the social value of consumption across national borders and do so through conspicuous consumption, reciprocal consumption, and vicarious consumption in their hometowns even without being physically present there. We conclude that, while cross-space consumption benefits individual migrants, left-behind families, and their hometowns, it serves to revive tradition in ways that fuel extravagant rituals, drive up costs of living, reinforce existing social inequality, and create pressure for continual emigration.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 157-175
Author(s):  
Wécio Pinheiro Araújo

Resumo: Em O Capital, Marx nos alertou que a mercadoria tem um caráter misterioso que carrega “sutilezas metafísicas e argúcias teológicas”. Este artigo tenta decifrar um pouco desse mistério buscando decodifica-lo naquilo que denominamos como a estranha objetividade do valor. Para isso, analisamos a relação entre a ideologia e o valor a partir da crítica marxiana à mercadoria, consignada à lógica de Hegel. Vemos que o valor se constitui como razão ontológica da mercadoria enquanto produto do processo de trabalho que carrega uma racionalidade imanente, isto é, um espírito socialmente produzido que se objetiva à medida que é vivenciado pelos indivíduos como uma lógica social que rege as relações nesta sociedade. Isso se dá por meio de “sutilezas metafísicas” na formação da realidade social marcada por contradições estabelecidas entre, de um lado, o conteúdo objetivo das relações sociais, e de outro, a forma como essas relações são vivenciadas pela consciência na sociedade capitalista. Nesta relação entre conteúdo e forma, encontramos determinações de profundidade ontológica entre o valor e a ideologia, enquanto forma social que opera harmonizando as contradições constituintes da realidade social, a exemplo do que acontece no trabalho assalariado. A mediação ideológica se põe como uma progressão imanente à materialização da vivência concreta da relação entre capital e trabalho no salário, de maneira a naturalizar a exploração que se esconde na estranha objetividade do valor que se realiza na troca de mercadorias. Concluímos que a conexão ontológica entre o ser social e a mercadoria é socialmente ubíqua, precisamente por conta do seu caráter ideológico na formação da sociabilidade a partir do processo de trabalho subjugado ao capital.  Palavras-chave: Valor. Ideologia. Trabalho, Capital. Salário.  Abstract: In Capital, Marx warned us that the commodity has a mysterious character bearing "metaphysical subtleties and theological insights." This article attempts to decipher a little of this mystery by decoding it into what we call the strange objectivity of value. For this, we analyze the relation between ideology and value from the Marxian critique of the commodity, consigned to the Hegelian logic. We see that value is constituted as the ontological reason of the commodity as the product of the labor process that carries an immanent rationality, that is, a socially produced spirit that is objectified as it is experienced by the individuals as a social logic that governs the relations in this society. This is done through "metaphysical subtleties" in the formation of social reality marked by contradictions established between, on the one hand, the objective content of social relations, and on the other, the way in which these relations are experienced by consciousness in capitalist society. In this relationship between content and form, we find determinations of ontological depth between value and ideology, as a social form that operates by harmonizing the constituent contradictions of social reality, as in wage labor. Ideological mediation is seen as an immanent progression to the materialization of the concrete experience of the relation between capital and labor in wage, in order to naturalize the exploitation that is hidden in the strange objectivity of the value that is realized in the exchange of commodities. We conclude that the ontological connection between the social being and the commodity is socially ubiquitous precisely because of its ideological character in the formation of sociability from the labor process subjugated to capital.  Keywords: Value. Labor. Ideology. Capital. Wage.  REFERÊNCIAS  ADORNO, Theodor W. Teoria Estética. [Asthetische Theorie]. Tradução de Artur Morão. – São Paulo : Livraria Martins Fontes, 1988.  ADORNO, Theodor W. Três estudos sobre Hegel. [Drei Studien zu Hegel]. Tradução: Ulisses Razzante Vaccari. – 1. Ed. – São Paulo: Editora Unesp, 2013.  ARAÚJO, Wécio Pinheiro. Ideologia e capital: crítica da razão imanente à sociedade moderna. Tese de doutorado. João Pessoa, PB; Leipzig, Saxônia, UFPB/UFPE/UFRN-HGB, 2018.  ARTHUR, Christopher J. A nova dialética e “O Capital” de Marx. Tradução de Pedro C. Chadarevian. – São Paulo : Edipro, 2016.   DUSSEL, Enrique. A Produção Teórica de Marx: um comentário sobre os Grundrisse. Tradução de José Paulo Netto. – 1 ed. – São Paulo : Expressão Popular, 2012. GERAS, Norman. Marx and the Critique of Political Economy. In: Ideology and Social Science: politics, sociology, anthropology, economics, history. – Ed. by Robin Blackburn, Fontana/Collins, 1977, p. 284-305.  JAEGGI, Rahel. Alienation: News directions in Critical Theory. Columbia Uni. Press, 2014.  HERÁCLITO, de Éfeso. Heráclito : fragmentos contextualizados. Tradução, apresentação e comentários Alexandre Costa. – São Paulo : Odysseus Editora, 2012.  HEGEL, G. W. F. Fenomenologia do Espírito [Phänomenologie des Geistes]. Tradução de Paulo Meneses; com a colaboração de Karl-Heinz Efken, e José Nogueira Machado. – 5. ed. – Petrópolis, RJ : Vozes : Bragança Paulista, Editora Universitária São Francisco, 2008.  MARX, Karl. Das Kapital: Der Produktionprozess des Kapitals. Erster Band, Erstes Buch (Kapitel XVI-LII). Hamburg, Nikol Verlag., 2016.  MARX, Karl. Grundrisse: manuscritos econômicos de 1857-1858 : esboços da crítica da economia política. – supervisão editorial Mario Duayer; tradução Mario Duayer, Nélio Schneider (colaboração de Alice Helga Werner e Rudiger Hoffman). – São Paulo : Boitempo; Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ, 2011.  MARX, Karl. Manuscritos econômico-filosóficos. [Ökonomie-philosophische Manuskripte] Tradução, apresentação e notas de Jesus Ranieri. - 2. reimp. - São Paulo : Boitempo Editorial, 2008.  MARX, Karl. O Capital – Crítica da Economia Política. Livro 1 – O Processo de Produção do Capital. Vol. I – 10 ª. Edição, Tradução de Reginaldo Sant’ Anna. Do original em alemão: DAS KAPITAL – Kritik der politischen Ökonomie (Buch I: Der Produktionsprozes des Kapitals, Quarta edição, 1890). São Paulo : DIFEL, 1985.  MARX, Karl. O Capital – Crítica da Economia Política. Livro 1 – O processo de produção do capital. Do original em alemão: DAS KAPITAL – Kritik der politischen Ökonomie (Buch 1: Der Produktionsprozess des Kapitals.  – São Paulo: Boitempo, 2013.   NICHOLS, Bill. Ideology and the Image: Social Representation in the Cinema and Other Media. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981.


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (11) ◽  
pp. 11-15
Author(s):  
Gan N.Yu. ◽  
Ponomareva L.I. ◽  
Obukhova K.A.

Today, worldview, spiritual and moral problems that have always been reflected in education and upbringing come to the fore in society. In this situation, there is a demand for philosophical categories. One of the priority goals of education in modern conditions is the formation of a reasonable, reflexive person who is able to analyze their actions and the actions of other people. Modern science is characterized by an understanding of the absolute value and significance of childhood in the development of the individual, which implies the need for its multilateral study. In the conditions of democratization of all spheres of life, the child ceases to be a passive object of education and training, and becomes an active carrier of their own meanings of being and the subject of world creation. One of the realities of childhood is philosophizing, so it is extremely timely to address the identification of its place and role in the world of childhood. Children's philosophizing is extremely poorly studied, although the need for its analysis is becoming more obvious. Children's philosophizing is one of the forms of philosophical reflection, which has its own qualitative specificity, on the one hand, and commonality with all other forms of philosophizing, on the other. The social relevance of the proposed research lies in the fact that children's philosophizing can be considered as an intellectual indicator of a child's socialization, since the process of reflection involves the adoption and development of culture. Modern society, in contrast to the traditional one, is ready to "accept" a philosophizing child, which means that it is necessary to determine the main characteristics and conditions of children's philosophizing.


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