scholarly journals Prostitution, Essential and Incidental Aspects: A Libertarian Argument for Legalization

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-133
Author(s):  
Marino Varricchio ◽  
Walter E. Block

AbstractProstitution is often depicted as an aggressive and coercive activity. We have convincing empirical evidence that sometimes this is indeed the case. However, this is not sufficient to make it illegal. We argue that an activity should be outlawed if and only if it is essentially aggressive and/or coercive. But prostitution is not inherently violent, only incidentally. Indeed, prostitution could be defined as “the act of rendering, from the client’s point of view, non-reproductive sex against payment” (Edlund and Korn, 2002). No aggression and/or coercion necessarily enters this all-inclusive definition. This is why prostitution should be legalized laws to the contrary repealed.

Author(s):  
Christopher McCarroll

This chapter sets out some key issues related to a philosophical analysis of point of view in memory. It does so by looking at examples of psychological, philosophical, and literary accounts of the phenomenon, as well as examples of the author’s own observer perspective memories. The chapter provides an overview of some of the empirical evidence related to visual perspective in memory. Despite these consistent empirical findings, however, a number of doubts and misconceptions about remembering from-the-outside still linger, especially concerning the status of observer perspectives in memory. This chapter outlines some of the skepticism to the possibility of remembering from-the-outside and points to a possible diagnosis of why such skepticism arises. This chapter points to a way of thinking about memory—to be developed through the course of the book—which eases the worries about remembering from-the-outside.


2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 163
Author(s):  
Celeste Perrucchini ◽  
Hiroshi Ito

Empirical evidence suggests an overall convergence in terms of GDP and per capita income occurring among the European Union (EU) Member States. Nevertheless, economic inequalities have been increasing at the regional level within European Union countries. Through the review of relevant literature, this study analyzes the increasing inequalities from an economical point of view, focusing on Italy and the UK as examples. First, a general overlook of the empirical evidence of the GDP and per capita income at national and sub-national levels will be presented. Second, an explanation of the possible causes of the results will be proposed through the use of economical and sociological theories. The findings of this research might uncover the relative inefficacy of EU Cohesion policies and point towards the necessity for deeper and more thoughtful measures to continue the convergence of Member States while preserving internal equilibria. This paper ends with discussions for the future directions of the EU.


2008 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 147-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olivier Accominotti ◽  
Marc Flandreau

Textbook accounts of the Anglo-French trade agreement of 1860 argue that it heralded the beginning of a liberal trading order. This alleged success holds much interest from a modern policy point of view, for it rested on bilateral negotiations and most-favored-nation clauses. With the help of new data on international trade (the RICardo database), the authors provide empirical evidence and find that the treaty and subsequent network of MFN trade agreements coincided with the end of a period of unilateral liberalization across the world. They also find that it did not contribute to expanding trade at all. This is contrary to a deeply rooted belief among economists, economic historians, and political scientists. The authors draw a number of policy lessons that run counter to the conventional wisdom and raise skepticism toward the ability of bilateralism and MFN arrangements to promote trade liberalization.


Biofeedback ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 110-120 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Gevirtz

Heart rate variability biofeedback has enjoyed increased popularity in recent years. In this review, empirical evidence from multiple sources is presented from the point of view of possible mechanisms of effect. While more research is clearly needed, the data thus far are certainly promising.


2021 ◽  
Vol 295 ◽  
pp. 01029
Author(s):  
Alina Ibragimova ◽  
Yan Wang ◽  
Michail Ivanov

The purpose of this work is to provide information on the development of the infrastructure of the African economy. The study provides statistics on African regions and industries. This article focuses on the forms of economic and social infrastructure, and directs to determine the share development infrastructural in Africa. The Africa has entered an era of devastating change this study shows that with the unfolding economic downturn in the northern economies that have traditionally dominated the global economy. The article provides empirical evidence on how the industrial sectors developed from an economic point of view. The authors believe that infrastructure affects output and productivity directly as a contribution to the production function of other sectors and as part of GDP formation. The article discusses the development of infrastructure for the period 1999-2019 without more detailed dynamics. It also does not explain the main topics developed by the authors. The work provides knowledge on how investments are developing in Africa, how industries have developed, and what is the role of each infrastructure sector in this development. It also shows how different areas of infrastructure work with different successes in creating new paths in the African economy.


1998 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 225-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin A. Garrett

Given the importance of draft animals—horses, mules, and oxen—in the development of the American economy, it is surprising how little attention has been paid to their contribution. Moreover, this is not, in most cases, attributable to a lack of empirical evidence; the vast majority of the work on draft animals to date is found in oral history and folklore literature. While this literature delighted in presenting the sentiments and personal stories of a few rather than attempting to provide a broader perspective, it does provide valuable historical information. Not surprisingly, however, the sentiments of a few, perhaps sometimes embellished, occasionally led to conclusions that are not consistent with predictions. For example, recent evidence supports the superiority of mules over horses and oxen in southern agricultural production, which refutes the notion that southerners used the mule for cultural reasons (Garrett 1990; Kauffman 1993). As Rockoff (1991: 243) states, “One of the main functions of the economic historian, from the point of view of economics, is to examine the foundation of these myths.”


2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 407-418
Author(s):  
Klára Katona

AbstractBefore 2008, several studies provided empirical evidence of a positive correlation between the functions of financial intermediation and economic growth. In 2008, the financial crisis shook trust in this correlation. Several studies found that comprehensive and fundamental changes were needed in the entire financial market. Attention focused on the role of morality as an essential and integral element of the economy, arguing that without a moral attitude at the individual and institutional levels, the whole system necessarily runs into crisis. Among the moral interpretations of the economy, which are concurrently based on philosophical tradition and religious doctrine, the Catholic Church has presented some of the most consistent and unified teachings related to such questions over time, but the effect on economic thinking is less than what relevance and other merits justify. Catholic social teaching suggests morality and the economy are inseparable and highlights the moral interpretation of economic discrepancies. By analyzing theoretical and empirical evidence, this paper assesses the economic validity and legitimacy of Catholic thought about the immanent role of ethics in the economy and the financial crisis.


Popular Music ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patryk Galuszka ◽  
Katarzyna M. Wyrzykowska

AbstractFrom an economic point of view, the business of record labels until recently boiled down to managing a portfolio of artists, with successful stars bringing the label enough money to recoup investments in market flops. The decline in record sales has called this model into question and forced labels to look for new sources of revenue. Employing qualitative data gathered in Poland, this paper demonstrates how labels react to adverse market conditions and what determines these reactions. The paper shows that these reactions include the monetisation of the relationship that a label has with artists through signing 360° deals, the commercial exploitation of artists’ brand names, and concentration on niche markets, either foreign or format-based (e.g. the market for vinyl). The paper concludes that record labels, regardless of which approach they choose to deal with the adverse market conditions, still think in terms of managing a portfolio of artists. What is more, there is no universal strategy which can be applied by every label to deal with declining record sales.


2012 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimi Akita,

AbstractThis article presents empirical evidence of the high referential specificity of sound-symbolic words, based on a FrameNet-aided analysis of collocational data of Japanese mimetics. The definition of mimetics, particularly their semantic definition, has been crosslinguistically the most challenging problem in the literature, and different researchers have used different adjectives (most notably, “vivid,” since Doke 1935) to describe their semantic peculiarity. The present study approaches this longstanding issue from a frame-semantic point of view combined with a quantitative method. It was found that mimetic manner adverbials generally form a frame-semantically restricted range of verbal/nominal collocations than non-mimetic ones. Each mimetic can thus be considered to evoke a highly specific frame, which elaborates the general frame evoked by its typical host predicate and contains a highly limited set of frame elements, which correlate and constrain one another. This conclusion serves as a unified account of previously reported phenomena concerning mimetics, including the lack of hyponymy, the one-mimetic-per-clause restriction, and unparaphrasability. This study can be also viewed as a methodological proposal for the measurement of frame specificity, which supplements bottom-up linguistic tests.


Author(s):  
Jan Sprenger ◽  
Stephan Hartmann

Convincing scientific theories are often hard to find, especially when empirical evidence is scarce (e.g., in particle physics). Once scientists have found a theory, they often believe that there are not many distinct alternatives to it. Is this belief justified? We model how the failure to find a feasible alternative can increase the degree of belief in a scientific theory—in other words, we establish the validity of the No Alternatives Argument and the possibility of non-empirical theory confirmation from a Bayesian point of view. Then we evaluate scope and limits of this argument (e.g., by calculating the degree of confirmation it provides) and relate it to other argument forms such as Inference to the Best Explanation (IBE) or “There is No Alternative” (TINA).


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