Thinking Outside the Boxes

The aim of this study is to conduct a critical discussion within a political economy framework on the use of mixed method, which is an increasing tendency in communication research, and its philosophical foundations in post-positivism. In the study, the mixed method called as “third methodological movement of the 21st century,” the limitations of the attempts to combine qualitative and quantitative methods in the positivist and postpositivist paradigm are revealed. The study discusses how the convergence of quantitative and qualitative methods in critical economy politics can be possible and what opportunities it offers in an effort to make a holistic explanation of social reality.

Philosophical Foundations for Establishing Scientific Humanism as Naturalism

In this chapter, the author presents the Marx-Hegel dialogue, a retracing of Hegel's system of philosophy and Marx's criticism of the absolute notion of Hegel's system of philosophy. Of particular importance is the emphasis placed on the nature of historical reality and the essence of alienation which arises in humans during periods of societal change. In this chapter, attention is drawn to the important role of philosophy in guiding the society to rethink the ontological and anthropological importance of human beings and the creation of new forms of life with a unique non-biological ontological basis.

Analytical Anthropology of Peter Hacker

Purpose. The article is an explication of the features of the anthropological teaching of Peter Hacker in the context of analytical philosophy with consideration to the context of European philosophy within the framework of the Oxford School of ordinary language philosophy. The theoretical basis of the research is determined by the latest research in the English-language analytical philosophical tradition, rethinking the place of anthropological problems in the system of philosophical knowledge. Originality. Referring to primary sources, we reconstructed the philosophical and anthropological teaching of Peter Hacker in the unity of its basic principles and theoretical and practical results. We determined philosophical origins of the key ideas of his philosophical anthropology and substantiated their originality, systematicity and logical argumentation. His philosophical position is defined as anthropological holism, synthesizing the reinterpreted ideas of Aristotle and Wittgenstein. Conclusions. Peter Hacker is the creator of the original version of Analytic Philosophical Anthropology. His anthropology is based on criticism of Cartesian dualism and physicalism, which underlie modern neurosciences and which he tries to overcome on the basis of Wittgenstein’s philosophical "logotherapy". The conceptual framework of his holistic anthropology is a rethought conceptual scheme of the Ordinary language philosophy. Hacker considers consciousness not as a separate mental reality, but one of the powers of human nature – an intellectual ability, which, along with emotional (passionate) and moral, belongs to a person as an integral socio-biological being. Asserting the free will of man, the Oxford thinker criticizes various forms of determinism, especially its most common form in modern science – neurobiological determinism, which is built on false philosophical foundations. This criticism allows the modern British philosopher to build an original, systematic and logically consistent anthropological concept that asserts the immutability of the highest human values – goodness, love and happiness.

The Importance of the Integrative Relationship Between Cause and Effect Analysis and The Sustainable Balanced Scorecard in Solving Problems of Economic Units

The aim of the research is to highlight the complementarity between cause-and-effect analysis and the Sustainable Balanced Tag Card. The problem with the research is that economic units are poorly aware of the theoretical and philosophical foundations of cause-and-effect analysis and their importance in costing and solving administrative problems and inadequate attention to financial and non-financial measures. In order to achieve the objective of research and test its hypotheses, the Wasit Textile and Weaving Plant of the State Company for the Textile and Leather Industries, located in the centre of the Wasit prefecture, has been selected as a centre for research. Its performance has been evaluated and a model has been presented to solve the problems it faces through a cause-and-effect analysis scheme with a sustainable balanced tag card (SBSC) that details all environmental and social aspects, both quantitative and financial. A set of conclusions has been reached, the most important of which is that the cause-and-effect relationship is not just a correlation, but a reasonable relationship between the level of the activity and its costs, because it gives analysts and managers confidence in the relationships repeatedly estimated in other sets of data, The identification of cost guides gives managers a vision of several methods they use to reduce costs and the quantity of routers, and the sustainable balanced labeling card uses both financial and non-financial performance measures to bridge the gap arising from the use of financial measures only, as well as to measure and improve performance , The economic unit wishing to take advantage of the characteristics of the adopted economic unit strategies that are relevant to each dimension of the sustainable balance tag and its drawbacks should be careful not to reduce the costs of products or services on an ongoing basis, and focus not only on reducing costs, but also on providing distinct products and services that meet

Dualism and Buddhism. Parallels and Points of Convergence with Neuroscience

The article is devoted to one of the most relevant problems of modern philosophy, the philosophy of consciousness in light of the latest discoveries of neurobiology. The most poorly studied aspects; the problem of free will, the problem of consciousness of the animal world and the problem of psychophysical parallelism are considered in this article. Some ethical and ideological issues related to the problems are also considered. The classic dispute about the nature of consciousness by E.V. Ilyenkov and D.I. Dubrovsky, which ended essentially in a stalemate precisely because of the ignorance of the importance of the above issues, is considered as an example of why these questions are relevant. The article also views the paradox of free will and responsibility for one's actions, which inevitably arises with a materialistic understanding of the nature of consciousness. The article briefly analyzes the key ideas for this topic by a number of prominent neuroscientists (Wilder Penfield, John Eccles, Oleg Kryshtal (Krishtal), Christoph Koch), devoted to the problem of the nature of consciousness in the time from the 1970s to the present, as well as the philosophical foundations of ideas about consciousness, formed in the European philosophy of modern times. The concept of dualism and its possible foundations, which are relevant at the present time, are examined separately, but the dualistic concept of consciousness proposed by Descartes is criticized as incompatible with the modern conclusions of neurobiology. Also, the evidence of world-renowned neuroscientists destroying the "human monopoly" on the possession of consciousness and indicating the presence of consciousness in the animal kingdom is presented. Ultimately, the philosophy of Buddhism is considered as one of the possible and most promising topics for studying in this direction. The strengths of the Buddhist concept of consciousness, which are hardly noticeable in this time, are summarized, thus giving an advantage over the ontological foundations of the concept of consciousness that prevailed in Europe in the modern era. In general, the convergence of traditional Buddhist views on the nature of consciousness with the latest achievements of neurobiology is noted.

For the Common Good

The foundations of research ethics are riven with fault lines emanating from a fear that if research is too closely connected to weighty social purposes an imperative to advance the common good through research will justify abrogating the rights and welfare of study participants. The result is an impoverished conception of the nature of research, an incomplete focus on actors who bear important moral responsibilities, and a system of ethics and oversight highly attuned to the dangers of research but largely silent about threats of ineffective, inefficient, and inequitable medical practices and health systems. In For the Common Good: Philosophical Foundations of Research Ethics, Alex John London defends a conception of the common good that grounds a moral imperative with two requirements. The first is to promote research that generates the information necessary to enable key social institutions to effectively, efficiently, and equitably safeguard the basic interests of individuals. The second is to ensure that research is organized as a voluntary scheme of social cooperation that respects its various contributors’ moral claims to be treated as free and equal. Connecting research to the goals of a just social order grounds a framework for assessing and managing research risk that reconciles these requirements and justifies key oversight practices in non-paternalistic terms. Reconceiving research ethics as resolving coordination problems and providing credible assurance that these requirements are being met expands the issues and actors that fall within the purview of the field and provides the foundation for a more unified and coherent approach to domestic and international research.

Standards for comparing validity of different treatment methods: the "five E framework"

Background and Aims. Evidence Based Medicine (EBM) neglects factors extrinsic to science. To bypass such a limitation, a global approach for validation of treatment methods is proposed. In addition to effectiveness, further standards are required, in order to include priority issues like bioethics, environment preservation, global financial crisis, and undeclared conflict of interest. Methods. We suggest to evaluate any healing system within a “five E framework” by applying the following standards: 1) evidence (see EBM), 2) epistemology, 3) ethics, 4) ecology, and 5) economy. 2) Preliminary adaptation of any research to the epistemological background of the treatment to be evaluated is needed, in order to compensate for the poor compliance of EBM methodology to holistic methods. The restrictions imposed by the rules of classical epidemiology to study design (see case definition and standardization of treatment) can completely twist the analysis of results. 3) The ethical standard implies giving attention given to treatment invasiveness, related both to life of animals employed in experimental studies and to side effects on health of human volunteers or patients. 4) The ecological standard, consisting in the implications of pharmaceutical production on environment, should be analyzed in terms of ecological footprint, i.e. for the global effects of industrial waste on ecosystems and species. 5) The economical standard evaluates both the impact of financial crisis and the role played by conflict of interest, comparing allopathy with holistic systems. Conclusions. The “five E framework” seems more adequate, for several reasons, to validate homeopathy or other treatment methods, if compared with the sole EBM approach. Misunderstanding of results and consequent publication bias can be avoided by adhering, in study design, to the philosophical foundations of homeopathy, i.e. by choosing a remedy according to the law of similars and the totality of symptoms – individualization of treatment. On the ethical plane, in the case of homeopathy, apart from the absence of drug toxicity and the possibility of avoiding vivisection for experimental purposes, even in the production of drugs from animal species, induction of death can be prevented or strongly circumscribed. About effects on environment, allopathic drug waste causes pollution, alters the features of a given species, or modifies the balance between different species, while the employment of large quantities of natural active principles in drug industry has an impact on biodiversity. Homeopathic industry has no relevant effects on environment, because slag release is insignificant and the productive process is highly efficient. Finally, homeopathy meets relevant economic issues: a) while management of crisis by states with a health system mainly oriented to allopathy imposes a heavy burden to community by reducing public funding of health care, the high sustainability of all holistic systems limits the risk of worsening health care level; b) homeopathy is less subject than allopathy to undeclared conflict of interest; the enormous margins of profit and the chance of competition issued by big allopathic industry have a limited role in classical homeopathy.