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Subthreshold negative emotions have superseded conscious reason as the initial and strongest motivators of political behavior. Political neuroscience uses the concepts of negativity bias and terror management theory to explore why fear-driven rhetoric plays such an outsized role in determining human political actions. These mechanisms of human anthropology are explored by competing explanations from biblical and evolutionary scholars who attempt to understand their contribution to human vulnerabilities to fear. When these mechanisms are observed in fear-driven political rhetoric, three common characteristics emerge: exaggerated threat, tribal combat, and religious apocalypse, which provide a new framework for explaining how modern populist leaders weaponize negative emotions to meaningfully influence individual convictions, tribal identities, cultural imaginations, and reactions against outgroups and perceived external threats.

This study argues for a biblical-theological approach to the ethics of Proverbs. It proposes that the ethical foundation for Proverbs lies in the principles established in Genesis 1-4 The argument unfolds as follows: Tracing the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants, one sees Solomon, the author of Proverbs, as a partial fulfillment of the promised seed in Genesis 3:15. Furthermore, other biblical writers depict Solomon as an Adamic king ruling in an Eden-like context. Consequently, understanding Proverbs' position within redemptive history encourages readers to interpret it through an Edenic framework. In other words, a biblical-theological approach compels readers to interpret Proverbs in light of Genesis' early chapters. This perspective equips readers with the key to consider applying Edenic principles within the book's ethical teachings. Readers then discover that Proverbs emphasizes and elaborates on Edenic principles related to work, marriage, loving one's neighbor, and progeny

Félix Guattari and Franco Berardi have both argued that media ecologies and psychic ecologies are intimately intertwined and as such, any exploration of the collective unconscious must engage with how the mind is formed with and through media. This understanding of networks of interdependence necessitates an exploration of how platformization has impacted users” collective psyche. Drawing from psychosocial theory, psychoanalysis and the work of Félix Guattari, this article analizes the micropolitics of desire of digital platforms, with an explicit focus on how algorithmic structures amplify extreme Right content, allowing fascisms to metastasis throughout digital spaces. It will first examine the algorithmic architecture of social media platforms, demonstrating how these digital spaces lock in and over-code desire through recursive feedback loops that amplify extremism. Following this will be an exploration of the excess of desire that is cut off and left as a remainder partial object, termed the “fascist abject,” and what role this process plays in the production of subjectivity.

Félix Guattari and Franco Berardi have both argued that media ecologies and psychic ecologies are intimately intertwined and as such, any exploration of the collective unconscious must engage with how the mind is formed with and through media. This understanding of networks of interdependence necessitates an exploration of how platformization has impacted users” collective psyche. Drawing from psychosocial theory, psychoanalysis and the work of Félix Guattari, this article analizes the micropolitics of desire of digital platforms, with an explicit focus on how algorithmic structures amplify extreme Right content, allowing fascisms to metastasis throughout digital spaces. It will first examine the algorithmic architecture of social media platforms, demonstrating how these digital spaces lock in and over-code desire through recursive feedback loops that amplify extremism. Following this will be an exploration of the excess of desire that is cut off and left as a remainder partial object, termed the “fascist abject,” and what role this process plays in the production of subjectivity.

Félix Guattari and Franco Berardi have both argued that media ecologies and psychic ecologies are intimately intertwined and as such, any exploration of the collective unconscious must engage with how the mind is formed with and through media. This understanding of networks of interdependence necessitates an exploration of how platformization has impacted users” collective psyche. Drawing from psychosocial theory, psychoanalysis and the work of Félix Guattari, this article analizes the micropolitics of desire of digital platforms, with an explicit focus on how algorithmic structures amplify extreme Right content, allowing fascisms to metastasis throughout digital spaces. It will first examine the algorithmic architecture of social media platforms, demonstrating how these digital spaces lock in and over-code desire through recursive feedback loops that amplify extremism. Following this will be an exploration of the excess of desire that is cut off and left as a remainder partial object, termed the “fascist abject,” and what role this process plays in the production of subjectivity.

In this thesis I critique the American socioeconomic system and culture through a multidisciplinary lens. Using the works of philosopher Karl Marx, economist Robin Kimmerer, and forensic psychologist Christopher Williams, I argue that there are three interconnected characteristics of our socioeconomic system that disincentivize us from creating growth-fostering relationships. These characteristics are the encouragement of overconsumption, the prevalence of hyperindividualism, and that people are valued for what they produce, not who they are. To counteract these characteristics, we must fight to create a Culture of Encounter, which is a culture with a radical dedication to seeing, hearing, and loving individual people without condition, expectation, or a specific goal. The works of St. Teresa of Calcutta and St. Therese of Lisieux, combined with the tenets of Relational Cultural Theory provide an argument for why creating a Culture of Encounter is necessary. Finally, I provide a concrete four step plan that helps people implement a Culture of Encounter into their everyday lives.

In this thesis I critique the American socioeconomic system and culture through a multidisciplinary lens. Using the works of philosopher Karl Marx, economist Robin Kimmerer, and forensic psychologist Christopher Williams, I argue that there are three interconnected characteristics of our socioeconomic system that disincentivize us from creating growth-fostering relationships. These characteristics are the encouragement of overconsumption, the prevalence of hyperindividualism, and that people are valued for what they produce, not who they are. To counteract these characteristics, we must fight to create a Culture of Encounter, which is a culture with a radical dedication to seeing, hearing, and loving individual people without condition, expectation, or a specific goal. The works of St. Teresa of Calcutta and St. Therese of Lisieux, combined with the tenets of Relational Cultural Theory provide an argument for why creating a Culture of Encounter is necessary. Finally, I provide a concrete four step plan that helps people implement a Culture of Encounter into their everyday lives.

There may be many factors determining the moral dimensions used by individuals when making political decisions. Two important dimensions worthy of examination are political orientation and gender. Based on Moral Foundation Theory (Graham et al., 2009), the present study examined how both of the aforementioned factors influence the moral dimensions used in political decisions. Participants (n = 338) completed a demographic survey, rated their self-perceived political orientation and then completed the Moral Relevance Scale (Graham, Haidt, & Nosek, 2009) and the Ideological Consistency Scale (Pew Research Center, 2014), which was used to place participants in liberal, moderate or conservative political orientation groups. A MANOVA showed no differences in participants based on gender, but significant differences in decision-making based on political ideology. Discussion focused on how moderates differ in their views from other ideologies, a relatively new finding.

This study's objective investigates the viewpoints held by Black women in two urban areas of Minnesota about the social upheaval that followed the murder of George Floyd in 2020 for using a counterfeit $20 bill. In the last decade, police killings of innocent Black people in the United States have received more attention, and Floyd's death is only one example of this phenomenon. In the U.S., the likelihood of a police officer taking the life of a Black man is higher than that of a White man. Between 2013-2019 there have been 1,641 fatal shootings of defenseless Black men by police officers. Video of Floyd's murder and the demonstrations that followed was extensively disseminated by many news organizations and other media sites (Ladyzhinskaya, 2021). It has been demonstrated that widespread coverage of killings on social media is also easy to access and harms the psychological well-being of the Black community. This is especially true when viewed in the context of the historical framework of institutional and cultural racism and discrimination in the U.S. This research ascertains the extent to which several Black women residing in the metroplex of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, were prompted to respond and act as a direct result of Floyd's death due to police misconduct. All the participants were selected based on their well known presence in the Black community. Each spoke intimately about their personal and communal experiences, which have shaped their activism and commitment to social justice. Based on these participants' narratives, recommendations are provided for professional practices which will provide invaluable information to regulatory systems, such as policing and the judicial system.

Félix Guattari and Franco Berardi have both argued that media ecologies and psychic ecologies are intimately intertwined and as such, any exploration of the collective unconscious must engage with how the mind is formed with and through media. This understanding of networks of interdependence necessitates an exploration of how platformization has impacted users” collective psyche. Drawing from psychosocial theory, psychoanalysis and the work of Félix Guattari, this article analizes the micropolitics of desire of digital platforms, with an explicit focus on how algorithmic structures amplify extreme Right content, allowing fascisms to metastasis throughout digital spaces. It will first examine the algorithmic architecture of social media platforms, demonstrating how these digital spaces lock in and over-code desire through recursive feedback loops that amplify extremism. Following this will be an exploration of the excess of desire that is cut off and left as a remainder partial object, termed the “fascist abject,” and what role this process plays in the production of subjectivity.

In my dissertation, I argue that Hegel, Adorno, and Horkheimer develop theories of modern sacrifice grounded in their critiques of modern reason—what Hegel calls “the Understanding” and Adorno and Horkheimer call “instrumental reason.” I contend that these thinkers recognize the process of rational cognition, which abstracts conceptual data from empirical reality and establishes the dominance of the universal over particular phenomena, as a sacrificial process—a view supported by their routine description of this process using the language of violence and death. However, this sacrificial conception of modern reason isn’t metaphorical: when read alongside their analyses of discursive cunning, an instrumental linguistic practice that detaches the speaker from their worlds, as well as their ideological analyses of the Reign of Terror and the Holocaust, it becomes clear that Hegel, Adorno, and Horkheimer recognize the isolating and destructive movement of modern reason as materially expressed in the modern world via bloodshed.

The article departs critically from the postsocialist condition in Yugoslavia marked by conservative revisionism that transformed the memorial landscape. The nation-building process took a clearly negative attitude towards the Yugoslav, socialist and partisan/antifascist past. The first part of the text will shortly present the notion of »counter-archive« and the central features of the method. The second part of the text will offer a short analysis of four case studies: A short partisan poem written by Iztok, a drawing by Dore Klemenčič, a partisan dance by Marta Paulin and a partisan film by Rudi Omota.

Missoula, MT

The protection of nature has been a central aim of environmentalism for well over a century. However, the concept of nature has been subjected to abundant critiques in recent literature, threatening the conceptual tenability of this goal. In this paper, I discuss why I find the concept of nature too valuable to dismiss and offer an account of nature that I believe remedies existent critiques. In Chapter 1, I recount arguments for the protection of nature and illustrate their dualistic underpinnings. In Chapter 2, I discuss issues with dualistic accounts of nature and demonstrate why Steven Vogel’s monistic alternative is unsatisfactory. In Chapter 3, I propose a dialectical account of nature and explore what an environmental ethic might look like within this framework.

This Essay analyzes whether the Rawlsian concept of public reason explains the substantive content of the lobbying limitation and the campaigning ban, and, more broadly, the implications of public reason for tax-exempt charities and their political speech. The question is notwhether public reasons—distinct premises and conclusions forming an argument—justify these provisions of law, but whether the political activity limitations of IRC § 501(c)(3) are properly understood to manifest or implement the ideal of public reason itself. Additionally, if these statutory constraints do not embody the ideal of public reason, do they offend it?

The article departs critically from the postsocialist condition in Yugoslavia marked by conservative revisionism that transformed the memorial landscape. The nation-building process took a clearly negative attitude towards the Yugoslav, socialist and partisan/antifascist past. The first part of the text will shortly present the notion of »counter-archive« and the central features of the method. The second part of the text will offer a short analysis of four case studies: A short partisan poem written by Iztok, a drawing by Dore Klemenčič, a partisan dance by Marta Paulin and a partisan film by Rudi Omota.

Almost exactly fifty years ago, Friedrich Kambartel, in his classic essay “Ethics and Mathematics,” did pioneering work in an intellectual environment that almost self-evidently assumed a strict separation of the two fields. In our first section we summarize and discuss that classical paper. The following two sections are devoted to complement and contrast Kambartel’s picture. In particular, the second section is devoted to ethical aspects of the indirect and direct mathematization of modern societies. The final section gives a short categorization of various philosophical positions with respect to the rationality of ethics and the mutual relation between ethics and mathematics.

In this paper, we utilize duoethnography - a research method in which practitioners discursively interrogate the relationships between culture, context, and the mechanisms which shape individual autobiographical experiences - to explore what may be beyond ethics in the context of data science. Although ethical frameworks have the ability to reflect cultural priorities, a singular view of ethics, as we explore, often fails to speak to the multiple and diverse priorities held both within and across institutional spaces. To that end, this paper explores multiple perspectives, epistemologies, and worldviews that can collectively push researchers towards considerations of a data science education that is equity-minded both in concept and practice. Through a set of dialogues which examine our positionalities, journeys, ethics, local cultures, and accountabilities, this paper explores the contextual realities rooted in the authors’ educational settings. These conversations focus on the humanity of our students, the communities from which we come from and serve, as well as the unintentional harms and possibilities associated with the development of data science programs across institutional types. We take a set of five core questions to examine how we made, and continue to make, sense of our diverse cultural perspectives on data science education and equity with/in relation to others’ realities. Broadly, this paper seeks to offer reflections on the related but differing functions of ethics and equity in data science education.

Edited collection of original essays debating Adriana Cavarero’s feminist ethics of nonviolence. Including an original essay by Adriana Cavarero and responses from Judith Butler, Bonnie Honig, Olivia Guaraldo, Simona Forti, Christine Battersby, Lorenzo Bernini, Mark Devenney, Tim Huzar and Clare Woodford. Although inspired by Cavarero’s recent work on an ethical maternal posture of inclination the responses situate Cavarero’s argument in her wider corpus of nonviolence and uniqueness, that critiques and offers an alternative to the masculine symbolic of philosophy. This introduction endeavours to not only introduce Cavarero’s work, but to chart the journey of an increasingly productive dialogue between Cavarero and other traditions within feminism, bringing together what were initially perceived to be radically divergent positions.

In philosophy, our goal is to ultimately discover what it is to be human. How do we exist in our world, and how should we exist? Throughout history, philosophers have been attempting to answer these questions in any way possible. Well, almost. Unfortunately, marginalized voices -- such as those with disabilities -- have been excluded from the conversation in a way that minimizes and undermines any answers provided. Philosophers such as Descartes make the argument that human existence is purely in the mind, and that we can separate ourselves from our bodies; many disabled philosophers would disagree. Disability studies finds that our body has just as much of an influence on our cognition as our brain (sometimes even more so); to separate ourselves from our bodies would be to fundamentally change our existence. We would not exist in the same capacity. But, because disabled voices have been excluded from philosophical literature and discussions, the canon currently has no choice but to follow the Socratic, Platonic, Aristotelian, and Cartesian ways of thinking: our bodies are mere instruments for our being and morality. In my thesis, I examine the ways in which ableism have influenced our philosophical thinking and how we as philosophers can attempt to include disabled voices in philosophy going forward.

In philosophy, our goal is to ultimately discover what it is to be human. How do we exist in our world, and how should we exist? Throughout history, philosophers have been attempting to answer these questions in any way possible. Well, almost. Unfortunately, marginalized voices -- such as those with disabilities -- have been excluded from the conversation in a way that minimizes and undermines any answers provided. Philosophers such as Descartes make the argument that human existence is purely in the mind, and that we can separate ourselves from our bodies; many disabled philosophers would disagree. Disability studies finds that our body has just as much of an influence on our cognition as our brain (sometimes even more so); to separate ourselves from our bodies would be to fundamentally change our existence. We would not exist in the same capacity. But, because disabled voices have been excluded from philosophical literature and discussions, the canon currently has no choice but to follow the Socratic, Platonic, Aristotelian, and Cartesian ways of thinking: our bodies are mere instruments for our being and morality. In my thesis, I examine the ways in which ableism have influenced our philosophical thinking and how we as philosophers can attempt to include disabled voices in philosophy going forward.

In philosophy, our goal is to ultimately discover what it is to be human. How do we exist in our world, and how should we exist? Throughout history, philosophers have been attempting to answer these questions in any way possible. Well, almost. Unfortunately, marginalized voices -- such as those with disabilities -- have been excluded from the conversation in a way that minimizes and undermines any answers provided. Philosophers such as Descartes make the argument that human existence is purely in the mind, and that we can separate ourselves from our bodies; many disabled philosophers would disagree. Disability studies finds that our body has just as much of an influence on our cognition as our brain (sometimes even more so); to separate ourselves from our bodies would be to fundamentally change our existence. We would not exist in the same capacity. But, because disabled voices have been excluded from philosophical literature and discussions, the canon currently has no choice but to follow the Socratic, Platonic, Aristotelian, and Cartesian ways of thinking: our bodies are mere instruments for our being and morality. In my thesis, I examine the ways in which ableism have influenced our philosophical thinking and how we as philosophers can attempt to include disabled voices in philosophy going forward.

The ancient philosophy of Stoicism, itself one of the foundations for international law, can improve contemporary just war thinking by forming a coherent set of philosophical principles to serve as a foundation for a just war theory. A Stoic approach considers justifications for moral actions to come not from an appeal to human rights, conformity to deontological rules, or from the utility of the actions themselves, but from virtuous character traits and corresponding virtuous actions. As such, a Stoic approach to just war theory is a virtue ethics perspective in which metaethical incentive for moral action is the agent’s own flourishing and successful life (eudaimonia). Such a theory is concerned with ‘internal justice’ rather than the ‘external justice’ of international laws, rules, or norms. Stoic justice is based on the conception of oikeiosis, with its dual aspects: the presumed natural desire for self-preservation, leading to the selection of things appropriate to the human constitution; and the supposed social instinct, most notably exemplified by affection for those in the agent’s ‘concentric circles of concern.’ As equally a natural law theory and a virtue ethic, Stoic just war theory also attempts to answer points of contention between political realism and cosmopolitanism. This work outlines and, in a precursory way, develops other implications of Stoic philosophy for just war theory derived from relevant (and salvageable) Stoic positions on physics and metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, moral psychology, and political philosophy. This project also examines the actions of ancient Stoic- or Stoically inclined- statemen in order to demonstrate the possibility, within its historical context, of Stoic justice in warfare. The Stoic just war theory answers problems and criticisms from other positions on natural law, virtue ethics, and just war. A minor theme of this project attempts to develop an education program in Stoic just war theory based on the ancient S

The recent popularity of sex reassignment surgery is logically untenable and immoral when understood in the light of Kantian philosophy. From a Kantian perspective of synthetic a priori judgments, I argue that a biological male cannot rationally claim to “feel like a woman inside.” As a male, any female is part of the noumenal world and cannot be known apart from perception. The statement “I feel like a woman inside” assumes all women feel the same on the inside. Kant’s explanation of the noumenal and phenomenal excludes the possibility of knowing that all women or men feel the same inside because it is impossible to know the noumenal world or the thing in itself. I argue that Kant’s moral principle of universality would conclude sex reassignment surgery would lead to contradictions and absurdities. If all men everywhere universally had the operation to look like their perception of a female, the end of the human race would soon follow; therefore, a Kantian would conclude sexual reassignment surgery is immoral.

Boghossian, Peter & James Lindsay. How to Have Impossible Conversations: A Very Practical Guide. NY: Lifelong Books, 2019. Kindle. 234 pp. $16.99

Seung-hoon Jeong discusses in his paper global action thrillers about the war on terror. He highlights the biopolitical abjection of counterterrorist agents from their state agencies. This abjection ends up either self-reaffirming in the manner of a sovereign agent (the Bond series) or terrorizing their sovereign system (the Bourne series), while both are trapped in the vicious cycle of terror and counterterror. More notable is the “mind-game” sci-fi genre. Source Code, among others, stages a loop of a traumatic counterterrorist mission with retroactive causality, a closed circuit of neoliberal productivity and pathological abjection in a video-game narrative. The time-travel motif here, however, ultimately “undoes” sacrifice, problematically sacrificing the ethics of sacrifice. Finding no exit from the sovereign system, the abject agent against it embraces the perpetual present of actions including undoing traumas. This reinforced reaffirmation of sovereign agency underlies Hollywood’s new ideology as seen in many other post-Source Code films.

Seung-hoon Jeong discusses in his paper global action thrillers about the war on terror. He highlights the biopolitical abjection of counterterrorist agents from their state agencies. This abjection ends up either self-reaffirming in the manner of a sovereign agent (the Bond series) or terrorizing their sovereign system (the Bourne series), while both are trapped in the vicious cycle of terror and counterterror. More notable is the “mind-game” sci-fi genre. Source Code, among others, stages a loop of a traumatic counterterrorist mission with retroactive causality, a closed circuit of neoliberal productivity and pathological abjection in a video-game narrative. The time-travel motif here, however, ultimately “undoes” sacrifice, problematically sacrificing the ethics of sacrifice. Finding no exit from the sovereign system, the abject agent against it embraces the perpetual present of actions including undoing traumas. This reinforced reaffirmation of sovereign agency underlies Hollywood’s new ideology as seen in many other post-Source Code films.

Climate change has been show to be caused by humans. Human-centric behaviors have affected the world to the extent that many believe we have entered a new geologic epoch. This epoch— the Anthropocene—has prompted exploration into the ethical relationship between humans and the rest of the world. We know that a purely anthropocentric ethical system of values has lead ecological imbalance and environmental destruction, and that a non-anthropocentric (or humancentric) ethical system of value would be better suited for maintaining and regaining a habitable environment. However, past conceptions of non anthropocentrism have relied on abstract conceptions of value that fail to create a useful and practical ethical system. A look into the views of indigenous cultures provides another conception of non-anthropocentrism grounded in the concept of relational values. Relational values emerge out of indigenous systems of knowledge, which are grounded in and supported by indigenous origin stories and cosmologies. These systems of knowledge are the product of thousands of years of observing the functioning of the natural world, and the efficacy and practically of the derived values are proven through generations of lived experience that embodied those values to great success. In order to integrate such values into the mainstream, we must overcome the institutionalized historical biases designed to oppress and diminish indigenous cultures and values. This can be done by integrating a land-based educational approach to learning, where the entire history of relations within a place or community is critically analyzed and discussed. If this can be done, then the foundation will be set for modern society to develop the necessary relational principles needed for avoiding perpetuating the same issues that resulted in the Anthropocene.

As individuals, how should we understand our personal complicity in climate change related harms? In this thesis, I argue that the predominant way we think of complicity within the Western moral paradigm—that is, as a distribution problem—is inadequate in helping us understand the nature of our complicity in climate change related harms. This inadequacy, in turn, psychologically hampers individual citizens residing in high-emitting nations of the Global North from effective and sustainable social and political engagement with climate change. To address the inadequacy and obstructions that result from it, I follow the discussion between Christopher Kutz and Iris Marion Young as they respectively build alternative conceptions of collective accountability (for Kutz) and collective responsibility (for Young) within the Western philosophical tradition. After situating their approaches in light of climate change, I gesture, as a conclusion, towards several ways we may begin to shift our understanding of complicity practically in our personal, social, and political lives.

This thesis arose out of a moment of discord, while an environmental philosopher was eating blackberries in the middle of a blizzard in Missoula, Montana. What follows is an attempt to bridge the gap between our principles and our practices, by asking the questions: What does ethical eating look like? Is it possible within our current industrial food system? and If not, what needs to change? Responding to the publication of the 2019 EAT-Lancet report, this essay moves beyond thinking of ethical eating as “healthy” and “sustainable” and challenges the networks of suffering and labour that we take for granted every time we sit down to eat. This essay tells the truths of animals’ living conditions, migrants’ working conditions, and the history of inequitable transcultural relations that has brought us one of our most popular food staples: bananas. Telling these (hi)stories is a partial attempt to overcome the alienation that is a defining characteristic of our current food system. Then, utilising Steven Vogel’s notions of (social) practices and our responsibility for them, and Joan Tronto’s ethics of care, this essay attempts to show how consumer, producer, and policy maker can all do better to mitigate the suffering inherent in our current food system—the industrial food complex. I then discuss three solutions to improving our food system: transparency, auditing, and localisation. Finally, I give the reader an idea of what ethical eating might look like. I call upon my own experience of ethical eating over the past year to help illuminate some of the limitations of our current framework and encourage a “participation” approach on the individual level. I conclude that overcoming the alienation of the industrial food complex will require eating where one is and developing institutionalised networks of practices that compliment this individual practice by making it accessible in our communities.

I attempt to understand what is meant by community by grounding the analysis in Raymond Williams’ historical definition. From this, I work the criteria of community as described by Williams so to determine their precise meaning and primacy. I attempt to show why community must be small in size while arguing that humans are in a community with nonhumans. Building upon this move, I take up an argument for the role of place in community formation. This preceding inquiry is meant to prime an analysis of both virtue ethics and literature, specifically an application of Martha Nussbaum’s Central Capabilities to Terry Tempest Williams’ Refuge and Henry David Thoreau’s Walden. In this, I make the case that human flourishing is possible when one is in an ecosystemic community with nonhumans present. This is to say that nonhumans impact other imperative goods in a serious way. Following from this, I provide a moral constructivist account of intrinsic value.

Seung-hoon Jeong discusses in his paper global action thrillers about the war on terror. He highlights the biopolitical abjection of counterterrorist agents from their state agencies. This abjection ends up either self-reaffirming in the manner of a sovereign agent (the Bond series) or terrorizing their sovereign system (the Bourne series), while both are trapped in the vicious cycle of terror and counterterror. More notable is the “mind-game” sci-fi genre. Source Code, among others, stages a loop of a traumatic counterterrorist mission with retroactive causality, a closed circuit of neoliberal productivity and pathological abjection in a video-game narrative. The time-travel motif here, however, ultimately “undoes” sacrifice, problematically sacrificing the ethics of sacrifice. Finding no exit from the sovereign system, the abject agent against it embraces the perpetual present of actions including undoing traumas. This reinforced reaffirmation of sovereign agency underlies Hollywood’s new ideology as seen in many other post-Source Code films.

For Israel, terrorism has plagued the nation since its beginning. Terrorism rears its ugly head in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons; however, in both the United States and Israel, Islamic extremism has presented itself as the largest threat. Since its birth as a nation, the United States has been involved in numerous conflicts, from the Revolutionary War to World War II and beyond. These wars were fought between nation-states and traditional powers, but since the attacks on 9/11, the United States finds itself in a new kind of conflict against a different kind of enemy. As a conflict between a nation-state and an ideological group, it is unlike anything the United States has participated in before. On the other hand, Israel has spent most of its history battling Islamic extremism, even beyond its time as an official state. Ultimately, this thesis explores the approaches of the United States and Israel take against radical Islamic terrorism and seeks lessons to be learned from Israel to further solidify the United States' dominance against terrorist threats. Military might and diplomacy have been enough for the United States to be successful in the past but those techniques are not proven against an ideology like Islamic extremism, which is so radical that its followers strive to be martyred for it. Until now, the United States led the rest of the world in military and intelligence capabilities but under pressure from this immediate and continuous threat, understanding how to adapt to the everchanging fight against terrorism will be crucial.

The nature of this project is to have a clearer understanding of Aristotle’s views on women and their role in the polis. To do this, this paper will discuss various texts written by Aristotle — mainly the Politics and Nicomachean Ethics — as a way of understanding the core of what Aristotle wrote regarding virtue, reason, morality and the political structure of a well functioning city-state. After showing Aristotle’s core conceptions of how all of these faculties work together to form the polis, this project will move into an analysis of how Book I of Aristotle’s Politics — primarily the capacities of women in the polis as set by what I will call the Authority Claim — can be interpreted. The next chapter will discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each viewpoint in an effort to show that although valid under some criteria, each fails to fully explain Aristotle’s view of women’s status within the polis. Once these interpretations have been shown to be incomplete in nature, this paper will argue that although Aristotle creates a narrative that seems to degrade women as being inferior to men, he does not exclude them from being a part of the political life of the polis. This is an important distinction because women make up half of the free citizenry of the polis. With women being able to engage in politics through the alternate interpretation of the Authority Claim given in this paper, the overall structure, and very nature, of Aristotle’s political theory takes on a new meaning.

Seung-hoon Jeong discusses in his paper global action thrillers about the war on terror. He highlights the biopolitical abjection of counterterrorist agents from their state agencies. This abjection ends up either self-reaffirming in the manner of a sovereign agent (the Bond series) or terrorizing their sovereign system (the Bourne series), while both are trapped in the vicious cycle of terror and counterterror. More notable is the “mind-game” sci-fi genre. Source Code, among others, stages a loop of a traumatic counterterrorist mission with retroactive causality, a closed circuit of neoliberal productivity and pathological abjection in a video-game narrative. The time-travel motif here, however, ultimately “undoes” sacrifice, problematically sacrificing the ethics of sacrifice. Finding no exit from the sovereign system, the abject agent against it embraces the perpetual present of actions including undoing traumas. This reinforced reaffirmation of sovereign agency underlies Hollywood’s new ideology as seen in many other post-Source Code films.

Space colonization is the act of permanently achieving human habitation off planet Earth. This is an important consideration for Humanity’s future, as we continue to run out of space and resources on Earth, with an ever increasing population. Colonizing another planet would allow new places to live, as well as vast new resources available. A big consideration in attempting space colonization is the impact it would have on the colonists both their mental and physical health. This research project will test if it is ethically just to subject humans to the negative physical and psychological effects of space colonization. The end goal of the project is to determine if the benefits of colonizing space at this time out ways the many drawbacks and pitfalls. POSTER PRESENTATION AIR FORCE ROTC UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH AND LEADERSHIP PRESENTATION

This paper offers a novel argument against the eating of meat: the zoopolitical case for vegetarianism. The argument is, in brief, that eating meat involves the disrespect of an animal’s corpse, and this is respect that the animal is owed because they are a member of our political community. At least three features of this case are worthy of note. First, it draws upon political philosophy, rather than moral philosophy. Second, it is a case for vegetarianism, and not a case for veganism. Third, while it is animal-focussed, it does not rely upon a claim about the wrong of inflicting death and suffering upon animals. The paper sets out the argument, responds to two challenges (that the argument is merely academic, and that the argument does not go far enough), and concludes by comparing the case to Cora Diamond’s classic argument for vegetarianism.

Under what conditions does the killing of a nonhuman animal qualify as euthanasia? In this paper, I elaborate an original nonprescriptive definition of nonhuman animal euthanasia which avoids the conceptual confusions surrounding the use of this expression. Such a definition imposes strict limitations on the notion of nonhuman animal euthanasia. On the one hand, the nonhuman animal whose life is ended through an act that legitimately qualifies as euthanasia is normally a sentient domestic animal. On the other, the painless and merciful nature of the termination of a nonhuman animal’s life is a necessary but not sufficient condition for it to count as a genuine instance of nonhuman animal euthanasia.

As of 2018, the U.S. began developing “a shared understanding of the risk and benefits of this technology before deciding on a specific policy response. We remain convinced that it is premature to embark on negotiating any particular legal or political instrument in 2019.” The DOD stated that “Human beings should exercise appropriate levels of judgment and remain responsible for the development, deployment, use and outcomes of DOD AI systems.” With our investigation, we predict that accountability for AI that is predetermined will fall on the person who oversees the process, while deterministic AI will fall on whoever the AI is based off if there is no one to oversee. There is no current U.S. policy on the application of AI. The U.S. is starting to put a greater emphasis on the development of artificial intelligence but has yet to create policies on the application (Chambliss, 2019). Within the Armed Forces, AI has the means to kill people based on the given information it receives from human or automated input, and if the input is incorrect or there is other missing information, no one can be held liable, which is unethical and a cause for concern and lawsuits against the U.S. (Gregg, 2019). Due to a lack of U.S. policy regarding artificial intelligence, our research group looked to the policies of our allies towards development of a policy that would be beneficial for the U.S. and ethical for its citizens (Greguric, 2016). Original: POSTER PRESENTATION; AUDIO added when event went online only.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a technique that is being used to increasingly automate aviation processes. The slow cleansing of pilots from the cockpit seems to be the next logical step based on the past, i.e. the removal of the navigator career field from commercial and military aviation. However, our team sees glaring problems with this progression based on historical examples (Boeing’s 737 MAX program) and the worries of the future (non-human initiated weapons deployment). The goal of our research is to slow the implementation of AI into the aviation community due to its current lack of technical progress as well as the unparalleled human grasp on complicated decision making. Original: POSTER PRESENTATION; Update: Became POSTER with AUDIO when event went online only. AIR FORCE ROTC UNDERGRADUATE

Sarah Kane’s Blasted has been analyzed from various perspectives that address the layers of destruction it exposes. From the questioning of its title and meaning, to the unravelling of the protagonists’ abusive relationship, the analyses have emphasized the depiction of vulnerability as the defining human trait that Jean Ganteau observes in contemporary British literature. However, a key aspect has been overlooked in the critical response to the play: for Kane vulnerability does not equal helplessness, but rather stands in opposition to it. Hence, this article concentrates on how Blasted formulates a new understanding of vulnerability that fits Judith Butler’s later redefinition of such notion as a trigger for resistance. It argues that, facing gender-based trauma, Kane dismantles the conditions that allow for a patronizing configuration of vulnerability in space by relocating the victim to an actual battlefield. Following Sarah Bracke’s conception of governmental security as resilient, the article explores Kane’s multisided articulations of violence, vulnerability and trauma. It traces human relations as well as the literal rupture of space. From the hostile environment of a warzone, the notions of victimhood and fragility become rearticulated to undertake the responsibility of survival, questioning our passivity and ethical duties towards Others.

Sarah Kane’s Blasted has been analyzed from various perspectives that address the layers of destruction it exposes. From the questioning of its title and meaning, to the unravelling of the protagonists’ abusive relationship, the analyses have emphasized the depiction of vulnerability as the defining human trait that Jean Ganteau observes in contemporary British literature. However, a key aspect has been overlooked in the critical response to the play: for Kane vulnerability does not equal helplessness, but rather stands in opposition to it. Hence, this article concentrates on how Blasted formulates a new understanding of vulnerability that fits Judith Butler’s later redefinition of such notion as a trigger for resistance. It argues that, facing gender-based trauma, Kane dismantles the conditions that allow for a patronizing configuration of vulnerability in space by relocating the victim to an actual battlefield. Following Sarah Bracke’s conception of governmental security as resilient, the article explores Kane’s multisided articulations of violence, vulnerability and trauma. It traces human relations as well as the literal rupture of space. From the hostile environment of a warzone, the notions of victimhood and fragility become rearticulated to undertake the responsibility of survival, questioning our passivity and ethical duties towards Others.

“Genocide” appears commonly in critical animal studies literature and sparsely in philosophy to describe human-caused violence against nonhuman beings. However, such uses of the term have rarely been informed by relevant work in genocide studies, nor otherwise formally substantiated. This thesis explores what is at stake when employing the term and proposes a model for appropriate application to nonhuman contexts. Claudia Card’s notion of genocide as social death allows for the consideration of nonhuman animals as victims of genocide. Social vitality is important to the lives of some nonhuman animals and its forcible diminishment results in social death for those nonhuman groups. Thus, instances of violence that inflict social death among nonhuman animals are genocide. By recognizing that nonhumans are, in fact, rendered victims of genocide through human violence against them, we challenge the anthropocentric bias that is fundamental to all genocidal perpetration.

Within this paper, it is shown that certain ethical assumptions are implicit within the claim that certain kinds of evil exist. When taken in tandem with the moral argument for the existence of God, these assumptions can be arranged in such a way as to provide a contradiction. To avoid this contradiction, I posit a non-existential alternative to direct inductive arguments from evil, but the non-existential alternative gives rise to novel objections. When considering their respective ethical implications, both the existential and non-existential variations of direct inductive arguments fail. Since any direct inductive problem of evil must be either existential or non-existential, without an adequate response to such objections, the success of direct inductive arguments is greatly diminished.

Sarah Kane’s Blasted has been analyzed from various perspectives that address the layers of destruction it exposes. From the questioning of its title and meaning, to the unravelling of the protagonists’ abusive relationship, the analyses have emphasized the depiction of vulnerability as the defining human trait that Jean Ganteau observes in contemporary British literature. However, a key aspect has been overlooked in the critical response to the play: for Kane vulnerability does not equal helplessness, but rather stands in opposition to it. Hence, this article concentrates on how Blasted formulates a new understanding of vulnerability that fits Judith Butler’s later redefinition of such notion as a trigger for resistance. It argues that, facing gender-based trauma, Kane dismantles the conditions that allow for a patronizing configuration of vulnerability in space by relocating the victim to an actual battlefield. Following Sarah Bracke’s conception of governmental security as resilient, the article explores Kane’s multisided articulations of violence, vulnerability and trauma. It traces human relations as well as the literal rupture of space. From the hostile environment of a warzone, the notions of victimhood and fragility become rearticulated to undertake the responsibility of survival, questioning our passivity and ethical duties towards Others.

In this thesis, I many related questions regarding the fluctuating relationships between national communities and outsiders, specifically in the case of refugees and stateless peoples. After discussing the meanings of these terms, such as the definition and identities of the refugee and the nation-state, I delve into a philosophical examination of individual rights, particularly rights that are defended by nation-states, and the relationships between national communities and those existing outside of those communities whose lives may depend on their acceptance into a nation-state. I philosophically outline the likely experiences of refugees as they are faced with statelessness, including what forces push against them, what actions taken by what groups have collaborated to ensure their inability to gain rights, and what attitudes contribute to these actions. My aim throughout this thesis was to understand and analyze the philosophical concepts of statelessness, exclusion, and rights.

Within this paper, it is shown that certain ethical assumptions are implicit within the claim that certain kinds of evil exist. When taken in tandem with the moral argument for the existence of God, these assumptions can be arranged in such a way as to provide a contradiction. To avoid this contradiction, I posit a non-existential alternative to direct inductive arguments from evil, but the non-existential alternative gives rise to novel objections. When considering their respective ethical implications, both the existential and non-existential variations of direct inductive arguments fail. Since any direct inductive problem of evil must be either existential or non-existential, without an adequate response to such objections, the success of direct inductive arguments is greatly diminished.

Sarah Kane’s Blasted has been analyzed from various perspectives that address the layers of destruction it exposes. From the questioning of its title and meaning, to the unravelling of the protagonists’ abusive relationship, the analyses have emphasized the depiction of vulnerability as the defining human trait that Jean Ganteau observes in contemporary British literature. However, a key aspect has been overlooked in the critical response to the play: for Kane vulnerability does not equal helplessness, but rather stands in opposition to it. Hence, this article concentrates on how Blasted formulates a new understanding of vulnerability that fits Judith Butler’s later redefinition of such notion as a trigger for resistance. It argues that, facing gender-based trauma, Kane dismantles the conditions that allow for a patronizing configuration of vulnerability in space by relocating the victim to an actual battlefield. Following Sarah Bracke’s conception of governmental security as resilient, the article explores Kane’s multisided articulations of violence, vulnerability and trauma. It traces human relations as well as the literal rupture of space. From the hostile environment of a warzone, the notions of victimhood and fragility become rearticulated to undertake the responsibility of survival, questioning our passivity and ethical duties towards Others.

In his article, "The Eventualization of Political Thinking: From the Arab Revolutions to the Trump Era", Óscar Barroso maps out some of the most important contemporary philosophies of the Event: those of Rancière, Badiou, Hardt and Negri and Žižek. These philosophies of the event are defined as post-humanist political proposals that entrust emancipation not to the realization of anthropological ideas but to the emergence of difference. Examining the pessimistic interpretation that these authors make of what has happened since the events of 2011, the author questions whether too much trust has been placed in the supposed virtue of difference and, as a response, he proposes a reappropriation of humanism.

In her article “Courage and Passion in the Reading of the Later Foucault of the Cynics” Inmaculada Hoyos Sánchez aims to determine what role the passions played in the courage of the truth of ancient Cynicism, for which purpose she analyses the lectures Foucault gave at the Collège de France in 1984. The hypothesis put forward in this article is that what makes Cynic courage different from other manifestations of the courage of the truth, such as Socratic courage, is that it specifically involves the eradication of shame, a passion that is social and public in character, rather than an overcoming of the fear of dying. Thus, Cynical askesis, on which courage is based, entails work not only on the passions themselves but on all the passions of humanity, so that Cynic courage points to another world. In the final part of the study, the author poses an open question as to whether the courage of the truth can or cannot be an active affective force.