scholarly journals A Utopian Way of Thinking about Work: Tracing William Morris’ Ideas on the Concept of Work

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-167
Author(s):  
Selcan Peksan

Social theories present a wide range of criticism regarding the modern organization of work, yet little on the nature of humans and what an ideal concept of work would be. Favoring a utopian way of thinking about work, this paper inspects William Morris’ understanding of work and the basic dynamics of work organization in his vision of the society of the future. This article has chosen to perform an in-depth analysis of his utopian novel News from Nowhere due to the transformation of work laying at the core of the book. By tracing the key patterns of work in Morris’ future utopia which he called Nowhere, this paper proposes the concept of work that articulated in Morris’thought as a means of gaining an alternative model regarding the recent debates about the future of work. In particular, the paper scans Morris’ arguments on labor to demonstrate how Morris’ view presents an inspiring approach for our era. This hopefully opens up the prospect of thinking about the ideal work of the future one wants to achieve.

2004 ◽  
Vol 57 (2) ◽  
pp. 182-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
David F. Ford

The future of Cambridge University is discussed in the context of the current British and global situation of universities, the main focus being on what the core concerns of a major university should be at this time. After raising issues related to core intellectual values (truth-seeking, rationality in argument, balanced judgement, integrity, linguistic precision and critical questioning) and the sustaining of a long-term social and intellectual ecology, four main challenges are identified: uniting teaching and research fruitfully; interrelating fields of knowledge appropriately across a wide range of disciplines; contributing to society in ways that are responsible towards the long-term flourishing of our world; and sustaining and reinventing collegiality so that the university can be a place where intensive, disciplined conversations within and across generations can flourish. The latter leads into questions of polity, governance and management. Finally, the inseparability of teaching, research and knowledge from questions of meaning, value, ethics, collegiality and transgenerational responsibility leads to proposing ‘wisdom’ as an integrating concept. The relevant sources of wisdom available are both religious and secular, and in a world that is complexly both religious and secular we need universities that can be places where both are done justice. Given the seriousness and long-term nature of the conflicts associated with religious and secular forces in our world, it is especially desirable that universities in their education of future generations contribute to the healing of such divisions.


2021 ◽  
pp. 134-161
Author(s):  
Michael E. O’Hanlon

This chapter examines various areas of defense technology, with a philosophy that might be described as “physics for poets.” The chapter provides information on the contemporary state of technology and projections for the future. It reviews broad trends across many areas of military technology, including cyber and artificial intelligence, as well as robotics, directed energy, and stealth. With a goal of making these important subjects accessible to a general audience, it suggests methods by which nonspecialists can make inroads into understanding them. The chapter surveys a wide range of military technologies, with a particular eye toward assessing whether collectively they can be used to revolutionize warfare in the coming years and decades. Ultimately, the chapter's category-by-category examination of military technology employs the same basic framework in the 2000 Technological Change and the Future of Warfare. The core of that book was an analysis of ongoing and likely future developments in various categories of military-related technologies.


1996 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daryl Michael Scott

On 4 June 1965, President Johnson, in his famous speech at Howard University, endorsed preferential treatment for black Americans and the idea of equality of results. To justify a departure from the ideal of a colorblind state, Johnson offered an alternative that might be called black exceptionalism. In response to the widely held view that blacks, like immigrants, should receive no assistance from the state in their quest to enter the mainstream of society, Johnson asserted that the oppression suffered by blacks made them unique. At the core of his justification was the plight of the black family in slavery and freedom and its impact on black children. “When the family collapses,” he stated, “it is the children that are usually damaged.”1 With words freighted with importance for the future of liberalism, he articulated a new conception of equality, one enforced by an activist state: “We seek not just freedom but opportunity–not just legal equity but human ability–not just equality as a right and a theory but equality as a fact and as a result.” Toward this end, he called for a conference to chart the future of racial liberalism.


2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Aleksander Samek

The article highlights the possibility of joint impacts of probation officers of both divisions (family and criminal) performing tasks in one family. The above issue was analyzed in three aspects: historical, organizational, legal and methodological. Conclusions that arise after analysis lead to believe that the guardianship system has developed in several directions, and the role of probation officers is currently differently understood by judges, probation officers and the society. Probation officers perform a very wide range of tasks related to the implementation of court decisions. Their preparation for the profession has been standardized. Graduates of pedagogical, psychological, sociological and legal faculties may become probation officers. Year-long apprenticeship is aimed at deepening the knowledge of the future probation officer in the field of work methodology. The author believes that the issue of cooperation of probation officers performing tasks in one family should become the subject of in-depth analysis, both legal and methodological. Well-prepared and implemented cooperation between probation officers of both divisions can bring a measurable increase in effectiveness of rehabilitation-educational actions carried out in an open environment.


AI & Society ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jakob Mökander ◽  
Ralph Schroeder

AbstractIn this paper, we sketch a programme for AI-driven social theory. We begin by defining what we mean by artificial intelligence (AI) in this context. We then lay out our specification for how AI-based models can draw on the growing availability of digital data to help test the validity of different social theories based on their predictive power. In doing so, we use the work of Randall Collins and his state breakdown model to exemplify that, already today, AI-based models can help synthesise knowledge from a variety of sources, reason about the world, and apply what is known across a wide range of problems in a systematic way. However, we also find that AI-driven social theory remains subject to a range of practical, technical, and epistemological limitations. Most critically, existing AI-systems lack three essential capabilities needed to advance social theory in ways that are cumulative, holistic, open-ended, and purposeful. These are (1) semanticisation, i.e., the ability to develop and operationalize verbal concepts to represent machine-manipulable knowledge; (2) transferability, i.e., the ability to transfer what has been learned in one context to another; and (3) generativity, i.e., the ability to independently create and improve on concepts and models. We argue that if the gaps identified here are addressed by further research, there is no reason why, in the future, the most advanced programme in social theory should not be led by AI-driven cumulative advances.


2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 312-321 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diana Moreira ◽  
Fernando Barbosa

Abstract. Delay discounting (DD) is the process of devaluing results that happen in the future. With this review, we intend to identify specificities in the processes of DD in impulsive behavior. Studies were retrieved from multiple literature databases, through rigorous criteria (we included systematic reviews and empirical studies with adult human subjects), following the procedures of the Cochrane Collaboration initiative. Of the 174 documents obtained, 19 were considered eligible for inclusion and were retained for in-depth analysis. In addition, 13 studies from the manual search were included. Thus, a total of 32 studies were selected for review. The objectives/hypotheses, results, and the main conclusion(s) were extracted from each study. Results show that people with pronounced traits of impulsivity discount rewards more markedly, that is, they prefer immediate rewards, though of less value, or postponed losses, even though they worsen in the future. Taken together, the existing data suggest the importance of inserting DD as a tool for initial assessment in conjunction with measures of addiction and stress level, as well as the consideration of new therapies.


This book opens a cross-regional dialogue and shifts the Eurocentric discussion on diversity and integration to a more inclusive engagement with South America in private international law issues. It promotes a contemporary vision of private international law as a discipline enabling legal interconnectivity, with the potential to transcend its disciplinary boundaries to further promote the reality of cross-border integration, with its focus on the ever-increasing cross-border mobility of individuals. Private international law embraces legal diversity and pluralism. Different legal traditions continue to meet, interact and integrate in different forms, at the national, regional and international levels. Different systems of substantive law couple with divergent systems of private international law (designed to accommodate the former in cross-border situations). This complex legal landscape impacts individuals and families in cross-border scenarios, and international commerce broadly conceived. Private international law methodologies and techniques offer means for the coordination of this constellation of legal orders and value systems in cross-border situations. Bringing together world-renowned academics and experienced private international lawyers from a wide range of jurisdictions in Europe and South America, this edited collection focuses on the connective capabilities of private international law in bridging and balancing legal diversity as a corollary for the development of integration. The book provides in-depth analysis of the role of private international law in dealing with legal diversity across a diverse range of topics and jurisdictions.


2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 136-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sung-Ae Lee

To displace a character in time is to depict a character who becomes acutely conscious of his or her status as other, as she or he strives to comprehend and interact with a culture whose mentality is both familiar and different in obvious and subtle ways. Two main types of time travel pose a philosophical distinction between visiting the past with knowledge of the future and trying to inhabit the future with past cultural knowledge, but in either case the unpredictable impact a time traveller may have on another society is always a prominent theme. At the core of Japanese time travel narratives is a contrast between self-interested and eudaimonic life styles as these are reflected by the time traveller's activities. Eudaimonia is a ‘flourishing life’, a life focused on what is valuable for human beings and the grounding of that value in altruistic concern for others. In a study of multimodal narratives belonging to two sets – adaptations of Tsutsui Yasutaka's young adult novella The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and Yamazaki Mari's manga series Thermae Romae – this article examines how time travel narratives in anime and live action film affirm that eudaimonic living is always a core value to be nurtured.


2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raja R. Gopaldas ◽  
Faisal G. Bakaeen ◽  
Danny Chu ◽  
Joseph S. Coselli ◽  
Denton A. Cooley

The future of cardiothoracic surgery faces a lofty challenge with the advancement of percutaneous technology and minimally invasive approaches. Coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) surgery, once a lucrative operation and the driving force of our specialty, faces challenges with competitive stenting and poor reimbursements, contributing to a drop in applicants to our specialty that is further fueled by the negative information that members of other specialties impart to trainees. In the current era of explosive technological progress, the great diversity of our field should be viewed as a source of excitement, rather than confusion, for the upcoming generation. The ideal future cardiac surgeon must be a "surgeon-innovator," a reincarnation of the pioneering cardiac surgeons of the "golden age" of medicine. Equipped with the right skills, new graduates will land high-quality jobs that will help them to mature and excel. Mentorship is a key component at all stages of cardiothoracic training and career development. We review the main challenges facing our specialty�length of training, long hours, financial hardship, and uncertainty about the future, mentorship, and jobs�and we present individual perspectives from both residents and faculty members.


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