Social Transformations in India, Myanmar, and Thailand: Volume II: Identity and Grassroots for Democratic: Progress

This book explores the multifaceted obstacles to social change that India, Myanmar and Thailand face, and ways to overcome them. With a collection of essays that identify common challenges and salient features affecting diverse communities, this volume examines topics from subnational and local perspectives across the peripheries. The book argues that identity-based divisions have created a system of oppression and political contention that have led to conflicts of different kinds, and hence serving as the common cause of different social issues. At the same time, such issues have created space for marginalized groups around the world to call for change. The volume recognizes that social transformation comes into being through an active process of deconstructing and reconstructing shared norms and ideas. The contents in this book are thus centered around two focuses: The impacts of identities and grassroots. Both of these aspects are at the heart of each country's transformations towards democracy, peace, justice, and freedom. Under this framework, the chapters cover a diverse range of common issues, such as, minority grievances, gender inequality, ethnic identity, grassroots power in alliance-making towards community peace, recovery and resilience, digital freedom, democracy assistance and communication, and bridging multiple divides. As identity-based cleavages are daily lived experiences for individuals and communities, it requires grassroots initiatives and alliances as well as democratic communication to tackle obstacles at the root. Ultimately, the book convinces readers that social transformations must begin at the individual to communal level and local to national level. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022.

Taking on the Ethical Obligation of Technology Competency in the Academy: An Empirical Analysis of Practice-Based Technology Training Today

Today's lawyers must be technologically competent, per Model Rule of Professional Conduct 1.1. Law schools and law firms were keenly aware of this expectation and summarily responded. While law firms offered more professional development opportunities, law schools began offering various courses focusing on technology skills. These courses have increased and evolved over time as the curriculum has changed with the technology. First, we present the evolution of ethical requirements surrounding legal technology competency and offer a description of the lawyering competency models most discussed today. We then review data about technology trends at the most innovative law firms and examine curricular offerings in technology or technology-related fields at American Bar Association-accredited law schools. Next, we offer a comparative analysis of multiple empirical studies to determine whether key areas of technology training were reflected in the legal education curriculum and were sufficient to meet ABA ethical expectations. Finally, we recommend solutions law schools may implement to increase technology instruction, services, and infrastructure to meet ethical standards. ABA-accredited schools should implement these recommendations in light of ABA Standard 301(a), the forecasted changes planned by the National Conference of Bar Examiners, and the new virtual practice landscape set by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Vaccine Hesitancy Among African Americans

The limited participation of African Americans in clinical trials has been a topic of discussion among medical and scientific researchers for some time. With the testing of coronavirus vaccines, this discussion has continued, particularly given the disproportionate impact of the virus on members of the African American community. With the public health goal of achieving widespread or "herd" immunity, the concept of "vaccine hesitancy" has also been addressed with regard to the population in general, and in relation to the African American community, among others. Vaccine hesitancy has been reported among groups from healthcare workers to rural residents to the poor. As is the case with all segments of society, African Americans are not monolithic. However, there are aspects of the issue of vaccine hesitancy which are unique and specific to the African American community in the U.S. In particular, the nature of the information about the coronavirus itself and about the vaccine, and importantly, the increasing availability of the information about the Tuskegee experiment, Henrietta Lacks, and other cases, along with the prevalence of misinformation and disinformation on aspects of science, such as that involving vaccines, are relevant to understanding the nature of vaccine hesitancy among African Americans.

Clocked by the pandemic! On gender and time in Rousseau's Émile

Pandemic disruptions to schooling threw into sharper relief the entanglements of economy, gender norms, and education that had been there, and throughout the modern world, all along. The particular entanglement this paper aims to unravel is the reliance of education on a certain kind of attentiveness, historically provided by a feminized teaching force and mothers, that itself rests on the cultivation of particular sensibilities regarding time.

Using Descriptive Inquiry to Make and Do Philosophy in School: Creating Shared Educational Principles at City-As-School during the Coronavirus Pandemic

This piece describes how the faculty of City-As-School used Descriptive Inquiry to generate shared educational principles during the 2020-21 school year during the coronavirus pandemic. City-As-School is a public experiential learning school in New York City serving older adolescents seeking an alternative to traditional high school. Descriptive Inquiry is an inquiry process developed by Patricia Carini and faculty at the Prospect School in Bennington, Vermont, that supports educators in understanding children and their own educational practice to teach for human dignity, ethical well-being, and holistic growth. The piece provides an introduction to City-As-School and briefly describes how faculty members have used Descriptive Inquiry to foster whole school professional learning and growth. The piece then details how the faculty used Descriptive Inquiry to surface and concretize shared educational principles during the 2020-21 school year, a poignant example of Patricia Carini's notion of "making and doing philosophy in a school."

Viral modernity? Epidemics, infodemics, and the ‘bioinformational' paradigm

Viral modernity is a concept based upon the nature of viruses, the ancient and critical role they play in evolution and culture, and the basic application to understanding the role of information and forms of bioinformation in the social world. The concept draws a close association between viral biology on the one hand, and information science on the other – it is an illustration and prime example of bioinformationalism that brings together two of the most powerful forces that now drive cultural evolution. The concept of viral modernity applies to viral technologies, codes and ecosystems in information, publishing, education and emerging knowledge (journal) systems. This paper traces the relationship between epidemics, quarantine, and public health management and outlines elements of viral-digital philosophy (VDP) based on the fusion of living and technological systems. We discuss Covid-19 as a ‘bioinformationalist' response that represents historically unprecedented level of sharing information from the sequencing of the genome to testing for a vaccination. Finally, we look at the US response to Covid-19 through the lens of infodemics and post-truth. The paper is followed by three open reviews, which further refine its conclusions as they relate to (educational) philosophy and the notion of the virus as Pharmakon.

"To honour cleanness and shame filth”: medical facemasks as the narrative of nationalism and modernity in China

As the Covid-19 pandemic has swept across the world, the wearing of medical facemasks has become a hot topic on social media. In China, the relevant discourses are entangled with codes of medical science, national self-esteem and appropriated modernity. These discourses can be dated back to the narrative established by Dr Wu Lien-teh, the great fighter in the Manchurian plagues of 1910–1911 and 1920–1921. This paper reveals that Wu and his colleagues used different strategies when displaying to the Western world their achievements in the anti-plague battle and when proving the effectiveness of the Western medical and hygienic system to Chinese people. Wu and his colleagues used metonymies, analogues and metaphors on or related to medical facemasks to illustrate the possibility of building a modernised nation with sovereignty. Because the construction of a sanitary system in China has always been labelled as a patriotic movement (Rogaski, Ruth. 2004. Hygienic Modernity: Meanings of Health and Disease in Treaty-Port China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 285–298), the wearing of medical facemasks has constituted an important part of the narrative of nationalism and hygienic modernity. This discourse continues to play a significant role in today's campaign against the coronavirus.

Ubuntu and COVID-19: A philosophical reflection

The emergence of COVID-19 has entered into and re(dis)arranged every aspect of human life. The pandemic has not only raised concerns about the extent to which hitherto-taken-for-granted human activities are no longer viable, and in some cases have become the enemies of humans, but have also created serious crises in values. There are also new fears, disarranged mental attitude and the need to develop the appropriate critical response that can be applied in helping humanity come to terms with the pandemic and its post-era. This is where Ubuntu comes in, and my interest is premised on three considerations: First, to position the defining concern of our time as the recognition that all nations of the world should contribute, should have a say in issues of global concern. Second, embedded in Ubuntu is a worldview that focuses humanity on their human-humane-essence. Third, Ubuntu will provide the needed anchor if all human activities will not fall prey to a techno-centric world. Highlighting the essential values embodied in Ubuntu is not just to register a philosophical enquiry;it is crucial to a renewed appreciation of philosophy itself as a constant, critical exploration into whatever issues confronting humanity. Certainly, a novel pandemic that is redefining human activities needs philosophy, given its foundational role in addressing fundamental human concerns, wherever they arise. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023. All rights reserved.

Artificial Intelligence in Covid-19

This book deals with the advantages of using artificial intelligence (AI) in the fight against the COVID-19 and against future pandemics that could threat humanity and our environment. This book is a practical, scientific and clinically relevant example of how medicine and mathematics will fuse in the 2020s, out of external pandemic pressure and out of scientific evolutionary necessity.This book contains a unique blend of the world's leading researchers, both in medicine, mathematics, computer science, clinical and preclinical medicine, and presents the research front of the usage of AI against pandemics.Equipped with this book the reader will learn about the latest AI advances against COVID-19, and how mathematics and algorithms can aid in preventing its spreading course, treatments, diagnostics, vaccines, clinical management and future evolution. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.

The semiotics of the anti-COVID-19 mask

The pandemic spreading of the COVID-19 virus has led to the global need to introduce, often by law, the medical face mask, which can undoubtedly be considered as "the object of 2020.” In a few months, most human faces around the world in the public space, but also often in the private space, have been covered with various kinds of protective masks. Very soon, these objects have become the centre of several discursive productions, going from medical reports to media coverage, from artistic representations to ironic memes. The medical face mask was not totally new in the west, where it was already present in special circumstances, like dentists' studios or emergency rooms, and was quite familiar in the east, especially in Japan, China, and Korea. Yet such massive introduction changed the meaning of the medical face mask in every context. Old habits were reconfigured or clashed with the new ones, giving rise to a novel syntax, semantics, and pragmatics of the human face in conjunction with this device and in the context of the global pandemic. The present paper offers an introduction to a semiotic mapping of such radical cultural change and its likely consequences.

Philosophy of education in a new key: Who remembers Greta Thunberg? Education and environment after the coronavirus

This paper explores relationships between environment and education after the Covid-19 pandemic through the lens of philosophy of education in a new key developed by Michael Peters and the Philosophy of Education Society of Australasia (PESA). The paper is collectively written by 15 authors who responded to the question: Who remembers Greta Thunberg? Their answers are classified into four main themes and corresponding sections. The first section, ‘As we bake the earth, let's try and bake it from scratch', gathers wider philosophical considerations about the intersection between environment, education, and the pandemic. The second section, ‘Bump in the road or a catalyst for structural change?', looks more closely into issues pertaining to education. The third section, ‘If you choose to fail us, we will never forgive you', focuses to Greta Thunberg's messages and their responses. The last section, ‘Towards a new (educational) normal', explores future scenarios and develops recommendations for critical emancipatory action. The concluding part brings these insights together, showing that resulting synergy between the answers offers much more then the sum of articles' parts. With its ethos of collectivity, interconnectedness, and solidarity, philosophy of education in a new key is a crucial tool for development of post-pandemic (philosophy of) education.

The philosophy of the human person curriculum in the Philippines: Basis for COVID-19 Model of Curriculum Revision

Identifying gaps and overlaps in the Introduction of Philosophy of the Human Person (IPHP) curriculum in the Philippines is a great concern that makes it relevant. This ascertains its scopes based on sufficiency in terms of themes, goals, and aims;principles and criteria used for content selection;and proposing a COVID-19 Model for future revision. Using content analysis, it utilized pre-determined codes on the themes, goals, and aims of social studies;and the principles and criteria for content selection. Four clusters of themes were sufficiently integrated with the IPHP curriculum in a spiral progression;three other clusters showed gaps with no integration. The 10 social studies goals were sufficiently integrated that remains consistent in a semester with a decrease in distribution due to is spiraling complexities of contents. Six aims were sufficiently integrated with no existing gap with a negligible overlap in personal development. The principles of the curriculum were sufficiently used as well. As the semester progresses, the utilization of these principles decreases toward the second quarter, which needs attention for a future revision, using a COVID-19 Model. These results have a practical impact on curriculum makers to see the nitty-gritty in crafting or revising a curriculum to ensure the balance of content integration, realignment of concepts and skills, and continuity. These results also promote social impact in understanding our humanity as juxtaposed in the IPHP taught in the senior high school curriculum in the Philippines.

Reading Chinese anti-COVID-19 pandemic narratives on facemasks as the art of disaster governance: a semiotic and biopolitical survey

In China and around the world, the global spread of COVID-19 has made wearing a facemask more than a pragmatic or aesthetic individual-level issue: it has instilled in people deontic value. In Chinese anti-epidemic narratives, the semiotic ideology of wearing a facemask has been closely related to collectivism, patriotism and, to a certain degree, nationalism. The facemask not only serves as a protective biomedical device but also as a cultural, political and spatial sign of the line of defence against disorders of the natural system, to establish the order of the social system. This paper argues from the perspective of semiotics and life politics that such mask narratives have effectively helped China prevent the large-scale spread of the epidemic across the nation and have served as a means of collective psychotherapy, paradoxically transforming individual separation into collective spiritual cohesion. Previous semiotic studies of disaster have not paid much attention to plagues or disaster governance discourse, between which biomedicine plays an important role. Thus, this paper aims to shed light on how biomedicine works with politics in coding and decoding the relationship between the natural system of the plague and the social system of governance.

All you need is love: the relationship between agape and work outcomes

PurposeThe purpose of this paper was to lay the necessary conceptual and empirical groundwork of agape in organizations. Specifically, the authors reviewed literature on agape;advanced formal definition of agape;explained the relationship of agape with related variables;developed a scale to measure agape and provided evidence of its reliability and construct validity;showed how agape uniquely predicted employee outcomes beyond transformational leadership;and showed how agape compensated for the lack of transformational leadership.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a survey with 214 working executives who rated their manager on transformational leadership and agape behaviours, and later indicated their own work attitudes. Next, the authors conducted a 20-min between-subjects vignette experiment with 147 business management students who were provided with a description of a supervisor and asked to indicate their work attitudes under the supervisor.FindingsThe authors advanced an operational definition and a scale to measure agape. The findings of this study indicated that agape was a unidimensional construct with high reliability. It had significant positive relationships with followers' job satisfaction, faith and loyalty, team commitment, satisfaction and risk-taking;explained incremental variance in employee outcomes beyond transformational leadership;and compensated for the lack of transformational leadership.Research limitations/implicationsThe present research has the potential to inform recruitment, selection, training, promotion and performance evaluation decisions in organizations.Originality/valueThe authors responded to calls for developing a clear and consistent conceptualization and operationalization of agape for improving scholarly research and leadership training and development.

An Introduction to Biopolitics and Shock Economy of COVID-19: Medical Perspectives and Socioeconomic Dynamics

This edited volume on the biopolitics and shock economy of COVID-19 crisis embraces a wide spectrum of topics such as shock economy, medical perspectives on COVID-19, application of geospatial technology, infectivity, immunity, and severity of the disease, as well as ontology of the disease emergence as important factors for adoption of relevant biopolitical measures, sociocultural obstacles, COVID-19-induced transaction costs, social support and resilience of inhabitants of marginalized areas, as well as business resilience factors, entrepreneurship, and digital transformation. Through each chapter of this book, the authors, with their expertise in the theme they picked, have attempted to unfold some emerging aspects in the COVID-19 crisis which could benefit not only the academics but also the institutional, social, economic, developmental, and health policy-makers as well as the health practitioners on the ground. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

The Ontological Nature and Cause of COVID-19: A Philosophical Analysis

In this chapter, the ontological nature and cause of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is investigated. The outbreak of the novel COVID-19, coupled with the fact that a global pandemic occurs virtually every century, has brought to the fore the need to interrogate the ontological nature and cause of the COVID-19 pandemic. There have been different conspiracy theories flying all over the globe about COVID-19 since its outbreak in Wuhan city of China and subsequent global spread. One matter of considerable public concern about the theories is the uncorroborated claim that the new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) is manufactured in a laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology as a biological weapon. This implies that the coronavirus is an artificial creation rather than a natural occurrence. Against this background, it is argued that the coronavirus is a natural phenomenon and that the resultant COVID-19, like other previous pandemics, is a privation of being. This chapter draws heavily on metaphysical works of Aristotle, Saint Augustine, and Thomas Aquinas to show that four types of cause, namely, material cause, formal cause, efficient cause, and final cause, are ontological components of every being in the natural world and that COVID-19 is not a being per se but rather a privation of being or good in a being. It is contended further that COVID-19 lacks a formal cause, and thus it cannot exist in isolation from a being (a human person or an animal) that has a formal cause. COVID-19 and other pandemics originally occur when a being is corrupted or its good nature is deprived of. It is concluded that to forestall further pandemic outbreak, humanity must stop upsetting and disrupting the natural order of things by desisting from eating certain animals and birds that are unfit for human consumption, or eating foods contaminated by such animals and birds. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Employing Humanistic Teaching Approaches to Promote Student Wellbeing in Higher Education

Given the increasing levels of stress, strain and anxiety brought about by "ongoing challenges of living independently, autonomous learning and peer competition [initially for better grades, and thereafter, for better jobs/careers] [as well as the] … financial challenges established by high tuition and living fees”, tertiary-level students from across the world have sadly been experiencing significant wellbeing issues, including mental health complications. There is therefore an urgent need for educators to employ innovative means of engaging students to neutralise stressful situations that may arise from these global tertiary educational trends, as well as the increasingly demanding pressures generated as a result of needing to adjust to new academic environments and teacher–student relationships in a current COVID-19, as well as a future post-pandemic, world. To that end, this chapter will attempt to put forward the suggestion that humanistic teaching approaches would be ideally suited to address this serious malady inflicting the higher education sector. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022.

Rethinking Prison Training in Colombia Froma Philosophical Perspective

In Colombia, overcrowding has historically been one of the main problems in prisons and penitentiaries, a fact that became more evident during the health crisis unleashed by COVID-19, as well as the way in which it violates the fundamental human rights of individuals deprived of their liberty. On the other hand, and from an educational perspective, another of the problems faced by the penitentiary system of the country is the reduced offer of training projects that have an impact on the development of the moral dimension of people in prison conditions, a shortcoming that, added to many others, hinders resocialization and explains the high recidivism in crimes.In this article, and supported by a reading of some of Dewey's works dedicated to thinking about human nature, its moral character and the characteristics of an authentic moral education, we advocate for an ethical education for people in prison conditions where the interest in transforming the conditions in which they develop and the creation of scenarios that favor the development of their capacity to reflexively examine experience through philosophy converge.Now, the conceptualizations presented here were precursors of a research process that began at the Universidad Nacional Abierta y A Distancia in the year 2021 under the guidance and accompaniment of Ph.D. Jose Barrientos-Rastrojo, professor at the University of Seville and director of the International Boecio Project, and in the framework of which stoicism workshops are developed in prisons oriented by students from different programs of the School of Education and the School of Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities. This research project led to the adaptation of the workshops to virtual and distance modalities for the work with different vulnerable groups and its impact is currently being evaluated by different degree works associated with this research.