Issues in Interdisciplinarity 2020–21/Power in Cosmetic Surgery

Evidence

Part 1

Evidence in Racial Inequality in the US Education System

Introduction

Before the Brown v. Board of Education ruling of 1954, schools were segregated and defended as "Separate but Equal"

Nearly seven decades after Brown v. Board, racial inequality still permeates educational structures in the United States, as made apparent by the persistence of an achievement gap between African American students and their caucasian peers. This chapter aims to understand why, despite the fact that education is often perceived as the ground for breaking down social inequalities , it appears instead to perpetuate them. By looking at the evidence used in Sociology, Psychology and Economics to explain racial inequalities, this chapter strives to present a holistic understanding of the issue.

Socio-economics

Socioeconomics, a sub-discipline of Economics, studies the relationship between economic activity and social processes . Socioeconomics has a distinct way of understanding and explaining racial inequality in the US Education system through its use of econometric evidence.

A Pennsylvania State University researcher documented that the school funding gap between the top 1% district and the average-spending school district at 50th percentile widened by 32% between 2000 and 2015 . Another study found quantitative evidence of the racial isolation in Atlanta, New York, and Detroit schools – cities with significantly high degrees of racial segregation by neighbourhood. In Atlanta where ‘black’ schools were 56% poorer than ‘white’ schools compared to 15% poorer in Detroit, the test-score gap between black and white children is nearly 5-grade levels compared to 2-grade levels in Detroit . Reardon concluded that the larger the poverty rate between black and white schools, the larger the achievement gap. Thus, the issue of inequality in education stems down to economic inequality .

The average African-American earns 62 cents for every $1 earned by the average white American and in 2016 , ⅓ of black American children were living in poverty compared to 11% of white children . Using the plethora of quantitative economic evidence, Socioeconomics argues that unless black children are liberated from poverty and able to attend well-funded schools, racial inequality in education will persist.

Sociology

According to sociologists, colour-blind theory is key to understanding the persistence of racial inequality in the US education system: they argue de jure equality of educational institutions, serves as a justification for inaction, as those with the power to enact change turn a blind eye to the persistence of de facto inequality.

Inherent inequality in standardised testing

Standardized testing is favoured for its objective, merit-based way of evaluating students. However, evidence disproves this supposed objectivity: a 2003 study shows how pretest phases with high-scoring students (who are typically white) determine which questions make up the SATs used for university applications. Another paper points to similar issues, with tests focusing not on critical thinking but rather knowing certain conventions (such as knowing ">" means “more than”). As such, the “race-neutral” approach to testing dismisses key differences between races such as distinct social capital and cultural capital, despite repeated demonstrations of their crucial roles in students’ achievement.

Testing systematically segregates learning

Evidence also shows that making these tests central to consequent decision-making, results in segregated learning, exacerbating inequalities in education. Indeed, teaching in schools with low scores – often schools with a majority of black and brown students – is forced to focus more on test preparation at the expense of other parts of the curriculum such as music and art, and enriching ways of teaching are set aside and replaced by methods which place all focus on providing correct answers. Moreover, within ethnically diverse schools, standardised testing is used to separate students into ability classes, resulting in African American students being disproportionately assigned to lower ability groups, where myriad factors contribute to low-quality teaching.

Psychology

Inequality as a result of the teacher's behaviours?

In Psychology, studies have evaluated the correlation between the behaviour of teachers towards their students and the achievement gap. For instance, psychologists have explored racial discrimination in teachers, who, overall, evaluate black students more harshly than their white peers. They also tend to be less positive about their academic abilities and attribute lower grades when they speak Black English. Moreover, researchers have indicated that teachers often refer non-white students to special-needs testing, whereas their white peers are more frequently assigned to gifted-and-talented testing. Although the results of these studies evidence discrimination based on race, psychologists who explored implicit bias suggested that such attitudes were unconscious .

Implicit bias and stereotypes

Implicit racial associations, one form of implicit bias, refers to all automatic cognitive responses people attach to a certain racial group. They are often measured by the Implicit Association Test, in which subjects are asked to press reaction keys associated with a certain image as quickly as they can. Results showed that 68% of respondents expressed discriminatory views towards black people , which evidenced the tendency of making negative implicit associations with black people. The study infers that since the average American expresses discriminatory implicit assumptions, an average American teacher is therefore likely to have biases which are detrimental to Black students.

Stereotypes, in addition to causing bias, affect students’ behaviour. An experiment found that African Americans scored lower than white students when they thought the test assessed individual capacities, but scored equally when the test was presented as a simple experiment. This implies that when assessed on their individual capacities, African American students are reminded of the negative stereotypes that weigh on their culture and the fear of confirming these stereotypes if they fail gives them additional, penalizing anxiety. Similarly, researchers observed that African-American students had poorer results when asked to record their race on the exam paper, demonstrating that black students' confidence was undermined by pejorative stereotypes.

The racial self-esteem issue has also been assessed in much younger children , which suggests that the stereotype-confidence problem comes from prejudices deeply anchored in society.

Conclusion

When formulating explanations for continued racial inequality in US education, each discipline draws upon distinct forms of evidence resulting in distinct conclusions. Socio-economists, relying heavily on quantitative data, argue social-economic status determines whether a student will be high-achieving; emphasising increased funding and more diverse neighbourhoods as viable solutions. Whilst Sociologists agree socio-economic status plays an important role in achievement, they have acquired further qualitative evidence demonstrating the pertinent role which family background plays in producing the achievement gap. Finally, psychologists argue that internalised biases, both in teachers and students, are central to inequality in education. They then advocate the necessity to educate teachers on implicit bias and its impact on the treatment of students.

While sociology bridges both disciplines, no study integrates all viewpoints. This may be due to confirmation bias – researchers tend to focus on what they are looking for and are often reluctant to validate evidence collected with radically different methods. Typically, socio-economists may not recognise the importance of implicit bias, pointing to the subjectivity of studies relying on qualitative data.

Although each discipline presents competing claims for the best approach to address the issue of racial inequality in the education system, this chapter argues that those differences can work simultaneously to contribute to a positive solution. Evidence from each discipline must be addressed in policy-making, for their individual contributions bring to light the multidimensional nature of the problem, requiring an interdisciplinary approach to be addressed efficiently. Conversely, efforts to reduce the inequalities can only be partial and ultimately unsuccessful.

Evidence in the fight against anti-vaccine movements

Introduction

Despite the common impression that anti-vaccination movements emerged through the Internet, they arose as soon as vaccination started being popularised. The vaccine against smallpox in the 1800s faced immediate hostility, seen as ‘unchristian’ and a violation of people’s personal liberty. Although the ways of expressing and spreading this opposition have evolved, the motives behind it today are still the same, opposing public health and medicine to civil liberty and choice.

Biology

Biological evidence promotes vaccination: the larger the vaccinated population, the better.

Yellow Fever

Yellow Fever is a disease prevalent in Africa that can be fatal, involving kidney deterioration and jaundice. It does not have any specific treatment and is responsible for 30,000 deaths every year, with a Case Fatality Rate of 50% or higher in severe cases. Being spread by mosquitoes, it cannot be eradicated, hence the importance of vaccination to reduce the number of its victims. Research has shown that the 17D (YF-17D) vaccine is efficient after 10 days in 95% of the patients, lasting for up to 30-35 years. Although the WHO recommends a single vaccination, study has shown that its efficiency is limited (with only 50.4% of Malian children still seropositive after 3-5 years), suggesting a second administration is required to reach an 80% immunity of the population, preventing yellow fever outbreaks.

Some evidence in the biological domain however shows harmful effects of the vaccine. Several pathologies have been linked to this vaccination, such as transverse myelitis , encephalitis , and peripheral facial paralysis . Nevertheless, the vaccine remains the most efficient way to prevent yellow fever and its adverse effects are very low, going from 0.4 to 0.8 cases per 100 000 vaccines.

Vaccine efficacy

Vaccine efficacy is calculated according to the difference between vaccinated and unvaccinated people who catch a disease. According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, IPV is 90% effective against polio for two doses (99-100% for three doses), making the US polio-free since 1979, the vaccine against chickenpox is 90% effective (two doses), and MMR vaccine is about 93% effective for one dose (97% for two doses) at preventing measles, leading to a 99% reduction of cases in the US.

Biological quantitative evidence therefore largely promotes (compulsory) vaccination, as the vaccines administered often have very high efficacy rates and help stop the spread of (or even eradicate) diseases. The few biological evidence used by the anti-vaccine movements often aims to show the causality between certain vaccines and diseases or infant deaths. However this evidence is often flawed or irrelevant statistically, compared to the number of lives saved by vaccination – preventing 2 to 3 million deaths every year - raising nevertheless ethical questions about the 'collateral damage' of vaccination.

Ethics

Ethics focus mainly on qualitative evidence concerning people's freedom and safety, presenting arguments that tend to support optional vaccination.

Philosophy

Philosophy in Ethics prompts reflection on what can and cannot be done, representing anti-vaccination movements' main focus. Their concerns oppose utilitarianism and consequentialism, highlighting the risks of vaccination for individuals rather than the overall population's safety. The example of Andrew Wakefield and the Lancet MMR autism fraud illustrates this. His study in the ’90s falsely stated that autism was a side effect of the MMR vaccine, resulting in an epidemic of rubella in the USA, showing the dangers of anti-vaccination movements, harming the population's health. Furthermore, anti-vaccine activists question the government’s right to force an individual's vaccination to attain herd immunity, despite refusal, leading to cases like Henning Jacobson's trial in the 20th century. Anti-vaxxers perceive vaccination as an invasion of autonomy and freedom, especially of children's rights, asking when a parent’s objection can be overcome.

Religion

Religion is another central matter in Ethics, the freedom of belief being a fundamental right. Vaccines were long seen as evil, being considered « unnatural ». Christianism for instance rejects vaccines containing embryonic origins derived from aborted foetuses, considered morally incompatible. Islam on the other hand, is opposed to certain vaccines that contain traces of pork gelatine, not being halal. Those reasons are hard to overcome in movements to fight anti-vaccination as they are more than evidence but beliefs.

Internet and Social Media

Finally, Ethics are involved in the role of the Internet and social media, which represents an increasing threat for vaccination. 43% of websites on Google associated to the key words « vaccination » or « immunisation » are led by anti-vaccination movements supported by accounts like « Beware the Needle » on Youtube or Instagram, spreading fake news that feed conspiracy theories. These websites represent dangerous content within anyone's reach, discrediting vaccination and governments' intentions, failing their ethical responsibility to inform, in addition to endangering the population.

Public Health

Public health as a discipline is the science of promoting the population’s health as a whole. It plays a crucial role in solving tensions in the evidence proposed in various disciplines, but also within them. Overall, public health professionals try to fight the anti-vaccine movement.

Compulsory vaccines

Governments can enforce mandatory vaccines to avoid the resurgence of a disease by promoting herd immunity, based on evidence relying on principles commonly used in Public Health. The “harm principle”, developed by John Stuart Mill, declares that unvaccinated people could be a danger to society as spreaders of the disease. Additionally, the “precautionary principle” states that preventive measures must be taken when a country is threatened by a virus. These principles apply utilitarianism, prioritising the well-being of the majority rather than the individual's. Hence, evidence in biostatistics, showing that punctual negative effects are negligible in front of the overall success of vaccines, mirrors public health’s goal of assuring the population’s safety (sometimes at the expense of the individual's).

However, vaccine exemptions for medical, religious, and philosophical reasons exist, based on the right of the individual's choice, although their validity varies widely. In the United States, 43 states allow religious exemptions, while only 15 allow philosophic exemptions. Overall, public health does not consider much personal choice – which is one of the arguments used by anti-vaccination movements –, and some countries like the US seek to consider ethics more by imposing less compulsory vaccines.

Education

In the fight against anti-vaxxers, education plays a crucial role. Today 70% of parents go to the internet to educate themselves on vaccination, but the overwhelming amount of misinformation leads to a confused population, often deprived of valid evidence. To educate families, trained healthcare providers remind the dangers of certain diseases and explain herd immunity as well as the process of vaccines' commercialisation.Online education campaigns have also proved to be efficient, with 66% of parents and 88% of pregnant women raising awareness and checking up on their children’s vaccination after having seen such campaigns in Australia. These strategies reduce interdisciplinary conflicts, simply by educating people instead of depriving them from their free will.

Conclusion

Altogether, the fight against the anti-vaccination movement is far from finished, due to contradictory evidence between disciplines. Today, as the Covid-19 vaccines are facing “vaccine hesitancy” and misinformation,it is necessary for Public Health to gain the trust of the population in order to reach enough vaccination coverage.

Evidence in "The Resource Curse" and democratic instability in Africa

Introduction

In this chapter, we explore how two disciplines rely on different types of evidence, which leads to contradicting conclusions on whether the "Resource Curse" is the main contributing factor to the continued democratic instability in Africa.

Countries by GDP (Nominal) in 2014

The economist Richard Auty introduced the idea of the “Resource Curse” and investigated countries that were rich in natural resources, but failed to grow economically. The “curse” describes how these countries often experience increased secessionist conflicts, poverty and reduced GDP growth, and anti-democratic effects. These components interact: authoritarian governments will be less able to resolve domestic conflicts, leading to an increased chance of conflict within the state; meanwhile, the reduced economic growth makes it harder to resolve such conflicts, and the impacts of conflict generate further economic chaos and decline. The widespread effects of this vicious cycle impact many African states.

Political science

In political science, research on the "Resource Curse" and democratic instability has been focused on utilising quantitative evidence, such as statistical analyses and models.

In 2001, the political scientist Michael Ross performed a quantitative analysis to investigate whether oil impedes democracy. He used pooled time-series cross-national data from 113 states between 1971 and 1997 and considered how the two independent variables, Oil and Minerals, impacted the Regime of a country. He used the control variables: Income, Islam, OECD membership, Regime_t-5, and 26 dummy variables, which account for unique factors from each year such as the effects of the Cold War. This study concluded that the oil-impedes-democracy claim is “both valid and statistically robust”. Ross confirmed the validity of this conclusion with the support of his statistical evidence.

A review of the developments in evidence since Ross' study shows the widespread quantitative evidence which supports this claim. Statistical models confirmed the relationship between natural resource wealth and political survival, as well as this effect being dependent on the strength of the initial political power in place. Following panel data analysis, the idea of a "conditional resource curse" was presented, providing evidence for the long term effect of oil wealth. In 2012, Anderson and Ross responded to criticisms concerning the short timespan covered by the data in previous studies by stating that oil wealth only began to have an anti-democratic effect in the 1980s, when developing country governments began to capture previously foreign-owned oil rents, thus accumulating wealth for themselves.

Further studies have suggested that British colonialism has had a positive influence on democracy. British rule was considered a “learning experience” for subsequent democracy, due to the introduction of reforms that facilitated democracy such as bureaucratic structures or the rule of law. Statistical analysis showed that there is a significant positive association between former colonial influence and democratic tendency, as well as countries with democratic historical backgrounds being less prone to democratic collapse.

History

Map of European colonies and the modern African borders

A comparison of the distribution of ethnic groups in 1880 vs a map of European colonies after the Berlin Conference

In history, evidence is based on the analysis of primary and secondary sources. This results in a narrative formed by particular historical events, thus the research methods and evidence produced are essentially qualitative.

Looking at qualitative evidence from the historical past of many African countries, we see that the natural resources of a state do not induce or inhibit political instability, but rather the instability is a result of historical and cultural factors such as colonialism, ongoing conflicts, corruption and economic recession.

The ongoing conflict results from the differences of ancestral, religious, and language backgrounds between ethnic groups. Historical analysis of the General Act of the Berlin conference shows that the dissimilarity within countries is owed to the “Scramble for Africa”, in which 13 European nations drew arbitrary borders as seen in an attempt to keep one another’s colonies in check. There was no acknowledgement of native African territories or ethno-regional factors (shown in the comparative maps). This engendered conflicts, as previously, dispersed communities had checks and balances to limit authoritarian power, but were then grouped together in an unprecedented environment of corruption and authoritarianism. Furthermore, qualitative surveys have shown the long-term civil, economic and emotional consequences of ethnic partitioning.

Oppressive colonial governments hindered the introduction of the values of democracy, by not holding elections and creating a legacy of autocratic rule. Imperialist regimes also made it hard for post-colonial rulers to establish authority democratically. During the post-colonialist era, bureaucracies emerged, which worsened the negative impacts of pre-colonial clientelism. As a result, post-colonial, modern bureaucracies transformed into neopatrimonial states. In this context, the extraction of natural resources was principally directed to benefit the patrimonial rule in power (personalised state) under the cover of an impersonal bureaucratisation. In consequence, the evidence highlights how, from a historical perspective, political instability has appeared as an inevitable outcome of inheriting a flawed system from colonial rule, which had a greater impact on political instability than oil wealth and the "Resource Curse".

Conclusion

Political Science generally maintains the view that oil wealth hinders democracy and supports this with statistical evidence, while History speculates that there are other factors to acknowledge, such as colonialism, supported by more qualitative evidence. While experts from each discipline will agree that both oil wealth and colonialism play a part, the conflict arises in the weighting of these factors as the different causes for Africa's political instability. This problem cannot be solved by simply comparing the evidence produced, because one approach offers a qualitative exploration of history whereas the other utilises a quantitative method of calculation, leading to a conflict in evidence.

Methods exist that attempt to quantify qualitative data by calculating the frequencies of particular themes from the set of data. This quantification has benefits, such as ease of analysis, providing answers to questions such as “To what degree ...?”, and allowing some comparison with quantitative data. However, it cannot be taken as the sole result of a qualitative investigation as it can undermine the impact of qualitative data , due to the differences in research methods and the data produced.

Understanding the main contributing factors to the continued democratic instability in Africa is important for creating a stable political environment, and so will be of interest to a number of parties. However, the differing evidence on this topic may lead to contradictory findings and incompatible attempts to resolve the issue. Here, we have recognised that the conflicting opinions arise from different types of evidence in History and Political Science, which are quantitative and qualitative respectively, and thus inherently incomparable by nature. Although they cannot be compared directly, we hope this chapter stimulates discussion on how both can be incorporated in both the recognition and resolution of problems.

Evidence in the Research and Diagnosis of Depression

Introduction

Depression is a mental illness that causes a constant feeling of dejection and low mood, which will strongly influence the daily lives of those affected. Nearly 1 in 10 people suffer from it, and the number of people touched increased considerably during the COVID-19 pandemic. Consequently, it is an important societal issue that requires research to understand its causes and prescribe an effective treatment. To achieve this, one must understand the development of this disease: it can be triggered by many factors of different origins which vary from one person to another.Thus, studying these evidences in the diagnosis of depression through the lens of different disciplines will allow us to obtain explanations on the implementation of the multiple treatments for this illness and to recognize how these evidences, while united, could result in a more accurate diagnosis.

Disciplines Perspectives

Biology

Biology as a discipline is concerned with the study of living organisms. From this perspective, evidence relating to depression is collected at different levels: the molecular level, as well as the circuitry in neural systems.

The study of depression concerning the circuity of neural systems often focus on the prefrontal cortex, amygdala and hippocampus which are considered to be responsible for maintaining emotional stability. Malfunctions within these areas are seen to be key to understanding the neurochemistry of depression. Quantitative evidence is collected with neuroimaging techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging and functional fMRI. These techniques provide visualisations both anatomically and functionally, allowing for the connection of the aforementioned brain sections factors towards depression.

In regards to the study of molecular mechanisms, most have focused upon neurotransmitters, which act as chemical messengers. Depression has often been connected towards imbalances concerning these neurotransmitters. Evidence for their study is largely quantitative, with methods ranging from the measurement of levels to advanced imaging techniques involving radiolabelling.

In regards to treatment, techniques are not yet sophisticated enough to diagnose on an individual case basis. However, the study of neural interconnections has allowed for the creation of medical depression treatments.For example, antidepressant medications to treat depression are known to act upon neurotransmitters to alleviate depression.

Psychology

File:Beck test.png

Beck's depression questionnaire

Psychology is the study of the human mind and how it influences the behaviour of a person. One of the approaches to collect evidences is through interviews based on open questions between a patient and a psychiatrist. These qualitative evidences can then be used to build a coherent list of the depressive symptoms patients frequently exhibit. This list is found in the DSM-5, a renowned classification used for current diagnosis and future research. The Beck Depression Inventory will also be created from these evidences and the theory of cognitive distortion. It is a questionnaire of 21 questions that will measure the severity of a patient’s depression.

To validate newly observed symptoms, studies are conducted comparing patients diagnosed with depression to a control group.
The information generated from such studies can then be statistically analysed in order to provide quantitative evidence on the prevalence of particular symptoms but also psychological causes of depression, such as stress. This quantitative analysis is next combined with findings from the aforementioned forms of qualitative evidence. Connections are then made between the different forms of evidence. In turn, this enables the diagnosis of future patients to be done in a more accurate manner. 

These studies have also proven that the etiology of depression is largely defined by the diathesis–stress model. Some people are thereby more susceptible than others to depression.

Sociology

Sociologist conducting a study using participant observation

Sociology is a discipline which studies the interactions between individuals and their environment. According to the sociologist George Brown "depression is essentially a social phenomenon in the sense of being usually the result of a person's thoughts about his or her world". Thus, sociology is concerned with depression as a disease that can be explained with aspects of social life.

There are two types of sociological studies that are relevant to depression. The first examines the social elements that cause or enhances the probability of developing a mental illness, and the second looks at how society responds to these illnesses. In the course of their studies, sociologists use several methods. To obtain quantitative evidence, in order to better understand the social conditions that favor the appearance of these diseases, they will identify specific groups of individuals and question them through interviews or surveys. In addition, sociologists can also go into the field to obtain qualitative evidence through observations or by interacting with the group studied. By analyzing the results, this will allow them to target social factors that are highly correlated with incidents of depression, and to know the responses of the population to depression, how they define the disease and whether they choose to be cured and in which ways, thereby, to be able to guide the search for treatments. According to the evidence gathered, the best way to fight depression for sociologists would be to put in place social policies to reduce the pressure on the individuals concerned and to provide more support.

Evaluation of Evidences

Given how severe depression is, the issue of its diagnosis extends beyond simply accurately diagnosing depression in a patient, due to the wide range of symptoms between patients and factors for the disorder. However, despite major studies being conducted on this subject, the diagnosis of depression is often misunderstood, with the need for more communication between related disciplines.

Biological evidence is crucial for diagnosis as well as the development of treatments. However this approach to depression includes several limits. Firstly, the existence of certain anomalies within the brain do not necessarily imply they were involved in the development of depression within patients. Therefore, it can be difficult to draw causal relationships between particular brain structures and incidents of depression. Moreover, there are multiple types of depression and levels of severity which are not distinguishable at the biological scale. The distinction between them can only result from a psychological approach. Nevertheless, the psychological studies are based on the patient’s word which can not be completely reliable and objective. Some people tend to self-diagnose, resulting in their responses to questionnaires being biased by their own interpretation of their condition. Concerning quantitative evidences in psychology or sociology, an issue also lies in how they tend to result in wide spread generalisations which do not take account  the specificity of individual experiences within the area of mental health which can be a hindrance to the progress of research and diagnosis.

With each discipline having difficulties in tackling the diagnosis of depression, it is important for interdisciplinary dialogue to be conducted by combining the different forms of evidence within each discipline in order to build complex models to group biological and demographic parameters which can create diagnosis subjects and connect them to different treatments. For example, evidence of biological predispositions and demographic correlations are helpful in determining subtypes within depression. However, while these models have been attempted, there have been inadequate or unsuccessful replication studies. This can potentially be attributed to the different areas of focus within each discipline, making it hard to integrate all forms of evidence into one cohesive model.

Evidence in Mindfulness and personal development

Introduction

Mindfulness was first presented in the Buddhist Satipatthana Sutta and has since grown in popularity as a technique said to lead to personal development, such as increased emotional awareness.

Today, the question remains as to how effective mindfulness is in personal development.

This article explores the evidence for mindfulness, and the different disciplinary methodologies for collecting this evidence, across the disciplines of philosophy, neuroscience and psychology. Some tensions exist between these disciplinary perspectives, including the lack of conversation between disciplines, inconsistent definitions and understanding of mindfulness-practise, and conflicting methodologies for gathering evidence. These issues lead to intra and interdisciplinary struggles in the formation of evidence and consensus between academics.

Evidence across disciplines

Philosophy

The Satipatthana Sutta, the foundational text of mindfulness in philosophy, communicates the effects of regular mindfulness practise, including the overcoming of grief, suffering and rumination, and the attainment of Nirvana. The Satipatthana Sutta reached these conclusions using Guatama Buddha's personal experience of mindfulness. Early Buddhist texts claim that Guatama persistently meditated until he believed he had fully awakened. The evidence for the effectiveness of mindfulness was his Enlightenment.

Sam Harris is a renowned philosopher and neuroscientist who studies mindfulness.

In terms of modern philosophical thought, Sam Harris explains how mindfulness creates a state of mind which is "undisturbed", thus improving the "character of our experience, and therefore, the quality of our lives". Philosopher Joseph Goldstein believes mindfulness practitioners become more accepting, peaceful, and less selfish.

In this discipline, philosophers gather evidence for the effectiveness of mindfulness through their experiences of direct participation in the practice. In his work, Harris stresses his "2 years on silent retreat" spent studying with monks. This touches on the importance of the oral tradition in gathering evidence within Buddhist philosophy. Whether or not practitioners develop an undisturbed mind as a result of mindfulness, they believe it to be an efficient technique, as they trust the experiences of their mentors.

Thich Nhat Hanh is a Nobel peace prize nominated activist and monk, often considered the Father of Mindfulness.

Furthermore, from an eastern perspective, Thich Nhat Hanh is often considered the Father of Mindfulness. A monk since age 16, he describes mindfulness as a “miracle” by which “we master and restore ourselves,” drawing upon his decades of experience practicing mindfulness.

Overall, philosophers cite their qualitative experiences as evidence for the effectiveness of mindfulness, rather than referring to scientific research which is now available to them. Philosophers' preference for their own disciplinary evidence may be attributed to the ambiguity in defining mindfulness in other disciplines, and that the benefits of mindfulness- such as 'Nirvana'- are hard to measure quantitively in neuroscientific research.

Neuroscience

Quantitative neuroscientific evidence demonstrates the personal impacts of mindfulness. Such evidence is vital in understanding the relationship between mindfulness meditation, an individual's self-perception, and their emotional processing. Neuroscientists study what they define as formal mindfulness- individuals practise specific exercises meant to stabilise their awareness of the present.

Anatomically defined Default Mode Network, in which activity is affected through mindfulness meditation.

Neuroscientists use evidence of functional changes in brain activity to infer a causal relationship between mindfulness and cognitive processes relating to specific neural pathways. Berkovich-Ohana (2011) used electroencephalography (EEG) to compare three groups of mindfulness-meditators (long-term, intermediate, and short-term), with non-meditators. More experienced meditators had lower gamma wave frequency/activation in their Default Mode Network (DMN), a region linked to self-processing and 'mind-wandering'/attention. Mindfulness-practise also linked to enhanced gamma activity in posterior regions, including the temporal lobes, indicating heightened sensory awareness. All changes represented long-term brain functions, strongly observable in meditative states, but also visible during participants' resting states. This evidence suggests that the personal impact of mindfulness (e.g. emotional awareness/regulation) is the result of long-term changes in neural activity in the DMN and posterior regions, related to awareness and consciousness.

Holzel et al. (2010) studied structural brain developments in participants who partook in a Mindfulness-based stress reduction programme (MBSR), using MRI scans. The imaging indicated increased grey matter concentration (development of neurons and neural networks) in the left hippocampus and the posterior cingulate cortex of the MBSR group, associated with emotional processing, responsiveness to stress, and cognition and self-awareness, respectively. This research demonstrates the structural effects of mindfulness, corresponding with its impact on emotional regulation.

In contrast with philosophers, neuroscientists take a predominantly quantitative approach to mindfulness, which standardises participants personal development. Although a quantitative approach precisely measures the impacts of mindfulness, it does not encompass the subjectivity of the experience like philosophy does. Additionally, analysing changes in the brain fails to consider that the impacts of mindfulness may have varying behavioural manifestations across individuals.

Western Clinical Psychology

In contrast with philosophy and neuroscience, psychological studies utilise two different definitions of mindfulness. The first emphasises awareness- the individual focuses on their internal presence. The second definition details the intentional practice of openness and care towards others and oneself. These definitions of mindfulness are fundamental for developing evidence to demonstrate its effects on individuals. However, evidence from individual studies has found that aiming to measure mindfulness using a binary definition creates a multitude of divided results. Regardless, several psychological studies still demonstrate positive changes in behaviour, including increased hopefulness and decreased anxiety.

The methodology in gathering evidence for mindfulness within psychology is both quantitative and qualitative. One frequently used method of analysis is the Kentucky Inventory Mindfulness Scale (KIMS), which has a self-reporting evidence scheme, and is replicable, to enable efficient statistical analyses. The Mindfulness Awareness and Attention Scale (MAAS) is another questionnaire, which creates correlative understanding whilst incorporating qualitative methods through its' self-reporting schemes. Christopher et al. (2009) analysed the progress in personal development whilst examining the use and cross-cultural applications of western mindfulness using these methods. In examining Thai and US undergraduate students, they found that Thai students demonstrated a more cohesive understanding of mindfulness, as reflected in their KIMS results. This highlights different cultural approaches to mindfulness- the immersion of the practice in Thai culture, and the 'intermittent' mindfulness experienced in western psychology. The MAAS scale obtained similar results surrounding the two groups' personal development and their conceptualisation of mindfulness.

Differing definitions of mindfulness and methodologies within psychology alter the evidence created within the discipline; an exhibition of this is the contrasting results of a study performed by Carmody et al. (2009), which detail that the evidence of mindfulness can be 'disidentification' which opposes the evidence of decreased anxiety, the result of a study by Sears (2009). Furthermore, the combination of qualitative and quantitative methods used in psychology utilises techniques from philosophy, and the scientific method in neuroscience, in the attempt to grasp the personal effects of mindfulness. However, the hybrid methodology does not include different disciplinary perspectives which prevent a necessary broader conceptualisation.

Conclusion

The lack of communication between disciplines means that scholars don’t share a common definition of mindfulness, nor a shared understanding of its effects, leading to tensions between disciplines. Due to the different approaches to evidence in philosophy, neuroscience, and psychology, no single discipline can fully conceptualise the effectiveness of mindfulness. Different methodologies, aims, and definitions of mindfulness in each discipline's research are the root cause of this conflict. Mindfulness is, therefore, an interdisciplinary practice, and should be treated as such in the collection of evidence. This may be done by combining methodologies and the understanding of evidence across disciplines to fully appreciate how mindfulness affects personal development using both quantitative (standard questionnaires and brain scans) and qualitative data, which considers individuals' unique experiences with the practise.

Evidence in the Propagation of Digital Fake News

Introduction

Fake news is the collection of shocking, surprising and necessarily false stories that come across as news, often digital. The propagation of fake news has in recent years subverted political and social institutions, posing a threat to democracy and human unity. This case-study will observe the issue through an interdisciplinary lens and look at evidence research undertaken in psychology, sociology and economics. By comparing the different disciplinary perspectives on evidence in the propagation of digital fake news, it becomes clear that the most effective solutions to combat this worldwide threat will come from combining disciplinary approaches.

Evidence in Psychology

Psychology is the study of human behaviour and consists of biological, cognitive and social aspects. Research in this discipline focuses on the effects of one or more variables on one or more outcomes. Psychologists aim to look at how certain variables lead to a change in behaviour.

To do this psychologists most commonly conduct studies that can either be qualitative (case studies, interviews, etc.) or quantitative (quasi-experiments, true experiments). The results obtained are then used as evidence to support models, such as the idea of reconstructive memory and the misinformation effect, which is when information after the event interferes with memory of the original event. To provide evidence as to why people believe fake news, one study presented participants with six news reports including two fake ones. Interviewees were asked if they remember the events of the six stories. Almost 50% of the participants said they remembered the false stories, and even provided details about the fake event. This study suggests the extent to which people can believe fake news because they are recalled as real memories. It also shows that people are more likely to create a false memory if the event is aligned with pre-existing beliefs. Studies have also shown that people are more susceptible to fake news that is phrased in a simplistic way (e.g. immigrants are responsible for unemployment). Furthermore, if one lacks knowledge of the topic, researchers have shown that a motivational bias may play a larger role.

Evidence in Sociology

Sociology has been defined as 'the study of the development, structure, and functioning of human society'. Sociological analysis covers a wide range of social problems, changes, states of order and instability, and at different scales, from the family unit to society. It embraces critical theory as well as the scientific method of production of evidence.

In sociology, empirical evidence is in the form of either quantitative or qualitative data. Quantified data on social phenomena is conveyed through surveys, statistics and censuses. A large number of participants responding to closed questions allows for a large-scale analysis, representative of society. However, selection bias – such as an over representation of men or women – is a perennial issue in such studies. By contrast, qualitative data relies on unstructured, open-ended interviews. When analysing data, one can distinguish between independent and dependent variables.

Utilizing these methods, the Pew Research Center conducted a survey in 2016 sampling 1,002 adults 18 and older looking at factors that could increase the sharing of fake news. Goyannes and Lavin identified the dependent variable as the probability of sharing fake news and the independent variables as demographic (age, gender, political orientation, income) and situational (how often people access fake news, unconscious sharing of fake news, who is most responsible for preventing fake news). Using regression models to analyze the correlation between variables, they concluded that older, Republican men with a lower income are most prone to sharing fake news. Answers as to why results like these arise may be better approached with qualitative methods.

Evidence in Economics

Economics is the study of how 'individuals, businesses [and] governments...make choices about how to allocate resources' based on the assumption that all individuals act rationally. To gather evidence in the form of empirical results, the discipline applies statistical methods to economic theory and models, in a branch of economics known as 'econometrics'. Qualitative evidence is infrequently used within the discipline.

One of the main assumptions within economics is that firms want to maximise profit. Accordingly, many digital technology companies - from 'Big Tech' to online blogs - use advertising revenue models, since their largest source of revenue is from advertising. Quantitative evidence is collected on both ends of the advertising model, from the platform and from the advertiser, in order to optimise key performance indicators - that is, to maximise engagement and to achieve the most effective customer response to an advert. Similarly, beneficiaries of fake news include both the people that have adverts on websites containing fake news and the creators of the fake news. Fake news generates more attention than most news stories due to the strong reactions that it can produce, such as 'surprise, fear and disgust'. Hence, according to the assumptions of economics, there is an incentive for websites to spread fake news in order to direct traffic, and therefore revenue, towards their website or publishing platform. For example, the 'cost per click' advertising model illustrates how, if a fake news post is 'clicked' on, the publisher or owner of the website will receive revenue, demonstrating how the advertising ecosystem benefits from the propagation of fake news.

Conflicts of Evidence: informing policy-making

Each of these established disciplines undertakes very different approaches and methods with regards to producing evidence about the same issue. Although all three are labelled a social science, the outcomes of their individual evidence methods about this issue do not necessarily correlate.

There are clear tensions between the research methods undertaken to produce the evidence. Extrapolating results from psychology - i.e. humans do not always act rationally - contradicts a key assumption in economics; sociology because it assumes neither adds another dimension. A practical example of this is the limited impact of the enforcement by social media companies of 'flagging' posts identified as fake news. 'Flagging' assumes what economics presupposes, that the individual, as a rational actor, would naturally dismiss the post when confronted with a cautionary message. By contrast, the study of biases in psychology and social factors in sociology challenge this assumption by suggesting individuals and groups are far less independent than assumed.

Furthermore, the value of collaboration across disciplines is seen in the importance of scale in affecting each discipline's research progress. A sociology study may provide evidence about demographic behaviour on a smaller scale that cannot be extrapolated to apply to society as a whole, which is the default parameter of econometrics. The need for collaboration is also seen when evidence used and produced in psychology is often applied in economics to assess larger model assumptions from a more specific perspective.

Policy makers have recently begun to adopt an interdisciplinary perspective, as illustrated by the 2019 UK Government White Papers reassessing state regulation of social media. These suggest a framework led by a varied board of academic leaders: practical proof that the interdisciplinary approach towards solving this worldwide threat to public discourse is the most effective solution.

Evidence in Tariffs

This is the Wikibooks Chapter for ATK 2020. Evidence in Tariffs (with particular focus upon those implemented by the US from 2016 to 2020 in response to China's economic growth), analysed through the lenses of political science and economics.

Introduction

Tariffs are taxes on imports of goods or services, acting as trade barriers and regulating international trade. Tariffs were implemented by Trump in 2016 to shield America from cheap foreign imports. This was one of Trump's most important promises in the 2016 general election and led to him winning a substantial number of votes in 2 key swing states, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

In March 2018, Trump imposed tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports into the US to safeguard steel workers and those working in the aluminium industry by making American-made steel cheaper than foreign-made steel. As a consequence, US producers could raise their prices revitalizing the American manufacturing sector. The vast majority of economists are against Trump's tariffs on China but some political scientists may justify their use.

The use of economic tariffs by Trump in America to achieve political goals highlights tensions between the disciplines of economics and political science when it comes to using evidence to justify one's viewpoint. The use of evidence between the two disciplines differs in terms of the different methodologies used to collect evidence, the type of evidence (qualitative or quantitative) and the specific focus of the discipline (economic growth or national security). These differences lead to each discipline disagreeing on the value of tariff implementation.

Evidence Across Disciplines

Economics

The impact of tariffs can be determined using the tariff diagram as evidence. Imposing tariffs protects the domestic supply as the diagram depicts a reasonable surplus for domestic producers. However, the consumer surplus is smaller than if there was free trade, contrasting the positive view of tariffs held in political science. This has relevance to the US trade with China as over $550 billion worth of products from China had new tariffs imposed, becoming an interdisciplinary issue due to the widespread impact this has.

The Effect of Tariffs on Domestic Consumers

From a political view, tariffs can be beneficial by meeting government aims for the prosperity of domestic trade. Economists would be against this, citing economic liberalism through free trade as the best way to ensure a nation's prosperity. When Bush implemented similar tariffs, he was condemned by the EU and the WTO, as these economic organisations argued these policies did not conform to the international rules of free trade. The views of economic organisations such as the EU and WTO confirms how most economists approach the issue of tariffs.

There was a negative effect on consumers as it was estimated that there were 300,000 jobs losses and a decrease in real GDP by 0.3% supporting the negative view of tariffs. However, this is contrasted by the predicted increase in income by 1.2% and exports by 5% in 2021 suggesting that economic evidence is not sufficient alone to analyse the effects of these tariffs, especially as economic diagrams are based upon numerous assumptions relying on humans being rational, disputed by the emergence of behavioral economics.

Overall, most economists would use quantitative evidence to justify the claim that Trump's implementation of tariffs will result in economic harm to the US. The main forms of evidence used by economists involve positivist methods which focuses on the description and quantification of economic phenomena. In this example, the negative consequences of tariffs are described using a tariff diagram and quantified with the loss in economic growth.

Political Science

Stephanie Rickard, a professor of Political Science in the LSE Department of Government, argues that Trump's metal tariffs were motivated by politics not economics.

Whilst economists and political scientists both may use analytical tools, political scientists are more likely to use descriptive tools. For example, they might quote Machiavelli who emphasized the honor of the state and argue that trade protectionism is a form of achieving this. This form of trade protection can be a useful way to win over voters in plurality electoral systems. Quoting prominent political theorists like Machiavelli is a form of testimonial evidence in which expert opinions support a given argument.

Furthermore, realist political thinkers believe that cooperation between countries is too idealist and so would be in favor of imposing tariffs to protect the interests of the nation state, in this case, the US. They use evidence such as China's influence over the World Health Organisation (WHO) during the corona virus pandemic as an example of how cooperation between states via organisation rarely works. This is a form of analogical evidence as it involves comparing the issue of tariffs to the WHO. Critics point out that this form of evidence is weak because it assumes the two cases are comparable. However, it is often the case in political science that analogical evidence is the only way of substantiating a specific claim.

Trump used Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, a law regarding national security, to justify this form of economic protectionism. Defensive structural realists, a type of political scientist, believe that the state should be protected and would be in favor of these tariffs as they reduce interdependence with competitors and focus on state security. This shows how some political scientists value the sociopolitical security from the tariffs regardless of the economic consequences.

Overall, some political scientists would use evidence to demonstrate their support Trump's tariffs against China, specifically qualitative evidence collected via normative methods, in which political decisions are judged to be either desirable or undesirable as well as analogical and testimonial evidence.

Conclusion

Economics and political science disagree in terms of the desired outcome: economic efficiency and profit compared to meeting political goals. The main tensions between the disciplines include economics tending to favor positivist methods that seek to explain the world whereas political scientist generally favor normative methods which seek to make judgement upon and improve the world. The differences in methodology result in different conclusions for whether or not tariffs should be implemented. Additionally, conflicts exist between the two disciplines because they value different things. Whilst economists focus on describing the welfare of the US, political scientists may focus on the security of the US more leading to opposing conclusions of tariff implementation. Therefore, different areas of concern for each discipline results in different forms of evidence and ultimately different conclusions.

Tensions exist between political science and economies due to the disciplines clashing when determining who should benefit. Analysing this economic trade war has shown how this dispute can not be easily solved as fundamentally, within both disciplines, what constitutes evidence is affected by both quantitative and qualitative factors shown by the need for economic and political theories. Overall, evidence suggests that these tariffs resulted in a beneficial outcome as they fulfilled Trump's political agenda despite negative consequences for consumers.

Overall, it is clear that an interdisciplinary approach is needed to evaluate evidence from different disciplines to solve world problems.

References

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Evidence in the Production and Consumption of the Palm Oil Boom

Introduction

The palm oil boom began in the 1970s to meet the rapidly growing demand for vegetable oil.

A high-yielding crop with versatile applications, palm oil has become deeply embedded in our economy, used for human consumption, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and biofuel. Moving from a multidisciplinary to interdisciplinary approach on the basis of evidence enables a comprehensive understanding of the surge in palm oil consumption and the resulting economic, ecological, nutritional and sociological effects.

Evidence in Economics

Economic evidence is largely quantitative. Empirical research provides the basis for building economic models for causal inference.

Selling red palm oil in a market

International trade of palm oil is the dominant macroeconomic indicator of the growing industry's impact. Net exports, a component of GDP, is the most common model used to measure national economic growth. Thus, in export-led economies where palm oil production constitutes a large proportion of net exports, trade data is an informative form of evidence. Economists calculate net exports of palm oil using trade estimations from:

1. Customs records, as outlined by the International Merchandise Trade Statistics (IMTS) Manual.

2. National accounts, by accounting for economic ownership of the palm oil, as outlined in the IMTS Manual.

Economists analysing the microeconomic impacts of the palm oil industry collect evidence by dissecting the market into its stakeholders and applying models to assess the benefits to these groups from the growing palm oil sector.

For example, studying palm oil workers, a classical supply and demand model would suggest the following:

↑ Demand for palm oil → ↑ Demand for labour in corresponding labour market → Upwards pressure on wages → ↑ Income of workers

These models can be checked against empirical data, for example the change in wages of palm oil workers can be compared to those in other commodity industries, to give the model credibility.

Evidence in Ecology

Ecology relies on quantitative research methods to understand the relationship between living organisms and the environment.

Deforestation, a major concern of the palm oil boom, has been observed and recorded by ecologists using satellite imaging. High-resolution images captured from satellites, like Landsat, collect data on land use and environmental change as a result of palm oil plantations. Tools like unsupervised classification, visual classification, and observation of spectral characteristics are used to quantify the plantation area. This identification process is repeated on datasets of satellite images from different time periods to compare changes of land use over time. Statistical models and formulas then calculate the rate of deforestation.

Through this methodology, ecologists are able to gather evidence on the statistically significant rates of deforestation due to the spatial expansion of palm oil plantations. A limitation of this methodology is its reliance on computer algorithms that may either mistakenly identify other vegetation as oil palm or are unable to detect oil palm because of the spacing between trees.

Evidence in Nutrition

Nutrition, the process of assimilating food, is linked to the health impact of palm oil on consumers. Nutritional evidence is obtained through scientific research, experiments, and clinical trials. These methods are usually integrated, analysing palm oil itself and then experimenting and observing its effects on subjects to understand the influence of palm oil on lipids in blood as compared to other oils. Differing trials were led with different parameters varying the participants' characteristics, sample size, and intervention characteristics. Their reliability can be assessed on the Jadad scale used for clinical trials. The method used is observing the impact on the body through regular intake of palm oil and integrating it into the subject's diet. Researchers analysed the principal fatty acids in palm oil and how they impacted functions of the body, e.g. body weight, metabolic rate and blood pressure.

Clinical trials have demonstrated that consuming fresh palm oil has benefits such as the intake of vitamin A and E and reducing lipid distribution in the body, however, there are risks to palm oil when not consumed fresh.

Evidence in Sociology

Sociologists, who study the social aspects of palm oil, also investigate its nutritional impact, although using different evidence: interviews, ethnography, survey research, and systematic observation. They typically use household surveys, presenting structured questionnaires to households chosen by multistage random sampling procedures.

Making Palm Oil in the Democratic Republic of Congo

The collected data is then analysed to form descriptive and inferential statistics, which mostly demonstrate positive impacts on producing communities.

Household surveys were utilised to investigate farm household diets. Unlike nutritionists who find quantitative evidence, sociologists collected face-to-face interview responses to a structured questionnaire to estimate and record calorific consumption and dietary composition of oil farm workers – utilising social, rather than scientific, indicators for wellbeing.

Researchers may employ the Social Life-Cycle Assessment to examine the social impacts of a product’s production. In Malaysia, researchers identified two key stakeholders, palm oil plantation workers and local communities. These stakeholders completed a set of questionnaire interviews regarding topics including discrimination, health and safety, and social benefit. Questions were structured on a five-point Likert Scale to examine the difference between expected and perceived quality of each criterion. Once descriptively analysed, the data suggested production has positive impacts, with affirmative outcomes in most sub-categories.

Disciplinary Tensions

Finding cohesion in the evidence presented by individual disciplines is the biggest challenge to understanding the impact of the palm oil boom with an interdisciplinary approach. This is due to the disparity between disciplines themselves: Economics studies decision-making within markets, organisations, and countries; sociology, human social behaviour; ecology, the relationship between living organisms and ecosystems; and nutrition, nutrients in relation to an organism's functioning. Therefore, each discipline examines divergent aspects of the issue. Consequently, methodologies and the evidence collected in each discipline often conflict, creating difficulties in integrating the disciplines to form a conclusion regarding the impact of the palm oil boom.

For example, nutritionists and sociologists examine the dietary implications of palm oil; however, while nutritionists use quantitative methods like clinical trials to study the biological impact, sociologists use qualitative research like interviews to examine different indicators, such as households' fruit and vegetable intake. Integrating these findings is difficult as they have conflicting focuses and types of evidence.

Tensions also arise between disciplines with inherent methodological differences, complicating combining data. Economics uses models that simplify reality, limiting the number of variables considered and externalities accounted for. Applying a simplified model like GDP when analysing the palm oil sector contrasts with research in the natural sciences, specifically ecology, where raw data provides positivist evidence, relative to a more constructivist economic approach.

Assumptions between disciplines may also conflict. Economics fundamentally assumes human rationality. Sociologists reject this idea, instead explaining human behaviour as a product of social factors, thus not always rational. They suggest, for example, that social forces influence the diet of palm oil farmers. This highlights the problem - to what extent can we integrate two disciplines whose findings don't necessarily conflict yet have opposing fundamental assumptions?

While it is difficult to compare the outcomes of research due to the nature of the evidence itself, taking an interdisciplinary approach to this issue allows a more complete understanding. Integrating evidence to tackle this issue allows an inter-disciplinarian to interpret that despite negative ecological impacts, there are important positive social, economic, and nutritional impacts of the palm oil boom to consider.

Evidence in Measuring Workplace Happiness

Introduction

Modern perspectives on happiness tend towards defining "purpose" in one's life. The Japanese, for example, qualify happiness through their idea of Ikigai, "that which makes one's life worth living", focusing on four main areas of life. (Note that "well-being" differs from happiness, which forms a part of overall well-being). This Wikibook chapter will explore the use of evidence in measuring workplace happiness, as well as the tensions arising between different disciplinary perspectives.

Quantifying Evidence – Disciplinary Perspectives

Economics

Gross National Happiness and Macroeconomic Indicators in the Kingdom of Bhutan.

Economists place value on quantitative data, using surveys, self-assessment scales and measurement tools such as the Day Reconstructing Method and Bhutan's Gross National Happiness Index. Tensions can arise with other disciplines as economists focus selectively on empirical data, which lacks subjective context, treating happiness purely as a calculation.

Previously unavailable, big datasets now provide empirical evidence that higher income correlates with higher happiness. This is true cross-nationally, enabling "reassessment" of the Easterlin Paradox, the idea that money doesn't buy happiness, and that more money to a poor person means more than it does a rich person. Company bosses use this evidence and implement pay increases tapered to benefit lower-incomes more than higher. The hope here is that happiness is "endogenous": engendering productivity and conscientiousness (Pinker, 2018), partially fulfilling a need to feel valued to feel happier. The evidence also refutes the earlier idea that $75,000 is the optimal happiness and income level above which happiness growth slows.

Psychology

Happiness pie chart with percentages, based on the Happiness formula of Lyubomirsky, Shkade, Sheldon and Seligman.

Modern Positive Psychologists established the Happiness Formula of H = C + V + S: C being conditions of your life; V being Volunteering that you do and daily choices you make; and S being your biological set point. Meditation, under the “eightfold noble path” (Haidt, 2006) helps with the V because it reduces attachment and cultivates acceptance. Happiness has been defined as “the form of pleasant moods and emotions, well‐being, and positive attitudes” (Fisher, 2010), and being happy at work has been shown to be an important factor in workplace advancement. Fisher established the key variables in measuring workplace happiness as job satisfaction, engagement and organisational loyalty, all of which can be measured both subjectively and empirically across a timeframe, concerning a unitary or collective subject.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy works to rationalise and not catastrophise behaviours, asking questions like "what's the worst that could happen?" and "has it ever happened?" to change behaviours through changing thought patterns. This has been evidenced through Randomised Control Trials (RCTs) and implemented in workplace settings to reduce stress amongst employees. A major method of evidence retrieval in psychology is self-reporting, consisting of single or multi-faceted questionnaires given to respondents through RCTs or on case-by-case bases, for example the Job Descriptive Index, or the Utrecht Work Enthusiasm Scale.

Psychology raises both intra- and inter-disciplinary tensions. Within psychology, twin studies have shown that genetic factors account for 35-50% of our happiness levels. This disproved early Freudian theory , favouring quantitative genetic data over subjective and qualitative analysis methods, raising tensions between psychologists as quantitative data continues to be held in increasingly high regard. Psychology emphasises reasons for behaviour rather than outcomes, with data typically being more subjective. However, evidence used in happiness economics is largely quantitative: mathematical models predict behaviour with happiness as the desired outcome. These types of data are seen in stark contrast to one another, ultimately leading to disharmony, perpetuating interdisciplinary tension further.

Neuroscience

Neuroscientific studies have been conducted into workplace happiness, demonstrating the interactions of neurotransmitters and the impact these have on happiness levels.

Recent research by neuroeconomist Paul Zak found that an increased level of the hormone and neurotransmitter oxytocin leads to an increased level of trust, efficiency and workplace productivity, in turn resulting in higher levels of happiness. This was proven with empirical evidence, as blood samples were used to quantify oxytocin levels in social interactions.

The evidence shows dopamine, a neurotransmitter, is a strong contributor to workplace happiness. Higher levels of dopamine in the brain have been correlated with higher levels of workplace motivation and happiness. Lower levels of motivation are linked to psychiatric disorders like depression and increased risk of Alzheimer's and other neurological disorders. The evidence used to quantify dopamine levels is empirical, using Positron Emission Tomography (PET scanning) to map, analyse and quantify neurotransmitter levels in different parts of the brain.

Tensions also exist between psychology and neuroscience. Psychology was historically the more sociological discipline, with neuroscience relying on biological principles. Neuroscience is based on the concept of 'eliminative reductionism', meaning many neuroscientists believe that neural analysis could replace psychological analysis. Psychologists label humans as complex systems, and believe that brain function can't simply be reduced to neural functions, but rather is influenced by a whole range of biological, social and cultural factors. Here lies an obvious tension, due to two opposing fundamental principals (reductionism vs holism), and the consequent effect on research methodology and formation of evidence.

Anthropology

Ikigai And Dimensions For A Balanced Life

Cultural, societal and geographical constructs of happiness hold the same communalities, what the Japanese call 'Ikigai', the Danish 'Hygge', for example. Humans are happier when they are fit, healthy, loved, safe, comfortable and socially connected (not lonely), which are critical considerations for workplace happiness. These factors can be measured by anthropologists through qualitative data, helping to understand the role of meaning and value in happiness, which are variables often excluded when just focusing on quantitative measures.

Smaller societies feel happier if they have cultural autonomy within an advancing, modern world. Many young, single, white, males have experienced high levels of unhappiness during lockdown and look forward to going to work for interpersonal contact, upon which mental health is dependent. Happiness differs between the generations: happiness at twenty is different to that at forty and at sixty as vested interests evolve and sociocentric orientations are challenged by globalisation. Anthropology has been a cultural critique of disciplines and what's best for humans and what's best for the State.

Anthropology almost keeps a restraining hand on quantitative happiness measurements. Sustainable emotional well-being of employees is a crucial contributing factor to workplace happiness; its positive effects can lead to increased productivity, resilience and engagement. Economic measures alone cannot quantify happiness, so applying an anthropological perspective could provide an overview of what makes humans happy, combining all the interdisciplinary evidence available and applying those conditions to the workplace. While the sciences, including economics, value empirical evidence, anthropology values qualitative ethnographic evidence. These differences can be overcome by combining cross-cultural statistics, which offer more nuanced understandings of local differences.

Conclusion

Disciplines approach the epistemology and ontology of evidence in different ways, creating incongruity in what constitutes evidence and how evidence is defined, leading to interdisciplinary tensions.

These contrasting beliefs pose challenges when it comes to measuring workplace happiness. While individual disciplines can provide unique perspectives, the search for clearer common ground continues. Taking a more comprehensive approach to measuring happiness, combining the subjective nature of qualitative data with quantitative data would be the ideal interdisciplinary solution. Evidence needs to be integrated holistically, but perspectivism between the disciplines slows the process of collaboration.

Evidence in The World Happiness Report

Established by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, the World Happiness Report (WHR) is an annual publication, written by experts in various fields, that utilises data primarily provided by Gallup to rank and assess national happiness levels of over 150 countries.

Methodology

Ranking of Happiness 2017-2019 - Top 20 Countries

The Gallup World Poll is a survey completed by at least 1000 citizens per country. Its results are used to generate indices that cover various social, economic, and political topics, such as Life Evaluation, Personal Health, and Personal Economy.

The Cantril Ladder scale forms the basis of the Life Evaluation index. It asks participants to place themselves on an imaginary "ladder with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top" where "the top of the ladder represents the best possible life for [them] and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for [them]". The calculated national averages (0-10) are the values used in the WHR's 'Ranking of Happiness'.

Using the World Poll indices and additional supplementary data, the WHR evaluates how these 6 key factors affect a nation’s well-being:

• GDP per capita;
• social support;
• healthy life expectancy;
• freedom to make life choices;
• generosity;
• perceptions of corruption.

Disciplinary Evidence

Psychology

In Psychology, the study of the concept of Happiness is mainly conducted through the construction of various theories, while the evidence of happiness itself is generally based on behaviour assessments and surveys. Criteria often studied in Psychology, such as "generosity" and "freedom of making life choices", play an important part in the assessment of happiness in the WHR.

In some instances, to be able to assess the actual level of happiness in individuals, psychologists collect data on their physical behaviour and then construct statistics based on said data. These behaviours include but are not limited to: laughing, smiling and helping others. However, despite the presence of the aforementioned quantitative methods, it is mainly qualitative ones that are used by psychologists in the construction of the report.

In the WHR and generally in psychology, the most common method used to process evidence of happiness are surveys where individuals are asked several questions assessing circumstances that may relate to their level of happiness, or are straightforwardly asked to rate their happiness on a scale from 0 to 10.

This surveying method is often criticised for being too subjective, as the perception of happiness varies from one individual to another and is disproportionately influenced by the most recent events in their lives.

Medicine and Health Sciences

Health (in particular physical health) and life expectancy play an important part in the assessment of a person’s happiness; these are medical concepts which allow the determination of a person’s quality of life and overall corporal well-being.

Physical health plays an essential role in an individual’s happiness due to biological factors (e.g. hormones released) that have been quantifiably proven to correlate with improved emotions and mental health. Life expectancy is linked to physical health, for when one has poor physical health, life expectancy is shortened. Therefore, the WHR considers life expectancy and physical health as evidence of the level of one’s happiness.

Evidence on life expectancy is taken from the World Health Organisation, which defines life expectancy as the ‘average number of years that a new-born could expect to live’. If one has a longer life expectancy, the likelihood for the person to be happy increases. Evidence in life expectancy incorporates both quantitative and qualitative elements such as documentation of birth mortality in hospitals and oral accounts provided through census. Similarly, evidence in physical health combines both qualitative and quantitative methods. The clinician's experience, patient's preferences and existing medical knowledge are all considered in evidence-based medicine, which facilitates the assessment of one's physical health.

Another important factor that is reflected through physical health and life expectancy is the country's healthcare system. For example, a poor healthcare system affects one's corporal well-being, limiting their experience of true happiness.

Economics

Traditionally, financial hardship is one of the main factors hindering individual happiness. As such, the WHR uses different econometric measures as a means of evaluating the relative causes of nations’ measured happiness and the differences between nations. The WHR recognises that income security in the event of involuntary unemployment is pivotal in determining life satisfaction. The most commonly used metric is GDP per capita — a measure of a country's economic output per person. The data shows that many of the countries with significantly lower GDP per capita tend to feature lower on the Happiness Rankings, indicating that analysing the evidence in personal economics and individuals’ incomes is critical to evaluating subjective well-being.

However, most studies do show that once basic human needs are met, additional income does not have a strong correlation with increased well-being. In fact, one of the main criticisms of using econometrics in quantifying happiness is that too much value is placed on personal income and GDP per capita. Most recent studies show that income inequality and financial security have a much stronger correlation with subjective well-being. Beyond this, most evidence suggests that it is not how much money we have, but rather how we choose to spend it, which impacts our happiness and well-being.

Interdisciplinary Interactions

The WHR relies on data from the Gallup World Poll, which is composed of over 100 core questions that cover the different aspects affecting one’s happiness. To garner holistic evidence, experts from different disciplinary fields including (but not limited to) Psychology, Medicine and Economics, work collaboratively. The questionnaire is divided into several sections, including those that directly correspond to the aforementioned disciplines. Examples of the different questions would be:

• Psychology: "All things considered, how satisfied are you with your life as a whole these days?"
• Medicine: "Are you satisfied with or dissatisfied with the availability of quality healthcare?"
• Economics: "How would you rate economic conditions in this country today — as excellent, good, only, fair or poor?"

In fact, some of the questions apply an interdisciplinary angle, for example, the question "Do you have confidence in the healthcare or medical systems?", concerns the psychological state of the interviewee, whilst their answer will also imply the effectiveness of healthcare systems, which is also evidence of medical infrastructures. This method ensures that the happiness indices generated for each country reflect the average national happiness of its population.

Tensions

One of the main criticisms directed towards the WHR is that with the attempt of assessing happiness by combining various disciplines using vastly differing and overall complex approaches to evidencing, the report fails to properly unify the resulting data.

For example, if we take the psychological method of happiness assessment, which is a survey involving subjective answers that are influenced by differing factors, and attempt to combine it with the objective GDP value used in economics, the resulting data accuracy may inevitably falter. Moreover, happiness is often seen as an individual concept — an experience that varies from person-to-person. Therefore, merging together qualitative and quantitative data into a single numerical result may fail to truly reflect the state of happiness in a country.

These various elements in interdisciplinary evidence must thus be accounted for when determining an individual's real happiness level.

Evidence in the Development and Diagnosis of Anxiety Disorders

Introduction

Anxiety is a common feeling of everyday life and can affect anyone who is under stress, whether it be before the deadline of an assignment or when practicing for the final of a sports tournament. It is positive and essential, providing that extra boost of adrenaline and motivation enabling success. But simple anxiety can become harmful to someone’s mental health when diagnosed with General Anxiety Disorder (GAD), defined by the Cambridge Dictionary as “a mental illness in which a person is so anxious that their normal life is affected”. Historically, the diagnosis of GAD as a specific illness was very blurry because of the similarities it shares with other conditions such as phobias, OCD (Obsessive-compulsive Disorder) or PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), often being considered a symptom of these disorders rather than a disease itself. The fact that mental health issues remained taboo in many cultures until very recently also did not help for developing our knowledge and financing research on these disorders. Furthermore, the more scientific disciplines, such as neurobiology, tend to disagree with anthropology, the first focusing on genetics and biochemical abnormalities while the second puts an emphasis on the cultural environment. This contrast creates issues of evidence between disciplines in the understanding of GAD in its development and diagnosis.

Anthropological Approach

The anthropological approach to anxiety focuses on the impact culture has on the causes and symptoms of the disorder. As argued by American anthropologist Franz Boas, historical and environmental backgrounds are essential for interpreting the psychological state of people in different cultures. Therefore, anthropology emphasizes cross-cultural differences in the expressions of anxiety and their underlying factors.

Finding Cross-Cultural Differences

Statistical data is used intensively in identifying the cross-cultural differences in the prevalence and major symptoms of these conditions among different ethnic groups. In a national survey on mental health in the United States, Asian Americans were reported to have the lowest rate of anxiety disorders (Table 1). Furthermore, expressions and symptoms of anxiety also vary and can be culturally-specific. Taijin kyofusho (TKS) is a social anxiety disorder more commonly found in Japan and Korea than in other regions and is characterized by the intensified concern of embarrassing others on social occasions.

Table 1. Percentages of Diagnosed Anxiety Disorders Across Ethnical Groups in America

	Social Anxiety Disorder (%)	Generalised Anxiety Disorder (%)	Panic Disorder (%)	Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (%)
White Americans	12.6	8.6	5.1	6.5
African Americans	8.6	4.9	3.8	8.6
Hispanic Americans	8.2	5.8	4.1	5.6
Asian Americans	5.3	2.4	2.1	1.6

Contextualising Differences

Contextualization of the differences is usually done by case studies including interviews with patients. Anthropologists take secondary evidence from patients’ self-reflections on their symptoms and past experiences to examine the relations between cultural beliefs and disorders. For instance, the potential link between the traditional belief of harmony and the prevalence of dizziness as a panic attack symptom is suggested by interviews with Chinese patients suffering from panic disorders. Other factors like social norms also contribute to the differences. People from collectivistic countries are reported to feel more embarrassment when rating certain behaviors in an experiment compared to people from individualistic countries, which may result in a high level of social anxiety in certain Asian countries.

Neurobiological Evidence for Anxiety Disorders

Neurobiology explores the anatomy of the nervous system and how this links to behaviour, an essential component of physiology and neuroscience.

GAD and other related disorders can be observed and explained biologically through research with animal models and newly developed techniques such as neuroimaging with humans. It has been determined that genetic predispositions to GAD and other mental disorders exist in certain individuals and that environmental factors also have an influence, possibly increasing risk factors for developing such disorders.

A growing amount of research in biology and psychiatry is currently being conducted in order to identify pathogenetic biomarkers, essentially underlying biological and genetic factors, that are linked to GAD. Neuroimaging techniques, including Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), have been particularly helpful in determining structural and biochemical abnormalities in individuals with GAD. Findings include an increased amount of grey matter in the amygdala, a part of the limbic system involved in the processing of fear, while the hippocampus is typically abnormally low in volume. Such structural differences, among others, are believed to be linked to issues in regulating emotion and certain symptoms of GAD. In addition, different studies have demonstrated the heritability of GAD, one of them getting a result of 49%. While intensive research is being led in order to determine the exact genes responsible for this predisposition, we remain largely in the dark on the topic.

Psychiatry and Evidence in the Diagnosis of Anxiety Disorders

One of the main issues in treating anxiety is successfully diagnosing it. Even if this disorder is very common among children and adults it remains one of the most misdiagnosed among the medical community. Although psychiatry is increasingly making use of neurobiology, particularly in the treatment of GAD through medication, the diagnosis of mental health disorders continues to widely rely on behavioural observations and qualitative evidence. Indeed, diagnoses are made using a range of qualitative tools such as clinical interviews, questionnaires and self-reporting, which may be deemed subjective and unreliable. Psychiatrists are then faced with the difficulty of associating behavioural and emotional symptoms with a specific disorder, using guidelines and diagnostic manuals such as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). This is particularly hard in the case of different anxiety disorders and depression which often have very similar manifestations. What may be observed is quite a significant lack of the use of neurobiology in the actual diagnosis of disorders such as GAD. Indeed, although neuroimaging could potentially solve some issues of subjectivity, such techniques are not currently advanced enough to be able to definitively tell different mental health conditions apart.

Conflicts of evidence between disciplines

Anxiety sits on a very fine line between a feeling of discomfort and a medical condition. While trying to make the distinction clearer, disciplines have each focused on different aspects of the disorder. Anthropology studies the impact of culture on individuals and the patient’s perception, while neurobiology finds evidence for anxiety in hereditary genes causing abnormalities in the brain. Indeed, while both disciplines explore aspects of GAD through research, sometimes with some overlap, a lack of collaborative engagement exists between them. This may explain some of the failures in psychiatric studies and diagnoses of GAD, and a more thorough interdisciplinary approach could be a solution. The emerging field of cultural neuroscience, taking both socio-cultural environments and biological factors into account, may thus be of use to psychiatry in the future. Another issue that needs to be tackled is the complete absence of neurobiology in the diagnosis of GAD. More investments in neuroimaging would increase the precision and utility of this technology and would ultimately allow neurobiology to have a more important role in the diagnosis of this condition. Furthermore, psychiatry primarily focuses on the treatment and diagnosis of the patient, although in many cases anxiety results from socio-cultural issues that cannot be solved only through therapy or medication. A more active engagement with anthropology and social sciences (economics or politics) could thus also be beneficial.

Evidence in The Plastic Continent

Introduction

The Plastic continent also known as the eighth continent lies between California and Hawaii and is three times the size of France. It is made of 1,8 billions pieces of floating plastic greatly impacting the marine life. This is one of the biggest issues in environmental science and climate change. Evidence about this continent is brought by different fields as it is an interdisciplinary issue. We will see how scientific and sociological methods can conflict with each other on this issue.

Evidence in Societal Impact

Measurement

Due to its waterborne nature, measuring the plastic continent and determining its location has proved a difficult task. A variety of approaches have been used to estimate these properties, producing a wide range of results. Estimates of the area it covers range from the size of Texas to the size of Russia.

The existence of the patch was first theorised by a study researching the distribution of plastic in a patch in the Japan sea which extrapolated that a similar patch must exist in the pacific with a much higher density of plastic. This was based on analysis of wind and ocean current patterns.

There are studies which have surveyed plastic distribution on beaches because this is much easier than surveying the sea, although many factors such as current and beach structure affect this as well as plastic from beach users, so it is an unreliable method for inference about oceanic plastic distribution.

Trawling surveys at sea are more direct but due to the size of the ocean it is difficult to gather enough data for a reliable result.

Image surveys conducted using aircraft were able to assess much larger areas giving more reliable information but could only account for plastic larger than 50cm so were no use in analysing microplastics. Scientist have also monitored the wildlife near the patch. One study onː The plastic content in the diet of albatrosses from Pacific islands showed that there were two distinct zones of debris.

Evidence in Chemistry

Plastic is all over in our everyday life. Unfortunately, it is almost indestructible (a single plastic bag can take up to 1000 years to degrade) and really hard to recycle.

Toxic chemicals are released in the ocean from the decomposition of the plastic as hydrophobic organic pollutants. « Microplastics behave like little chemical sponges and all of these very toxic, persistent substances that are in the water will stick to the outside of the plastic in order to move from the aqueous environment to a more hydrophobic environment » according to Sherri Mason, environmental chemist. Those microplastics help to move those chemical products of the environment to organisms that ingest them. Those chemicals come from the chemical composition of the plastic produced by industrial companies. They contain chemical additives such as plasticisers, colorants or UV stabilisers. Evidence of this chemical pollution due to microplastics can be seen in the organisms of marine animals and birds that eat them thinking it is their natural food. Once they are ingested those microplastics can desorb and then are stored in the fat of those animals. Chemicals can affect the ability of marine organisms to store energy and therefore animals have a lower life expectancy.

Evidence in Biology

The food chain is disturbed by microplastics in the ocean. Turtles are found entangled in plastic bags or birds’ stomachs are found to be full of plastics. Dissections by biologists of hundreds of those species found dead near beaches or in the droppings of animals pointed out this excessive amount of microplastics. According to Greenpeace, around 1,5 million animals are victims of this plastic pollution in the oceans each year. Those ingestions of plastic have consequences on the health of those marine species such as inflammatory cellular responses or other diseases as necrosis, birth defects, cancers, effects on immune system due to alteration of gene expression... Those effects have been shown mostly through research conducted on dolphins.

Evidence of this plastic continent is also seen in the studies and researches into sediments. Depending on the weight of microplastics some sink and lead to a great amount of plastic on the sea floor. The investigation of plastic in the deep sea is difficult due to limited access. However, some have detected in samples microplastics from depths up to five kilometres with a new extraction technique using high density salt solutions to float the plastic and separate them from other solids.

Evidence in Economics

Plastic has been mass produced and is difficult to destroy so plastic waste is a big issue which economists have created models to explain.

Considering that international legislations forbid direct littering at sea, it is difficult for Economists to measure Plastic waste into the Ocean. However, light products usually make their way into the sea passing through rivers or helped by the wind. Therefore, to calculate Plastic in the Ocean, Economists decide to calculate inadequately managed waste in order to measure the amount of plastic but also the countries that pollute the most. They created an equation: ‘Inadequately managed plastic wastes = Plastic waste per capita x Inadequately managed waste % x population’ and it delivers results proving that in a Capitalist Economy like ours with growing GDP per capita, Plastic waste especially in the ocean is a growing problem. Moreover, these calculations are based on ‘very conservative estimates’, and the actual amount of Plastic waste is far greater than the one they used for the calculations.

Evidence in Responsibility

Political Evidence

In addition to assessing the waste management of different countries, studies have used qualitative methods to determine debris' origin. One study reported a rapid increase in Asian bottles. Computer models of ocean currents have been used to predict the course plastic debris would follow and then from this determine its origin. All studies around this matter are liable to political bias.

The actual Laws

The territorial waters and the subsoil and airspace above and under it are up to 12 nautical miles away from the cost, the country which borders them has the right over these waters. The Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) is a maximum width of 200 miles beyond the baselines. In the EEZ, the coastal State has a sovereign right for the purposes of exploration and exploitation, conservation and management of natural resources, the seabed and their sub-surface. The State can for e.g. regulate fishing activities. Beyond the EEZ, in the high seas, the States no longer have rights. In these Seas, the concept of freedom governs. The only right that States have is the right of hot pursuit in High Seas if it began in the EEZ of the coastal State.

Because the Plastic Continent is in the high Seas, no country could be sued for not taking care of it

Conclusion

The long-term impacts of oceanic plastic are unknown so extrapolation is necessary to assess its danger. It is waterborne so researching it causes technical challenges. Its dynamic nature means it is difficult to quantify and trace. There are many different methods of gathering evidence on it and the conflicting results they produce make it clear that an interdisciplinary approach is necessary to reach a consensus.

Evidence in Transgenderism

Introduction

Transgenderism is the phenomenon whereby a person's gender identity does not correspond to the sex they were assigned at birth. Although this concept exists cross-culturally and throughout history, it is difficult to distinguish between the various terms used (e.g. transsexual, third gender) and their boundaries. Fluctuating definitions of the phenomenon are derived from different disciplines, in which evidence also takes various, conflicting forms. Psychology, biology and social anthropology tackle transgenderism from different perspectives, using various methodologies, research tools and frameworks. To formulate a comprehensive understanding of transgenderism and expand societal consciousness on the issue, it is important to identify the tensions and values behind evidence in each discipline.

Evidence in Biology

Biological studies on the causes of transgenderism involve different fields of the discipline: genetics, brain activity and biological factors; while employing different methodologies. In genetic research, biologists use heritability studies in families to see if inherited genes from previous generations could influence gender identity. Similarly, twin study designs are used as evidence. By comparing the concordance rate in DNA among monozygotic and dizygotic twins, they obtain data to estimate the genetic contribution of gender identity. Though this method is one of the most widely used, it yields some limitations as the instruments used to measure gender identity may be confused with gender expression.

Biologists also conduct molecular genetic studies to examine the consequences of prenatal hormone exposure, focusing on sex-hormones receptors that could be responsible for undermasculanisation-feminism. Studies typically investigate small sample sizes or individual genes, and conduct a statistical analysis to see which ones are overrepresented to draw conclusions. However, further work and replications in this area is needed before considering it as strong evidence.

Finally, biologists look for quantitative evidence in parts of the brain that account for sexual dimorphism. Typically, researchers compare brain structure and activity between cisgender and transgender people using various medical imaging techniques such as functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) and Positron Emission Tomography (PET). This examines if brain regions in transgender people resemble the genders they identify with, rather than the one they were assigned to. Studies show that it is indeed generally the case.

Evidence in Psychology

Psychological research into the cause of transgenderism tends to focus heavily on the experience of the individual, providing significant quantitative evidence by either quantifying qualitative evidence or using methodologies that rely on interviews and questionnaires, as well as observation.

Early methods of obtaining evidence were overwhelmingly case-study based, with the first research in 1949 from Cauldwell based entirely on one individual. This was useful in giving a snapshot of period typical attitudes to transgenderism as a mental immaturity brought on by a disruptive upbringing and genetic predisposition, whilst demonstrating an accurate qualitative account of personal experience. However, this methodology is not conducive to generating quantifiable evidence applicable to other individuals, hence the recent shift towards alternate methodologies.

Recent methods of obtaining evidence include experiments exploring the sociocultural backgrounds of transgender individuals and gender identity development during childhood. These methods are more conducive to establishing universal laws within the discipline as they generate large sets of quantitative data for evidence that can be studied to identify causal relationships. It has been found that children display knowledge of typical gender stereotypes long before they show a differentiation between sex based on genital information, highlighting psychology’s emphasis on the importance of ‘nurture’ over ‘nature’ and more biologically based theories. However these types of methodologies, despite rising ethical standards in recent years, tend to lack consideration for transgender individuals within the structure of the methodology, eg. continuing to use binary terms such as male and female within questionnaires. Therefore, there are still improvements to be made to the methodologies used in psychological research to collect evidence.

Evidence in Social Anthropology

The main evidence used by anthropologists is ethnographic evidence collected by methods like fieldwork, participant observation or interviews, which are predominantly qualitative. The data is then analysed using the framework of anthropological theories or positionalities, such as structuralism, feminist or queer theory.

Social anthropology’s evidence of transgenderism consists of analysing the lived experiences of transgender people through ethnography, and exploring the context-dependent existence of transgenderism and its expressions. It explains transgenderism as part of identity and often with a level of agency and performativity that other disciplines neglect because social anthropology uses evidence by relational methodologies. For example, the Travesti in Brazil are biologically male but acquire female body characteristics. However, although ethnographic research shows that they are viewed as women psychologically (similar to the view in scientific disciplines), the Travesti may not see themselves as transgender. The qualitative approach of social anthropology is important because the definition of transgenderism varies cross-culturally and temporally/ The Western male-female binary framework exemplifies this need for contextualisation of evidence as it is not universally applicable or correct, as demonstrated by various global ethnographic studies, or carry colonially-impacted ideas. Furthermore, queer theory suggests that gender is distinct from sex and can be socially constructed. Thus, notions of gender may vary cross-culturally, so queer theory can be used as a framework in social anthropology to explore the relation between gender, biological sex and transgenderism.

Social anthropology situates lived transgender experiences within their societal context (e.g. class, race), taking into account the impact of intersecting factors on transgenderism, gender binaries, or labels used in various societies, such as colonialism in the history of a society having an impact on cultural perception on gender or transgender issues. Reflexivity in social anthropology takes into account the positionality of the ethnographer and puts into question possible biases within their methodology, ethnographic evidence and analysis.

Integration of Evidence and Conclusion

By integrating evidence from the three disciplines, a more holistic understanding of transgenderism can be gained. In Biology, limitations of the twin study design (i.e. distinction between measurement of gender identity and expression) may be improved upon by using more subjective evidence from other disciplines. Psychology may use social experiments with participants in various age groups to distinguish between gender expression and identity, as childhood may be a key time in establishing stereotypes. Social anthropology may obtain evidence from individuals using interviews/testimony instead of quantitative evidence. Combining these through an interdisciplinary approach will give the most efficient use of evidence.

However, interdisciplinary tensions could stem from differences in methodologies used by social anthropology and scientific disciplines. Due to reliance on qualitative evidence such as interviews or observations by ethnographers in social anthropology, clashes in evidence may happen as quantitative evidence tends to hold more authority, potentially leading to a power imbalance across the disciplines or favouring evidence from natural sciences. However, by quantifying experiences, the subjectivity of transgender experiences cannot be captured. By reducing transgenderism to biological or psychological factors, there is loss of societal context and the variety of lived transgender experiences across cultures.

Causes of transgenderism are complex and it is unlikely that an exact set of explanations can be found within one discipline. In order to apply evidence to real life, it is important to be aware of why certain types of evidence are used, and what they measure and fail to capture. Awareness of these disciplinary tensions allows for a comprehensive, interdisciplinary application of evidence to be used in understanding transgenderism.

Evidence in Intelligence Testing

Introduction

The means by which intelligence is defined and tested has significant implications for individuals livelihoods in modern society so the subject has been the source of controversy.

Intelligence is an abstract concept formulated from variable aspects, and different disciplines have conflicting views on what counts as evidence in measuring intelligence. Some even argue that intelligence testing should cease. However, it can be a valuable theoretical and practical tool in studying mental development and assessing cognitive abilities. Resolving interdisciplinary conflicts through integration could develop more holistic approaches to intelligence testing which can be used to benefit individuals and society. Tests need to be universal across machines, animals, humans, and therefore disciplines, and results standardised against humans. Reaching a common understanding of evidence of intelligence means we'll have certainty of when a machine has achieved intelligence.

This Wikibook will look at evidence in intelligence testing in psychology, computer science and an anthropological/sociological perspective with the goal of highlighting conflicts.

Evidence in Intelligence Testing in Psychology

Normal IQ distribution with mean 100 and standard deviation 15

In Psychometrics, the most common measure of intelligence is Intelligence Quotient (IQ). There are multiple modern IQ tests, the most common in the English-speaking world being the Wechsler Intelligence Scale, with different versions for adults and children. David Wechsler believed intelligence to be made up of interconnecting elements of cognitive ability that could be isolated and measured. The current version of the test, WAIS-IV, is composed of indexes: verbal comprehension, perceptual reasoning, working memory, and processing speed.

The IQ score is calculated based on standard deviation comparing individual performance against the average. These scores are normally distributed where average score is the most common (mean of 100 and standard deviation of 15 IQ points). IQ scores are therefore estimates of intelligence rather than being a direct measure. IQ tests have been shown to have high statistical reliability with a confidence interval of approximately 10 points and a standard error of 3 points. Although performance in IQ tests can vary on an individual basis due to external factors such as motivation and anxiety, casting doubt on validity, IQ scores correlate with performance in jobs and schools. Some psychologists regard this as sufficient evidence that IQ tests are viable for practical use in education and jobs.

Other psychologists have been critical of IQ tests with Wayne Weiten stating "IQ tests are valid measures of the kind of intelligence necessary to do well in academic work. But if the purpose is to assess intelligence in a broader sense, the validity of IQ tests is questionable." IQ tests can measure forms of intelligence, but broader aspects including creativity and emotional intelligence are unaccounted. There are alternative tests for measuring aptitude in response to the criticisms. An example is the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test.

An Anthropological and Sociological Perspective

Anthropological and sociological understandings focus on an individuals interactions with their wider culture and society. Since intelligence is a contested concept for which definitions vary both across and within cultures, those within anthropology argue that tests measuring intelligence must be emic – i.e., derived from within – the culture of the individual being tested. Due to qualitative differences between cultures, some argue that quantitative comparisons made across cultures will be unhelpful . Taking an anthropological perspective, Sternberg and Kaufman have argued that cultures "designate as “intelligent” the cognitive, social and behavioural attributes that they value as adaptive to the requirements of living in those cultures". Similarly, some sociologists argue that intelligence is a social construct, and its evidence is the product of a particular sociohistorical context concerned with issues surrounding social stratification and inequality.

In relation to measuring intelligence, those taking anthropological and sociological perspectives have highlighted the modifiability of intelligence, along with other external factors influencing performance in particular testing methods. Berry and Irvine have emphasised the need to appreciate the different levels of context that influence the performance of intelligence, including ecological and experimental contexts. Their work has shown how cognitive styles develop in accordance with environmental demands. The requirement is then for the experimental context (context in which intelligence is being tested) to align with the individuals own learning and everyday context. One example comes from Brazilian street children, who, despite being reliant upon their mathematics skills to run their own business to survive, performed poorly on solving the same mathematical problems when tested in school due to the abstract nature of the problems presented which were removed from their real-world context. Conventional IQ and psychometric based tests, are thus considered problematic for their basis in assumptions of the acontextuality of intelligence and cognitive performance, especially when used to compare individuals from diverse cultural and economic backgrounds.

Evidence in Intelligence Testing in Computer Science

Language as Evidence

The imitation game follows from Descartes’ ideas of language versatility in new and challenging situations being the first test of intelligence. An interrogator, separated from a machine and human, asks questions. Through answering, the machine tries to trick the interrogator that it's the human, and the human tries to help the interrogator guess. If the machine is successful, it provides evidence that it's intelligent according to Turing. The machine must mimic a human, pretending it's unable to perform complex equations and faking natural-looking human spelling mistakes. Evidence for intelligence here is adaptability, not the g-factor view of handling complexity.

The HAL project measures conversational ability as evidence of intelligence and an estimate of human maturity is assigned to the machine. The machine’s speech is examined for evidence looking at vocabulary size, response types and mean length of utterance.

Cybernetics

Goal-focused systems (both animal and mechanical) where communication, or conversation, between system and environment is a prerequisite for activity. The system’s response/activity as it interacts with the changing environment is taken as evidence of intelligence. Evidence of intelligence is focused on activity and purposeful behaviour rather than reason.

Universal Intelligence Test

A machine receives rewards for interacting with an environment, it must learn the environment structure and what actions receive rewards to maximise amount received. Extra reward is given for applying Occam’s razor which is a intuitive, yet intelligent, method.

IQ

It's rarely considered evidence of intelligence when a machine completes a classical IQ test, possible from 1963 when an AI program passed geometric analogy tasks from WAIS.

Often results are comparable to humans but, like in the case of number completion, the way machines solve problems can be different meaning results have different error distributions.

Related is psychometric AI, the field of building machines that can solve a range (using a single test is useless to evaluate a machine since it can be specialised to solve it) of established tests.

Conclusion

There is still much debate over what is considered evidence in intelligence testing. In machines, testing is focused on evidence for real-time flexibility, adaptability, and creativity; especially in terms of language and conversation. Like anthropological and sociological approaches, computer science tends to focus on interactions with the external environment. This goes against the universal, static, approach of IQ tests which, in its emphasis on evidence for intrinsic characteristics of intelligence measured in isolation, tends to ignore context. Engagement between these disciplines, alongside unexplored disciplines, could help move away from this narrow understanding of intelligence and towards a more practical understanding.

Evidence in Hormonal Contraception

Introduction

Hormonal contraception exists in several forms, including oral pills, vaginal rings or skin patches, all sharing the same mechanism: they influence female hormone levels to prevent ovulation, with a wide application in birth control and treating menstrual symptoms.

Due to such broad usage, research considers evidence from multiple disciplines, including biology and psychology, when regarding the development of new or currently available contraception. This range of studies produces a variety of evidence which in itself presents interdisciplinary tensions. Therefore, an insight into such tensions between biology and psychology will better the understanding of hormonal contraception by policy makers and the general public, improving their everyday use and effectiveness.

Evidence in biology

Most of the biological evidence relating to hormonal contraceptives is produced through randomised control trials (RCTs), or large, non-comparative multi-centre registration studies. A problem in the field is that both these designs, although less so in RCTs, run the risk of producing biased evidence as the companies that manufacture the study contraceptive fund and undertake these studies themselves. Furthermore, the sampling frames consist of mostly Europeans or Americans, with research lasting only 365 days evaluating up to 8 menstrual cycles. Hence, long-term health effects of hormonal contraceptives are undocumented.

Within the discipline, evidence for hormonal contraception is varied. This is due to the fact that synthetic hormones affect bodily hormone production, leading to several physiological changes. This forces biological research to use several specialised methodologies to measure each effect.

One problematic assumption in the biological study of hormonal contraceptives is the application of self-reports to generate quantitative measurements. This links to the issue of inconsistently defined terminology such as “continuation,” “compliance”, “adherence,” “misuse”, “nonuse,” and “correct use”. The reliance of self-report studies on these unstandardised definitions produces conflicting evidence and limits the observation of negative outcomes.

Most importantly, biologists fail to capture the full complexity of contraceptives due to the general lack of research towards non-physiological effects of hormonal treatments, or menstruation-associated symptoms, participant satisfaction, and long-term health effects due to continuous contraceptive use. There is a preference within biology to consider only physical conditions in evidence. Many epidemiological case studies suggest increased risks of venous thromboembolism, ischemic stroke, and myocardial infarction, all of which are easily tested and objectively quantifiable conditions.

Evidence in psychology

“Literature testing psychological implications of commencing oral contraceptives has lagged behind research investigating physical risks.” - Kobey and Bunnk, 2012.

Despite this, the field pushes for a greater understanding of long-term consequences in hormonal contraception use. There is a heavier use of meta-analyses as the field takes advantage of previous psychological research. Alongside these meta-analyses the psychological evidence also focuses on the use of in-person interviews and population based studies; these aid in giving a longer-term perspective with a more qualitative approach.

The research conducted to review effects of hormonal contraception, formed over a larger time scale than biological research, not only analyses the impact at both a neurological or hormonal level, but also a behavioural level. This helps to diagnose sources of certain mental illnesses and the hormones used in contraception which serve to aggravate them.

Research methods also include subjective discussions on second wave feminism and the impact of contraception on the workforce due to a relation to women’s health and psychology. There exists further qualitative observation of the impact of hormones on primates, and qualitative studies relating to behavioural patterns in women. These studies carried out on primates and then women show an impact not only upon the physical health of the individual, though it is noted that these specifications fall more in line with biological research, but also upon levels of aggression and depression. However, primates may be considered sufficiently distant to humans that they yield uncertain evidence regarding possible human consequences.

Tensions

Differences in evidence type present one avenue in which tensions arise. Many biological studies are clinical, randomised-control trials, such as Osuga, Hayashi and Kanda’s 2020 study. Effects of hormonal contraception on a large sampling frame are numerically ‘scored’, with results statistically analysed; this produces primary evidence which is largely quantitative and removes any subjective aspect of personal experience. In psychology however, there is a focus on using reports and interviews to generate evidence; the emphasis is on personal experiences with contraception and impacts on mental health and sexual activity. Evidence such as this is gathered from more subjective, situational studies as opposed to the objective and statistical biological experiments.

Another tension arises within the differing uses of self-report based evidence. In biology, this evidence is treated as quantitative and generally not deeply evaluated; in many experiments abnormal personal experiences are excluded from calculations. This same self-reported data in psychological research is treated as qualitative evidence and is analysed to draw new conclusions, suggesting reasons for the abnormalities. The issue of unclear terminology regarding participant conditions in biological research further demonstrates this lack of focus on individual participant action. Alternatively, in psychology, this terminology is standardised as individual experiences are usually the focus of the research.

Furthermore, biological studies considering the safety of contraception may focus more on physical side-effects, such as abnormal bleeding. The mental side-effects considered in psychological studies may take longer to manifest themselves. As such, the evidence gathered in biology considers seemingly more physical or ‘tangible’ side-effects. This could mean that biological evidence is deemed more valid than its psychological counterpart; here another tension becomes apparent as there is a notion of necessity in biological research but not psychological.

Conclusion

In the development of hormonal contraceptives, there is greater focus on biological research when first considering drug viability, with psychological studies carried out following this. While hormonal contraception has been in use for over 50 years, suggesting high levels of biological research, the psychological effect of contraception on stress responses and emotional memory remains unexplored; it is only in recent years that this is being considered. This can be attributed to the fact that production of evidence in psychology is somewhat limited to studying patented products already in use, while biology is not. In order to overcome such limitations, an interdisciplinary study of contraception will be beneficial.

Regarding the study of long-term effects, longer research periods mean that psychological studies ‘lag’ significantly behind biological ones. Policy makers therefore may consider biological evidence a priority, and psychological evidence an afterthought. In light of this, when considering the viability of a contraceptive drug, there are ethical concerns testing for psychological effects in a substance not yet clinically trialled. However, the amount of time required for the long-term psychological study of contraceptives may mean that drug companies prefer to develop drugs after only clinical tests; this is concerning considering mental health is equally as important as physical. With this rising consideration regarding mental health, policy makers may take an interest in an interdisciplinary approach to hormonal contraception development.

Lastly, after considering current tensions, there is also some progress toward an interdisciplinary approach. Currently there is little use of the psychological perspective within biology, however in psychological meta-analyses there are references to biological evidence. This shows a promising interdisciplinary future within the study of hormonal contraception.

Evidence in Effectiveness of Lockdown

Introduction

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, a debate concerning the optimal response started. This chapter investigates the evidence disciplines of Economics, Political Science and Public Health rely upon to determine the effectiveness of the implementation of lockdowns and the role disciplinary methodological differences play in it. Lockdown is defined here as 'a series of restrictions on the social and economic life of citizens and use of public spaces'.

As this debate is influencing states' decisions to pursue particular virus-containment strategies, it is important to highlight the potential flaws in the arguments of each discipline and to demonstrate that an interdisciplinary approach is essential for determining the most effective measures.

Disciplinary Approaches

Economics

In Economics, virus-suppression measures like lockdowns are viewed as a trade-off between economic costs and lives lost. Many researchers attempt to represent the problem as a cost-benefit analysis by constructing quantitative models that either justify the costs of lockdown or find it inefficient.

Economic evaluation is based on abstract, generalised models that rely on quantitative data, estimates, theories, forecasts and other models, for example, epidemiological models which also have some degree of abstraction and error. Both economic and epidemiological models have to be based on limited data obtained by observation rather than controlled randomized trials and thus may be insufficiently reliable.

As a result, some economists propose mitigation strategies that are less economically severe instead of a full lockdown. But others recognise the validity of strict short-term suppressive restrictions, admitting that if they help to contain the virus, it may speed up the economic recovery and lower costs in the long-term. However, those who calculate economic costs, inclusive of deaths and harm incurred due to a recession caused by lockdowns, suggest that strict suppression measures may be less effective in less economically developed countries and that the idea of the choice between economic harm and lives lost is flawed due to the direct interconnection of the two.

Therefore, a dominant opinion doesn't exist within the discipline due to a high degree of uncertainty, and the differences in questions, methodologies, and consequently, the evidence that different economists consider.

Public Health

Public Health researchers' primary focus, regarding lockdowns, is “disease trends and risk factors, outcomes of treatment or public health interventions... and health care costs and use.”

Specifically for pandemics like Covid-19, the most common method used for assessing combative strategies is an ‘intervention and prevention program evaluation,’ a combination of qualitative and quantitative methodologies. This method aims to determine the effectiveness of lockdowns by comparing the change in the indicators in the pre-lockdown months and post-lockdown months.

Majority of the evidence in public health research consists of models of the number of cases against different factors such as geographical location, age-groups etc. Multiple national and cross-national studies have observed an overall downward trend in the number of cases after physical distancing measures (such as lockdowns) have been implemented, establishing a direct correlation between the two. However, although India imposed a nationwide lockdown that slowed infection rate, the number of cases skyrocketed as soon as the lockdown was lifted. This was due to inadequate existing public health facilities which weren't improved during the lockdown, reversing any positive effects of it.

Public health recommendations continue to evolve during the pandemic. However, overall, based on limited quantitative evidence, the public health ministries of multiple countries assert that lockdowns are the most effective preventative measures, especially when coupled with other mitigative strategies such as test and trace and mandatory quarantines.

Political Science

Political Science studies focus on the actions and attitudes of individuals, groups, and institutions on the local, national and international levels. To understand the effectiveness and consequences of lockdowns, it collects empirical evidence through surveys, questionnaires, interviews, and case studies along with field-work, ethnographic works and past experiences.

In regards to the effectiveness of lockdowns, the central issue for political scientists is the impact of lockdowns on political support and behavioural attitudes towards governmental institutions and actors, especially in democratic states, due to increasing government intervention (e.g tracking systems ) and the undemocratic nature of lockdown depriving people of the civil liberties.

The findings of multiple cross-national surveys indicate an increase in diffuse political support , regarding lockdown arrangements.

However, the qualitative evidence suggests that the undemocratic nature of lockdowns can worsen existing social conflicts as well as lead to a new wave of social unrest in democracies. Studies have illustrated several correlations: between distinct features of states and citizens’ reaction to lockdown, between political beliefs, agitation campaigns and lockdown compliance, and between unemployment and opposition to the state-proposed measures.

All in all, the existing evidence suggests that the short-term effects of the lockdown on political support are mostly positive as the people recognize its need. However, long-term effects are yet undetermined, but seem to be more negative as no fundamental ideological changes are happening while the role of the government changes, and this can cause continuous violent discontent with undemocratic measures, thus putting the safety and well-being of people under threat.

Conflict in Evidence

Overall, multiple conflicts among these disciplines along with their most contested conclusions seem to arise from the limitations of the evidence that they rely on. The nature of their methodologies makes some disciplines consider short-term impacts rather than long-term ones and take either qualitative or quantitative factors into account, but not both.

Evidence in Public Health is limited to the short-term impact of lockdowns on health-related variables. It doesn’t account for how they may influence economic variables such as exacerbation of existing economic inequalities and negative growth in GDP, causing a recession. Recessions result in increased unemployment levels and poverty, which can lead to higher long-term death rates, especially in less developed countries.

The evidence in Economics considers these long-term impacts on economies, but it is based on limited quantifiable factors. Economic models tend to lack recognition of psychological influences, of some quantitatively unmeasurable uncertainty, and many aspects of the complex interdependence of society. They calculate the effectiveness of lockdown measures based on a change in the GDP and estimated value of life and don't consider the citizens’ opinion on the ‘economic costs vs lives lost’ debate. For example, the initially calculated costs of a lockdown were later reassessed when it was found that only 7% of the negative growth in economic activity was due to legal restrictions while 60% was caused by people’s fear of the severity of the virus and the anticipated crisis, highlighting the importance of consideration of human behavior.

Due to the qualitative nature of the evidence it relies on, Political Science considers the effectiveness of suppressive measures in relation with human behavior. For example, due to its attention to the political climate and levels of trust in the country at the time of entering the lockdown, it addresses the likelihood of social conflicts and lack of compliance with the proposed measures and thus, chances of failure of lockdowns and loss of lives resulting from them if people are not in support of any governmental decisions.

A higher degree of reliance on interdisciplinary perspectives and evidence therefore will lead to fewer dangerous policy experiments and a more effective mitigation of the pandemic and its consequences.

Evidence in the Euthanasia of Dementia Patients

Introduction

The euthanasia of dementia patients is becoming increasingly contentious as the syndrome's prevalence rises with the ageing population, and concerns over healthcare costs and wellbeing grow. Euthanasia, the act of painlessly ending a life to relieve suffering, is, where legal, increasingly requested by dementia patients. Dementia is 'a group of related symptoms associated with a gradual decline in brain functioning'.

Alzheimer's disease and other dementias world map (in deaths per million persons)

Two branches of the debate especially generate interdisciplinary tensions. This chapter explores how tensions between Medicine, Sociology, and Ethics concerning this issue can be explained by the forms of evidence these disciplines examine. The first branch concerns judgements between an individual's life and the wellbeing of their society. The disciplines each bring valuable insights to the debate, yet struggle to reach a consensus on the right approach. The second concerns the rights of patients: examining differing disciplinary understandings of the syndrome, how they affect an individual's autonomy and approaches to valuing lives.

Individual and Collective Benefits

The three disciplines have contrasting approaches to the conflict between benefits to individuals and their society. Ethics, the study of morality, forms arguments logically, based on axiomatic or subjective assumptions of the writer, discipline, and opposing positions. Anecdotal evidence is also used to highlight specific moral issues. Dresser, for example, criticises one case where a court prioritised 'economic and third party [family] concerns' over those of an 'incompetent' patient in permitting the cessation of life extending treatment. Logically extending from axioms of respect for autonomy and life, they view the decision as immoral, contrasting with sociological and medical positions.

Sociology studies the behaviour and experience of individuals based on their demographics and groups, and is therefore concerned with the social influences on decision-making and the effects of decisions and policies on groups. Although many relevant studies are published in medical journals, their sociological approach constructively builds on medical and ethical discussions.

Several studies explore the effects of euthanasia and dementia on the experiences of family members, suggesting that allowing euthanasia decreases levels of grief, trauma and depression in families. Roest's study found that, despite the legal, ethical and medical narratives suggesting otherwise, patients' families were central in both physician and patient decisions concerning euthanasia. Rather than criticising this, they suggest that the family's role should be further recognised, contradicting Dresser's conclusion. Thus, different conclusions result from different forms of evidence: ethical premises and anecdotes vs. qualitative, community-focused data.

Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALY) is a common measure used to distribute scarce resources and maximise usefulness of medical treatments. It calculates life expectancy, adjusted for any health conditions or disabilities a person lives with. The measurement therefore favours the young and healthy, leading to a reluctance to assign resources to patients that could remain in poor health after treatment. Due to its assumption of perfect health as an optimum, focus on maximising 'benefit' to society as a whole, and reliance on empirical rather than qualitative evidence or axiomatic values, the QALY is criticised in sociology and ethics for its discrimination against the ageing and disabled. This criticism is especially relevant to dementia patients, who face stigmas associated with dementia and financial pressures to fulfil their "special duty [to society] to die", decreasing their chances of receiving healthcare resources.

There are further ethical and sociological claims that dementia patients are depersonalised by the increasing medicalisation of old age, where they are perceived as unwell, as opposed to merely old.

Personhood

The issue of personhood and dementia is highly intersectional, influenced from across the human sciences. Ethics, sociology and medicine have very different approaches to the concept's importance and how it should be preserved.

The skeletal formula for Donepezil: one of the most commonly used drugs in the treatment of dementia.

The medical diagnosis of dementia includes cognitive, neuropsychological, and genetic tests. Research-wise, medicine focuses on physiological interventions and symptom-relieving drugs, generating the empirical evidence that medicine's physiological focus is grounded in. Due to this focus, the medical community faces considerable pressure for timely diagnosis, symptom relief, life-extending interventions, and rapid transitions into care programs.

Sociology explores the issue through a social constructionist framework and qualitative evidence, investigating the cultural, social and demographic factors that impact the prevalence and perception of the syndrome. This approach leads to a view of dementia that is based on its experience being an intersection of social position, symptoms, and the construction of dementia. Due to this evidence base and understanding of dementia as being socially constructed by medical classifications and media presentation, Johnstone and others argue that unnecessary stigma and fear have been generated around ageing by the medicalisation of dementia, leading to the depersonalisation of patients. This, and literature, showing how dementia prevalence and experience vary by demographics, has raised concerns that allowing euthanasia could become discriminatory.

This 'depersonalisation' is justified in medicine by the elements of competence to consent: communication of a choice, factual understanding, appreciation of consequences, and rationality. Thus, dementia patients are often not considered competent in their decisions, especially those who refuse food or treatment, or opt for euthanasia.

The concern about the euthanasia of dementia patients is shared by sections of sociological literature and medical practice, but for very different reasons. Tension arises from the sociological view that, in medicines neglect of patient autonomy, pessimism and 'pejorative interpretations of forgetfulness', they perpetuate a view of a 'black hole of ageing' which magnifies the patients desire for death while disrespecting requests or attempts to achieve it.

The consensus in ethics is generally that the wishes of the patient should be respected, and that advance directives are problematic in this regard. Dresser criticises the medical practice for neglecting the present patient when decisions are made based on their advance directives or another individuals assessment. Her argument is based on Parfit's 'Complex view' of personal identity, which is a view based on the subjective, qualitative observation that people feel disconnected from their previous selves and their values change over time. The evidential conflict with medicine is clear. As it concerns the physical changes in a body over time, viewing an individual as multiple persons over the course of their life seems incompatible with medical methods.

Conclusion

There is little consensus between Medicine, Ethics and Sociology in regards to euthanasia and dementia. Each discipline draws from evidence that prioritises different areas of the issue of living with dementia. Medicine continues to do valuable work for those suffering from dementia, however, medical practice would benefit from sociological and ethical insights. Sociology is concerned with intersectional affects on the experience of dementia, criticising policies and representations that favour one group over another or create unnecessary suffering. It brings insights into how cultural and medical views can be improved to support people with dementia, as well as important social considerations in the euthanasia debate. Ethics, concerned with morality and individual rights, also raises valuable questions. It integrates these with sociological studies of how the treatment and rights of dementia patients could be improved in medical practice, especially concerning their right to die. There is encouraging research bridging this gap in medical sociology and medical ethics, however, significant difficulty exists in changing medical practice due to its highly practical focus.

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Introduction

Time perception refers to the subjective, individual experience or awareness of the passage of time. Time being a concept of major importance to people and their fear of fatality, time perception is a very widely studied issue, in multiple disciplines across both humanities and natural sciences.

As its evidence comprises subparts (primary or secondary, qualitative or quantitative), the study of time perception in any field seems complex. It is an intrinsically individual and subjective phenomenon and analysing different evidence from different perspectives is a complex process.

Time perception in Neuroscience

Research and evidence in neuro-scientific time perception

A range of research methods have been used to produce evidence relating to how humans perceive time, with a focus on the anatomy and physiology of the brain. These include electrophysiology, psychophysics, EEG (electroencephalogram), MRI, and computer modelling data which are used in conjunction with more qualitative evidence produced by asking subjects questions and recording their responses. The present consensus in the scientific community is that the mechanism of time perception lies in the connections within and between neural networks, as opposed to constrained to a single part of the brain.

Emotions and time perception

The mechanism underlying the phrase ‘time flies when you are having fun’ has been scientifically examined and qualitative evidence has been found to support the hypothesis that emotion does affect time perception. A 2011 French study run by Professor Driot-Volet and Sandrine Gil involved showing subjects extracts of films intended to induce fear, sadness, or indifference (neutral clips like weather reports used for the latter). After viewing, subjects estimated the duration of a stimulus, and having seen a fear inducing clip, time seemed to slow down, as fear activates an internal response that increases the rate of the internal body clock. Surprisingly, sad clips were not seen to alter subjects sense of time, as the clips were not personal.

Overcoming the subjectivity of evidence

The very nature of studying time perception is that it is subjective and individual, which contributes significant challenges to obtaining valid evidence. To overcome such issues, researchers utilise standardised tasks that allow for a more accurate comparison of the way individuals perceive the effect of emotions and experiences on time. It is important to separate the time perception in a neutral context to the time perception emotional situation. This ensures that it is the emotions of the emotional stimulus that affect the way time is perceived, rather than other factors involved in the emotional event.

Time perception in Philosophy

Particular evidence in philosophy

Contrary to scientific fields, philosophical evidence and the resulting thinking are not as obvious or quantitative. The main evidence available in our subjective and relative perception of time is individual experience : anything one feels, thoughts, memories or even physical feelings. German philosopher Martin Heidegger stresses that time “persists merely as a consequence of the events taking place in it”. Therefore, time is perceived through events that come in succession. Each and every individual experiences these events by means of their senses before perceiving them in time, in the way a flash of lightning is first perceived by vision and later by hearing. Philosophical evidence when it comes to time perception, with its regards to personal experience, is therefore most likely to be empirical, qualitative and primary.

Memory as the major type of evidence in time perception

Such introspective evidence can allow a study of the perception of time’s duration. St-Augustine highlights the prevailing role of memory, being the evidence on which we base our understanding of the time we live in. The duration of a moment can only be assessed once it has passed and has been anchored in our memory. The memory of this moment, of what one felt and thought, is what allows us to place it in time. The only time in which we exist is the present, and our memories of events represent the evidence of time passing. Past and future are just existent in our minds, and only allow us to organize our memories of events chronologically. Evidence of time duration and passing, lying in memory, is evidently fully subjective. St-Augustine describes our conception of time as fully spontaneous, thus there is no need to try and explain it.

How memory leads to a qualitative and individual perception of time according to philosophy

Sharpening St-Augustine’s argument, W. J. Friedman formulated two models. The strength model states that the more recent an event, the stronger its memory is. Based on empirical evidence, he counters it with the inference model, arguing that time is perceived by recalling characteristics of the events which date we are trying to gauge. Indeed, he tested how people would remember a list of words, given successively, considering they were told to remember some of them more than others. Experience shows that the best remembered words were not the last ones but the ones on which attention was drawn. Overall, philosophy provides evidence that individuals will remember events and therefore perceive time according to their personal experiences (interactions, orders received, striking feelings) impacting their memory. Thus time perception is a relative concept and not a universal one.

Conclusion

Tensions and common ground between the disciplines

The main basis of the existing tensions is the types of evidence used as it incorporates many sub-parts (such as objective and subjective evidence). Indeed, disciplines relying more on solid, quantitative and objective evidence such as neuroscience will have a different understanding from disciplines using more subjective evidence like philosophy does. Neuroscience and philosophy differ on the fact that neuroscience covers immediate time perception and the impact of emotions that are felt simultaneously whereas philosophy highlights the importance of past experiences and how they influence one’s time perception. However, they concord about the fact that time perception lies on a subjective basis and that individual profile – emotions and experience – is key to one’s time perception. Our interdisciplinary approach therefore challenges the generally acknowledged belief that objective evidence is more powerful than subjective.

An interdisciplinary approach: the domain of psychology

Tackling the concept of time perception in an interdisciplinary way naturally leads to the field of psychology. Psychology – "the study of the mind and how it dictates and influences our behaviour" – strongly relies on neuroscientific evidence, theory and methods, which are the first tools used by psychologists to assess issues. For example, it was shown that the emotion of anxiety obstructs an accurate perception of time. However, psychology as a profession focuses as well on directly helping individuals to reach mental and behavioural stability. To reach this aim, a unique patient-psychologist relationship has to exist. Philosophical evidence enters here the process : an individual's time perception depends on their memory of personal experience. This means the evidence on which the therapist will work to help the patient will come out of their communication and the patient’s telling about their past : primary subjective evidence which could indicate what might provoke their anxiety. In this way, associating philosophy and neuroscience with their tensions and common ground altogether helps get a holistic approach and cope efficiently with time anxiety.

Evidence in the French Security Law

The French Global security law

The 20th of October 2020, Jean-Yves Fauvergue et Alice Thourot introduced a new proposition of law to put in action within the French government. It included new regulations upon the municipal police’s power, the instauration of new equipment and devices of video monitoring for enhanced social security and new policies to restrict rights to disseminate videos of the police.

Sociological approach

Sociological insight on a law appears beneficial in the understanding of a policy's effect on society. According to the government, this law only aims to tackle issues of increasing violence against the police due to online diffusion of videos calling out for violence. Even though, this law claims to protect the nation’s police, many activists, journalists as well as the EU and the UN are expressing their dissatisfaction with this law, which is not in line with French values and human rights. Sociologically, videos are primary sources of evidence that can reveal violation of human rights. In a society where social medias reveal themselves as platforms of self-expression, the use of video as an evidence to denounce, critique and question is one of the most used and relevant tool. However, some factors associated with the social media obstruct the evidentiary value of a video: the anonymity, display of misinformation or information with lack of context, all make social media not always very convincing and often subjected to collective denial for lack of credibility.

Conflict Theory Perspective

Conflict theorists, center their sociological perspective upon power relationships within broader social structure, in particular inequality and uneven wealth distribution causing consequent class conflict. According to Chevigny and based on evidence he collected in America, a conflict theorist, police brutality is a governmental instrument used for and by social elites to suppress potential social threats that could destabilize their privileges. This perspective emphasize the exploitative aspect of social structure and the global passivity and lack of consciousness due to an established status quo. Using this perspective as an evidence, this new law regulating rights upon video-recording authority, appears as a mean to prevent the population from having access to disturbing videos that could destabilize the order to the detriment of potential victims, as well as allowing police officers to commit unjustified violence with impunity to groups that would represent a threat. This law is meant to cover up undesirable social movements, likely to cause social unrest.

Philosophical Approach

With the new security law, civilians don't have the right to take any video footage of the police. The French people are now watched and are incapable of looking back at the authority, making the look a new object of power. In "Discipline and Punish", Michel Foucault reflects on the panopticon a project thought by Jeremy Bentham. The "panopticon" would be a tower of control at the centre of a prison where someone observes every movement of the prisoners without them being able to look back at him. Humans tend to act correctly in front of a camera: they stand straight and tries to look decent in front of the observer. The subject of the film becomes the subject of the observer installing a new power relation between the two. In this context, allowing a one-way observation provides full control for police officers and attacks our freedom. However, Hobbes demonstrates that giving more power to a member of society is the key to societal cohesion. According to his book, "Léviathan" the " man is a wolf to man". Humans are naturally egoistic beings that fight amongst themselves. Civilians therefore accept to submit themselves to one leader to guarantee security and social cohesion. Thus Hobbes would claim the law is both legitimate and improves social cohesion. Philosophy embraces different opinions on subjects through different experiences. In philosophy, limited quantitative or qualitative evidence is found as one relies on their own subjective interpretations of the world. Evidence in philosophy is, therefore based on theories that are often only conceptualised. Arguably, philosophical evidence wouldn't be concrete enough in a practical situation such as the global security law, but can allow us to conceptualise some of the incentives and issues that come with the law. Philosophy and sociology prove that with a same issue and two different sets of evidence lead to different interpretations of the global security law.

Law, Philosophy and Human Rights

A key tension over the justification for the Security Law is the nature of human rights. It is around this issue that there has been much contention, namely with the UN high commissioner for human rights calling for a rewrite on the grounds of human rights. As laws are ultimately justified through the authority that a government is granted to create laws, the only evidential claim against the law is on the grounds of human rights. Human rights are claimed to be "inherent to all human beings" by the united nations but there is less clarity about which rights should have priority. Legally, Human rights hold a higher standing than international law and can be used by citizens to hold their governments accountable, so if the liberty of the populace is prioritised over the security of the police then obligations to the law are justified. It is here that philosophy can help exemplify which of these rights should be protected. An approach by Maurice Cranston, can help to provide ways to analyse rights themselves. If we apply some of Cranston's tests, particularly the idea that rights must respond to threats to other or the same rights, we can see that we can justify the UN reaction as the right of the freedom of press in regards to the police contributes to the prevention of future injustices done by the police, so the rights of freedoms, in this case, help protect future security rights of the public. On the contrary, the rights the police have to security stand not in defence of any other rights, but instead stand in contradiction to the future security rights of the public. As such, through this combined approach we can justify the UN response and see how we can prioritise rights over one another.

The Interdisciplinary Approach

The usage of evidence, and the types of evidence in these three disciplines is ultimately very different, and as such lead to very different outcomes. Political Philosophy uses evidence, with a stronger focus on reason alone, to support normative claims, whilst Sociology aims to explain why things are in society and create theories around that, using real life systems as evidence and law is used to exert powers over a society, and is evidenced by societal power systems in place. Evidence used by these disciplines greatly differ, they are still beneficial as they aim to explain different things; Philosophy helps us grasp the purpose of the law in a wider societal perspective, the sociology helps us grasp how the law will impact society and the discipline of law helps explain how the law will be put into practice and on what grounds. The three disciplines, despite some of their contradicting theories, approach the French Security Law from different angles, which ultimately aids us in understanding the law as a whole.

Introduction

The use of herbal substances to relieve pain and treat disorders is an ancient medicinal method. In modern society, this idea has been extended to include debate surrounding the medicinal use of illegal substances like cannabis. There has been much controversy on a disciplinary level due to the different research methods employed in approaching this issue, and subsequently, the different modes of evidence procured. This has resulted in tension between academic disciplines. How could these approaches be mediated? And can they result in a beneficial interdisciplinary perspective which may provide a broader and more informed scope regarding Medical Cannabis?

Evidence in Psychology

Psychology uses qualitative research methods－ including open-ended questionnaires/interviews－ and quantitative－ clinically-focused reviews and more statistical, positivist surveying methods, for example－ to acquire evidence. These are equally as fruitful in observation of the topic in question.

Regarding systematic reviews, one clinically-focused review was undertaken in 2020, with researchers observing plant formulations, clinical prescriptions of subjects, and their occupational and health elements. Although overall findings of each study were described as ‘nascent’ in relation to each other, isolated studies suggested advocacy for the use of CBD for sufferers of anxiety and schizophrenia. This mode of research presents some benefits: it provides a holistic glance into the efficacy of cannabis on treating mental health issues, with acknowledgement of variables in subjects’ health conditions and occupations. However, there are shortcomings within this. One could argue that the positivist nature of the findings ignores the nuances of the human condition as it does not incorporate direct testimonies of those afflicted with mental health issues.

Furthermore, evidence can be gleaned through the utilisation of qualitative methods including online forums. A forum was hosted by AZDHS in 2013 about the use of cannabis to treat PTSD, with comments being indexed online. General observations found that there was overwhelming advocacy of this from sufferers of the disorder, with claims that it lessens “the brain's sensitivity to outside triggers that can exacerbate PTSD symptoms”. While this mode of evidence provides a more contextualised, humane exploration of this topic, it is limited in the sense that logically, the forum would be dominated by those who are advocates of the cause as opposed to detractors, opening up the possibility of bias within the responses gleaned and consequently narrows the validity of the evidence.

Evidence in Pharmacology

One of the early pharmaceutical randomised controlled trials regarding cannabis in relation to anorexia nervosa was published in 1983. One method used was a qualitative questionnaire answered by the participants. The results showed that the subjects who received the active substances in cannabis, Δ9-Tetrahydrocannabinol or THC, improved sleep and experienced less anxiety than those who received placebo. This information was however later presented in quantitative form through tables and diagrams. The trial also conducted quantitative research by measuring weight of the participants but the used dose of THC did not provide a significant effect.

Additionally, a randomised controlled trial in 2017 showed quantitative evidence that THC in form of Dronabinol© can be used to treat Anorexia Nervosa by showing a larger increase in weight of patients who received THC in comparison to those who received placebo. An aspect of the study was that patients with depression or other psychiatric disorders were excluded from the trial This made the study more focused on the weight gain and thus the quantitative evidence available.

In opposition to the two trials previously discussed, a study from Oxford University in 2008 aimed to examine the side effects of medical cannabis. The study provided preliminary evidence from Magnetic Resonance Imaging that long term use of cannabis damages Corpus Callosum. The MRI scan was analysed by separating it into voxels, calculating the eigenvalues and eigenvectors and lastly the values were normalised. The images were also qualitatively analysed and visually compared to placebo. These methods show that the MRI scan provided both qualitative and quantitative evidence.

Furthermore, physiological side effects connected to failure in the digestive and cardiovascular systems reoccur in control trials. Several studies on both model organisms and humans provide empirical evidence that the side effects depend on the relation between THC and the endocannabinoid system in the brain.

Evidence in Law

In contrast to analysing the issue of medical cannabis from the psychological and pharmacological aspects, a legal perspective provides contradictory evidence.

In the United Kingdom, questions about the medical use of cannabis has been regarded since 1998. The House of Lords had selected the Science and Technology Committee to investigate on the possibility of using cannabis for medical reasons. They concluded that there was enough convincing evidence that cannabis had medical capacities to treat many forms of pain. They also recommended starting trials of cannabis to treat medical problems. However, the UK government did not accept the committee’s recommendation. This was partially changed in November 2018 as the government changed the law after the Home Secretary acknowledged raised concerns of parents of children with illnesses such as epilepsy. The current law allows specialist doctors to take the decision to prescribe unlicensed medicines in form of cannabis. However, the law makes it clear that the use of cannabis for recreational purposes is still illegal and that penalties concerning unauthorised use will remain as it was.

In April 2019, Emma Appleby, mother of a nine-year-old girl with severe epilepsy and a rare chromosomal disorder, saw her £4.500 of cannabis oil confiscated by officials after entering the UK from a trip to Holland. Appleby was devastated to not be allowed to use the cannabis oil on her daughter as it was the only solution she found to relieve her daughter’s pain. She also stated that she tried several pharmaceutical “drugs and diets", but all failed to remove her daughter’s pain and symptoms. Appleby added that some treatments made the case worse as they caused side effects. As mentioned, the law was changed in November 2018, however it seems like parents have struggled to get prescriptions.

Conclusion

Through integrating elements of a psychological approach with phamacological evidence, academics can acquire a holistic understanding of the issue of medical cannabis. Not only by observing evidence within the two separate disciplines to gain understanding regarding the psychological and physiological effects of medical cannabis, but also through the utilisation of both quantitative and qualitative research methods in both disciplines. As demonstrated, these research methods garner evidence of both a positivist and interpretive nature, mediating both for a deeper enquiry in determining medical cannabis’ capacity to treat mental health issues. These methods account for external factors that may have implications on this topic, and that may otherwise be difficult to observe empirically. Moreover, from a legal perspective, this evidence can be put into practice through updating of the regulations in place, which makes prescription of the drug contingent on a doctor's opinion, making it very difficult to access for some people. An interdisciplinary approach would be beneficial in developing those regulations, through the incorporation of evidence from psychology, pharmacology and law to craft a path towards more modernised and evidence-based forms of medication.

References

Truth

Part 2

Truth in "The Crown"

Introduction

The Crown is a Netflix-original series that portrays the life of Queen Elizabeth II. This chapter analyses Truth in the episode ‘Aberfan’, which depicts the collapse of a spoil tip that killed 144 people, 116 of which were children, in the Welsh village of Aberfan in 1966.

Disciplinary Approaches

Historical Approach

There has been consistent enthusiasm for the British Royal Family, particularly our Queen Elizabeth II. Her reign of 68 years has been a source of stability. Amidst the Aberfan tragedy, the Queen’s position was relatively tenuous; declining colonial influence and successive economic crises put pressure on her public response to the Aberfan tragedy, particularly for the Welsh who were seeking ways to become more independent. Nevertheless, the monarchy was viewed as having a necessary role in Britain’s leadership, and economic hardships did not erase pervasive loyalty to the Crown.

Historical Truth is presumed to be objective, and led by evidence; the moulding of Truth into a narrative directly contradicts objectivity. However, historical narratives make partial Truths more accessible, but in order for these to be valuable, we must acknowledge them as such and draw distinctions between Truth and narrative. During the 19th century, an approach to Historical Truth which focused on heroic individuals became fashionable, created by Scottish Philosopher Thomas Carlyle who stated, “The History of the world is but the Biography of great men.” The Crown is a product of this ‘Great Man’ approach, constructing a narrative around the Queen. The show’s depiction of the Queen fulfils the theory’s assumptions that necessary qualities are innate in a predestined ‘Great Man’ and will arise when a leader is needed. This is shown in the portrayal of the Queen’s ability to conform to different situations without becoming emotionally involved. Social Historians would contest this, stating that more evidence is needed relating to groups disenfranchised by this approach, otherwise Truth cannot be interpreted from the evidence presented. However, both approaches to Historical Truth involve the construction of a narrative, whether it be around an individual or a movement, and we should not devalue one source over another as Truth can be gleaned from both.

Film Studies Approach

To produce a historically accurate episode, The Crown’s research team relied on quantitative and qualitative evidence. The quantitative evidence constituted data about the Aberfan community, the events leading up to and following the incident, and the casualties. The qualitative evidence came from archival material (such as newspaper articles that commented on the disaster and the societal, political and royal responses), biographical works about the royal family, consultations with historians about the incident, and interviews with the survivors.

Nevertheless, this plentiful and diverse evidence presented challenges to The Crown’s writer, Peter Morgan. He shared that the survivors’ recollections of the Queen’s visit to Aberfan contradicted the negative public response to her late arrival (which she also regretted in hindsight). Therefore, Morgan had to decide how to tell the story.

In the episode, the Queen’s response to the tragedy is presented as cold-hearted and it is strongly suggested that she only visits Aberfan to avoid bad publicity. However, a survivor, Jeff, claims that she “showed outward emotion” and that she “shed genuine tears when a young Aberfan survivor handed her a posey” (while in the show, after receiving the posey, the Queen fakes a tear). The Mirror approach to Truth was not employed because the portrayal of the Queen in the show does not align with the qualitative evidence from the interviews with the survivors. What is the reason behind overlooking that qualitative evidence and thus, risking the historical accuracy of the episode? A possible answer is that The Crown is concerned with a larger Truth, presented through the Interpretative approach. Overall, the show focuses on the monarchy as an institution. Perhaps the Queen’s response is portrayed as unsympathetic in order to emphasise her duty as a monarch to present stoicism during a national crisis, which she fulfills exceptionally well. This could suggest that in order to fulfil her duty, the Queen has repressed a part of herself, namely, her emotional response to tragedy. The central themes in The Crown could be equated to Truths that are consistent throughout the show, and which the filmmaker chooses how to tell.

Behavioural Psychology Approach

The episode partly focuses on the differing duties between a Royal and the Prime Minister. Wilson – the then Labour Prime Minister – in The Crown encourages the Queen to visit Aberfan, which she resists and questions as it was not considered her duty. Wilson responds with “to comfort people”, which baffles her.

After the Queen did visit Aberfan, a scene depicts Wilson and the Queen confiding in each other about the fronts they put on to satisfy public expectations. The Queen is portrayed as emotionally void, and whether this is true or not, it brings up an important discussion about what the public requires from the monarchy and its government. Wilson reveals that he was Oxford educated, doesn’t like beer, and prefers cigars over pipes “but cigars are a symbol of capitalist privilege” which interferes with his appeal to voters. He comforts the Queen’s inability to have genuine outward emotional responses by stating that “no one needs hysteria from a head of state…the truth is, we barely need humanity”, suggesting that a Queen must be stoic to fulfil her civic duty. Robertson states that “In Stoicism, the passions, or irrational emotions, are conceived of as emotionally charged cognitions…and are, therefore, susceptible to disputation.” This is a representation of a Social Constructivist approach to truth. Here Morgan gives the Queen and Wilson certain character traits for the audience, so they can understand why and how they make decisions. Whilst characterisation is integral to producing a drama, and this demonstrates a logical understanding of these roles, a Truth here has been created that nobody, other than those depicted, can confirm.

Evaluation

The Crown approaches Truth in the episode of ‘Aberfan’ through its focus on royal and political response. Whilst being more realistic than other episodes, with respect to the tragedy it depicts, the show is a historical drama, not a documentary, and with that comes necessary compromises. From a historical perspective, the show mainly uses the Mirror approach to Truth to depict historical events that reflect reality. However, this is complicated by the ‘Great Men’ perspective which the show employs, conveying explicitly one viewpoint to the detriment of others. From a Film Studies perspective, the show may be seen to use an Interpretive approach, presenting a logically constructed Truth based on historical data without fully reflecting historical reality. The show also uses the Social Constructivist approach to Truth as it conveys real people as characters for an audience to get to know through their language and social context. This allows the viewer to sympathise, blame and praise those characters for their actions, and develop opinions on the historical and political figures depicted. The Truth of these real people that the show represents, however, is one that cannot ever be truly known by the public, yet is necessary for the makings of a successful drama. It is here that Truth can, (and in some ways, must) be influenced by the creators of the show.

Truth in censorship of women's bodies on social media

Introduction

Today’s era is profoundly marked by the growth of social media. Given their wide impact, it is important that powerful networking platforms, such as Instagram, Facebook or Twitter, represent the populations in their realities. However, numerous debates have emerged regarding the norms and values that social media conveys. Indeed, the rise of censorship of women’s bodies has caused indignation around the world. This chapter will be discussing how different disciplines conduct various approaches to the truth of this phenomenon.

Truth in Law

Censorship, which can be defined as the "official prohibition or restriction of any type of expression believed to threaten the political, social, or moral order“, is used by social media in their rules to regulate the display of nudity. However, they restrain women’s bodies’ expression and their interpretation is often subjective to their phrasing. Thus they aren't applied equally to every woman. “Squeezing female breasts, defined as a grabbing motion with curved fingers that shows both marks and clear shape change of the breasts“ is supposed to be forbidden on Facebook, but in reality, prominent breasts being touched can be censored whereas small breasts aren't. Moreover, celebrities and women who match the beauty ideals - thin, white etc.- are restricted less severely than others. The vagueness of those policies allows social media to remove anything they want. Pinterest's policy is a great demonstration of the freedom that the platform has to delete anything without justification : ”We reserve the right to remove or modify User Content, or change the way it’s used in Pinterest, for any reason”.

As for menstruation blood, contents have been removed on the basis of the policy even though it was respected. In March 2015, a photo depicting a fully clothed woman with bloodstains on her trousers and sheets was removed without explanation, except that it didn't respect the policy even though menstrual blood is not mentioned in it.

However, some policies are actually very specific and thus restrictive. For example, “female nipples“ are censored on TikTok, Facebook and Instagram but male ones are not. Even though some improvements have been made allowing nipples to be shown “in the context of breastfeeding, birth-giving and after-birth moments, health-related situations“ for Facebook and Instagram, it is not generally allowed yet.

In conclusion, because of the law expressed in the policies which induce censorship on social media, the online image of women’s bodies is not a mirror of reality. The ambiguity of the policies and their vagueness makes the truth that is shown subjective and unfair.

Truth in Sociology

Social interaction has an impact on humans and their mental state and since it is largely carried out through social media nowadays, the censorship of certain content also plays a part in shaping our society’s mentality.

Social media can affect the human psyche in various ways, including how people view their own bodies and feel about themselves. Especially young women seem to be affected by this and experience for example eating disorders and distorted perception of their bodies due to profuse exposure to certain beauty ideals (in this case, thinness) on social media. Evidently, what is seen on the platforms, and in turn what is not, can severely affect the norms and ideals that are deducted within society.

Content such as the graphic demonstration of women’s body hair, mothers breastfeeding, women's nipples or discussion about natural phenomena like their menstrual cycle has been subject to censorship on social media. What one is left with are social media platforms that provide viewers with an altered picture of women’s bodies, with also not all kinds of bodies being equally represented. An example is the censorship of pictures of overweight women. This promotes unrealistic body images for most girls and women and further invigorates the striving towards bodily “perfection”, which is seemingly defined by the content that does end up being viewed. The issues of "female nipples" and "female body" hair being censored are also especially controversial in society, since for men it is considered socially acceptable to show their nipples as well as body hair.

“Taboo-ing” such topics and pictures in the first place constructs a perception of parts of women’s bodies as something shameful and sexual, and the display of such as suggestive and provocative. Thus, sociologically, the censorship of women’s bodies on social media does not only mirror issues in society like their sexualization and stigmatization but also further consolidates them by constructing an incomplete and consequently non-authentic portrayal of reality.

Truth in Economics

Nowadays social media is one of the most effective ways for businesses to reach new audiences on a global scale, and like every firm, social media companies’ first concern is to make a profit. Their primary and most successful way to make money is through selling advertising, meaning that an advertising sales representative sells « space » on their platforms to companies that want to advertise their products.

Advertising companies try using societal “supposed ideals” in ads on social networks to maximize the audience they are reaching, in an endeavor to sell a maximum amount of products. An example is the adage: “what is beautiful is good”, in other words: what is attractive makes more money. Facebook's and therefore Instagram’s guidelines consider content where “nudity or implied nudity (even if artistic or educational in nature), excessive visible skin or cleavage (even if not explicitly sexual in nature) images focused on individual body parts, such as abs, buttocks or chest, (even if not explicitly sexual in nature)” against their Advertising Policies.Also, black or “plus-size” women have been largely underrepresented in advertisements in general for a long time, and still are in part. During the ad review process, the advertising sales representatives of the platform decide whether the ad will be made available to the consumers or not.

Companies decide what they show on their platforms and what they do not. An economist would say that all economic agents make rational choices and as firms, social media platforms' primary concern is, as said before, making money. That means that in truth, censorship is a rational choice to pursue their goal of making a profit. This theory is manifested by the fact that women's nipples, hairy legs, or menstrual blood in advertisements can be considered "shocking" and consequently have a negative impact on business.

Conclusion

Examining the fact that women’s bodies are being censored on social media through the lens of different disciplines, various explanations of the truth that this phenomenon displays can be deducted. While sociologists would not only argue that the censorship reflects issues within society itself, but also that this censorship constructs an image and expectations of the woman’s body in society that are not entirely truthful, an economist would use a more quantitative approach, explaining the situation to be a result of a business model aimed at increasing the profit of companies. Law provides us with necessary guidelines but also leaves real grey areas with respect to which kind of content is approved for display on social media. As the truth might be situated somewhere in the middle of these explanations, an interdisciplinary approach is necessary to illustrate it accurately.

Truth in the definition of Gender

Introduction

Biologists and sociologists define gender in different ways. Whereas biologists argue that gendered behaviour is due to biological traits and physiological features, sociologists believe that it is a social construct. These different views cause tension between the two disciplines.

A case study that illustrates this tension is that of Christie Lee Cavazos : when filing a medical malpractice suit on a doctor who allegedly misdiagnosed her husband in 1996, she experienced the impact of these different views. She had undergone a sex change operation in the 1970s and had legal documents and the testimony of medical experts stating that she was both physically and psychologically female. Despite this, under the premise that Cavazos would always have male chromosomes, Chief Justice Hardberger ruled that she was unable to file the suit as his spouse, suggesting that the marriage was illegitimate. This shows that socially she could be female, but still be considered biologically male, causing a strain on her rights as a woman; evidently, there is a dichotomy between truth in biology and sociology.

This chapter will further explore this tension through observing the views of the opposing sides and their respective critiques. This kind of analysis is important as gender has such a huge impact on the lives of individuals, as exemplified through Christie Lee Cavazos’ story.

Gender defined by Biology

Within the discipline of biology, gender is considered binary, as it is assumed to follow after one's biological sex. According to Oxford Dictionary, sex is defined as, “either of the two main categories (male and female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions.” The physiological distinctions between men and women include differences in chromosomes, sexual organs and hormones.

Female and male chromosomes

Both sexes have twenty-three pairs of chromosomes; however, women only have X chromosomes, whilst men have both X and Y. The presence or absence of the Y chromosome enables biologists to determine the sex of an individual. In the first stages of embryonic development, male and female embryos are almost morphologically identical, however, eventually, due to the expression of the sex-determining gene, on the Y chromosome, the testes begin to develop. In females, the absence of this gene, in collaboration with the presence of other genes, leads to the development of the ovary. The gonads which develop – the ovary and testes – are essential for the development of secondary sexual characteristics in the sexes, as they secrete sex-specific hormones. These include oestrogen, progesterone and testosterone. Males and females produce all three of these hormones, but in different concentrations within the blood: females have higher levels of oestrogen and progesterone, whilst males have higher levels of testosterone.

In some capacity, the recognition of specific sex-related differences could be highly advantageous, as it would improve the quality of gender-specific medicine. Before the 1800s, men were considered the blueprint of humankind, and women's health was therefore grossly misunderstood.

In essence, within biology, the definition of gender is limited to the physiological, with the truth of one's gender being determined by the sexual organs which they possess.

Despite the undeniable biological truths which separate males from females, scientific data which seeks to prove gender as biological is often flawed. Scientists have often interpreted results to studies with bias, or have chosen to only answer certain questions which serve the biological sex narrative they had assumed true. The study of neurological differences between the sexes also poses a problem as in fact our brains develop according to our use of it, which since the earliest stages of life is culturally determined.

Gender defined by Sociology

According to the Oxford Dictionary, gender refers to the “state of being male or female as expressed by social or cultural distinctions and differences, rather than biological ones”. This source of information is recognised as being reliable and it removes the biological discipline from the definition of gender. This would mean that someone’s gender could differ from their birth sex, which is an idea also accepted by official bodies such as the Office for National Statistics .However, in most cultures, we assume that people follow a particular behaviour according to their sex. The French sociologist Anne Dafflon Novelle, in Filles-garçons: socialisation différenciée? (Girls-Boys: differentiated socialisation? ), argues that society pushes individuals to act in a stereotyped gendered way. She explains that places of socialisation such as schools or families unconsciously orientate children to different roles and behaviours, depending on their birth sex.

Social scientists argue that gender is socially constructed, exemplified by Judith Butler's notion of ‘performative gender’, or the one of "doing gender" by West and Zimmerman (1987). These concepts refer to gender as repeated actions and behaviour rather than something which we irrevocably are. The famous quote of the French sociologist and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir, “One is not born but rather become a woman” in her book The Second Sex (1949), illustrates her point of view that one’s gender is defined over time through a process of socialisation which begins at birth. She implies that we perform and embody our gender by respecting and internalizing the stereotyped social roles and norms expected from our sex by society.

This shows that from a sociological perspective, the truth of the definition of the term 'gender' is that it is a socially constructed set of actions that are not necessarily tied to one's biological sex, as biology would assume.

However, David Reimer's case can be used to criticise the sociological view. Reimer was born as a biological male, and due to an incident at birth, his parents raised him as a female following the advice of a psychologist. Reimer underwent sexual reassignment surgery, also taking female hormones as he developed through puberty. He found himself depressed and uncomfortable as a woman and, ignorant of his birth sex, felt as if he should be male, making this transition as a teenager. This suggests that the socialisation of Reimer into the female gender was irrelevant and that it was his biological sex which defined his gender, meaning that it is not entirely a social construct.

Conclusion

Truth in the definition of gender is not absolute; it varies according to disciplines. Biologists and social scientists, respectively, assume that gender can be defined through biological features and social ones. Their definitions differ because they don’t exercise in the same field, and are not confronted by the same data and evidence. Therefore, the truth of gender's definition is subjective.

Scholars such as Wendy Wood and Alice H. Eagly have worked on a theory that joins these approaches on gender together: the ‘biosocial theory’. This psychological perspective claims that the division of labour is the cause of the emergence of gendered behaviour and differences in the sexes. This division of labour would be due to the socialisation of children that internalise a specific and expected behaviour depending on their sex, but also because of hormones and biological traits that differ slightly, such as size or role in reproduction.

Unfolding the truth about the definition of gender can benefit from an interdisciplinary approach, as different disciplines provide subjective truths which can complement and verify each other, making the final outcome more nuanced.

Truth in 21st century advertising

Introduction

With the advent of the 21st-century came the popularization of social media. It rendered the traditional form of mass advertising redundant, changing the way advertisers communicate with the market. Big data mining and analytics allow advertisers to precisely target audience and optimise reach. However, advertising is increasingly perceived by the public as a distortion of reality; something not to be believed, and in this chapter, we look into the truth and ethics behind this modern form of advertising from the perspectives of three disciplines: Psychology, Economics, and Philosophy, seeking to find common ground between the clashing ideas.

Psychology's Discourse on Advertising's Truth

Today, numerous firms propose similar products and services, consequently standing out is the key to success. According to psychologist Harry Hollingworth, to produce efficient advertisements, firms need to capture the consumer’s attention, make a lasting impression, and motivate them to buy. The consumer's willingness to purchase a good or service will depend on their idea of the product, how they identify with it, and their confidence in the expected benefit. The consumer is convinced of the truthfulness of the advertisements promoting the merits of the product(s), and this trust is key to ensuring customer satisfaction and loyalty. The understanding of psychological elements enhances the precision of targeted advertising.

Psychologists have developed approaches to influence customer perceptions through advertising. Harlow Gale's theory focused on how colours and designs affect customers’ decision-making. Walter Dill Scott discovered that people form categories of mental images according to their dominating sense, so advertisers would need to refer to all the senses to appeal to each person. His theory is based on suggestion, mental imagery, perception, emotion, and memory applied to advertising.

According to psychologist Gary Lupyan, perceptions aren't objectively true because they are shaped by our past experiences, needs, values, and expectations. As a result, perceptions are subjective to each person. For marketers, consumers' perceptions are of more value than their knowledge of objective reality.

Our perceptions are shaped by the marketer's willingness to create a need and make people buy. Customers’ perceptions of the marketed product do not necessarily reflect reality, since they are provoked and conditioned by marketers. This approach to truth in advertising through psychology allows us to understand the impact of marketing techniques using psychology on people's perception of truth.

Philosophy's Discourse on Advertising's Truth

Advertising is an innately utilitarian practice, seeking to “satisfy needs and wants through an exchange process”. However, this attempt to satisfy the customer does not necessarily mean that utilitarian advertising is ethical. For example, McDonald’s advertisements hold utilitarian value in that they satisfy the desires of many consumers, but the health implications of regular consumption of such unhealthy foods contradict the suggestion that these advertisements adhere to utilitarianism. In fact, many argue that the negative impacts of such advertisements overshadow the gratification they evoke in those who view them, so much so that the UK government imposed a ban on television junk food advertising before 9pm in an attempt to tackle obesity. However, from a purely utilitarian perspective, there are arguments to be made for both sides; hiding the truth of the repercussions of habitual junk-food consumption causes more widespread satisfaction among consumers who enjoy it, and it could be argued that this should be prioritized over showing the rather more grim truth of the realities of this sort of lifestyle.

Another major philosophical perspective on advertising is the deontological one. Deontology is the study of moral duty along the lines of good and bad. A deontologist would support the restriction of communication that deceives consumers or takes advantage of their psychological traits for the sake of profit. Therefore, from a deontological perspective, the truth is the most important factor in advertising. In 2019, prompted by advertisements for products such as ineffective weight loss drinks, the UK’s advertising regulator told agencies to eliminate stereotypes “likely to cause harm, or serious or widespread offense”, supporting the deontological perspective that advertisements should not portray anything untruthful.

Economics' Discourse on Advertising's Truth

Since the beginning of the 21st-century, advertising has become a key business plan for firms and start-ups. Indeed, 80% of Google revenue per year comes from advertisements that they run on their platforms. Social media greatly benefits from this, as US social network ad revenues have nearly doubled from USD$21 billion in 2017 to USD$36 billion in 2019. However, advertising's success as a business plan has created significant monopolies such as GAFA, discouraging new firms from entering the market as they cannot compete against them.

Advertising has benefited from a new economic study called “behavioural economics” which adds "insights from psychology and empirical research on human cognition and emotional biases to economic model”. In the digital era, this means mass collection of user data, subject of the 2018 Facebook trial. The discipline of economics helps perceive 21st century businesses' main motivation: using data to provide more accurate ads, resulting in increased profitability. Therefore, platforms' key interest is the amount of time we spend on their services, resulting in them creating increasingly addictive content.

In terms of data collection, great emphasis has been placed on Artificial Intelligence, as it helps understand users' behaviour by analyzing large amounts of data. The objective of 21st-century businesses that run ads is to make you perceive them not as a tool but a necessity, motivated by the fact that a click on an Instagram ad is worth, on average, USD$1.3 of revenue. Therefore, the study of the economic discipline within the context of ads in modern businesses gives better insight on how regulations on data utilisation allowing a limited amount of data to be stored would prevent centralized economies such as monopolies and psychological addiction to technological services.

Tension and Solution

The prevalence of 21st-century digital targeted advertising brings concepts in behavioural economics, a subdiscipline developed from the foundations of economics and psychology, into practice. This interdisciplinary approach has led to marketing and media communication advancements, but also tension between disciplines and different camps of ethics theories. With the discrepancy between the understanding and theorizing on truth across disciplines explored in this chapter, utilitarian interdisciplinary practice has struck deontological concerns, with its coherence with the truth disputed. Despite the argument from some cognitive psychologists that to separate objective truth from subjective perception is impracticable, there remains a need to address the ethical issues raised amid a global climate of low trust levels.

Given the unreliable nature of consumers' perception, we suggest exploring the often overlooked works of communication ethics scholars for the implementation of Aristotelian actor-centred ethic principles in existing frameworks of advertising-communication advisory codes, which emphasize advertisers' practical ethical awareness instead of universalist ethic values. This should come not just as a legal mechanism but more as self-regulation, in response to frequent violations of articles on 'misleading advertising' and 'honesty' in regulatory codes of ethics. From the perceiving side of the issue, a trend of fact-checking political advertisements by institutions, combining positive evidence and political communication techniques, has become increasingly common. Exploration of the possibility of bringing the practice of truth validation into advertising for consumer products and services might provide interdisciplinary insight to truth-seeking in this issue.

Truth in Euthanasia in the Netherlands

     Active euthanasia is legal      Passive euthanasia is legal      Assisted suicide is legal      Euthanasia is illegal      Ambiguous legal situation      no data

Introduction

This chapter aims to explore the issue of Truth in Euthanasia in the Netherlands. This country was the first to legalize the practice of euthanasia. Since then, there has been an ongoing debate over this issue for the last 30 years . Euthanasia is a Greek term, that translates to “good death” . It emerged as a response to the criticism of medical advance, that controlled the lives of humans . What was supposed to give freedom to vulnerable patients, might lead to violation of human rights and doctors’ abuse of power .

The research has been limited to the Netherlands, one of the two countries in Europe where active voluntary euthanasia is legal . During the debates in other countries, where euthanasia is considered unethical , the Netherlands is used as an example of legalization. Establishing truth in euthanasia requires an understanding of the medical, legal, and ethical perspective.

Truths within Disciplines

Law

By establishing rules that correspond to reality, truth is the foundation of law. The consideration of whether euthanasia should be legalized emerged in 1973 with the "Postma case" . The lawsuit against a physician, who performed euthanasia, shed light on the debate over the establishment of new criteria and their truths. It allowed euthanasia to be conducted on a patient. In 2002, the Netherlands legalized euthanasia with the “Termination of Life on Request and Assisted Suicide Act” .

The Dutch law considers euthanasia as a criminal offence but does not recognize it as murder . It is legal under the circumstances of “hopeless and unbearable” pain. Article 293 , from the Dutch Penal Code, highlights the consequent punishment of an individual who “deliberately terminates the life of another person”. However, when it is conducted by a doctor, who respects the "diligence criteria", it is not punishable. Euthanasia is considered an ambiguous concept from a legal perspective. Therefore, the truth in euthanasia, according to Dutch law, is subjective to a specific case, simultaneously being limited by an objective legal act.

Moreover, euthanasia is framed by the legal interpretivism, but the truth about the act itself relies on the doctors' honesty . When euthanasia is performed, documents underlining the act need to be completed and reported to authorities. Some physicians do not enter the legal process by stating untruthful reasons for a patient’s death. Therefore, the limitation of the Dutch legal framework of euthanasia relies on the truthfulness of healthcare professionals. Unfortunately, in some cases, it can lead to abuse of power and obtaining manipulated truth.

Medicine

Truth in medicine is empirical as doctors tend to use statistics to define medical methods. However, this is not the case for euthanasia where many ongoing cases require much deliberation due to a multilateral truth.

The modern criterion of death is based on the “total brain standard” which establishes someone dead after the cessation of all brain activity . However, this standard was debated in 2013 when Jahi McMath was declared brain-dead but was still kept on life support until June 2018 . She retained hypothalamic functions of her brain and did not meet the “total brain standard” criteria. Even though this case occurred in the United States, it highlights that not having a global protocol to determine death, complicates the situation of euthanasia all around the world. Truth in euthanasia is, therefore, multilateral, as it depends on the definition of death, which is still changing.

Voluntary Passive Euthanasia (VPE) and Voluntary Active Euthanasia (VAE) are not authorized in the same proportions by doctors. VAE is seen as “murder” since the medical practitioner administers patients with a lethal overdose of medication instead of letting them die (VPE) . Nonetheless, by associating the death of a person with brain death, our identity is defined by our mind and brain, not by our body. Thus, from this perspective, the body is seen as a form of life support that keeps the brain alive, erasing the difference between VAE and VPE . However, this medical truth is limited by the law as the Netherlands and Belgium are the two only countries legalising VAE in Europe. Therefore, there is no absolute truth in euthanasia since different disciplines clash against each other.

Ethics

Studying truth in euthanasia from an ethical perspective is essential for the understanding of the debates surrounding it. It raises moral dilemmas. Ethics, as a discipline, investigates if euthanasia is a crime on itself and if doctors are the appropriate professionals to end the life of a person . In 1978, J.H van den Berg, a Dutch psychiatrist, published Medical Power and Medical Ethics. The author questioned the tradition of protecting life at all costs. He suggested a new medical ethics code, focused on the right of the patient to complete knowledge and power over their life. Pluralist truth in euthanasia can be found in two moral justification suggested by van den Berg.

The first one provides a non-medical justification of “respect for autonomy”. Patients, if they want to, can exercise their free-will and voluntarily ask for euthanasia. However, this raises the first ethical question on the abuse of this method by the patients and the doctors. If the patient is unconscious when euthanasia is considered, who should make the decision?

The second justification states that respect for pain should be considered the main moral principle supporting euthanasia. However, the ‘unbearable suffering’ stated in the Dutch law is subjective. How can the doctor define the truth if he is unable to feel the pain of the patient?

Ethics, as a discipline, try to establish the truth in euthanasia by respecting patient's free will and pain. Ethics use a pluralist truth, taking into consideration different perspectives, all being true to some extent .

Tensions between Disciplines

Euthanasia emerged in the Netherlands as a response to medical technology . It arose as an ethical idea and aimed to give freedom to vulnerable patients by applying pluralist truth . Later, the nature of this practice changed and lost its initial premise. It is limited by law and legal interpretivism, which can lead to abuse of power and manipulation of the truth. The law impacts medical practitioners and restricts their actions. These disciplines aim to cooperate to define holistic truth. However, they create a paradox where one limits another, leading to unwanted solutions.

This idea is linked to the debate between emotions and reason. Truth in law is often defined with reason. It allows law specialists to apply universal practices that do not take into consideration their own emotions. In contrast, ethics use emotion and are based on defining what is right or wrong, taking into consideration the autonomy, pain, and free-will. Dutch medical professionals apply both, reason and emotion, while establishing the truth in euthanasia.

Conclusion

Overall, truth in euthanasia can be debated within three disciplines: law, medicine, and ethics. The interdisciplinary truth obtained in the Netherlands does not apply to other countries. They each have their socio-political and cultural factors that influence the regulations. That implies that truth in euthanasia worldwide is more relative than absolute since it depends on different perspectives. Finally, it is essential to acknowledge that truth in euthanasia can be manipulated. Thus, it is linked to power, another interdisciplinary issue, and its abuse by patients and doctors.

Truth in Virginity

{{:Issues in Interdisciplinarity 2020-21/Truth in virginity]]

Truth in Punishment and The Panopticon

This chapter explores how philosophy assesses and conflicts with conceptions of truth in disciplines relating to crime and punishment. Postmodernist thought, specifically critical philosophy, conflicts with criminology by critiquing its methodology and conception of truth. Postmodernism also takes a critical approach towards utilitarianism, as seen through its views on the Panopticon prison scheme, thus creating a disciplinary divide with economics.

Criminology and Critical Philosophy on Punishment

Criminology applies the scientific method to explain “interactions of processes in law-making, lawbreaking, and the reactions of society to these processes”. It takes a positivist approach to knowledge when analyzing issues of crime and punishment. There is, however, some dissonance within criminology, as its early development by sociologists means it is greatly influenced by sociological thought. While criminologists commit to the use of the scientific method and believe there is consensus on epistemology, views of truth in the discipline have historical associations to sociological writings and methodology.

Major criticism has been filed against criminology’s approach to punishment by critical philosophers. In Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, Foucault takes a constructivist approach to criminal law and justice. He argues that criminology is not grounded in scientific truths but is a result of social forces. He illustrates this by underlining how law's incorporation of criminal psychiatry in the nineteenth century was informed by a shift in focus from ‘crime to criminal’, and new rationality about how crime may be inherent. Such rationality demanded unique forms of scientific knowledge to justify the characterization of criminals and led to truth formation in the subject. This truism about ‘individual offenders’ still informs criminology today.

Foucault instead supported the analysis of power dynamics behind institutional conceptions of truth. Discipline and Punish thus provided an analysis of the rationale behind methods of ‘discipline’. One critique was of the underlying assumption of homo criminalis, or criminal man. Prisoners, who would otherwise be considered rational actors (homo economicus) in social sciences such as economics, are assumed in criminology to be homo criminalis—someone who is to be treated scientifically and distinct from non-offenders. Foucault suggests this assumption stems from historical methods of information gathering by prisons in the nineteenth century to theorize reasons for offenses. As such, criminology and one of its key assumptions were informed by available academic resources and historical findings rather than a universal or positivist truth.

While criminologists have adopted ideas about truth from critical philosophy, it has generally been limited to superficial changes to existing academic concepts and structures. Habits of sociological thinking have made it difficult for criminologists to fully appreciate and reflect on Foucault’s criticisms, and the pursuit for ideas with fixed meanings has given rise to positivist criticism of Foucault’s work as ‘lacking in rigor and being too ambiguous’, largely due to his intentional use of constructivist ideas.

Economics versus Postmodern Philosophy on The Panopticon

Due to its position as a discipline where qualities of epistemological methods are discussed, philosophy lacks a unifying theory of truth, though individual philosophical theories do maintain distinct conceptions of truth. Schools of philosophy hold central dogmas that form the foundation for their ideas. Utilitarianism, as such, holds its central dogma—that the most moral action is one that maximizes utility—as an absolute truth.

Much like utilitarianism, a base assumption of absolutes is required when assessing positive classical economics. Frank H. Knight's 1940 publication, "What is Truth" in Economics?, categorizes knowledge in economics as that of human tendencies rather than that which can be understood through direct observation and "tests". Knight reflects the view of classical economists as he maintains the assumptions of people as rational actors, or those who will always act in order to maximize their own happiness with all available information, and that there exists an "ideal" apportionment of resources in any given circumstance.

Visualisation of Bentham's prison design.

This attempted "ideal" allocation is illustrated in Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon. Originally, the Panopticon was an architectural plan for a prison: a circular building positioning the inmates’ cells around a central surveillance tower. Inmates do not know when they are being watched, so they therefore must act as if under observation at all times. The Panopticon can be seen as a real-world application of Bentham’s utilitarian philosophy, where he defines utility as the property of producing “benefit”, or preventing "pain or unhappiness to the party whose interest is considered”. In the relevant economic context, Bentham posited that utility was defined as a "rational management that ‘lightens’ public expenditure".

In order to understand the Panopticon as a utilitarian prison scheme, it is important to view it through the lens of growing dissatisfaction with the prevalence of capital punishment under the criminal justice system of Bentham’s time. Bentham viewed his system as an improvement over the former in all aspects, stating that his simple architectural idea improved morals, health, industry, and the economy.

Bentham proposed a two-tiered system of efficient management fueled by monopolistic competition. The construction of the Panopticon would be the product of entrepreneurial contractors jockeying for the building contract, required to offer reasonable terms of construction so as to remain competitive in the market. Similarly, market forces of supply and demand allowed for a more efficient implementation of discipline in that "the punishment [of the convict], preventing his carrying the work to another market, subjects him to a monopoly, which the contractor makes as much of as he can (Bentham 1838)".

Despite a system poised for efficiency, numerous criticisms have been levied against the Panopticon. Most famously, in Discipline and Punish, Foucault uses the Panopticon as a metaphor to critique discipline under the modern state system. Although not a direct critique of Bentham’s prison design, the metaphor's influence led to widespread criticism of the concept, which developed a general misunderstanding of the Panopticon and Bentham's work as a whole. Primarily, the Panopticon has existed in modern consciousness solely in terms of Foucault’s description of panopticism as a form of power based on omnipresent surveillance. Due to Foucault's projection of governmental systems on the Panopticon, Bentham’s ideas have increasingly been perceived as authoritarian and pro-punishment. This interpretation conflicts with Bentham’s views in actuality: utilitarianism’s aim to maximise happiness suggests he viewed punishment as immoral except when preventing further unhappiness.

This misunderstanding hinges on conflicting attitudes to truth in morality and societal benefit. As mentioned, Bentham holds as an absolute truth that the most moral action is that which maximises happiness and minimises unhappiness, supporting his Panopticon through its economic benefit, efficiency and internalisation of discipline. Oppositely, the conception of truth by many postmodernist philosophers, including Foucault, is relativist and constructivist. Foucault posits that truth is socially constructed, specifically by power dynamics. By extension, according to social constructivism an action's moral worth is not set - it is dependent on the society in which it is contextualised. This difference in conceptions of truth means the morality of the Panopticon is debatable: utilitarians like Bentham see the plan as entirely morally justifiable, but later postmodern thinkers like Foucault question this idea.

Truth in Body Image

Introduction

In recent years, growing social media usage among adolescents has been linked to cognitive eating disorders and negative body image, especially more image-based social media applications such as Instagram.

Tensions between the medical, psychological and media disciplines arise when discussing this topic due to contradictory views and evidence. The issue of “truth” within the subject of body image also creates tension between these disciplines by questioning the objectivity of truth in medicine in comparison to the varying forms of truth drawn on in psychology and the subjectivity of constructed truth within social media.

Body Image in Medical Science

Definitions of weight

Category	BMI
Underweight	≤18.5
Normal weight	18.5 to 25
Overweight	25 to 30
Obese	≥30

Body image in medicine revolves around the concept of health. A healthy body in medical science is based on the empirical truths surrounding the degree of health attributed to different body types. Medicine tells us that a body is unhealthy when either overweight or underweight. Underweight and obese people were “associated with higher all cause mortality” . Being overweight was associated with greater risk of hospitalization, especially for circulatory and musculoskeletal diseases. Normal weight proved to be the least associated with relative risks of cardiovascular and musculoskeletal diseases and all cause mortality..

There are many health risks associated with eating disorders. For anorexia these include cardiovascular complications such as arrhythmia, complications in skeletal development in adolescents, delayed puberty and risk of miscarriage during pregnancy. Eating disorders that involve purging also increase risks of dental enamel erosion and vocal cord pathology. Binge-eating is associated with acute gastric rupture and esophageal rupture.

Body Image in Psychology

Psychology draws on different types of truth, varying from forms of empirical truth based on statistical research to conclusions reached by psychologists that are often based on a more subjective truth using causation and correlation. Psychologists use case studies to investigate the links between social media usage and indicators such as self-objectification and negative body image, which are common markers in teenagers with eating disorders, in order to discern the effects that social media can have on body image and disordered eating patterns.

Social media applications, in particular Instagram, have recently been associated with body image issues for young women which can often link and lead to disordered eating and increased self-objectification. Women with greater disordered eating patterns spent longer on Facebook and were reported to engage in behaviours such as untagging themselves in photos and comparing themselves to their friends (Mabe, Forney, & Keel, 2014). As well as anorexia nervosa, Instagram has been increasingly linked to orthorexia nervosa, which is defined as an unhealthy obsession with eating healthy food, with symptoms of orthorexia as measured by the ORTO-15 test being shown to have a significant relationship with higher Instagram use (Turner & Lefevre, 2017). Despite orthorexia not being recognised as a mental disorder by the American Psychiatric Association therefore not appearing on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, there has been increasing peer-reviewed literature appearing on the subject.

Body Image in Social Media

Media's concepts are based on the views of society. Therefore, the foundation of what we know is a constructive truth: meaning that everyday knowledge is a socially constructed phenomenon. Body image has long been manipulated by the mass media. Magazines, movies and social media have promoted ideal body types and created the idea that being thin is being beautiful. Young people have resorted to eating disorders in hopes to achieve this desirable body type. The number of eating disorders has been rapidly increasing in recent years due to the dominance of social media and the minimum age for girls with eating disorders is decreasing and is lower than 12 years old. A study carried out by the Florida House Experience showed that a staggering 87% of women compare their bodies to what they see on social media. Moreover, celebrities and influencers use their platforms to advertise "Weight Loss" products based on empty promises of losing weight effortlessly. Their influence fuels young girls to use products that are not safe since they don't require FDA approval. However, in recent years, a #BodyPositivity movement has surfaced that encourages the acception of bodies no matter their shape or form. This wave of different body types being shown on social media helps boost confidence in teenagers. Yet, progress is not perfect. Only 43% of posts under the body positivity hashtag represents plus size women which isn't a representation of reality. Additionally, many posts still glorify being thin and degrade curvier bodies.

Tensions Between the Disciplines

The empirical truth in medicine of the desirable body being healthy conflicts with the constructed truth in media of the desirable body being thin. The constructed truth in the media promotes underweight which is associated with increased health risks. However, as truth on social media is constructive it is subject to change of public opinion which has recently shown the emergence of a movement that appreciates all body types. Medical science also conflicts with this constructed truth that encourages people to embrace their potentially overweight bodies and hinders them from introducing healthier practices in their lifestyles. According to medicine, being overweight is also associated with increased health risks and therefore undesirable. Media finds the constructive truth of body image in beauty whereas medicine finds the empirical truth of body image in health.

The constructive truths that steer the body image narrative in the media can be criticised through a psychological lense. Psychology indicates the harm that the pressure regarding body image that dominates on social media causes on its consumers, especially among adolescents. Psychology concerns itself with understanding how and why body image dissatisfaction arises. Social media however, promotes a constructed truth that regenerates structures that further this dissatisfaction. The focus on mental health within psychology conflicts with the focus on physical health within medical science. Psychology uses both empirical and subjective truths to understand how negative body image is detrimental to mental health. Medical science focuses instead, solely on empirical truth, and the effects of a ‘bad’ body on physical health. Here, although there are differences in how the disciplines consider truth, the tension lies mainly in their focus of subject matter.

Conclusion

After looking into the subject of body image, it's clear that taking an interdisciplinary approach is necessary. Each discipline’s truth contradicts the others which creates tensions previously explained. The constructive truth of body image in social media is sometimes forgotten. People tend to rely on current trends to assess their value. Consequently, young people, who are exposed daily to social media, suffer tremendously mentally. This is why psychologists should be included in the building of social media platforms for example. This could help create safer apps for teenagers to stop the struggle in body image. Additionally, medicine and psychology have contradicting visions of a healthy human being. Therefore, working closely together they could find an approach to lower people’s BMI avoiding medical dangers while working on their mental health and stop degrading their body image. In summary, we’re still far from handling the struggles of body image that people face but taking an interdisciplinary approach could create progress.

Truth in Pain

Introduction

Pain is a discomforting experience that involves sensory and emotional aspects, possibly attributed to tissue damage, informing the body of noxious stimuli or a problem with internal functioning. However, it is not fully understood in terms of its biological and psychological interaction.

Biology

Biology takes a positivist approach to pain, arguing that the only way of knowing is through biological processes that offer an objective representation of reality and therefore hold the data from sensory encoding as empirical data. A stimulus is detected by nociceptors that respond to noxious stimuli, which leads to an action potential being fired. Once the pain threshold is passed, individuals will feel the pain, with the strength of pain corresponding to the frequency of action potentials.

Neuroimaging

Neuroimaging techniques allow us to observe pain objectively through neural activity. An example of this is the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRIs) in the diagnosis of fibromyalgia, a condition which causes severe pain all over the body. Fibromyalgia patients have increased neural activity in the pain matrix - a group of brain structures activated during pain. In this case, neuroimaging is used to reach the truth of pain in an objective manner.

Psychology and Philosophy

Psychology and Philosophy offer an interpretivist approach to pain, emphasizing how the experience varies significantly depending on individual interpretation and situational perception.

Perception

In philosophy of perception, interpretivism suggests that human perception is not simply a reaction to external stimuli, it depends on the intention attached to it; different people react differently depending on their interpretation. An example of the importance of individual interpretation is masochism, characterised by sexual gratification derived from experiencing pain. While pain is usually synonymous with suffering, masochism demonstrates how this is not always true, as masochists contrarily derive pleasure from their pain.

Scepticism

Philosophical scepticism questions the certainty of an objective reality; pyrrhonists established sets of arguments claiming that reality constitutes of experiences which vary based on circumstances and individual interpretation therefore, the experience of pain cannot be reduced solely to biology. Scepticism argues for the suspension of judgment, hence, despite the uncertain nature of an objective reality, the subjective experience of pain in humans is real and represents the truth of pain.

The placebo effect is an example of this; one study demonstrates this phenomenon using patients suffering from migraine attacks - the efficacies of the real drug "Maxalt" labelled as a placebo, and a placebo labelled as Maxalt were very similar in reducing pain in patients. Furthermore, when the patients were given the placebo labelled as "placebo", "Maxalt or placebo", then "Maxalt", the pain experienced decreased progressively, demonstrating that although they should physiologically and objectively experience pain, this is not the reality.

Anthropology

Anthropology takes a social constructivist approach to pain, focusing on different cultures' attitudes in how pain is understood, and how the meaning and use of words vary across cultures.

Differences in attitude

In some cultures, pain is not seen as an issue: a study in rural Nepal found that pain was common, yet no one ever sought help regardless of the severity; pain was perceived to be a normal part of aging, and not related to any health issue. Cultures such as those in American Indian, Asian, Black and Hispanic groups are stoic regarding pain and are reluctant to report it, seeing it as a weakness - whereas Arab and Iranian cultures encourage the emotive expression of pain. In China, pain is often seen as a test to improve their standing in life after death, therefore they encourage bravery and stoicism.

Differences in language

Different cultures describe their pain differently - this was demonstrated in a study conducted using participants from Nepal and America that suffered from chronic pain. Descriptors such as "stabbing", "burning" and "sharp" were common across the samples to describe pain, but those unique to Nepalese participants were "catching" and "cloudy". Furthermore, 91.7% of the Nepalese participants used metaphors to describe their pain, which was much less common in the other sample. The results highlight how the meaning and use of words can vary across cultures, suggesting that language is not always a valid measure of pain, as the meaning of words may be misinterpreted by another culture.

Tensions between Disciplines

Critiques of Positivism

Positivism employed in biological fields may lead to reductionism and the personal account of the subjective experience being bypassed. For example, a patient who complains of pain may receive the wrong dosage of pain medication if the physician neglects the description of the pain severity by the patient and simply orders medical tests, such as an X-ray, blood test or CT scan, to be carried out to find material evidence of the pain. Such cases may be seen when pain is not reported yet there is physical evidence, such as when perception overrides physiology as seen in the placebo effect, or when pain is reported in the absence of physical evidence, such as pain in phantom limbs or tactile hallucinations.

Critiques of Interpretivism

Interpretivism considers the personal account of pain to understand the patient's experience, however, social constructivists argue that the experience and account are influenced by different cultural attitudes and language use. Individuals from stoic cultures may deny experiencing pain, and cultures that view pain as a test or a normal part of ageing may not see pain as a threat to their health. The validity of the patient's account is also limited by differences in the use and meaning of words, as social constructivists argue language is a social construct, possibly leading to misinterpretation. This demonstrates how the interpretivist approach is perhaps too simplistic, as it may fail to recognise how individual experience and accounts are influenced by cultural differences.

Critiques of Social Constructivism

Social constructivists argue that, due to cultural differences, accounts of pain vary so much that we cannot deduce the reality of pain. However, positivists state that the physiology of pain remains the same across all humans regardless of different cultural attitudes towards pain, therefore the assessment of cultural differences would be of no use. This is demonstrated in positivist methods of pain assessment, opposing techniques revolving around communication and language, where cultural background is relevant. Through a positivist perspective, pain is studied in a reliable, objective way, allowing inferences to be made by using data that is universally comparable between different individuals.

Interdisciplinary Solutions

Recently there has been a shift towards research in Neurophenomenology; the discipline's combination of a positivist and interpretivist approach has been supported as a robust means of obtaining truth in pain.

The McGill Pain Questionnaire, designed with the intent of combining positivism and interpretivism, uses many pain categories such as "pressure", "tension", "temporal", "spatial", etc. combined with different pain dimensions such as "flashing", "throbbing", "pounding", etc., and compares these descriptors of sensation to descriptors of feeling, such as "exhausting", "suffocating", etc. The results are organised by summing values associated with descriptors to produce a number that represents pain quality in a positivist manner, based upon incorporating interpretivist principles.

Through these examples we can see real world implications that have a strong impact on people's lives, along with the necessity for including interdisciplinary approaches in the investigation of pain.

Truth in Greenwashing

Introduction

Greenwashing is defined as “the intersection of two firm behaviours: poor environmental performance and positive communication about environmental performance," and has become a popular tactic in response to recent consumer demand for more sustainable goods and services, especially in wealthier nations with a “disposable culture”. This demand stems from the growth of science-backed environmental consciousness within the past few decades, but has been capitalised upon as a quick way to turn a profit from a customer’s good intentions. Fast fashion companies are notorious for this practice, due to their global markets and cheap goods, which allow for profitability to continue while allowing consumers to look past how their products came to be. The ‘truth’ is that these two disciplines haven't quite found an effective way to work together, which creates tension in today's over-consumptive Western world.

Greenwashing and the Environment

Environmental studies is a discipline that uses analytical tools to evaluate human impact on the environment. In fast fashion’s case, this represents critically demonstrating the impact of their accessible, inexpensive and produced quickly products that keep up with current trends. The truth implied here is science-based and objective.

Annually, around 80 billion pieces of clothing are purchased (the majority going to the United States), bringing in 1.2 trillion dollars for the fashion business. The availability of fast fashion pushes consumers to purchase more, increasing demand for raw materials, and creating waste at both production and disposal stages. The majority of the discarded clothing goes to landfills, so from a purely quantitative standpoint, the eco-friendliest course of action would be to lower manufacturing rates.

Manufacturing is primarily located within nations with cheap labor, especially in China and Bangladesh. Their sustainability goals and resources may differ from their buyer nations, making environmental (and ethical) issues more likely to slip through the cracks. For example, 90% of clothing purchased in the US includes either cotton or polyester, both of which can have serious effects on worker health. Additionally, cotton growth is water-intensive, and polyester is derived from oil making it difficult to dispose of or recycle.

The Case of H&M's "Conscious" Line

In 2010, the Financial Time Deutschland reported that the cotton within H&M's clothing that was certified as ‘organic’ from India was actually inorganic. The scandal impacted brand reputation as H&M was one of the first to introduce organic cotton into their clothes in 2004, and since 2007, has been producing garments that are 100% organic cotton. The move originally allowed H&M to be seen as a green firm that cares about the environment.

More recently, H&M was also criticised for greenwashing their “Conscious” collection, by making it unclear to consumers what the percentage of the garments had actually been recycled, according to the Norwegian Consumer Authority. Ultimately, H&M cannot back up all of their claims. Their statements are formed from normative truth, a phenomenon where humans declare something good or bad based on qualitative judgement. H&M wants their products to appear eco-friendly, while the objective truth shows that their manufacturing changes are not necessarily effective in heralding a sustainable change.

Greenwashing in marketing

Greenwashing is a prevalent practice primarily because of the financial gains that it brings, as well as an improved brand image that increases consumer purchase intention. Given marketing’s goal to increase profitability, the objective truth about the advertised products becomes irrelevant. Truth becomes constructivist; advertisers create their truth about products, which is later sold to the consumers.

Much of broader environmental messaging is formulated to shift the blame onto the individual, while these companies pump emissions and pollution into the environment, and even withhold information relating to future climate change, as Exxon and Shell did in the 1980s . They can create a form of guilty normative truth in consumers’ minds, making them believe that they are the ones at fault. Then they appease them by greenwashing destructive practices, making consumers feel better about buying from them in a world where everything carries an environmental impact.

However, research proves that the greenwashing brings desirable financial effects only when unacknowledged. Consumers, after learning about products being greenwashed, significantly lose trust in that specific brand, and tend to avoid their products. Therefore, an effective greenwashing campaign has to successfully deceive customers, at least to an extent. This approach is in direct opposition to the environmental point of view, where scientific, positivist truth is paramount.

Acknowledgment of greenwashing, however, does not influence only the company that took part in the greenwashing. It can influence the perception of all other products previously deemed to be eco-friendly, even the ones that truly are. It negatively affects person’s trust in the ‘green’ label, effectively lowering purchase intention and making them more suspicious towards seemingly unrelated products. This can have significant effects on the green movement as a whole, legitimate or not.

Opposition to Greenwashing

The most obvious example of the tensions between the disciplinary views are the movements focusing on counteracting greenwashing. Its harmful effects have been acknowledged by some of the world’s governments, who have established laws and authorities to fight these practices. Instances include the guidelines provided by the Federal Trade Commission in the United States, some of which are are aimed against the potential greenwashers and carry legal consequences. Several companies have already been prosecuted as a result. Additionally, the European Commission recently passed new regulations to sort companies by sustainability status in order to deter future investment into their practices. This has had pushback from industry experts wondering if it will do more harm than good, but the move is certainly encouraging transparency within business practices into the spotlight .

Examples of the tensions are also visible in the actions of other, non-governmental entities, such as a not-for-profit organization Two Sides. Its anti-greenwashing campaign has resulted in a few hundred companies removing misleading marketing claims.

In certain cases, it can even be the companies themselves pushing for more stringent measures to disclose environmental impact. In a significant example of both the market and environmentalism working together, DuPont, a large manufacturer of harmful CFCs, skewed the market towards themselves by switching to greener practices, then both advertising that fact and suddenly supporting environmental regulation, hurting competitor sales . This is a constructive interdisciplinary approach that ensures profitability, forces companies to go green in order to compete, and does not drastically mislead consumers.

Conclusion

The public is gradually becoming more aware of misleading practices such as greenwashing. Though brands try to suppress truth and maximize profit through marketing, customers are increasingly willing to do their own research, using positivist scientific resources to do so. Ultimately, it is difficult for these two disciplines to work together, as their goals are radically different and often exclusive. However, an interdisciplinary perspective is vital in order to find an optimal middle ground, where the benefits are maximised with respect to both ethics and environment. It is important in fields such as politics, where interests of both parties clash in attempt to impose their own truth, but a broader view could lead to favorable compromise.

Truth in Explanations for the Rise of Human Monogamy

Introduction

Historically, human relationship have taken various forms, but monogamy, the practice of having only one sexual, romantic relationship at once, has emerged as starkly dominant. Several disciplines have offered different explanations for the factors driving its pervasiveness, tensions which can be attributed to their approaches to truth. Biology subscribes to scientific realism, adopting a positivist, empirical correspondence theory of truth, in which the truth they seek to generate mirrors the natural world. In viewing the foundations of social life as biological, they posit that the current prevalence of monogamy is natural and driven by deterministic factors such as the genetic makeup of humans and evolutionary forces. Conversely, sociological approaches based on social theory assume a more constructivist approach to truth, recognising that monogamy arises from, and is constituted in, social and historical contexts, as a social norm and institution rather than an essentialist biological fact.

In this chapter, we will be exploring further exploring how these frictions between perspectives on truth lead the disciplines to conflicting conclusions.

Explanations in different disciplines

Essentialist arguments in Biology

Male Goeldi's marmosets regularly check their mates' reproductive condition by inspecting her genital scent glands.

Evolutionary Biology

As only 3-5% of the mammalian species are socially monogamous, evolutionary biologists deem the prevalence of human monogamy an anomaly. In seeking an explanation, academics have extrapolated ethological work to humans.

Research suggests that ecologically imposed monogamy may originate in early monogamous couples when population levels were low and scarce resources could only provide well for a couple and their offspring. Male and female partnerships thus emerged as the most effective way to utilise resources. This explanation is well-documented amongst biologists; Benshoof and Thornhill indicate that monogamy is mutually beneficial, citing the example of marmoset Callimico goeldii. The female’s reproductive success heavily depends on "the food and protection provided by the hunting male", while the male invests in his relationship to ensure "the survival of his young and thus his own reproductive success".

Whilst this explanation has been contested, the general consensus is that a monogamous mating system is more likely to survive within a population. Cooperative breeding details the differences in kin-based benefits between non-monogamous and monogamous mating systems. As kin-based benefits are diminished under female multiple mating, biologists predict that monogamy is key to increase relatedness within a system and receive the subsequent evolutionary advantages.

Neuroscience

Neuroscience treats social behaviour, such as monogamy, as a stable, scientifically explainable phenomena, which can be understood through manipulating neural circuits in the brain and observing their behavioural outcomes. Consequently, neuroscientists posit that monogamy in humans is the inevitable outcome of a linear chain of neurochemical reactions.

Neurological processes have been connected to genetic make-ups as modes of explanation. Research carried out by Larry Young in 1998 claims to have found a "monogamy gene", using vole species displaying diverging social behaviours, from those associated with promiscuity (Microtus montanus) to monogamy (Microtus ochragaster). The results were then used as a proxy for examining the human neural model for monogamy. A longer strand of a section of microsatellite DNA, changing the neuroanatomical distribution of the neuropeptides oxytocin and vasopressin receptors, has a positive causal relationship with monogamous social behaviours, such as "pair bonding, parental care and mate guarding." The distribution of these receptors triggers a neurochemical event with behavioural outcomes, ultimately determining whether the individual is monogamous or nonmonogamous.

Another neuroscientific study linked heightened brain activity in areas associated with social pain during conditions of jealousy, suggesting monogamy is maintained through neural negative reinforcement.

Constructivist arguments in Sociology

Marxist perspective

Marxism views societies as constructed in the historical materialist sense, in which social realities and truths about them are products of their material contexts .Consequently, Marxism recognises that family organisation is dynamic and susceptible to modification by material and social changes. Engels propagated that the shift from community to the monogamous nuclear family structure was driven by the move from "primitive" communism to capitalism.

Before "structured conjugal relations", society was organised in "primitive" community, characterised by unregulated sexual relations, matrilineality, and matriarchy. The introduction of husbandry and improvement in agricultural techniques created a newfound material surplus. As "[p]roduction of exchange eclipsed production for use", private property emerged. Men controlled private property due to the sexual division of labour, and it was therefore in their interests to ensure patriarchal hereditary rights. The institution of monogamy emerged as an enabler of patrilineality, as it ensured certainty in paternal relations.

As summed up by Engels, the monogamous family model emerged "not on natural but on economic conditions", systems of both exchange and power relations embedded in capitalism. Although this is not deterministic, ownership and control over means of production provide resources used to shape the reproduction of ideas; social institutions like monogamy are dependent on both.

Feminist perspective

The feminist perspective explains the rise of monogamy by similar factors as Engels, also considering the phenomenon as a social norm and institution built on capitalist notions of possession. However, as the field primarily emerged in the context of the 1960’s sexual revolution in the United States, a greater focus is placed on the emotional and personal sphere of sexual relationships, and the application of critical feminist analysis to previously deterministic psychological theories.

Feminists are generally critical of the essentialist explanations for emotions of jealousy that neuroscientific study offers; Toril Moi argues that “psychology becomes relevant only when jealousy has occurred; when and why somebody becomes jealous…are socially determined”. In seeking to explain the origins of jealousy, several feminists have theorised it as a socially constructed, rather than natural, emotion, framed as evidence for love in order to maintain the institution of monogamy. Some have also questioned why it is that jealousy, and the possessiveness it endorses, has come to be considered a desirable element in romantic and sexual relationships, when it is largely undesired in platonic relationships. Thus, they recognise that whilst certain phenomena may be natural, the arbitrary meanings attached to them are social, political and cultural.

Conclusion

The different ways in which biologists and sociologists perceive truth influences not only the nature of the explanations they offer to the rise of monogamy, but also the extent to which they are able to separate those causal explanations from justifications for its dominance. Biological explanations rely on human nature, and therefore become prescriptive and deterministic, insofar as what is natural must also be considered inevitable and true. Thus, explanations for why monogamy is pervasive become justifications for why it should be pervasive. Meanwhile, sociological explanations take on a more descriptive approach, recognising critically that the causal relationships between capitalist or patriarchal forces and the rise of monogamy are arbitrary and unessential.

Aided by the rise of new materialism, which repositions the human within material matter, interdisciplinarity can help bridge these seemingly discrete explanations for monogamy. For example, the refutation of the nature-culture binary, claiming “monogamy’s normalised status cannot be disentangled from its scientific naturalisation”, exposes scientific truth as reliant upon sociopolitical “conceptualisations”. Moreover, tension between realism and social constructivism is eased by the concept of “agential realism”, where scientific study interacts with and influences the object, demanding the conception of science as a "material-discursive" practice.

Whilst an interdisciplinary approach may not directly determine which is the single true explanation for the rise of human monogamy, it facilitates a more holistic understanding of the phenomenon by illuminating the limitations of each discipline’s epistemological approaches and conceptions of truth.

Truth in Conspiracy Theories: Flat Earth

Introduction

Flat Earth theory is a pseudoscientific model in which the Earth is not spherical, but a flat disk. While this has been a view held by some societies in history, the notion that the Earth is round has such overwhelming scientific support that it is no longer a subject of debate in the mainstream scientific community, and is the generally accepted view in modern society. However, in the last two decades, the theory gained popularity again. Flat Earthers are sometimes driven by religious convictions. Flat Earthism acts as a conspiracy theory, with the idea that mainstream media, government and academia are deceitful. Often, this can be contextualised within these individuals' broader ideas of the world and political outlook, wherein instead of using the scientific method to arrive at an empirical truth, an approach more common to politics and reminiscent of social constructionism is used. The attempt to approach astrophysics in the way one would approach politics can play a part in explaining the prevalence of this conspiracy theory.

Truth in Physics

Physics is a science that "deals with the structure of matter and the interactions between fundamental constituents of the observable universe". Therefore, by using this definition, we can say that there exists an absolute truth, otherwise known as reality, which physics strives to help us understand. Through the use of the scientific method, physicists have been able to draw conclusions derived from rigorous testing and scepticism, making these conclusions empirical and reliable. As a result, the “truth” in a scientific context can be seen as the most accurate representation of reality that has been achieved. Furthermore, the “truth” within physics also has a social aspect to it. Physics as a discipline is constructed by the society of physicists and the “truth” can also be seen as the model which is most widely accepted in that community. Every advancement suggests that physics is getting closer and closer to the truth in its purest form and the exhaustive lengths physicists take to make the data as accurate as possible reflects this.

The pseudoscience behind the flat earth theory is based on rudimentary pieces of evidence that display a limited knowledge of physics and have been easily debunked by the scientific community. This can be seen in one of the main supporting arguments of the flat earth theory. Pictures that show skylines beyond the horizon line are consistently used by flat earthers to justify their reasoning. However, these images are mirages, explained by the refraction of light. The air directly above the surface of the water has a higher refractive index than the warmer air above it, causing the rays of light to bend downwards towards our eyes. Meanwhile, we assume that the rays of light have travelled in a straight line, creating a superior mirage where the object appears higher than it actually is.

On the other hand, the proof that the earth is indeed round is overwhelming. Basic mathematical principles such as that of Newton’s law and the angle of incidence allow us to deduce the curvature of the earth. Moreover, Foucault’s Pendulum, which is attached to a motionless point, changes its direction of oscillation over the course of a day, as the earth rotates beneath it, proving that the earth is a rotating sphere rather than a flat disc.

Truth in Politics

Political science is subjective and the concept of truth lies in its relativism. There is no guaranteed correct answer, rather Politics hinges on people's perceptions. Zerilli questioned if there even is truth in politics . It is impossible to find the truth via experimental means to the highest standards due to ethical and practical constraints. Therefore, the data derived from these experiments are less conclusive. Often, the political frame of mind fails to appreciate the depth of rigorous testing of truth physics allows and requires, leading to false conclusions such as flat Earth.

Politics as a discipline aims to scrutinise power structures. Flat Earthers’ radical rejection of mainstream academia is often a political act. Often, flat Earthers disagree with many outcomes of academic research. Any political system or belief is a compromise in which one must decide which outcomes are more or less important: for instance, one might argue safety is more important than personal freedom to support their gun control stance. Flat Earthism becomes a part of such a compromise, whereby the parts of academia which do not fit into the individual’s political system are important enough that entirely rejecting the institution of academia becomes necessary. This rejection results in a denial of academia’s findings, such as basic astrophysics.

Conflicts About Truth

Physics, ideally, looks at data with an impartial eye and values negative and positive outcomes equally, thus drawing a conclusion as a logical extension of the data. On the other hand, Politics often deals with parties of opposing views, so the author often uses evidence to convince rather than to investigate, affecting how truth is perceived. The work often has a clear bias. Therefore, a lot of "amateur science" fall into the trap of conducting studies to convince. Flat Earthers' experiments often attempt to prove that their theory is correct rather than to investigate the question at hand. The experiment becomes a rhetorical tool rather than one of inquiry.

Physics as a field has a clearer progression of truth than Politics and this creates tension between the disciplines. In Physics, the shape of the Earth was derived from empirical and numerical proof, so the topic is no longer contested within mainstream academia. The field of astrophysics can move on to other issues. In Politics, according to its subjective nature, an idea can never be truly proven right. Even if a theory has developed in great detail, its roots can still be challenged and debated, for instance, the current Western system of capitalism is still often disputed. Additionally, the field of Politics is adaptive to its surroundings, such as levels of technology, which are liable to change, causing a shift in what the “optimal” political system is at the time. Thus, nothing in Politics is ever as certain as the curvature of the Earth is in Physics (where the sort of research that would be required to put the shape of the earth in question is improbable). By looking at the work in astrophysics from a political lens, this means that the certainty in the Earth's curvature seems like the result of whoever must be in charge rather than of the scientific consensus.

Conclusion

Using flat Earth as an example, we can acknowledge the objective and subjective views about truth within Physics and Politics. The misapplication of a discipline such as Politics to astrophysics results in tension, and leads many to form incorrect conclusions. Understanding this can be useful in finding approaches to dispelling conspiracy theories.

Truth in Free Will

Introduction

Determinism and free will are viewed through different disciplinary lenses, each interpreting empirical evidence as truth differently. Free will was initially considered though a philosophical lens, using phenomenology and constructionism to determine truth. However with the advent of genetics and neuroscience, amongst other disciplines, in the 19th and 20th centuries empirical evidence and a positivist approach to truth has added new perspectives to the debate. Often there are tensions within these disciplines, interpreting evidence differently.

Sociology

Social determinism, first introduced by Emile Durkheim (1858–1917), theorises that an individual’s social interactions and constructs determine their behaviour. Social factors in this context refer to interpersonal interactions, education, culture and other experiences encountered through the course of one’s life. Social determinism implies a sense of hegemonic control of the society and its constraints over an individual. Determinants such as acceptance, taboos, culture, gender, education, stigmas etc. largely restrain one’s decisions throughout their life. This is as there is a specific thought process that society creates through the means of education, interactions, familial relations etc. As these experiences are vital to an individual’s decision making behaviour in the future, sociologists argue that society is dominantly deterministic. This leads to the conclusion that free will does not exist as all behaviour is ultimately a consequence of societal supremacy on the human mind.

Psychology

The psychological approach to Determinism, and the question of “free will”, is grounded on a dualistic assumption that will is either determined, and so contingent to the laws of causation, or free of any prior conditionnement by past events, and therefore undetermined. The law of causation dictates that earlier events have a direct influence on the present behaviour of an individual, thus causality allows for the prediction of future behavioural responses.

Psychological Determinism finds a correlation between childhood events (circumstances of one’s upbringings) and present mental state. Children are heavily conditioned by their exterior environment, and more dramatically impacted by their experiences as they do not have any to compare them with.

It is therefore conceivable that one individual's relationship with their caregiver has a direct impact on later relationships formed in the future. John Bowlby’s theory of attachment offers a model constructed on four attachment patterns, which are determined by childhood causality, and dictate an individual's response to affection, dismissal and trust, as well as ideas of love and self-worth. The four patterns are the following:

- Secure attachment (indicates caring, responsive and sensitive caregivers)

- Ambivalent attachment (indicates unpredictable, uncertain and sometimes insensitive caregivers)

- Disorganised attachment ( indicates rejecting, unpredictable and fearful caregivers, and therefore lack of affection and distrust)

- Avoidant attachment (indicates dismissive and insensitive caregivers, leading to a fear of affectionate/emotional responses)

These attachment patterns during childhood, lead to the formation of 4 attachment styles in adulthood: Secure, Anxious-attachment/preoccupied, Fearful-avoidant and Dismissive/avoidant. These attachment styles predict an individual’s response to affection and intimacy, its emotional availability, view of self and others, fears of abandonment and rejection, as well as choice of partners based on these styles.

Physics and Mathematics

The physics or mathematical approach towards determinism explains that any ordinary act occurs as a result of a series of initial actions that ultimately set it in motion. This is often referred to as the mathematical phenomenon 'the butterfly effect', an idea first introduced by Edward Norton Lorenz (1917–2008) as part of his Chaos Theory, which again aims to prove that deterministic laws govern the outcome of all actions. It is also believed that predetermination of outcomes may be possible by the use of accurate statistical calculation of the chemical, biological as well as environmental changes of an individual. This implies that there is a calculated and practical reasoning behind every decision and action an individual makes, thus invalidating the possibility of human agency, and reinforcing the truth that free will is illusionary. However, there are several arguments against such practical theories of determinism. For example, the way in which learning, memory, emotions and experiences play a role in an individual’s actions and reactions.

A contrasting theory is that humans are complex systems which use stochasticity to choose responses. In studies of other species the adaptive, stochastic abilities of organisms to choose a behaviour in response to internal and external information supports an interpretation that choices are a complex probability, influenced by genes and environment, but not pre-determined. As this theory accounts for the external and internal factors that can influence the random probability of decisions, stochasticity promotes the possibility of free will.

Biology and Genetics

Strict biological determinism believes lives are pre-determined by genes. This can be controversial. Many accept that, although positivist, biological determinism is influenced by constructionism. Genetic facts and objective evidence are combined with qualitative data on behaviour from sociology to reach the truth. The DRD4 gene has been linked to personality and political views, previously thought to be determined by social environment. There is also evidence that genetics influence social grouping; friendships often form between people with similar genotypes. This shows that genes contribute to individuals' personalities and behaviour.

This pluralist approach to truth is continued in epigenetics, the study of how gene expression is altered. Experiencing trauma has heritable epigenetic effects. From studying Holocaust survivors it was found that FKBP5 gene expression was affected by the trauma experienced, which was passed down to children. This gene is involved in stress responses and is associated with depression. Depression, also linked to several other genes, affects behaviour. As depression is an illness, not controlled by the patient, this suggests that behaviour is influenced by genes. Epigenetics demonstrate that initial genetic conditions can change in response to external factors, and that a genome and gene expression affect psychology and ergo free will. Therefore it considers the truth to be that behaviour is determined by genetics and society.

Conclusion

Both biologists and physicists consider truth to be derived from objective laws, although how the evidence is gathered and interpreted varies. The empirical evidence from Physics is not considered applicable in complex human behaviour by sociologists and psychologists.Also, it conflicts with constructionist and phenomenological approaches which consider truth to be from experiences and interactions. To approach free will from any single disciplinary perspective is to exclude valuable insights from other aspects of it. The effect of genetics on behaviour is difficult to distinguish from that of the environment. Additionally, the study of epigenetics is in contrast with physical determinism as it demonstrates that initial conditions do not predict outcomes. Biology also incorporates stochastic theories about choices, but concludes that there is an unpredictable interplay between the environment and initial conditions which ultimately gives rise to free will. Evidently, there are multiple interdisciplinary clashes within the debate of determinism and free will. Through their own lenses, the varying disciplines come to suggest the truth that to an extent, free will is illusionistic.

Truth in COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution

Introduction

The upcoming vaccines would become a key solution to the COVID-19 outbreak, a global pandemic recognized by The World Health Organization (WHO).

Nonetheless, the confrontation between the expected initial limited supply and the "staggering global need" leads to a controversial topic: How to distribute scarce vaccines effectively and equitably for the sake of the whole society?

This interdisciplinary problem has yielded arguments from different disciplines: Epidemiology, Economics, and Sociology. Due to contrasting disciplinary perspectives and priorities, different types of "truth" provided multiple insights, yet made the decision-making process tough by creating tensions between disciplines.

Truth in Epidemiology

Covid Vaccine Clinical Trial, Padjajaran University

Epidemiology measures disease outcomes concerning populations at risk (groups of healthy or sick people, counted as cases if contracting the disease being studied). In "truth", epidemiology uses positivism, being based on a posteriori knowledge, empirical evidence, inductive reasoning, and observational research.

Positivism in Vaccine Development

The SARS-CoV-2 vaccine developed faster than other previous vaccines through empiricism and observational research methods, associated with positivism.

The research methods included using preclinical and toxicology data already available (e.g. the 80% similarity between the genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV) and new research tools (e.g. “structure-based antigen design, computational biology, protein engineering, and gene synthesis”).

Despite the importance of a posteriori knowledge when defining epidemiology’s truth, data from the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine development are incomplete. Because the reactogenicity of the vaccine caused severe allergic reactions in some individuals, groups of people were neglected from the vaccine research: drug or alcohol addicts, the uncontrollably ill, pregnant women, children under 16, and individuals allergic to drugs (eg. Paracetamol). That being said, most vaccine tests were efficient in adults. Therefore, with minimal risk to human subjects, implementing an accelerated COVID-19 vaccine program is needed.

Inductive Reasoning in Vaccine Distribution

Epidemiological truth relies on inductive reasoning: generalizing research outcomes to effectively propose a vaccine distribution method. Based on previous vaccine distribution approaches, the standard age-based mathematical program proved to be the most optimal (fast in delivery, better uptake for the people at risk: health-care workers, the sick, and the elderly).

However, since epidemiology prioritizes risk factors and vaccine doses are scarce, the first to receive the vaccine would be Health Care Personnel (HCP) and then essential workers, patients with high-risk underlying medical conditions, and elderly individuals.

Vaccine effects remain uncertain. Hence, countries like Switzerland delayed the accelerated COVID-19 vaccine program, which urges epidemiologists to conduct further research and alter their initial risk-based plan if needed.

Truth in Economics

Economics concerns the production and distribution of goods and services. When approaching truth, it uses positivism, interpretivism, and social constructionism to determine how distribution would affect different social groups and the economy.

Positive Externality of Vaccination

From a positivist perspective, according to economist Tyler Cowen, one “uncomfortable truth” is that “Most of the best distribution methods are blatantly unfair.” In this context, he claims fairness is overvalued. He proposed a geographically concentrated approach to vaccine distribution that would save more lives and restore the economy through limiting vaccine doses within certain regions.

In this approach, the underlying truth is making the most use of limited vaccine doses by intensifying the positive externalities of vaccination such as "herd immunity and reduced transmission of the disease". This truth mirrors broadly the augmenting hidden health protection gained by third parties, that are not directly related to the production or consumption of vaccines. Thus, a dynamic social environment is constructed by economists.

However, the validity of the truth is undermined. The real-life situation is oversimplified with external and unpredictable variables. Neither subtle extra benefits nor potential welfare gain could be precisely quantified before policy implementation.

Truth of Figures

It was argued that based on the collection and analysis of macroeconomic data (e.g. high unemployment rate, unstable inflation rate), 75% to 85% of the population must be vaccinated to recover the economy.

However, data “on the size of the effect of COVID-19 vaccines on transmission” is still unavailable. The predictive "truth" is mainly based on the changing state of the pandemic and the economic outlook of the US.

Moreover, there is an imperfect measure of a nation’s macroeconomic reality. For instance, unemployment figures do not take underemployment and hidden unemployment into account. This implies the overestimation of actual macroeconomic conditions when observing and interpreting them from the perspective of the unemployment rate. Other unpredictable factors (e.g. domestic consumer confidence and business confidence) also influence the final observable impacts of vaccines on stimulating the economy. Therefore it is hard to verify the reliability of the ubiquity and precision of figures given as truth in this case.

Truth in Sociology

Sociology studies the impact of society on observable phenomena. When approaching truth, sociologists use both social constructionism and interpretivism, based on qualitative and quantitative data, and empirical and experimental evidence.

Health Inequalities

From the sociologists' perspective, vaccines should not be distributed in a "colorblind" method in the U.S., but instead by targeting racial minorities who have suffered more from the COVID-19 pandemic. They emphasized that health care services were already race-biased. Surveys carried out in hospitals show that there are 4 times more Hispanic or Latino persons hospitalized for COVID-19 in the US than white persons.

Widening socioeconomic inequalities also affect ethnic minorities (Black, Indigenous, Pacific Islanders, Asian, Hispanic or Latino persons, etc). A report states that "the ethical justification for prioritizing economically worse-off racial minorities rests on epidemiological, economic, and social justice grounds". Therefore, the World Health Organization (WHO) encourages governments to distribute vaccines by targeting the reduction of social inequalities.

These "unfair" truths have been underlined by sociologists. However, sociologists' way of finding constructed meanings in society could be influenced by their subjective truth, which lines up with their values.

Localization and Distribution

With the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) (an index that geographically studies social vulnerability), and the quantitative evidence of COVID-19 cases, sociologists can localize the regions where COVID-19’s aftermaths would be the most consequent with "people of color and other vulnerable populations" and where it would be "right" to distribute the vaccine as a priority.

They also emphasize that the ethnic minorities and the poor are disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 and are not reflected in the initial vaccine prioritisation order; despite this, those ethical questions need to be explored. This shows that the research focus on the socially disadvantaged groups requires further exploration in the truth construction about certain neglected groups in sociology.

Conflicting Truth in Public Health

Contrasting possible outcomes in vaccine distribution programs emerged in the field of Public Health.

While Epidemiology and Economics, use positivism to approach the truth, Epidemiology targets the high-risk population in vaccine distribution, while Economics seeks to maximize social utility. Both Economics and Sociology use social constructivism and interpretive truth within research in their field, however, Sociology stresses out the pre-existent social and health inequalities in vaccine distribution.

Considering the significance and complexity of the "truths" formed by different disciplines, an interdisciplinary approach is essential in government policy-making of the COVID-19 vaccine distribution, to benefit society the most.

Truth in Biological Definitions of Race and Implications in Black Maternal Care

Introduction

The case of black maternal care provides a microcosm in which the wider concept of race can be examined. The truth behind a biological basis of race has been challenged since the concept’s inception, and yet racial categorizations are still used to inform medical practice. To define is to reach a consensus that attributes a meaning to a word, so that each word reflects a truth that allows people to communicate. By exploring how misguided definitions of race adversely affect health outcomes for black patients in the US and the UK, this chapter highlights the problems caused by different conceptions of truth. Care provided to black women during pregnancy will serve to exemplify our arguments by applying them to reality.

Illustration from Types of Man by Josiah Clark Nott and George Robins Gliddon, 1854

Bio-Anthropology

As a discipline concerned with the synergy between biology and culture, biological anthropology has often been looked upon to inform wider definitions of race. With the discipline’s origins rooted in Western Euro-American scholarship however, early conceptions of race within anthropology were marked by racial discrimination and prejudice. Emphasis on morphology combined with the existing white-supremacist ideology arguably led to the black and white dualism which has since been regarded as a true natural distinction upon which biological research should be based. Since, biological anthropology has moved away from evolutionist definitions and has instead focused on ancestry, genetics or society to inform their notions of race. The variability in approaches to understanding ‘race’ however, has meant that definitions of race are unstable and localised – a major issue when used to inform medical interventions.

Researchers investigating genetic research have either stressed the need to reevaluate biological conceptions of race, which, as they note, are "so disputed and so mired in confusion", or falsified the entire notion. As such, contemporary anthropologists have come to understand race as a social construct used to arbitrarily categorise groups based on physical characteristics. Despite this, due to the higher prevalence of certain conditions in some groups, racial categories have been maintained in healthcare and are still used to inform maternal treatment. This can affect black patient outcomes two-fold: there is a risk of misguidedly extrapolating data on health from people with European ancestry to people with African ancestry (where relevant biological variation may eventually be found), and of black patients being treated differently based on unfounded conceptions of racial differences which are both reinforced by and products of, both personal and institutional biases.

Biomedicine

Within biological taxonomy, where race is considered no more than an informal rank, races are “thought to be discrete, exclusive, permanent, and relatively homogenous”. While that may have been popular opinion when races were first classified, we have come to understand through anthropology that genes unique to racial ancestry are very rare.

Articles using the term 'race' rarely offer a definition, and it is often used as a term for environmental, behavioural and genetic factors. This ambiguity favours the prevailing belief that “race” means “gene pools”, thus neglecting the sociological and anthropological factors that lie at the very foundation of race. Therefore the greatest issue with research lies not in the definition of race, but the lack thereof.

Malaria prevalence around the world.

One widely publicised study connected higher rates of preterm birth in black patients to genetics, but gave no genetic evidence to support this. Articles like these, in which racial inequalities are attributed to gene pools, through eliminating social factors alone, falsely pose as empirical truths and misinform practitioners.

Using race as a blanket term for both environmental and genetic factors is also problematic. For example, where Sickle Cell Disease – which causes many complications in pregnancy – can be reliably traced back to malaria-prevalent countries, increased rates of high-blood pressure and pre-eclampsia are largely attributed to environmental factors. Both of these complications are classified by race in research, but relate to distinct ancestral (genetic) and environmental (sociological) aspects. Clarifying these differences is necessary if we are to minimise the ambiguity surrounding ‘race’, and its impact on health outcomes.

Sociology

Healthcare access has long been thought to be influenced solely by the socio-economical and/or geographical circumstances of the individual, especially in the US, where free healthcare is not assured by the state. However, regardless of personal background, black mothers still suffer under racial disparities in maternal care outcomes, including a 30% higher pregnancy related mortality rate. Whilst positivist truth can be obtained empirically, sociology emphasises constructive truth. These contrasting belief systems shed light on how healthcare is impacted by racial biases.

Stereotyping and racial biases influence practitioners' and advisors' recommendations, widening the gap of racial disparities. Women who experienced racial discrimination during previous treatments were almost three times more likely to avoid postpartum treatments – regardless of their socioeconomic background, potentially resulting in further complications. Practitioners' racial biases are perhaps grounded in education, as research has found medical students commonly believe black people are less susceptible to pain. The ‘strong black woman’ narrative observed in Euro-American societies delegitimises patient's claims, which can lead to worse actual and perceived health outcomes.

Raising racial awareness in medical education should help to eliminate biases before they become embedded into medical practice. There is a pressing need for new policies to improve regulations in women’s health services, thus a collaborative approach to public policy will be critical.

Statistics and its Implications in Policy making

Public policy making is significantly influenced by statistics, which supposedly represent reality. However, policies addressing disparities in women’s maternal care involve defining race, which is problematic due to limitations in producing unbiased statistical data. Thus, statistics shape both policies which directly affect black maternal care, and the definition of race in medicine itself.

In statistics, the race of an individual is classified either by self-identification or by others’ perception. Individual classification is more frequently used for its consistency, nevertheless, it is common for a person’s race to be defined by an outsider – whose judgement may be based upon phenotypic characteristics. These judgements are disputable as they imply that physical features correspond with genetic or biological variation, a relationship which, as mentioned previously, has never been scientifically demonstrated.

Further, in a world of growing racial diversity, maintaining race-based statistics is increasingly challenging and decreasingly appropriate. A potential solution is to substitute the notion of race and instead establish categories through cultural partitioning. Culture-related habits and environment have been shown to have a greater impact on health than genetics and race, therefore a collaborative approach between statisticians and cultural anthropologists would be uniquely beneficial in achieving a more accurate classification system.

Conclusion

Ultimately, healthcare institutions may believe they are following positivist truths about race founded in biology in their practice, when in fact their medical interventions are informed by notions of race which are constructed by the society in which they live. The failure to consider the social and environmental factors involved in health outcomes for black patients further reinforces the assumption of a biological basis for race. It becomes obvious therefore, that only an interdisciplinary approach combining anthropology, biology and sociology among others, can reveal the truth about race and its implications in healthcare. A proposal to shift from a race-based to a race-conscious approach in medicine has been suggested to overcome structural racism which results in major health inequalities.

Truth in the Stanford Prison Experiment

Introduction to Social Psychology: An interdisciplinary approach

Social psychology is the scientific study of the cognition and actions of individuals in social situations. The field is dominated by research motivated by a positivist approach to uncovering the truth, but has become divided into separate areas with different research methodologies and practices . The opposing approaches to truth discovery have created interdisciplinary tension between the psychological and sociological branches, each disregarding the others work, deeming it irrelevant. The successful integration of the disciplines is essential for finding a more objective truth within the discipline.

The chapter will look in depth at the different disciplinary truths and the need for integration, with focus on the Stanford Prison Experiment as a prime example of why interdisciplinary work is necessary.

Case Study: The Stanford Prison Experiment

File:Guard and Prisoner in Stanford Prison Experiment.jpg

Guard and Prisoner in Stanford Prison Experiment

The Stanford Prison Experiment (1971) was a social psychology experiment by Philip Zimbardo in the basement of Stanford University. The experiment took an inductive and constructivist approach to the truth and aimed to investigate whether sadistic behaviour is caused by individual personalities (dispositional), or their surroundings (situational). To do this, Zimbardo created an experimental set-up that simulated prison-life. The experiment was supposed to run for two weeks but was shut down after 6 days due to serious ethical issues concerning the well-being of the participants.

The integrity of the experiment was questioned, with 'demand characteristics' (participants acting in a certain way because they think it's expected) being a contributing factor, meaning the results were a biased, tampering with the 'truth'.

Disciplinary Perspectives

Three Faces of Social Psychology

The idea of interdisciplinarity in the social psychology field is not new; the 25 years after WWII was named the 'Golden Age' of interdisciplinary social psychology as many training and research programmes were established in major US universities. Yet, by the mid 1960s these had mostly disappeared. The contributing factors to their disappearance are said to be the threat to the traditional departmental structure and a lack of funding and major breakthroughs. . Approaches to truth in social psychology became marked by three separate divisions, described as 'three faces' by James House. These divisions were psychological social psychology, symbolic interactionism and psychological sociology (sociological social psychology), all with new and different interpretations of the truth and different research methodologies. Psychological social psychology emphasised laboratory methods, symbolic interactionism focusses on informal interviewing methods and psychological sociology uses mostly survey methods.

The continuous growing apart of these fields, resulting in academic ignorance, can be seen as the main contributing factor for the demise of the SPE. An interdisciplinary team from all divisions would have been able to avoid the countless ethical violations and would've produced a universal truth, helpful and applicable throughout multiple disciplines.

Psychology: Psychological Social Psychology

Psychology seeks to understand the truth behind human thought, feeling, and behaviour. Psychological social psychology is largely dominated by this pursuit of inductive truth through the scientific method (truth seeking through experiment and observation). The notable Stanford prison experiment (SPE), highlights how scientific methodologies are used in practice in psychological social psychology.

Firstly, a hypothesis is defined. Zimbardo, the researcher behind the SPE, wanted to test the hypothesis that it's the personalities of the guards that is the cause of abusive behaviour in prisons (dispositional). The second step is designing an experiment for observation and evidence collection. Zimbardo created an experimental set-up simulating prison-life. 24 volunteers were randomly assigned, after psychological screening, to the role of either 'guard' or 'prisoner'. The screening processes accredited any aggressive behaviour to the environment (situational).

In following the scientific method, Zimbardo created a 'structured' system to seek truth in his experiment. However the lack of emotional empathy in the scientific method can mean the whole social picture isn't acknowledged- no objective truth.

The SPE relied solely on naturalistic observation for evidence collection; observing and recording behaviour as it occurs. Though common in social psychology, it is not a scientific method of measurement; unstructured observations are recorded qualitatively, causing interdisciplinary tension (especially in the SPE) due to its conflict with the scientific method. Experimental psychologists often argue that naturalistic observation produces a less objective 'truth'. They contend that the results are less reliable because it is harder to control variables, meaning the experiment is unrepeatable and therefore the conclusions cannot be tested.

However, the interdisciplinary nature of social psychology means that it possesses a unique version of 'truth'. This means that though it extracts much of its methodology from psychology, there is value to be gained from integrating techniques from other disciplines, such as sociology. It is arguable that this value gained balances, or even outweighs, the value lost from not rigidly following the scientific method.

Sociology: Sociological Social Psychology

File:Prisoner Questionnaire- Stanford Prison Experiment.png

Prisoner Questionnaire conducted after Stanford Prison Experiment

Sociology is the scientific study of human interaction and social relationships, looking at social processes and rules.. Specifically, sociological social psychology (psychological sociology) studies individual social psychological behaviour and its relation to social structures.

Psychological sociology emphasises survey research methodologies in identifying truth, taking a more qualitative approach than psychological social psychology. and focusing more on individuals experiences in social situations more empathetically- a factor missing from the SPE.

Post experiment, Zimbardo conducted a short survey of the prisoners, where they placed their emotions towards guards and prisoners on scales of different adjectives. The sociological methods Zimbardo used were very simplistic and arguably lacked depth. By placing greater emphasis on psychological sociology in the SPE e.g. surveying the individuals throughout the experiment, the ethical issues could have been avoided and a more objective truth could have been reached.

However, the integration of a survey system into a scientific method set-up introduces two opposing evidence types, creating conflict. This could be seen as disrupting the variables in place, and, depending on the researchers discipline, one evidence type may be favoured, producing biased results and a 'subjective' truth.

Conclusions

The Stanford prison experiment is a prime example of sociology and psychology interacting within social psychology. Expertise from both schools were required to create a realistic prison simulation. However, more co-operation and crossover was needed to eliminate bias and uncover a more accurate truth.

Though it remains a frequently cited and influential experiment in psychology today, ambiguity and distrust in the results remain, much of this arising from ethical concerns, as well as interdisciplinary tensions between the sociological and psychological areas of social psychology. This is because there seems to be a shortfall in what are accepted as the necessary standards of measurement for the development of theories and production of ‘truth’. The SPE is often criticised for this very reason.

Despite this, it seems clear that the methodologies of both disciplines (sociology and psychology) bring something to the table and create a more universal truth; qualitative (sociological) measures such as survey and self-reporting are necessary to gage the participants individual emotional experiences, whereas quantitative (psychological) methods are needed to set up the experiment in a systematic way (scientific method) and track behaviour. This highlights the need for integration between the disciplines, to create universal truths that are accepted and beneficial across disciplines.

Truth in gender wage-gap in 1991-1995 Russia

Introduction

We were interested in exploring the issue of gender inequality. To narrow down the focus of our study, we decided to investigate an important factor of gender inequality, the gender pay gap. The focus was put on Russia in its post-communist period between 1991 and 1995, as it is characterised by a significant increase in the gender pay gap. Our chapter aims to investigate the causes of the gender pay gap during this period from an economical and sociological perspective and identify the tensions between those disciplines, which we concluded arose from differences in truth.

Prior to the fall of the Soviet Union, communism favoured gender equality by urging citizens to work and increasing female representation within their legislation. Government's policies were equal pay for all and encouraged labour force participation, regardless of gender.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, women started earning less, with the hourly wage for men being larger by 31% in 1992, and men earning more by 25% in 1994. This is known as the gender pay gap - an egalitarian measure that portrays the inequalities in the earnings between genders. While there are two types of pay gaps, this study focuses on the non-adjusted pay gap which is the mean difference between income for men and women and sharply increased after 1991.

The Disciplinary Take on the Issue

Economics

With the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia's economic participants were exposed to a very harsh and sudden reality in the form of capitalist market reforms - liberalisation, privatisation of state institutions and free trade. There were major changes to Russia's wage structure with all positions having now a monetary value expressed as a monthly salary.

Gender pay gap increased due to the alterations in the overall wage structure, not because of gender-specific factors. Wage structure means how certain job occupations and rents with persons performing tasks are defined in monetary value. A labour specific legislation in Soviet Russia segregated women in non-manual jobs, which under capitalism, had a smaller monetary evaluation and continued to be institutionalised through economic incentives. Another reason was the decentralised wage-setting system, which allowed an employer to arbitrarily, without the intervention of the state, to determine employees' wage.

Most of the research conducted on the issue operated within the neoclassical economic school of thought, where there is “a single scientific assessment standard”. This results in the formulation of one scientific truth, which corresponds to the existing economic concepts.

A founding axiom within neoclassical economics school of thought is that everything is done to maximise profits and utility, which explains the thinking behind reasonings for the increased gender pay gap. Income is understood as the innate, technical result of the capitalist market forces, which demand evaluation of one’s labour. The gender pay gap as an economic occurrence, mishappening of the capitalist system. When analysing the increased gender pay gap, the changes in distribution in a completely new economic system determined the causes, not historical, social reasons for inequality.

Post-socialist Russia was in deep economic constraints that created circumstances for Pareto Optimal. Applied here; it meant that a decrease of women's wage and change in their economic position would be inevitable to ensure economic growth, as it is inherent for capitalist economic to make one group worse off than the other.

Sociology

Gender inequality was largely due to gender differences in human capital. Females were underrepresented in political power, and as main caregivers usually had fewer years of work experience. According to “Market transition theory", gender differences led to greater female labour market disadvantage in the market economy. Women were usually assigned low-skill, low-pay positions. This is explained by the Marxist ideology, which promoted manual labour as more important, as opposed to non-manual labour. Manual labour, regarded as superior and paid more, requires accentuated physical strength and women weren’t considered for employment in these positions.

The decrease in employed women widened pay-gap in Russian Federation. Socialist anti-discrimination policies, childcare and maternity benefits had been removed. Discrimination against women in the job market rose. Women were increasingly perceived as more family-oriented, less committed and ambitious, more likely to take maternity and sick leaves, which became more expensive under the high economic pressure of the market system. Work was no longer a mandatory endeavour, and the number of voluntary exits from work by women increased. It was explained by the cultural norms of the patriarchal society, which conditioned women to be in favour of staying at home. It is also thought to be an outcome of the response to lower wages, loss of benefits and harassment rather than cultural norms.

Sociology seeks to explain the social world using sociological theory. Those paradigms are used to formulate a stable hypothesis on society. Most sociological research investigating gender pay-gap in post-communist Russia is done from the symbolist interactionist and gender conflict theory standpoint.

Symbolic interactionism theory understand society as the product of everyday interaction. It focuses on peoples individual social situations and the meaning they attach to them. It investigates the issue of gender inequality from a micro perspective, arguing that socially conditioned cultural appropriateness of sex-linked characteristics shape the way gender is perceived in society. The gender discrimination on the job market arises from the perception of women as less-ambitious and more family-oriented.

Conflict theory provides a macro perspective on the gender pay gap issue, looking at large scale structures that shape society. The theory claims that society is in “perpetual conflict” due to a consistent race for resources. This is especially relevant after the fall of communism when citizens were now urged to compete for job positions. Russia, a manifest patriarchal country, facilitated men in the workforce as opposed to women, which ultimately led to an increased gender wage-gap after 1991. The favouritism of men over women within a patriarchal country and under conflict theory, when men stood higher chances at competing for resources against women, germinated into pay differentials between sexes.

The Evaluation of the Truth in Economics and Sociology

The tension between Economics and Sociology in identifying the causes of the gender pay gap lies in the perception of truth. They use different assumptions to form their perspectives on the issue. Economists used a unified theoretical framework determining conclusions. For economists, gender inequality is a “technical puzzle” where rights and wrongs are clearly visible. Thus, the gender pay gap is a technical issue, one which is free from historical backgrounds, contexts, social norms or power relations. Because the gender pay gap is understood as an unfortunate economic occurrence, they chose abstract methods to explain it, which leads them to overlook nuanced causes.

Sociological theories concentrate on the organisation of society and the interaction between people. They argue that the social patterns of society arise from the individualistic interactions between humans and that they aid our understanding of social manifestation.

The tension arises due to the individualistic perception of the truth of those disciplines; what is true for an economist is not necessarily true for a sociologist and vice versa. The identification of the tension between Sociology and Economics, allows one to find the “loopholes" in the assumptions about today's gender pay gap in Russia. It grants us a comprehensive understanding of the issue and permits the creation of a more exhaustive and impartial solution.

Bibliography

Power

Part 3

The power of Christianity in modern society

Introduction

Most of the countries with Christian origins have separated their secular government from the power of the institutionalized religion, contending a neutral opinion about the individual’ religious beliefs. Yet, the contemporary Catholic Church, as a representative of the body of believers throughout the world, holds a certain power especially in the field of moral consciousness, human rights and ethical behaviour. The Popes’ encyclical letters of the last decades address the themes of birth, death, life, marriage, equality and the environment. These themes have had direct or indirect impacts on various disciplines which are based on ethical discussions, especially gender studies, medicine and ecology. Pope Francis is slowly abandoning traditional anthropocentric views and reductionist approaches for the discussion of problems, allowing a form of liberal theology to better interact with interdisciplinary studies.

Bioethics in Medicine

Bioethics is an area of study dealing with the ethical connection of particular biological and medical practices, remedies, and technologies. With the advances in the knowledge of the human biological system and how it thrives, longevity is expanded nowadays. This implies that people now live longer in the midst of fatal illnesses, but the controversy stands as to how to respond to such possibilities; this leads to the emergence of bioethics as a discipline. However, one factor that inherently affects this response is the fundamental belief of Judeo-Christianity, which prohibits any act that will lead to actively or passively ending one’s life. Such activities are considered sinful and against God’s will. Therefore, bioethics-related issues such as euthanasia, physician-assisted suicide, right-to-die, and abortion defy Christian principles, which plays a pivotal role in shaping people’s preference and ethical beliefs or even political perspectives in modern society

However, the extent of Christian influence on bioethics depends on the degree of religious power in politics. For instance, it is noticeable that in the European political system, where state and church are independent, liberal opinions and actions are permitted. Specifically, The Netherlands and Belgium made euthanasia and abortion legal since the state does not meddle with citizens’ personal religious convictions on these matters This is not the case for the Caribbean, where they tend to be much more conservative regarding morality, being deeply rooted in Christian views. Unlike European countries, Caribbean laws regarding bioethics, particularly in Jamaica, is often strongly influenced by religious inclinations, affecting political decision making toward bioethics.

It can be surmised that Christianity shapes people’s beliefs and preferences on bioethics related to abortion, euthanasia, and physician-assisted suicide. However, the impact of Christianity on bioethics in the real world depends on the political standpoint of liberalism or conservatism.

Ecology

Pope Francis’ encyclical letter Laudato si, (2015), comes after decades of environmental discussions within the Church. If John Paul II inaugurated a debate about environmental ethics in which God’s Creation was placed at the centre of attention, Benedict XVI asserted that there is a theological kinship between the love for God and that for the environment. According to Pope Francis, since “ecology studies the relationship between living organisms and the environment in which they develop,” its mechanism should become an interdisciplinary model for the care of the planet and its inhabitants. With Pope Francis environmental discussion takes a more global and holistic stance. In his letter, inspired by Francis of Assisi, the Pope perceives an interconnectedness among the theological, ecological, economic, political, and social crisis. “It follows,” the Pope writes “that the fragmentation of knowledge and the isolation of bits of information can actually become a form of ignorance unless they are integrated into a broader vision of reality.” In a speech, released in 2019, Francis argued about various interrelated topics: first, how the profit of maximizations of corporations lead to the exploitation of the planet and consequently to models of exclusion; second, how climate change is destructive for the planet and impacts especially the poor; third, how pollution affects health conditions and condemns future generations to pay; finally, how protecting nature restores the dignity of the excluded. In Laudato si, there is a constant interaction between natural and social systems leading to the emergence of a discipline that the pope calls social or integral ecology. With this, the pope has replaced the original anthropocentrism with a more complex point of view. The Pope’s Letter perceives the Creation as a complex system which cannot be studied with a reductionist anthropocentric approach, but only with a new interdisciplinary paradigm which is already expanding the interreligious contemporary environmental debate.

Gender Studies

Since the emergence of Christianity, it has wielded power by being an important instance of structuration in different countries. In the 20th and 21st centuries, the awareness within our society that some dominant ideas about gender perspectives could be disputed helped the emergence of certain debates. With these debates came the creation of the notion of gender studies . From that moment, people realized the tremendous power Christianity exercises on gender issues .

The example of the gay community demonstrates how Christianity influences gender studies. In fact, the Church is historically opposed to emancipation currents from the LGBT community. Furthermore, Christianity has always been affiliated with the conservative right representing a considerable part of the population, especially in Europe where right-wing governments thrive. This explains why Christianity plays a major role in shaping public opinion on gender issues. One debate currently opposing the Church with the LGBT community is same-sex civil union . The opinion and discourse of Church representatives haven't changed in decades on this question. Popes have always been against same-sex marriages and agreed with the Church teaching that holds homosexual orientation as 'objectively disordered' . However, Pope Francis doesn't follow the path of his predecessors and creates division within the Church . He publicly expressed his support for same-sex civil unions in a documentary from October 2020 . Although the leader of Christianity changed his tone, the power of the Church on this gender debate stays strong because Francis' opposition remains almost absolute.

In the actual society in which the voice of minorities is increasingly heard, it is very interesting to study how Christianity remains centre to gender debates. Many communities ask for the Church's opinion to change, and despite progressive acts from the pope, his word isn't enough to make significant changes. This shows how traditional conservatism can give Christianity such an impacting power.

Conclusion

In synthesis, the most recent position of the Pope is toward a restoration of human dignity based on sustainability which is both ecological and social. Thus, the power of Christianity in the contemporary world can be especially detected in three disciplines: gender studies, medicine and ecology. Tensions within and among these disciplines are created by progressive and conservative approaches in different Christian schools. There are several levels of influence and response which are generated from the papal encyclical letters and attacked by Christian communities around the world. While Pope Francis assertions have revolutionized Christian thought opening new paradigms, conservative communities, often more strongly related to local economies and politics, resist the Pope’s methods and approaches reasserting the value of orthodox views. Such tensions might be risky for the Catholic Church inner divisions, yet Pope Francis’ attention for human rights, liberal ethics and integral ecology continue to polarize the world with an unprecedented power especially among the young generations.

Power in Sex Education

According to UNESCO, comprehensive sexuality education is recognised as "a culturally relevant approach to teaching about sexuality and relationships by providing scientifically accurate, realistic, non-judgemental information." This definition already identifies a few key academic stakeholders and hints to a possible conflict of interests and consequently tensions between researchers of different disciplines. Through the exploration of the Foucaultian power-knowledge theory, this Wikibooks chapter will examine the tensions arising in the effective implementation of sexual education between the disciplines of anthropology, medical sciences, public policy and religious studies.

Interdisciplinary tensions in sex education

Anthropology and Medical Sciences

Power in the production of sex education research within medical sciences is delineated through the implications of gender bias in scientific literature through the application of anthropological concepts.

Emily Martin, a feminist anthropologist, exposes this linguistic sexism through her work The Egg and the Sperm by highlighting the contrasting tones depicting menstruation in women and sperm maturation in men suggests the subtle implications of linguistic sexism. While menstruation is illustrated as a “chaotic disintegration” that employs negatively-connotated words such as “‘ceasing’, ‘dying’, ‘losing’”, sperm development is labelled as a “breathless prose”. As a result, power is utilised linguistically to construct our subjectivities and ultimately continues to perpetuate the traditional stereotypes surrounding women. While Martin argues to employ gender-neutral descriptions in place of the ones above, scientific publications, however, failed to acknowledge her suggestions as the egg cell was portrayed instead as an aggressor who “captures and tethers” the sperm.

The enforcement of gendered stereotypes within scientific literature could also serve as a reflection of the widespread gender bias within medical sciences. Some studies argue that female stereotypes fuel the assumptions that women are unsuitable to become scientists, resulting in widespread prejudice against them within the field. Others suggest that the gendered environment could be demonstrated through the exclusion and underrepresentation of women in scientific literature. Thus, the failure to collaborate with more socially receptive disciplines such as anthropology would contribute to the inherent power imbalance within and between the disciplines causes the production of gendered sex education literature.

Medical Sciences and Public Policy

UNESCO’s ambition to provide comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) for all is not entirely successful due to interdisciplinary tensions between medical sciences and public policy, as caused by a power imbalance. This tension can be framed by the implementation of abstinence-only education (AOE).

AOE emphasises that sexual abstinence before marriage avoids sexually transmitted diseases (STD) and adolescent pregnancies. AOE programmes hence commonly provide medically inaccurate facts and withhold information regarding various aspects of reproductive health, such as contraception and safe sex. Such dangerous methods conflict with the spirit of CSE and science.

Despite the abundance of scientific research proving the inefficiency and perverseness of AOE programmes, and the widespread acknowledgement that scientists produce reliable, life-saving information, there was a resurgence in government funding towards AOE rather than the science-aligned CSE in the United States in 2018. This was no coincidence, but due to the power imbalance that exists between medical scientists and public policymakers.

Governmental bodies look to policymakers and their research to inform decisions - a reliance that establishes the relation between the two. Yet, policymakers, perhaps driven by personal beliefs or pressure from government objectives, have ignored the research of medical scientists on sex education in their work. This ignorance is aided through direct coercion by using governmental power to deviate funds away from medically informed CSE into AOE. Today, only 17 states in the US required medically accurate program content. There is a clear disconnect between scientifically produced knowledge and sex education as a result of this tension.

Religious Studies and Public Policy

Secularism, which is defined as the separation of religious and state institutions, holds a significant presence within the relationship between education and religion.

However, taking the USA as an example, Christianity still holds the authority as the single largest religious denomination nationwide, therefore, it has a major impact on sex education (SE) curriculum. The tensions that emerge between religious studies and public policy on SE appeared from the Christian view on sexuality. SE that Christian communities prefer mostly consists of abstinence-only-until-marriage or abstinence-only programs, promoting prohibition of any premarital sexual contact. These programs tend to include words such as "purity", "virginity", "chastity" and ignore information about contraception, STDs, and abortion. The supporters of these programs believe that excessive information induces interest, which makes teenagers more likely to sexually explore, contradicting the initial aim of medically accurate CSE.

It is likely that for the USA government, religious beliefs concerning SE prevails over scientifically accurate ones - in 2019, 88% of all Congress members were Christian. Therefore, having institutionally coercive powers on public policy by funding more AO schools and promoting abstinence rather than medically accurate curricula affects the quality of SE. In states such as Arkansas or Texas, state governments do not provide CSE curriculum with medically accurate information on contraception and safe sex leading to the highest rate of teen pregnancies in these states.

Possible resolution: Communication studies, the bridging discipline

Communication studies in contrast to the aforementioned disciplines does not work towards creating knowledge in sexual education (SE), but rather towards bridging the gap of cultural, linguistic and institutional differences that make interaction challenging. It uses power as a strategy to promote collaborative work.

Communication studies is an academic discipline examining the process of human communication, its creation, delivery and receiving of messages. Understanding the power dynamics and language of decision-makers of different disciplines, communication scholars can bring about collaboration and the effective, widespread implementation of SE. By overcoming disciplinal divides, such as the quantitative, positivist approach taken by scientists and the interpretivist approach of anthropologists and communication professionals, better forms of SE knowledge can be created. To illustrate, communication professionals might argue for the incorporation of media as an educative tool, as qualitative research has shown that popular media is increasingly becoming the preferred source of information for teenagers seeking sexual guidance. Nonetheless, health professionals may remain skeptical about the traditionally 'entertainment infused' portrayal of sex in the media, as analyses have shown that 80% of movies have sexual content, however without showing the risks of unprotected intercourse or STDs — thus making them medically and educationally inaccurate. Ultimately, in communication studies power is used as a strategy, to articulate and mediate voices between decision-makers of various disciplines to find common ground and share knowledge and consequently bring about effective SE to the public.

Conclusion

The Foucaultian power dynamics delineates the reluctance of co-operation between the scientific and non-scientific disciplines causing these tensions to arise in the production of sex education knowledge. What is “culturally relevant”, is decided by the government and may not be unbiased or scientifically accurate. The power dynamics between these disciplines create a hierarchy where anthropologists’ work is undermined by medical scientists through linguistic sexism, while medical scientists are undermined by policymakers and religious studies specialists in the form of ignorance. Thus, constructive communication between disciplines would be integral in effectively producing sex education knowledge.

Power of Gender and Sex in Sport

Introduction

Sport is a powerful global arena . Burstyn asserts that sports engage people in a shared experience which can be a uniting force that bonds divisions of society. However, it also possesses the normative power to strengthen the social standards that create these divisions, like gender for example.

Given sport’s cultural and global relevance, it provides a key power base in the socialisation and presentation of gender. As Hall argues, ""Sport today represents not only a global movement but also a highly institutionalised cultural practise that helps to maintain male hegemony in our societies"" (Hall, 1990 in Hovden and Pfister, 2006:p4). Sport has, historically, been male-dominated yet more recently has also been a medium in the movement towards gender equality. Sport thus holds a key position for both fortifying traditional hetero-normative gender identities as well as being a vehicle for social and cultural change .

Disciplinary viewpoints

Business

Business is an important discipline regarding the gender gap in sports, it illustrates the dominance of men in this sector through differences in sponsorships, salaries, and attention given by organisations and big companies. It has been observed by Vogue that these inequalities are most represented in team sports with tennis being the one where the pays are the most similar.

Numbers are the best way to underline the issue. In WNBA (Women NBA), the highest salary in 2019 was $117,500 against $37.4 million for men. This discrepancy is proportional to what the organisation generates on top of the sponsors, WNBA generates “$25 million annually from its TV deal with ESPN” whilst the NBA is closer to $2.5 billion. Another good example is football, where FIFA for the Women's World Cup gave out a total of $40 million to the winning teams against $400 million for the Men's World Cup.

The inequalities in money invested between men and women are purely the result of business statistics and decisions. There is an issue of the demography of the audience: according to a survey led by Statistica with 9,690 respondents worldwide in 2019, the audience for sports events is at 76% men. As men tend to watch men, there are bigger investments there despite in some cases a lower revenue: still according to Forbes, the USA women's team with 4 World Cups are paid $4,950 per game against $13,166 for the men's USA team (22nd in the FIFA ranking and generating less revenue). Male-dominant audiences also pushed firms to sexualise women in certain sports to stimulate and grow its audience: the commercial logic of “sex sales”. It is sometimes done through using lingerie as uniforms such as in Women's American Football or Beach Volley. Through man-targeted advertisements, bigger investments in men and sexualisations of women, the business of sports is man-oriented.

In order to see some change in business, there would need to be more women in positions of power in organisations like FIFA, UEFA, NBA and in multinationals. Additionally, marketing women’s sports as a distinct category instead of directly comparing to men's would build the logic that a female athlete is no longer a woman playing a man’s game but simply an athlete.

Sociology

The advent of the second wave of the feminist movement in the second half of the 20th century indicated enormous changes in the social order and intellectual discourse of the Western world. The issue of gender inequality in sport has suddenly gained a lot of relevance and importance as a subject of sociological analysis.

Research in this field has been substantially pushed forward by the publication of Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison which identified the notion of normalizing power and demonstrated the involvement of social institutions in the construction of gender roles and cultural norms. By adopting this perspective, sociologists started to recognise patriarchal structures that prevailed in male-dominated sports associations which over the years extensively contributed to the marginalisation of women in athletics.

Feminist scholarships proved to be especially consistent and efficient in identifying instances of power abuse and gender discrimination in sport. Conducted studies show that predominantly masculine imagery of sports in marketing and education alongside a high negative discrepancy of women’s sports in global media coverage (with only 6-8% of all sports news being devoted to women ) have played significant roles in the propagation of asymmetrical ideologies of gender that legitimise the perceived natural superiority of men.

With the established theoretical framework, sociologists have continued to analyse power structures that reinforce oppressive gender stereotypes. Mackinnon (1987) argued that culture, by the means of normalizing processes, has evolved to perceive masculine identity to be a personification of strength, resilience, speed, physical dominance, aggression, competitiveness, and confrontational spirit, while feminine identity to be a representation of weakness, passiveness, sensitivity, and grace. Further research provides evidence that adopting these characteristics and conforming to traditional gender roles often has a destructive effect on individual sporting experiences of both women and men. EIGE’s Gender Equality Index clearly shows that women who comply with the conventional paradigm of femininity, that confines them to caring activities, often find themselves participating less in other social activities such as sports and leisure.

Conclusion

There is an evident conflict in how disciplines view gender bias in sport. Business, although acknowledging the gender bias, has tended to ignore the social consequences of its’ sector’s decisions to champion male dominance in favour of reaping the economic benefits of the sport industry. Feminist sociological scholarship provides a critical stance towards the cultural and social institutions which, they argue, fortify oppressive behaviours and undermine women’s capability to make life choices. They view the acts of the business sector as perpetuations and normalisations of internalised gender stereotypes and thus, indirect assertions of power.

This friction between business and sociology can itself be seen as a power dynamic. Each discipline holds a unique epistemology and thus distinct viewpoints and contributions, an absence of communication or acceptance between disciplines causes tension. The business sector’s apparent ignorance or dismissal of sociological theory can be explained through the arguable incongruence of the two disciplines. Firstly, they seem to function on different operational planes with sociology championing theoretical application, and business, pragmatic action. Secondly, they tend towards contrasting methodological practices, despite significant overlap, sociology gravitates towards the qualitative, and business, quantitative empiricism. These discrepancies are evident in this case study: business focuses on the differences between genders and sociology emphasises the similarities, business highlights the contrast in earning potential and performance where sociology attempts to discredit them. Gender bias in sport as a case study exhibits the difficulties of approaching a problem with fixed academic frameworks; mono-disciplinarity results in reductionist approaches to real-world issues.

Recently, interaction on this topic between these two disciplines has increased. Media campaigns and sponsorship of female sport with sociological foundations has surged. A notable mention is the Always’ ‘Like a Girl’ 2014 campaign which presented gender stereotypes as learnt, highlighting the importance of gender socialisation, empowering girls globally to regain power in sport. . This is just one example of the benefits of interdisciplinarity when approaching real-world issues.

Power in Contraception

Introduction

The contraceptive pill, the revolutionary invention playing a significant role in female sexual liberation and gender equality, may not be as feminist as we thought. As a divided issue, its research in pharmaceutical sciences and portrayal in the history discipline offer a varied and interdisciplinary perspective on this controversial issue. Their contrasting scientific and subjective approach highlight varied ways we approach the issue of power. When combined, they offer a more comprehensive view on the causes and impacts of power in the issue of contraception.

Power in History

History as a discipline is written and re-written by historians' selectivity of primary sources aiming to provide the most accurate account of events possible. However within History, there is an enduring gender bias within the discipline that sees a lacking female presence in reading lists, source syllabi and conference panels that discuss the specifics of what is taught within the curriculum; history in academia remains largely male. In the UK there are only 20.8% female history professors. In another example, a Stanford applied history conference featured 30 executives, exclusively white males. What if primary sources were the result of a western-male centred authority on what has been chosen to be told and the way it has been told? History relies on people's perceptions and society's way of experiencing and recalling events, but in a society where the prevailing perception is a male one, it is difficult to be completely objective.

History as a discipline allows us to look at how we view the chronologies of contraception in a way that shapes our contemporary view on the subject. Yet as we use History for understanding, unequal balances of power within the discipline distort how the history of contraception can be understood. There is an indirect, institutionalised form of power within History, held by certain groups of people, which unconsciously stifles the voices of minorities and potentially generates a lack of collective truth and accuracy. In studying the history of contraception, the male majority gives less space to women's voices and perspectives. The curriculum then bases more on facts and events rather than personal narratives, and subject these narratives to a generalisation of all women and the women's movement. A female perspective on the subject allows more diversity of thought as their positionally brings along with them an experiential connection and understanding rather than just an academic one.

Fortunately, there have been efforts to dismantle these gender biases within the discipline, where more women are encouraged to pursue research and be present during discussions. In this sense, we can say that the gender disparity is improving as contemporaries are more aware of this institutionalised bias. For example, in Reproductive Rights and Wrongs, the Global Politics of Population Control and Contraceptive Choice, Betsy Hartmann tackles the, until then, undiscussed issue of the pressure that can be put on some women in several countries and socio-economic groups by powerful figures that provide them contraception 'often in an unsafe manner, for their own objectives, which are fundamentally disempowering of women and of poor people generally.' . However, this indirect coercion will continue if the industry remains dominated by men who hold the most senior positions, thus those in higher positions of power have greater control over the academic narrative.

Power in Pharmaceutical Sciences

Side Effects in Female Contraception Methods

Power in pharmaceutical science is present in research related to the contraceptive pill. Women are often responsible for the burden of contraception (evident in the vast variety of female contraception drugs available), yet are subjected to various side effects associated with contraception. These include, but are not limited to, headaches, nausea, mood swings, and more serious effects such as blood clots and breast cancer. One study on the use of hormonal contraception by women found that it positively led to use of antidepressants. Why has further research not been done in the half century since the birth of contraception to reduce these side effects and make contraception safer for women?

The issue lies in the sex bias present in the discipline of pharmaceutical science. Especially in drug research, most are conducted and carried out on men, without regard for how the two sexes might react differently. Because of this, the recognition of health problems, from a drug specific to women, has been slow. Nancy Krieger posed this question: ‘Why, for four decades, since the mid-1960s, were millions of women prescribed powerful pharmacological agents already shown, three decades earlier, to be carcinogenic?’ This lack of knowledge can also be seen specifically in contraception. The Pearl Index was created in 1933 by Raymond Pearl, a male biologist, to calculate the effectiveness of contraceptive drugs in preventing pregnancy. Still used today, the Pearl Index uses equations not accounting for the side effects women experience taking the drugs.

Research in Male Hormonal Contraception

Meanwhile, results in research on the male contraceptive pill indicate that hormone regimens that induce azoospermia, the lack of viable sperm in the semen, prove to be effective in pregnancy protection, comparable with the female contraceptive pill. Given the erratic nature of the pill’s side effects for women, it is questionable why research in male oral contraceptives has not further progressed. A WHO study testing one male hormonal contraceptive found that androgenic common adverse effects included acne, mood changes, and abnormal liver function tests — all of which homogeneous to side effects in the female pill. Yet, this product was then deemed unacceptable to users. There are claims implying further testing has not been done due to the risk that may accompany long-term use, although the first large scale human trial on the female pill was carried out by Gregory Pincus in 1950s Puerto Rico before it was approved in the U.S., in which three deaths occurred.

It is consequently not presumptuous to view the power imbalance in gender in the field of pharmaceutical sciences as partly responsible for this issue. The underrepresentation of women in STEM indubitably leads to the implicit bias towards androcentric scientific studies — a form of indirect and direct coercion rooted in the social identity theory. The male agentic nature of scientific research has led to an invisible advantage for male scientists and reticence in female; therefore, the evident bias towards progressive studies in female contraceptives, rather than male, exists despite the extensive opposing justifications.

Conclusion

Interdisciplinarity is vital to the future of contraception. With a more objective approach from historians, the impartial truth of the implicit power imbalance in contraception is elucidated to the public. This change in authoritative historical influence hugely impacts the contemporary perspective that is fundamentally prevalent in scientific research — what has been written before will affect what researchers decide to study — which, in turn, transforms subsequent research, and therefore the field as a whole.

In a world where the supply and demand model is profoundly influential, this collective shift in view can also lead to an increase in unbiased research in contraception as the public advocate for more female representation in the scientific community. Progressive pharmaceutical science research can therefore be done to equalise the responsibilities of the two sexes in regards to contraception, thus ultimately advancing gender equality within this domain.

Power in Cosmetic Surgery

Introduction

Cosmetic surgery is a speciality of Plastic surgery that focuses on improving or rejuvenating one's external appearance. In the last couple of decades, the percentage of people undergoing plastic surgery has grown significantly, with an increase of 446% in the United States in only one decade . This Wikibooks Chapter will scrutinize several power dynamics that can help us understand this growing phenomenon and examine the interdisciplinary tensions, inherent to the controversial nature of this practice. Currently, disagreements regarding the social and psychological implications, hinder communication between disciplines. However, an interdisciplinary perspective may be the best approach to understanding its increasing popularity and the power dynamics involved.

Disciplines

Medicine

Western beauty standards play a crucial role in the plastic surgery industry. Recently, some surgical cosmetic interventions have drawn the attention of sociologists because of the racial implications they carry, as they seem focused on pursuing western beauty standards by erasing physical characteristics typical to a certain racial group. The main procedures include:

A patient before (top) and after (bottom) undergoing double eyelid surgery

Double fold eyelid surgery: Often referred to as “Asian blepharoplasty”, this surgery consists in creating a fold in the upper eyelid to form a slight furrow, making the eye seem wider. This surgery could be interpreted as a way to appear more caucasian, proving the racial alienation exercised by western influence.

Whitening treatments: In most eastern countries there is a considerable link between beauty and pale skin. There is a wide variety of products which aim to reduce the skin colour, such as makeup, whitening creams, and melanin-reducing injections. While some argue there is no correlation between the desire for pale skin and western beauty standards and relate this to skin colour reflecting social status, it can be interpreted as a manifestation of the hegemony of European beauty ideals nowadays . Lastly, there are some surgeries which, although not directly related to western body traits, can be interpreted as a pursuit of western beauty standards. For example, nose reshaping surgery, where Asian women look for a high-bridged narrow nose, which strands further from the average Asian nose, with a flatter nose bridge and wider nostrils. Other examples are breast augmentation or jawline reduction .

Psychology

Psychology can shed light on the motivators behind the desire to transform one's body, such as low self-esteem and an amplified perception of the interconnectedness between one's body and identity. These characteristics often surface as body dissatisfaction, which can start developing during childhood. Puberty related body transformations, appear to particularly influence young girls, as studies suggest, girls who start menstruating earlier are more likely to develop and maintain a negative body image . The speed at which these changes take place, make the new features seem more prominent, resulting in self-consciousness increasing, and all body-related comments having a greater impact on the subject .

Body dissatisfaction, in itself, is becoming more prevalent, to such an extent that it is being accepted as a normative discontent. This has made recognising body image disturbance, a more serious form of body dissatisfaction, increasingly challenging. This often appears as a symptom of psychiatric disorders, such as body dysmorphic disorder, narcissistic personality disorder and histrionic personality disorder.

People suffering from such disorders, perceive cosmetic surgery as a tangible solution to an intangible problem, yet such unrealistic expectations can result in cosmetic procedures causing more harm than good. Further psychiatric symptoms may arise after surgery, such as depression, anxiety and self-destructive behaviour, and studies have even suggested, undergoing breast augmentation is correlated to increased suicide rates.

Sociology

The sociological perspective observes that people associate beauty with positive traits. Thus, cosmetic surgery is increasing in popularity in countries with both low and high income as a powerful tool for increasing social mobility and employability opportunities.

In South Korea, for instance, some job applications require information such as weight and height accompanied by a photo, and reports suggest about one-third of human resources managers employ workers based on their appearance despite them not being the best fit for the job . Conversely, suitable candidates are rejected solely due to their appearance. Considering these consequences, cosmetic surgery may no longer be a 'want' but instead regarded as a 'need' and a pivotal investment.

Further, an "ethnical market" for cosmetic surgery has grown into existence, driven by immigrants, determined to adjust to the beauty standards of the society they live in. Understood to help with avoiding prejudices and exoticization, ethnic surgery is about inclusion, rather than purely aesthetics. People may not negate their origins but invest in social and economic opportunities that cosmetic enhancements can provide.

With the normalization of cosmetic surgery discrimination against the ones despite their age and gender avoiding it might become a new social problem.

Power Dynamics

Advertisement for double eyelid surgery, targeting teenagers, in a train in Japan

As recognised medical practitioners, cosmetic surgeons carry authority, making their suggestions, alongside personal, non-verbalised attitudes towards the practice, immensely powerful . Interviews with surgeons have shown age related features, are usually considered subjective issues, while ethnicity related features are seen as objectively problematic, yet only when discussing non-white individuals. Increasing demand for such procedures, often described as “ethnic corrections" , demonstrates a prejudice for western features, but surgeons do not necessarily interpret these as embodiments of racial inequalities. They argue, while there may be a western ideal, this is not standardized across all races and that, for example asian patients, do not desire double eyelid surgery because it removes their stereotypical features, but because they want to appear more “alert and bright-eyed”.

Surgeons further have distinct views related to gender. While cosmetic surgery is considered “normal” for women and compared to wearing makeup, similar parallels are not drawn in regards to men. Appearance related concerns are only perceived inherent to women, thus when males formulate similar worries, surgeons expect more justification. Due to a lack of understanding, the preconception that men are less effective in communicating their wishes and the fear of a malpractice claim if the results do not match expectations, cosmetic surgeons are therefore inclined to reject male patients . This perpetuates a cycle of cosmetic surgery remaining scarce for male patients, and thus the industry provides institutionalised support for defining gender. Aware of these power dynamics, cosmetic surgery companies, nevertheless choose to profit from them. Advertisements are directed at women, and focus on making these procedures appear empowering, as women are considered more perceptible targets, as well as more suitable patients.

Patients are found and created , but because patients are increasingly given control over every procedural detail, women believe their decision is self motivated, resulting in blind contribution to the reproduction of larger structural inequalities.

Interdisciplinary tensions

Every discipline approaches cosmetic surgery differently. While, sociology emphasizes the social opportunities surgery provides, suggesting they fabricate a new consumer market enabling individuals to present themselves as desired. Psychology sees surgery as a strategy to gain control over feelings of inadequacy. In practice, psychology is overlooked with surgeons not trained or required to complete psychological analyses of their patients. Increasing demand for cosmetic surgery, and the corresponding economic wealth generated are compelling motivators that have led psychological risks, to be ignored to prevent decelerating this growth.

Absence of interdisciplinary communication prevents understanding the increasing craze about cosmetic surgery and its potential threats. Cooperation between disciplines could help solve problems associated with cosmetic surgery.

Lights will Guide You Home: The Sociological and Environmental Impact of Light in Cities

Introduction

In 2018, the UN estimated that 55% of the world's population lived in urban areas, and that number continues to increase. Urban lighting therefore affects over 3.5 billion people worldwide, as well as a significant number of animal species, and its implementation and regulation can have enormous impacts. Sociology and Ecology are two disciplines contributing to our understanding of urban lighting today. An interdisciplinary framework for these disciplines to communicate already exists: Urban Planning. However, tensions between them persist, which is reflected on lighting policies. This chapter explores the role of power in research and policies about urban lighting by identifying the conflict of priorities which impedes communication between disciplines.

Sociological perspective

Sociological priorities are manifold within the study of urban lighting, and they sometimes conflict with one another even within the same field. Three of these priorities are the reassurance of safety, gender equality and economic growth. Economic growth and the reassurance of safety have particular influence in urban lighting, while gender equality is more implicit. Sociology encourages the increase or re-design of urban lighting in order to make public space more inviting, through analysing how artificial light impacts experience.

Urban lighting and safety reassurance

Urban lighting yields latent power over individuals' emotions and perceptions of safety. The NYC Mayor’s Office conducted a study on public housing residents in New York City; only 21% of the residents felt safe at night compared to 50% during the day. This issue must be addressed by psychology experts to abate this sense of vulnerability and inability to recognise potential offenders and their facial expressions. The lack of visual clarity withdraws the potential victim’s power.

In another study, participants were shown a photograph of an urban area in different lighting levels based on varied light settings. The photographs of lower light levels exposed much less visual information; this distorted the spatial dimension. Responses were recorded using Situation-Response Questionnaires to demonstrate that lower lighting levels and colder lights produced stronger responses of fear. Perhaps, warmer lighting can be utilised outside as academics argue it encourages a sense of calm.

Therefore, how individuals view safety within the community is being affected by insufficient and inefficient urban lighting.

Urban lighting and gender equality

Insufficient or ill-designed street lighting is one of the main variables which can affect the gendered nature of public space. Women and other gender minorities tend to avoid darkness, or areas that are too brightly lit, because they feel unsafe. Sometimes, this leads them to avoid going out at night altogether. Urban planners and city officials, commonly cisgender men, therefore hold latent power over gender minorities. Indirectly, their policies on urban lighting can restrict gender minorities' movements and decision-making power, influencing gender roles on a societal level (linking women to the home, for example). A UN Women report on New Delhi, where 95% of women feel unsafe, suggested that increased urban lighting would reduce gender inequalities in the city. However, the issue of gender in lighting policies is often overlooked: in London's 2018 Urban Lighting Strategy, there was no mention of it.

Urban lighting and economic growth

In developing countries, urban lighting can catalyse economic growth, improve quality of life and increase wealth. Nighttime lighting and wealth are so fundamentally linked that scholars even suggest nighttime illuminations could be used to measure a country's GDP.

Artificial light enhances productivity by allowing nighttime work. It facilitates leisure at night, encourages tourism by increasing reassurance and improving the city's aesthetic landscape. The Telegraph states roughly 1 in 7 people in the world live in "light poverty" (not having access to artificial light). Often, those who live in these conditions are forced to resort to unhealthy and dangerous alternatives to electrical light such as candles and kerosene lamps. This suggests that increases in artificial lighting in developing countries are to be welcomed.

Ecological perspective

Socio-economic arguments in favour of urban lighting can overlook the harmful ecological impacts of light pollution; 30% of all outdoor lighting is misused. This not only results in economic loss but also contributes to climate change. For instance, in 2017, the US lost $6.3 billion and contributed an excess of 23 billion pounds of CO2.

The adverse effects of excessive city lighting transcend the common problems of energy inefficiency. The most notable "forms of light pollution are sky glow, light trespass, glare, and over-illumination". These have severe ecological and evolutionary repercussions. The plenitude of research conducted on the topic has not obstructed it from being underestimated.

Urban lighting and wildlife

The first effects of light pollution were observed in 1888 on migratory birds, who mistake city lights for the constellations they utilise as a guide. This results in light-induced mortality, a growing anthropogenic threat that requires control. 60% of birds picked up by the Fatal Light Awareness Program (FLAP) in the Toronto region have been found dead. Even if they survive, they have lower body weights and condition indices than fledgelings captured at the colony. Many more studies demonstrate the adverse influences on behavioural and physiological functions of various taxa. Although some outcomes are yet to be proved, the disruption of daily cycle patterns is “likely to influence processes such as growth, reproduction, eclosion, diapause, moult and embryonic development.”

Urban lighting and human health

There is additional neglect surrounding light pollution's effect on humans. Similarly to other animals, light pollution can have a strong influence on their melatonin production . As melatonin has been shown to hold antioxidant properties and boost immune responses, its lower concentrations in the body have been associated with an increased risk of cancer. Most distinctly, due to increased levels of oestrogen (also caused by suppression of melatonin production), with breast cancer. Interestingly, blue light suppresses melatonin production more than lights at longer wavelengths. Perhaps, switching to red-toned lamps could minimise these adverse health consequences.

Conclusion

While activists argue light pollution is a straightforward challenge, it is more complex. Viewed ecologically, the conclusion is clear: governments should introduce laws limiting illumination from the cities. Nevertheless, a reduction in urban lighting could have extreme societal repercussions. Sociology and Ecology's debate is mostly centered around "costs" and "benefits" of urban lighting , but fails to consider a middle ground. Adaptive or intelligent dynamic lighting, which adapts lighting levels according to statistics or motion sensors, is of increasing interest to researchers and provides a possible resolution. However, adaptive lighting is not well-developed, and is not even mentioned in Los Angeles' 2020-2025 lighting strategy, although LA is considered one of the most innovative cities in terms of street lighting.

This can be attributed to a lack of well-developed connections between "research, policy and practice". Perhaps, a "collective efficacy" can be deployed towards improving awareness of urban lighting's impact on humanity and our ecological environment. Collective efficacy is the ability of individuals to control others' behaviour in a community with an intended effect. Arendt theorised that power could never be attributed to the act of a single individual, but of the group that implements, builds and stimulates the agency within the community. Informing the public would therefore encourage policy-makers to adopt street lighting that upholds sociology and ecology's conflicting priorities effectively.

Power of the West in response to the COVID-19 pandemic

Introduction

In November 2019, COVID-19 began to spread internationally. In light of this pandemic, governments had no choice but to take immediate action to protect people. Specialists from many disciplines came together to influence and analyse governments' decision-making. However, power dynamics in global health, economics, international relations and philosophy had a detrimental impact on many Western countries' responses to the pandemic, subsequently obstructing effective international collaboration.

Global health vs. postcolonial studies

In global health, power is predominantly held by high-income countries (HICs), which can affect funding and thus influence areas of research within the discipline. Power is further centred in the Global North, given the contention that the discipline reflects neocolonialist values and is based upon white saviourism – the assumption that non-Western countries are unable to solve healthcare crises without foreign assistance. Indeed, approximately 80% of leaders in global health are from HICs, whilst 90% have been educated in them. Moreover, non-Western specialists continue to be underrepresented in journal publications. These power dynamics have all contributed to what Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (Director-General of the World Health Organisation) deems a ‘colonial hangover’ in the West’s response to the pandemic. Given the inherent assumption that former colonies are superior in knowledge, African doctors with previous experience dealing with the Ebola epidemic there have not been consulted as much by Western powers. Furthermore, given the Eurocentrism prevalent within the discipline, global health organisations in the Global North, have not considered the unequal distribution of resources, such as shelter or water, in other communities when formulating the response strategies they recommend for them. For example, social distancing is unable to be effectively achieved in slums, whilst frequent hand-washing is difficult where water is a rare commodity.

Postcolonial studies, whilst it recognises that power has historically been held by colonising nations in the West, shifts the focus of research to the subaltern (formerly oppressed nations), giving them power within the disciplinary curriculum. Using this perspective, the lack of acknowledgment of Kerala and Senegal's successful responses by Western global health specialists has been criticised, creating tensions between postcolonial studies and global health. Therefore, integrating a postcolonial approach may help address power imbalances in the response to the pandemic, allowing the Global North to understand how a strategy formulated by the West may not be applicable elsewhere.

Economics vs. global health

Similar tensions exist between post-colonial studies and economics as power in economics (like in global health) lies mainly in the hands of the Global North. Indeed, given the wide-spread knowledge of the West, economists from the South often remain unheard. Moreover, power in the discipline is predominantly held by men as exemplified by the facts that only 14% of full-time economics professors in the US are female and only two women have received the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. Consequently, these power dynamics have influenced responses formulated to the pandemic considering the impact of measures on women seemingly has not been at the forefront of decision-making given that their access to reproductive healthcare has decreased in several US states with abortion services being downgraded to non-essential in order to save medical equipment and hospital beds. This conflicts directly with the aims of global health, given that the WHO stresses the importance of universal sexual and reproductive healthcare.

Protectionism refers to the 'policy of protecting domestic industries against foreign competition'. While cooperation is being encouraged in global health, some Western economists advise nations to use protectionism as a strategy to hold power above the international framework in response to the pandemic. Using national security as the primary argument, many states are accelerating their protectionist measures by reducing foreign trade (e.g. medical equipment) and investment. Vaccine nationalism has emerged at the expense of international cooperation.

International relations vs. global health

The scientific discourse in international relations is highly biased towards Western academics. A reason for this may be that the most prestigious IR degrees are provided by Western institutions. Moreover, IR theory lacks a deep understanding of the situation of developing countries, which, in combination with the export of Western theories to developing countries, has negative consequences for these states since these theories often are not applicable to their situation.

Realism, which assumes a state of anarchy among states with every state trying to survive by accumulating power, is dominant in IR. It is very prevalent in the US, which has a strong influence on the education of political leaders since 19 out of 25 of the most prestigious IR programs were located in the US in 2011. As opposed to idealism, realism does not explicitly emphasise that political leaders should not commit immoral actions in favour of national interests and classical realists do not believe in the effectiveness of international institutions. Proponents of realism claim it explains political events and can be useful in informing policy decisions. An expression of this individualistic thinking and scepticism of international institutions may be that many Western nations favoured their own strategies rather than the WHO's guidance during the pandemic, even going as far as blocking the flow of resources to other countries. For example, France confiscated millions of masks that were originally ordered by the NHS.

The lack of understanding of developing countries and the prominence of realism in IR, by hindering international collaboration, clash with the approach of global collaboration within global health.

Philosophy vs. anthropology

Two Western philosophies have the most power over policies: Bentham’s utilitarianism ('the greatest good for the greatest number') and Kant’s human dignity, which prohibits causing any form of harm to a human being, especially to attain something. Although they are widespread, their concepts are not applicable everywhere. Considering non-Western philosophies would be beneficial when solving a global crisis. The ubuntu philosophy originating in the south of Africa, ('I am because we are'), places community wellbeing above personal comfort. Its reliance on collective solidarity helped screen 11,140,600 people as of May 29th 2020. This approach clashes with the Western mentalities, which are either too individualistic or mainly concerned with economic profit and growth. However, these perspectives remain unknown to most, as they are overshadowed by Western ideas, promoted by men.

Anthropology tries to bring LICs and ex-colonies to the forefront by diversifying and expanding conceptions of global ideas, thereby giving them as much power within academia. A report from the IW institute has compared ethical priorities during the pandemic. In Asia, countries are more protective of the elderly, whom they have particular respect for. In South America, people prefer rescuing women and young people. The theory of cultural relativism reminds us that culture influences ethics greatly, thus making the idea that everybody should follow the same procedure unrealistic. African countries have dealt with viruses more often than Western countries. Consequently, philosophies that have shaped their responses should be democratised so they can be considered as Western ones are on the global stage.

Conclusion

Overall, the dominance of Western academia and the gendered power imbalances within the aforementioned disciplines are the primary causes of the interdisciplinary conflicts identified. Thus, including experts in feminist studies in the decision-making process would place the spotlight on women’s health during the pandemic. Additionally, incorporating insights from postcolonial studies and the broader lens of cultural anthropology may allow other disciplines to shift their focus to the Global South and hence find better country-specific response strategies to the pandemic.

Power in the Tragedy of the Commons: Overfishing

Introduction

The Tragedy of the Commons, first termed by Garret Hardin, describes when a non-excludable common pool resource finds its users acting in their self interest, overexploiting the shared resources which leads to the inevitable collapse of the resource itself. A keen example of this is overfishing as development in technology and increased demand for fish has led to unsustainably larger harvests and thus stressed local fishing communities and their ecosystems. Overfishing in a commons presents itself as an interdisciplinary issue through the dimensions of power. Within the disciplines of human ecology, politics, and economics, unsustainable exploitation arises when interest groups prioritise profit and strategic power over an ecological balance.

Economics

13 investigated companies which own around 40% of fish stocks

Globalization and increased demand for fish has led multinational corporations (MNCs) to gain economic power over national governments, fishing-dependent communities of developing countries, and the ecosystem. MNCs regularly catch more than 200 species in over 100 countries and territories and the fish harvested by MNCs are crucial resources for both the marine market and biodiversity thus earning a profit on them negatively impacts the environment.

Yearly reports of the inspected (13) MNCs demonstrate that the extent of considering sustainability as a market strategy varies across these firms and it seems that many continue to treat the environment as separate to their business rather than integral to it. Sustainable fishing practices notions may come from governments or consumers, however, the power gained from earning profit and the possibility of maximising it triggers entrepreneurs to pursue self-interest decisions that they would not otherwise make. Furthermore, global companies, capable of influencing policy-making, became resilient to the aforementioned pressure and continue to threaten both local communities and ecosystems.

Each firm being motivated by receiving maximized revenue causes the fish stocks to be overexploited. MNCs' decision-making could be explained through the concept of game theory where companies interact in a prisoner's dilemma game with each other. Every firm can decide on the number of fish caught taking into account other companies' strategies, however, the competitive industry, the rivalry of resources and the desire of maximized profit result in the market allocation that deviates from the environmentally-friendly outcome leading to excess supply, wasteful practices and the tragedy of the commons.

Revenue maximization and the prisoner's dilemma game are powerful aspects of economics that cause valuing private benefits more than external costs. This phenomenon leads to the conflict between economics and the environment which results in overexploitation of shared resources.

Human Ecology

Ecosystem justice is the concept that ecosystems are a whole, made of equally important interlinking parts. Weakening one part of the ecosystem is equivalent to harming the whole, therefore, each part deserves equal consideration . Through this lens, overfishing is an example of ecosystem injustice.

Overfishing and ecosystem injustice

The fishing industry and its fishery harvests have negative effects on the local surrounding marine ecosystems . These effects cause decreasing species populations, decreased diversification, and migratory pattern changes that harm the dynamics of local surrounding and interconnected ecosystems. Effective biological indicator-based methods such as trophodynamic indicators, that measure structural changes and interactions in ecosystems, allow for ecological analyses of the damage caused to local marine ecosystems detailing when vulnerability arises . Interactions between ecosystem damage and overfishing can be examined in the case study of artisanal fisheries in Senegal . Analyses of trophic level variances in comparison with measures of Catch per Unit Effort (CPUE) between 1990 and 2009 indicate fishing practices lead to decreasing populations of larger fish species and an increase in small species .

Overfishing practices of fisheries hold direct power over marine ecosystems by directly decreasing species’ populations from targeted catches and hold indirect coercive power through the influencing harm these population changes cause the trophic structures of ecosystems

Collaboration in Natural Resource Management

In 1990, collaboration between Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans with fishing entities created the Halibut Advisory Board (HAB), introducing an Individual Vessel Quota (IVQ), whereby the International Pacific Halibut Commission (IPHC) review stock levels each year and recommend a total allowable catch (TAC) to each IVQ. The HAB ensures that the ecosystem remains sustainably managed between decentralised powers, and creates collaborative, non-competitive fishing practice

Politics

The central conflict in the commons of fishing is between the disciplines of economics and human ecology. However, the role of politics acts as an intersection where these disciplines can either collaborate to achieve sustainable solutions or influence to fulfil their disciplinary goal. An example of the latter is how politics can exploit the ambiguity of international, federal and local regulations regarding fishing.

Ambiguity in Laws

A case study of overfishing in Somalia suggests that due to the lack of set regulations in Somalia, conflicts between federal and local laws regarding fishing rights allow IUUs, developed countries, and MNCs to continue trawling the waters. Similarly, Somalia’s designated Exclusive Economic Zone of 200 nm has been questioned by several countries in the UN as they continue to fish up till 12 nm of the waters. Lack of continuity in federal and local laws enables local authorities to sell permits which allow unsustainable bulk fishing practices. Issues of direct power are central to this ambiguity in-laws: the absence of framework translates to ambiguity in who truly holds power over the resources which allows parties with a profit motive to exploit the resource system further.

Strategic and Dependency Power in International Fishing Agreements

The dimensions of strategic and dependency power are observed in the politics of international fishing agreements. Trade and licensing regulations often seem to favour MNCs and developed countries over their developing counterparts which favours their economic motives of keeping costs low and maximising individual profit. The developing countries are exploited for their lower prices and are trapped in a cycle of dependency as most of these countries rely on agriculture exports as a part of their national revenue.

The recent deal which allows Chinese vessels to fish in the Somalian EEZ was widely criticised due to its unsustainable and exploitative fishing methods and its long term impact on the livelihoods of locals. Such policies and deals encourage exploitative fishing practices and contribute to the early collapse of these commons. An example of such a collapse is Senegal , where overfishing and policies favouring industrial fishing negatively impacted traditional farmers, causing an increase in poverty, unemployment and immigration to other countries.

Conclusion

Conclusively, international and national conflicts of interest have an influencing power on fishing practices that lead to overfishing. With much of the ocean being considered international territory, a lack of ecological surveillance and policies that enforce open dialogue between MNC interest, local fishing cultures, and ecologists monitoring ecosystem health; allow for an unaccountable exploitation of fishing resources that disregards socio-environmental health over short-term economic benefit. A potential solution to managing fishing resources would be a collaborative effort between national and international policy makers to enforce and regulate a decentralised decisive power over fishing practices, enforcing accountability and continual evaluation of fishing practice and its influences, replacing neoliberal and structural adjustment policies and intense fishing with local focused, sustainable alternatives.

Introduction to the Legalisation of Cannabis

On the 2nd December 2020, the Commission on Narcotic Drugs, from the United Nations Economic and Social Council reclassified cannabis as a less harmful drug. Cannabis was before on the list of the most dangerous drugs under the Schedule IV of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. This decision sets an unprecedented turn. From now on, international law recognises the medical benefits therapeutic cannabis can have. This decision was taken by a political organisation based on the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommendations and thus highlights that different disciplines come into play in this issue. The problem however, is not solved because while the UN decision has an internationally symbolic dimension to it, each country has their own legislation. Therefore, the use of cannabis is twofold as it is not only therapeutic but also recreational. The different disciplines involved including medicine, politics, law and economics have significant power here, which makes the legalisation of cannabis an issue that cannot be solved by a monodisciplinary approach.

The Medical Discipline : a Decisive Power in the Legalisation

Medical power plays an essential role in the legalisation of cannabis and has a great pressure on its control. A therapeutic use of cannabis is not a new practice, however the question of legalising its use recently appeared in the medical discipline. According to numerous international researches, marijuana is an effective solution for pain control and could become a much safer treatment than opiates which currently account for 70% of drug associated deaths. Moreover, the use of cannabis as a muscle relaxant has been positively experienced with Parkinson’s disease and its use as a treatment for PTSD has been promising.

On the other hand, although certain researches have proved wrong some of the negative assumptions on marijuana consumption, for instance a lowered IQ as a consequence, the use of cannabis can still cause harm. Despite the political and economic advantages of its legalisation, the power of medical research could not have been ignored in the UN decision since it highlights the dangers of cannabis use for individuals including Cannabis Use Disorder, harmful effects on teenagers’ brain development and cognitive dysfunction

However, these negative effects are comparable to those of alcohol which is on the contrary legalised, so it may raise potential misunderstandings of cannabis users about its prohibition. Indeed, cannabis would cause less harm than alcohol, but the hypothesis of regulating cannabis as little as alcohol, allowing hemp recreational use is firmly countered by scientific research as it aims to prevent normalisation of cannabis consumption  ·.

Thus, the scientific profession is definitely challenging the legalisation of cannabis without its therapeutic criteria which has been decided by six governments so far for political, legal and economic benefits. On the other hand, the legalisation of a controlled distribution of cannabis strictly for medicinal use is increasing as it is more and more supported by the medical power.

Governmental Power

The consequences of the legalisation of cannabis are significant in politics and law. These disciplines, although distinct, are intertwined in this issue, under one organ: the government. Being the decision-maker, the government has a major power on the outcome of this issue.

Part of the political and legal power promotes the legalisation of cannabis. Their main arguments are the following: legalising cannabis and putting it under government control will allow the dismantlement of the criminal market of cannabis. The police are overwhelmed with cases of people who smoke marijuana, while other more serious cases require their time. According to FBI data 500,000 arrests were made in the United States for cannabis possession in 2019. The power held by the judiciary, lobbying for more financial means and time, is an incentive for the legalisation of cannabis. In addition, marijuana being one of the most consumed drugs, dismantling its black market would be a major win for any government. This results in tensions between parts of governments that push for the legalisation, seeing it as a political driver and the medical power.

Yet, drawing on the examples of states and countries that legalised marijuana, some governments pointed out that there is no guarantee that the black market will be dismantled, or that its legalisation does not make way for other, more harmful drugs. Moreover, the legal power highlights that it is not because a law is not efficient that it should be changed to the opposite, otherwise arm trafficking and tax evasion should be legalised too. Conflicts within the law lead to cases such as the United States where cannabis is prohibited federally but legal in some states.

Thus, the legal and political disciplines have tremendous power in solving such an issue through governments. However, due to the tensions within their perspectives and the power struggle, a unique outcome has not yet been cleared.

Economic Power

Legalising cannabis is very impactful for the economy. It not only can create a new revenue source, but it can also reduce the costs associated with law enforcement measures. In Canada, around $70 million is earned yearly through levies on legal hemp sales whereas, police, prison and court associated costs accounted for more than $600 million in 2009

Black markets are underground markets, whereas legalisation is a synonym for transparency and control. A market controlled by the government allows production to be done in better conditions to ensure a higher quality production. Certain economists argue that an official marijuana market would make it easier to control sales to the underage population that cannot purchase it. Thus, economists sometimes side partial with the political and legal power.

On the other hand, the total costs of cannabis legalisation are highly subject to how the consumption changes. This means that if hemp consumption surges dramatically, social costs will outweigh economic benefits. These social drawbacks mainly include health care costs, traffic accidents, fire damage costs and economic loss of income (both in terms of cost of marijuana and loss in productivity) .

Eventually, even when cannabis is legalised, the black market is not set to disappear. In California today, it is three times larger than the official market since its prices are more attractive to customers and producers do not pay taxes on their sales. Therefore, economic power is another influence in the resolution to legalising cannabis.

The Interdisciplinary Challenge: the Seek of a Possible Agreement

In conclusion, the legalisation of cannabis raises an interdisciplinary conflict especially between the medical power and both the economic and governmental powers. Although a great proportion of the medical profession supports a controlled legalisation of therapeutic cannabis, only the hypothesis of legalising recreational cannabis highlights the economic, political and legal benefits. As these different disciplines each have significant power in the decision-making on this topic, their different conflicts of interest and views prevent a consensus from being reached. Nevertheless, several governments seem to have found a compromise: the decriminalisation of cannabis possession below a certain quantity. The police would not be as flooded, which is both a legal and financial advantage. Finally, if the quantity limit is decided by the medical authority, public health would not be threatened by this type of decision.

Power in Contact Tracing Apps

Introduction

Contact tracing apps facilitate the identification of people that have come into contact with someone that has tested positive for COVID-19. Different countries have created different versions of this app, but this chapter focuses on apps that use Bluetooth to exchange signals with other phones with the same app.

This chapter deals specifically with the power dynamics that emerge between disciplines as they wrestle for influence over the design of contact-tracing apps. It identifies three main disciplines which contribute to this interdisciplinary tension as contradictory perspectives arise on how best to approach the trade-off between privacy and effectiveness: law, technology and sociology.

Disciplines

Law

Law has the most obvious overt power in this debate as those involved in the development of contact-tracing apps, from computer scientists to government officials, must act in accordance with the legal constraints on their work. This power is explicit as the demands for privacy protections are clearly laid out in documents such as the European Union's (EU) General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).

However, the power of law is limited because the law is open to challenge. For example, the GDPR states that the processing of personal data can be lawful when it is strictly necessary for the purpose it serves, in this case reducing COVID-19 transmission rates. Furthermore, some countries have unique laws that grant exceptions to privacy laws during public health crises, such as the Infectious Diseases Control and Prevention Act of South Korea and the Infectious Diseases Act of Singapore. As what is deemed a necessity and a public health crisis is open to interpretation, there is a possibility for the overt power of law to shift to other parties who can prove that certain compromises on data privacy are necessary.

Technology

In policy making, technical expertise from scientists is widely regarded as a source of power that can influence policy decisions. The idea that modern digital technology can solve all societal problems has been growing rapidly in the field of technology, with the terms “solutionism” and “technology triumphalism” being created to criticize this idea. The manifestation of this can be seen in how scientists were quick to advocate for digital solutions, such as contact tracing apps, to quickly detect and isolate potential coronavirus cases as manual contact tracing was too slow and limited.

The crux of the debate on contact tracing apps has to do with whether apps should utilize a decentralised or centralised model. Under a centralised model, the anonymised data gathered by logging interactions with other users is uploaded to a remote server when the user tests positive from COVID-19. Under a decentralised model, this process is carried out on the mobile device itself and the records are not revealed to anyone, thus ensuring a higher level of privacy than the centralised model.

As the first apps were developed, most attention seemed to be on the centralised model, with a large collaboration of scientists from at least eight European countries starting the Pan-European Privacy-Preserving Proximity Tracing (PEPP-PT) project. Proponents of the centralised model argued that the centralised collection of data would allow public health authorities to provide epidemiological insights like the location of clusters and which types of areas are prone to becoming clusters. It would also prevent individuals from falsely declaring themselves infected, making the data more accurate. As scientists convinced governments that this was vital to combat the spread of the virus, countries such as France and the UK started to develop apps based on the centralised model. This example of latent power, where one party exercises power over another by influencing what they think they need, led governments to exert their power. For example in April 2020, the government of France called on Apple and Google to relax the strict limits on what data their app can collect.

Sociology

Ensuring that privacy standards are maintained is a key consideration within sociology and therefore many sociologists have been weighing in on the debate between centralised and decentralised apps.

Sociologists believe that there is a major breach of privacy with the centralised model and the risk of mission creep could result in large scale state surveillance. They argue that for the app to be effective, a sufficient percentage of the population must accept the privacy tradeoffs and download the app. If these tradeoffs are too severe, the download rates of the app would be low. This can be seen in some countries utilizing the centralized model, such as France, where less than 10% of the population had downloaded the app as of October 2020.

As public trust is the resource that policymakers depend on to establish effective contact tracing systems, this relationship between public trust and policymakers can be seen as resource dependence. This form of power was exercised in April 2020, when over 300 academics from 26 countries signed a letter criticising the centralised model. They pushed for the more privacy-preserving decentralised version and argued that with this model, citizens would be less resistant to download the app, hence increasing its effectiveness. By explaining the dependency of the effectiveness of the app on public trust and thus preserving privacy, sociologists can influence the actions of policymakers. The impact of this power can be seen by the significant drop in popularity of the centralised model, with the UK switching from a centralised to a decentralised model and the withdrawn support for PPEP-PT in favor of it’s decentralised competitor.

However, this power is limited depending on the unique sociopolitical context of each country, which determines the level of trust people have in government. For example, the contact tracing app of Singapore involves the centralised collection of data from users that test positive, but the app has been met with broad acceptance by its citizens. As citizens of Singapore have a greater trust in their authorities than other countries such as the UK and Germany, they may be less concerned about placing their data in the hands of authorities and more willing to download the app.

Conclusion

As each discipline wrestles for the dominance of their perspective, it is clear that the concept of power is central to contact-tracing apps. While scientists trying to create effective technological solutions are frustrated by the emphasis on data protection rights that hinders their potential, sociologists who are stringent in their privacy standards are unwilling to compromise for technological benefits. These challenges from different disciplines are not necessarily a drawback, and in fact highlight the benefit of taking an interdisciplinary approach to real-world problems. The power struggle prevents one voice from dominating the debate and allows policymakers to achieve an equilibrium in the solution that respects every factor, from the benefits of processing personal data to the necessity of also gaining public trust. There is no one balance that fits every society, as each must reflect their unique laws and sociopolitical contexts, further highlighting the need to see this issue from an interdisciplinary perspective.

Sovereign Power in the Crimean Peninsula: Approaches from International Relations and Law

Introduction

The Crimean Peninsula was annexed by Russia in 2014 after a referendum was conducted in Crimea. Crimea was then formally incorporated as two federal subjects of the Russian Federation. However, Ukraine and the majority of the international community still recognize Crimea as part of Ukraine and do not consider the annexation as legitimate.

There have been controversies over this case in academia, especially in the disciplines of Law and International Relations (IR). The status of Crimea and the debates around it concern governments, professionals and the public. This chapter will examine Russia’s annexation of Crimea from the perspectives of law and IR (specifically the realist school), and discuss the tensions between these two disciplines.

International Relations

Realism in the context of IR theory can refer to a wide spectrum of theories, but with the overarching view that states prioritise their own power and survival over all other interests, including morality.

Russia’s annexation of Crimea is in line with John Mearsheimer’s theory of offensive realism that great powers “look for opportunities to alter the balance of power by acquiring additional increments of power at the expense of potential rivals". Russia saw the annexation of Crimea as an opportunity to expand its power despite the international backlash and negative economic impacts it would cause. The annexation would give Russia more territory in the region, along with strategic military benefits of Crimea’s location.

As Mearsheimer wrote, “great powers recognize that the best way to ensure their security is to achieve hegemony now, thus eliminating any possibility of a challenge by another great power”. Russia is threatened by the increasing US influence in Ukraine due to the expansion of NATO and the Ukrainian bid to become a member state. From a realist strategic standpoint, Russia saw one of its greatest rivals extending power and influence right into its backyard, which was a major security threat. Russia thus decided to take action to curb this perceived encroachment of its security by seizing power in Crimea. The annexation also helped Russia signal its position as a great power to the international community. As such, the realist idea of states pursuing security at all costs can be a useful way to understand Russia’s actions.

A classical realist theorist would also point out that Russia’s actions showed blatant disregard for the people of Ukraine and their self-determined government. The more powerful Russia acted upon its power as it liked, knowing that the weaker Ukraine could not do anything. This is in line with Machiavelli’s idea that IR is unconcerned with morality, especially when there is an imbalance of power.

Law

Legal academia examines the Crimea case in terms of its legality and legitimacy in both international and national law. Similar to other inter-state cases, the law can be invoked in favor of and against the secession of Crimea by the parties in the conflict, making the case a contentious one. Many debates arise from the topic of self-determination as Russia’s argument for its activities was to help the Russian population in Crimea exercised their right to self-determination. However, most legal professionals share a consensus that Russia’s annexation of Crimea was nonetheless illegal.

The principle of self-determination is itself controversial. There have been disagreements among international lawyers on whether the right of self-determination of people includes a right of secession, and if so, in what situations. Public international law does not recognize specific eligibility of the application of the right to self-determination. Judging from previous practices, the premises of secession are that firstly, a group identified as people had been excluded by a state from the exercise of self-determination; and secondly, there is no other way of securing their human rights than seceding from the state. However, according to political experts, neither of these premises existed in Crimea. According to the Constitution of Ukraine, Crimea was an autonomous entity that possessed some administrative power. This indicated that the Crimean population was not excluded by the Ukrainian government from participating in the state's politics and prevented from exercising internal self-determination. Therefore, the first premise was proven false in the Crimea case. According to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, who had visited Crimea in April 2014, the alleged violations of the rights of ethnic Russians appeared to be "neither widespread nor systemic”. Hence, both of the premises were refuted. Therefore, the exercise of self-determination in the Crimea case did not conform to the international rules and regulations.

Tensions Between International Relations and Law

The disciplines of IR and Law focus on completely different elements and aspects in this case. The realist school of IR highlights the motivations of Russia and the imbalances of power, while legal academia argues about legality.

Legal academia realizes the role of politics in the practice of legal rules and the vulnerability of the principle of self-determination to politicization. They propose international law should aim to improve objective legal thresholds of applicability and criteria to leave smaller spaces for subjective political motives to manipulate law, and set the boundaries of the exercise of external self-determination. However, realist IR theorists may hold that laws, no matter the principles they are based upon, mean nothing if they cannot be enforced and/or are mere political tools.

The realist school recognizes the existence of international law, but rejects its power. In their analysis of international law, politics is viewed as the supreme issue of importance. The law is simply a tool to be deployed in a more important political game. This also applies to the role of morality. This approach has come under significant criticism. For example, E.H. Carr stated that realism excluded four essential aspects of effective politics: ‘a finite goal, an emotional appeal, a right of moral judgement and a ground for action’. To put it another way, the unfeeling approach of realism may not be the most appropriate for dealing with conflicts that ultimately stem from human nature.

Stakeholders, such as diplomats looking to craft foreign affairs policies, might look somewhere in the middle to find a more balanced and perhaps more realistic view of how normative judgements can shape inter-state conflicts and how it can be taken into account in their policies.

Conclusion

While IR seeks only to explain the motivations behind a country’s actions without judgement, international law serves to balance the power of states and maintain peace through normative judgements. The tension between IR and Law exists for this very reason. Russia, in its attempt to circumvent this tension, chose to use constructivism in IR to legitimize the annexation instead. Russia speaks of the strong Russian identity in Crimea and Crimea’s shared history, pride, and culture with Russia to justify the annexation. Russia uses this, along with the referendum, to claim that the annexation of Crimea adheres to international law. Russia is thus attempting to exploit the grey areas in the discipline of law by presenting their justification behind the annexation using constructivism in IR. This marriage of the disciplines attempts to recognize alternative moral judgements that are more compatible with realist goals. However, this argument is still rejected by most of the international community, which shows the tension between IR and Law may be inevitable.

Power in tax policies

Introduction

Wealth distribution by percentile in the United States

In 2014, Oxfam came to a shocking conclusion: The 85 richest people in the world owned as much wealth as the poorest half of the entire world population. This report sparked a recurring debate about wealth inequality and how to effectively redistribute wealth. The strongest economy of the world, the U.S.A. do not set a good example for other economies in this regard: data has proven the growth of wealth inequality in the US since the 1970’s and has been further rising in recent years. Redistributive Policies are vital theories and concepts in the economical and political world to reduce inequality and to find a sustainable way of development, with a fair trade-off between growth and equity. One major issue in the design of redistributive policies is the conflicting influence of economists and political scientists on policy-makers. These policies differ in nature, but one constant tool used for reallocating wealth has been taxation. However, the extent to which taxation should be used as a tool for redistributing wealth has caused a divergence in opinions between economists and political scientists. On the one hand economists see taxes as one way of solving problems of market failure,but remain cautious on the effects on economic growth. On the other hand, political scientists focus on the social aspect of taxes, which should be used to provide financial stability, in order to build an inclusive society. From where stem these diverging opinions on wealth redistribution and why does economical influence appear to have the upper hand in this debate?

The US corporate tax: a focus on growth or on redistribution

Economists argue that a decrease in corporate investments may occur when firms face higher corporate tax-rates. This prevents potential further growth of the labour demand, leading to higher productivity, employment and an increase of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) . A lower corporate tax thus benefits the US economy by increasing economic competitiveness and capital investment, linked to an expansion of the corporate tax base and living standards across the country. Thus, in order to prevent a reduction of the GDP due to the possibility of offshoring to countries where the corporate tax rate is lower (Cayman Island and Singapore) than in the home country By keeping low corporate taxes, tax neutrality is facilitated, allowing decisions not to be based on taxes but rather on other economic reasons . An example of how a reduction in corporate taxes is beneficial to the economy is the ’Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 9. The previous 35 percent federal corporate tax did not exploit all the economic opportunities because the new corporate tax of 21 percent is expected to become a more powerful tool in boosting the economy . Thus, the overall wealth of the country would increase, enhancing general welfare along with it .

‘A crude distinction between Economics and Politics would be that Economics is concerned with expanding the pie, while Politics about distributing it’ . In the 1970s, growth was prioritized, which led to ‘the growing concentration of income-generating assets in private hands’(,p.14)and to a reduction of the total revenue of governments. The corporate tax, which is one way for the government to collect revenue, is used to redistribute wealth and correct market failures. However, to which extent political action must be taken to equilibrate economic exchanges has been largely discussed. The moral political concept of distributive justice defined as the “study of the morality of the distribution of economic goods and services” , is a key concept of J.Rawls’ theory . It states that without knowing our initial birth conditions, anyone would choose a fair distribution of wealth. How citizens think about wealth redistribution and equity nowadays is mostly due to their own sociocultural perception of poverty. For example, Americans have a strong belief in the principle of meritocracy; being rich only depends on your willingness whereas Europeans see poverty as an economic scourge where high corporate taxes would rebalance the injustice.

The meritocratic belief of Americans is not always reflected in their public policies. As citizens generally dislike passing laws calling for new taxes, politicians rarely tend to use tax policy as an advantage for their electorate and consequentially, the established tax system mainly designed by lawyers and economists, is never questioned. In comparison to investments in other public services, the effects of taxation on the individual are hard to grasp. This incertitude allows knowledgeable persons of interest to step into the discussion on law implementation and subsequently leads to the creation of more flexible laws for high-income groups. Big corporations are one group that hugely benefit from this. As taxation is a burning topic in our society, elected governments will prefer inaction to please potential future voters rather than explain how raising certain taxes could be beneficial to a large proportion of its electorate .

Conflict of power between economics and political science

The campaigning process in the United States to become senator or representative amounts to a concerning sum spent to endorse candidates. In 2020 the total amount spent on congressional campaigning alone is estimated at more than $7 billion. Thus, candidates do not have sufficient funds for their own campaigns (except if they are extremely wealthy), and rely on donations to support them. By providing substantial funds, donors can give a competitive advantage to a candidate by raising his/her public visibility through ads, campaign events and fundraising for more donors.

This implies that wealthy stakeholders, including big corporations, can lobby their way into policy-making, by sponsoring their prefered candidates with substantial funds. The American campaign system can therefore be compared to a market, where buyers invest in certain candidates, hoping to get returns on their investments through beneficial policy-making. Taking this economical approach to the problem, shows how donors use economic principles to shape tax policies: they use power in form of resource dependency, by solely funding candidates with shared economic beliefs.

As for any other policy issue, the power that political scientists can exert, to convince candidates to propose higher or lower taxes as part of their agenda, is to raise public awareness about the issue. This will build a strong electorate for a candidate advocating for higher or lower taxes. Hence, political science uses the overt dimension of power: power as decision-making. It enhances collective knowledge about the issue to the electorate, which in turn influences the candidates because it elects them.

We mentioned the difficulty of explaining how raising taxes can be beneficial for most voters, which would lead to power as resource dependency dominating over power under the form of knowledge.

Conclusion

We have demonstrated that in the US, the pure aspiration for economic growth does not benefit everyone. The involved lobbying of big corporations in tax policies has led to the debate being centered around economical implications instead of also considering political dimensions. Within a political process, it leads us to be aware of inequalities through awareness-raising-campaigns. Finally, providing more unbiased platforms, where the benefits and limits of taxation are explained, could provide a stage for economists and political scientists to present their views in a more collaborative manner and mitigate their conflict.