Wilkes University

About: Wilkes University is a education organization based out in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Pharmacy. The organization has 616 authors who have published 1032 publications receiving 21050 citations. The organization is also known as: Wilkes & Wilkes College.

Drug delivery compositions and methods

Abstract: A drug delivery composition is disclosed which includes a triple salt proxy functional group and at least one amino acid functional group A method of forming the drug delivery composition includes reacting a triple salt with at least one amino acid in an aqueous environment A biodegradable fabric is disclosed which includes a polymerized structure of a triple salt proxy functional group and at least one amino acid functional group

The adsorption and thermal decomposition of tricresylphosphate (TCP) on iron and gold

Abstract: Because tricresyl-phosphate (TCP) is a common antiwear additive in lubricants, there is great interest in its interactions with metal substrates. The TCP was allowed to adsorb on polycrystalline iron and gold at room temperature. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was used to analyze the adsorbed species. The substrate was then heated in steps to 330 C, and the changes in the adsorbate were analyzed after each step. On both substrates saturation adsorption occurred at about one monolayer, but the sticking coefficient was less on gold than on iron. Comparison of the XPS spectra of TCP on each substrate with the spectrum from condensed TCP indicated nondissociative adsorption on gold, possibly by dipole-induced dipole interaction. On iron, there was apparently additional interaction between the substrate and the tolyl groups on the TCP molecule. TCP began to desorb molecularly from gold as soon as the gold was heated above room temperature. The desorption was complete by 200 C. However, when the iron substrate was heated, TCP did not desorb but decomposed between 150 and 250 C.

Rethinking Moral Motivation: How Neuroscience Supports an Alternative to Motivation Internalism

Abstract: In this chapter, I draw on neuroscientific work to provide support for an alternative account of the relation between moral judgment and motivation. Much recent discussion focuses on the dispute between motivation internalists, who hold that there is a necessary connection between moral judgment and motivation, and motivation externalists, who deny this. In contrast, I argue that this relation is best seen as a normative one: moral judgment ought to be accompanied by the appropriate motivation. I support this view by developing a descriptive account of moral psychology informed by research in neuroscience and psychopathology, which I call affective engine theory. According to affective engine theory, moral judgment is influenced by two distinct representational systems: affective mechanisms and general representational mechanisms. This descriptive account supports a disjunctive conception of moral judgment, which distinguishes between different kinds of moral judgments on the basis of the influence of different representational systems in their etiologies. I argue that such a conception of moral judgment is both descriptively and normatively adequate. Such considerations provide reasons to reject motivation internalism. However, rather than simply adopt externalism, I argue that the relation between moral judgment and motivation is governed by a normative ideal of moral agency. Such an ideal is required precisely because, as the empirically-informed account of moral psychology defended here makes clear, humans are prone to certain kinds of practical failures that result from a disconnect between distinct representational systems. Together, these arguments demonstrate how research in neuroscience can contribute to normative theorizing: attention to the neuroscientific details highlights the complexity and heterogeneity of moral thought and can therefore guide the construction of normative accounts that are descriptively adequate.

We Have Only Ourselves to Fear: Reflections on AI Through the Black Mirror of “White Christmas”

Abstract: Anxieties about artificial intelligence (AI) have centered on its imagined potential to autonomously originate unforeseeable, uncontrollable, profound threats to human beings. Yet, in the Black Mirror (2011–) episode “White Christmas,” AI serves primarily as a tool by which human-originated cruelty can be implemented and amplified. In particular, the cookie, a device storing an extant person’s consciousness outside of his or her body, can be cognizant of existential dependence on the whims of the original consciousness, instantiating the horror of which human beings are capable and casting a reflecting surface by which our fears about AI merely point us back to ourselves.