In this study, the potential for artificially intelligent sapient life to be integrated into a Lutheran theological anthropology is investigated. The investigation is done via the means of a reconstruction and reactualisation of Lutheran anthropology, applied to the hypothetical scenario of artificial general intelligences having been created. The study takes its roots in questions of how intelligent life made by human artifice would interact with the Lutheran narrative-relational imago Dei paradigm, and what room there is within the Lutheran framework to integrate such intelligent life. In the study, the analysis will be threefold; with the first chapter dedicated to presenting the basis within Lutheran theology within which the rest of the study is conducted, the second chapter to identifying core points of conflict that may arise were artificial life to be introduced, and the third to finding preliminary solutions to these. Although the study is and must be hypothetical-speculative in nature, the conclusion is reached that there seems to be some manner of room for artificial intelligences to be integrated into a Lutheran way of understanding the imago Dei paradigm, albeit with some lingering issues that can quite hardly be solved entirely until the real dawn of artificial intelligence. Although some reservations remain, it therefore points towards the possibility of future artificial intelligences being Humanity’s theological equals, and leaves it to future studies to reach a more elaborate understanding of what that means and implies in practice, both ethical and dogmatic.

No description available.

In this study, the potential for artificially intelligent sapient life to be integrated into a Lutheran theological anthropology is investigated. The investigation is done via the means of a reconstruction and reactualisation of Lutheran anthropology, applied to the hypothetical scenario of artificial general intelligences having been created. The study takes its roots in questions of how intelligent life made by human artifice would interact with the Lutheran narrative-relational imago Dei paradigm, and what room there is within the Lutheran framework to integrate such intelligent life. In the study, the analysis will be threefold; with the first chapter dedicated to presenting the basis within Lutheran theology within which the rest of the study is conducted, the second chapter to identifying core points of conflict that may arise were artificial life to be introduced, and the third to finding preliminary solutions to these. Although the study is and must be hypothetical-speculative in nature, the conclusion is reached that there seems to be some manner of room for artificial intelligences to be integrated into a Lutheran way of understanding the imago Dei paradigm, albeit with some lingering issues that can quite hardly be solved entirely until the real dawn of artificial intelligence. Although some reservations remain, it therefore points towards the possibility of future artificial intelligences being Humanity’s theological equals, and leaves it to future studies to reach a more elaborate understanding of what that means and implies in practice, both ethical and dogmatic.

This dissertation contains three essays on the non-pecuniary preferences pertaining to financial asset characteristics and their implications for asset pricing. The first essay considers the pricing implications of screens adopted by socially responsible investors. A model including such investors reconciles the empirically observed risk-adjusted sin-stock abnormal return with a systematic “boycott risk premium” which has a substantial financial impact that is, however, not limited to the targeted firms. The boycott effect cannot be displaced by litigation risk, a neglect effect, and liquidity considerations, or by industry momentum and concentration. The boycott risk factor is valuable in explaining cross-sectional differences in mean returns across industries and its premium varies directly with the relative wealth of socially responsible investors and with the business cycle. The second essay generalizes Fama (1996)’s concept of Multi-Factor Efficiency without being limited by additional random state variables that must affect future investment opportunities. Incorporating non-pecuniary preferences into a representative investor’s utility function generates multi-factor pricing implications. A representative investor chooses among expected returns, variances, and levels of characteristics according to their taste, which gives rise to an N-fund separation theorem with static characteristics. If a portfolio is built to maximize the exposure to the asset characteristics, the covariance between asset returns and this portfolio returns will be identical to the underlying characteristics. Such identity makes obsolete any attempts to distinguish between characteristics and risk exposures as the driving forces behind the cross-sectional variation in stock returns. The third essay develops a procedure for deriving systematic factors from characteristics, based on maximizing each factor’s exposure to a characteristic subject to a given level of factor variance. The resulting characteristic-mimicking portfolios (CMP) price mean asset returns identically as the original characteristics, irrespective of the underlying model. Accordingly, differences in the performance of mimicking factors and characteristics in explaining mean returns should be interpreted as an artifact of arbitrary procedural choices for generating mimicking factors. Factors and characteristics may be distinguished usefully only by determining if CMPs have significant explanatory power for the time series of returns. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Thesis advisor: Stephen J. Pope / This dissertation attends to the crisis of addiction in the United States. The increasing number in annual overdoses and the inadequacy of national responses to curtail these preventable deaths demands an immediate moral response. In the last year, deaths caused by overdose increased by nearly 29 percent, and 20.8 million people in the United States are currently living with substance use disorders. The number of families affected by addiction presents a striking testimony to the scope of the problem. Nevertheless, there is still enormous disagreement over the nature of addiction and therefore how to best treat it. This dissertation will therefore offer a theological approach to addiction in order to advocate for a social response to this crisis.This dissertation proceeds in five chapters. In the first chapter, I evaluate the medical and moral models of addiction. This first chapter engages research in neurobiology and psychology and argues that these models are premised upon a false dichotomy between determinism and freedom of the will. The second chapter explores disagreements in bioethics over the meanings of health, disease, and illness. These different definitions contribute to the chasm between the medical and moral models of addiction. This chapter proposes a holistic account of health for understanding addiction and healing. The third chapter grounds this holistic account of health in Karl Rahner’s transcendental anthropology in order to uphold the fundamental relationality of human persons and to move past the false dichotomy presented in chapter one between determinism and freedom of the will. This chapter then offers a theological examination of sin as a power or force that preconditions freedom. It concludes by proposing a theological and relational account of autonomy. The fourth chapter engages philosophy of the mind in order to argue for a nonreductive approach to mentality that appreciates the ways in which human persons are co-constituted by bottom up and top down causality. A nonreductive approach to mentality offers a way to understand addiction as an interacting set of processes and patterns. This fourth chapter concludes by considering the possibility for responsibility by examining narrativity, vulnerability, and imagination. It argues that there is a moral responsibility to imagine a better world for people living with addictions, and to bring that world about. Finally, the fifth chapter draws upon the theological virtue of solidarity and the principle of the preferential option for the poor in order to articulate a preferential option for people living with addictions. I argue here that Church institutions can stand in solidarity with people who suffer from addiction by acting as providers, educators, and lobbyers. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2022. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Theology.

Intercrafts Peru Inc. has been working side by side with Peruvian handcrafts producers for over ten years and it is currently going through a financial and organizational downturn. The company has experienced net losses for the past three years and there is a need to implement changes that can revert this situation by putting the company back on track to achieve sustainable long term grow. The organization is subjected to trade practices established by the World Fair Trade Organization (WFTO) and it is through this practices that the company has established long term relationships with customers in North America, Europe and Oceania. However changes in the industry and internal inefficiencies limit the capacity of Intercrafts to increase the number of sales reaching new customers. The company was born as an initiative of the (Interregional Central of Peruvian Artisans) CIAP and explains the low bargaining power towards the suppliers because of the relationship. Furthermore this bond reinforces the social commitment of the organization from its conception, to support the sustainable development of the artisans and their environment. It is in this commitment that the company can exploit most of the potential strengths and opportunities. In this context this strategic plan proposes the use of three strategies to take the company from its current situation to the desired situation to be the best crafts exporting company in Peru in 2020: (a) Product development through strategic alliances, creating new designs capacitating the artisans to improve the products; (b) Retrenchment, restructuring some of the company’s processes to reduce costs and have an efficient operational system; and (c) Market penetration attacking the high end niche market with improved marketing. / Intercrafts Perú Inc. ha trabajado de la mano con productores de artesanía peruanos por más de 10 años y actualmente se encuentra en una mala situación financiera y organizacional. La compañía ha operado los tres últimos años incurriendo en pérdidas. Existe una necesidad por realizar cambios que puedan revertir esta tendencia y poner a la compañía en un camino de crecimiento sostenido en el largo plazo. La organización está sujeta a las prácticas de comercio establecidas por la Organización Mundial de Comercio Justo y es a través de estas prácticas que ha conseguido relaciones de largo plazo con clientes en Norte América, Europa y Oceanía. Sin embargo cambios en la industria e ineficiencias internas limitan la capacidad de Intercrafts para ampliar la base de clientes actual. La compañía nace como una iniciativa de la Central Interregional de Artesanos del Perú (CIAP). Y en esta relación se explica el bajo poder de negociación que existe hacia los proveedores. Sin embargo esta relación también refuerza el compromiso social de la compañía que, desde su concepción, está dedicada a apoyar al desarrollo sostenible de los artesanos y su entorno. Es aquí en donde se encuentras potenciales oportunidades y fortalezas que Intercrafts necesita explotar. Es en este contexto que este plan estratégico plantea el uso de estrategias para llevar a la compañía del estado actual a ser la exportadora número uno de artesanías peruanas en el 2020: (a) Desarrollo de producto alianzas estratégicas, fortaleciendo la relación con CIAP con capacitaciones y creación de diseños innovadores; (b) Atrincheramiento, reestructurando algunos de los procesos de la compañía con el fin de disminuir costos y ser más eficientes; y (c) Penetración de mercado, atacando nichos en el sector más elevado del mercado con una nueva técnica de mercadeo.

El delito de Enriquecimiento Ilícito se encuentra tipificado en nuestra legislación desde hace más de tres décadas y, desde su tipificación, poco se analizado en doctrina sobre su naturaleza y sobre el bien jurídico protegido con el mismo. Si bien un sector importante de la escaza doctrina nacional que ha escrito sobre el tema lo ha considerado desde siempre un delito residual y/ subsidiario; es también cierto que un porcentaje de dicho sector, solo se remite a repetir una vieja posición que sienta sus bases en la ratio legis del legislador de 1981 –año en que se incorporó este delito en nuestro Código Penal-. Asimismo, es casi unánime la posición nacional en torno a reconocer en el Enriquecimiento Ilícito un bien jurídico protegido que adolece de especificación –e, incluso, que abunda en lo subjetivo cuando se mencionan la ética o la moral de los funcionarios públicos-. Esto último coadyuva a la interpretación errónea del tipo y fortalece – por un claro desinterés en desarrollar más profundamente el tema- la posición del delito como subsidiario. Si bien no comparto la tesis de la subsidiariedad, solo pocos autores han argumentado seriamente dicha posición, mientras que la gran mayoría de ellos se han remitido –sin análisis detenido- a la doctrina extranjera –sobre todo la argentina y la colombiana-. Si bien en torno a este delito se han planteado algunas problemáticas en el marco de su aplicación a un caso concreto, considero preciso e ineludible, de cara a una correcta interpretación y posterior análisis de los problemas derivados de su aplicación, la determinación del bien jurídico específico protegido. Es a partir de dicha concretización que la tarea de interpretación se dificulta menos y, como también argumentaré, se llega a conclusiones distintas a las que hemos dado por sentadas desde siempre. Para tales efectos, he dividido este trabajo en tres capítulos. El primero tiene como finalidad fortalecer al bien jurídico como fin de protección del Derecho Penal. He considerado preciso sentar posición al respecto al tratarse de un delito contra la Administración Pública, que, por su naturaleza supraindividual, ha sido objeto de críticas en razón –sostienen- de su intensa abstracción; además, porque, al ser el funcionario público el único protagonista en el mismo, se trata también de un delito de infracción de deber –en donde aquél ocupa una posición especial jurídico institucional-, aspecto que, luego de afirmado, podría llevar a la confusión de la base dogmática de la que se parte –así, no se asume en este trabajo un punto de partida funcionalista por su excesivo formalismo, pero tampoco se descartan los aportes que, alienados con las propias consideraciones, efectivamente coadyuvan a un mejor entendimiento sobre el tema-. Posterior a ello, se desarrollan los argumentos relacionados con la protección de los bienes jurídicos supraindividuales –en donde se ubican los delitos de corrupción de funcionarios-; así, como se podrá apreciar, parto de una protección autónoma y no personalista en esta clase de delitos. Ello facilita expresar posición en torno a la alegada contraposición entre la estructura de los tipos en clave de peligro abstracto y el principio de lesividad en el grupo de delitos bajo la rúbrica de “delitos contra la Administración Pública”.

Yunta es una organización no lucrativa que se desarrolla en el ámbito de educación, específicamente en el desempeño socio-emocional de niños y adolescentes en situaciones vulnerables. Yunta surge como iniciativa de sus fundadores en Arequipa, quienes se percataron que la educación no es solo adquisición de conocimiento, sino requiere una sólida base psicológica para el correcto desarrollo de los menores. El principal objetivo del programa que Yunta desarrolla es el desarrollo de auto-estima y el desarrollo del sentido de la posibilidad. El presente trabajo propone el desarrollo del Plan Estratégico de Yunta, el cual se sostiene en los lineamientos definidos por el profesor Fernando D’Alessio Ipinza, director general de CENTRUM Católica. Como resultado de un seguimiento estricto de esta metodología, se determinó que el compromiso y trabajo de todos los que forman parte de Yunta, resulta en un requisito indispensable para la mejora de la organización. El plan sugiere la implementación de siete estrategias que permitirán que al 2020 Yunta sea reconocida como una organización sostenible que crea agentes de cambio en la sociedad peruana. Estas estrategias incluyen: (a) desarrollo de mercado para incrementar el número de patrocinadores, (b) desarrollo de productos a través de alianzas estratégicas con universidades que permita atraer alumnos extranjeros y profesionales que deseen aportar a la organización, (c) rightsizing a fin de incrementar el número de personas trabajando en el área administrativa de Yunta, (d) interna – calidad total a fin de promover una cultura de transparencia y análisis cuantitativo, (e) diversificación concéntrica a fin de crear nuevos programas innovadores para diferentes mercados, (f) penetración de mercado a través de alianzas estratégicas con agencias de publicidad que incrementen la exposición de la marca Yunta ,y (g) interna – cultura a fin de promover una cultura interna de innovación y desarrollo de R&D a través de alianzas estratégicas con organizaciones internacionales. / Yunta is a non-profit organization in the education sector, specifically concerning in the socio-emotional achievements of children and teenagers in vulnerable situations. Yunta is the result of the initiative of its founders in Arequipa, who realized that not only getting knowledge is important, but having solid psychological support for the well-being of the minors. The principle objective of Yunta is the socio-emotional development and the increase in the sense of possibility. This project propose the elaboration of a Strategic Plan for Yunta, based on the guidelines defined by professor Fernando D’Alessio Ipinza, general director of CENTRUM Católica. As a result of the application of this methodology, it was determined that the commitment and work of all the members of Yunta, is an indispensable requirement to the improvement of the organization. The plan suggests seven strategies to enable Yunta to be recognized by 2020 as a sustainable organization that empowers children that become agents of change in Peruvian society. These strategies include : (a) market development to amplify the scope of sponsors, (b) product development to develop a strategic alliance with universities in Perú to attract college students and professionals that are interested in volunteering, (c) rightsizing to increase the number of staff member supporting the administrative areas in Yunta, (d) internal - total quality to promote an internal culture of transparency and quantitative analysis, (e) concentric diversification to develop a strategic alliance with international organizations in order to create new innovative programs, (f) market penetration to develop a strategic alliance with a publicity agency to create brand awareness, and (g) internal - culture to promote an internal culture of innovation and R&D by developing strategic alliances with Yunta’s international associates.

No / The Economics of Sin examines the definition and evolution of sin from the perspective of rational choice economics, yet is conscious of the limitations of such an approach. The author argues that because engaging in activities deemed to be sinful is an act of choice, it can therefore be subject to the logic of choice in the economic model. The book considers the formation of religions, including the new age revival of `wicca¿, as regulators of the quasi-market in sins, and goes on to appraise the role of specific sins such as lying, envy, jealousy, greed, lust, sloth, and waste in individual markets and in macroeconomic activity. Empirical evidence on issues such as cannibalism, capital punishment, addiction, adultery and prostitution is also explored. Samuel Cameron concludes that a large percentage of economic activity is intimately connected with forms of sin which are in some circumstances highly beneficial to the functioning of markets, particularly in the presence of market failure. This innovative, interdisciplinary study of the institution of sin will be of enormous interest to a wide-ranging readership, including researchers and teachers of economics, sociology and theology. It will also be of importance for anthropologists and philosophers.

The purpose of this research is to develop a 2015-2020 Strategic plan for Creamás, a Peruvian NGO that fosters the dreams and ambition of children through education and diverse workshops. The company began operating in the country in 2009 and throughout the years has managed to become a referent in the NGO national industry. In order to do that the model proposed by Fernando D’Alessio was followed throughout the nine chapters of the document. After thorough research, meetings with the directorates and volunteers, and on-site visitation, data was analyzed in an attempt to decipher the current holistic situation of the organization; its strengths, weaknesses and which opportunities and threats the external situation posed the organization. By complementing such information with a newly proposed vision and mission, and the identified organization’s interests; six long term objectives were defined with their correspondent short-term objectives. Besides that, five strategies were chosen in order for the Creamás to achieve its objectives and as a consequence, its desired vision. Furthermore, in order for Creamás to assess the implementation of this Plan, the document includes the proposed Balanced Scorecard; with the short-term objectives and their correspondent indicators. The fallouts of this work indicate that currently Creamás lacks operational efficiency due to the poor training of its volunteers, is still unable to measure its actual impact on the students, and does not possess a solid funding structure; all of them a must if the firm is to remain relevant in the industry / El objetivo de este trabajo es desarrollar un Plan Estratégico de Creamás para el periodo 2015-2020. Creamás es una ONG peruana que promueve que más niños tengan sueños y ambiciones por medio de clases de matemática y talleres complementarios. La empresa empezó a operar en el país en 2009 y a través de los años ha logrado convertirse en una reconocida organización. Para el desarrollo del trabajo se siguieron los nueve pasos del planeamiento estratégico definidos por Fernando D’Alessio (D’Alessio, 2013). Luego de una detallada investigación, reuniones con Directores y voluntarios, y visitas en campo, se analizó la data recogida a fin de descifrar la situación actual de la organización; sus fortalezas, debilidades y las oportunidades y amenazas que el entorno le presenta. Al complementar esta información con una nueva propuesta de visión y misión, además de los intereses de la empresa; se definieron seis objetivos a largo plazo. Asimismo, se eligieron cinco estrategias para alcanzarlos y que Creamás consiga lograr su situación futura deseada. Para la implementación del presente Plan, el documento incluye un Tablero de Control Balanceado con objetivos a corto plazo y sus indicadores de medición correspondientes. Los resultados de la investigación indican que Creamás presenta problemas en cuanto a eficiencia operacional debido al pobre entrenamiento que reciben sus voluntarios, no es capáz de medir el impacto que causa en los estudiantes y no cuenta aún con una sólida estructura de donaciones; situaciones que deben ser resueltas para mantenerse relevante en la industria.