Gini Nelson’s Engaging Conflicts

“Save the date” for my September 26 – 28, 2007 SES (Science, Ethics and Spirit) Conference in Santa Fe. There will also be a two-day pre-conference Transformational Mediation Training by the Institute for the Study of Conflict Transformation (ISCT), a national think-tank supported by a consortium of universities including the University of North Dakota, Hofstra Law School, Temple University, and James Madison University. Kristine Paranica, the Administrative Director and Fellow of the Institute, and Director of University of North Dakota’s Conflict Resolution Center, will then present two workshops at the SES conference: one on transformational mediation, and one on the use of transformative principles in conflict communication. Both the pre-conference Transformational Mediation Training and the SES Conference will take place at the Upaya Zen Center in Santa Fe, NM with the opportunity to interact with the Center’s diverse residential community of monks and lay people. I expect that both CEU and CLE credits will be available for both. I’ll post more details over the next couple of weeks, so please check back.

            

Psychology studies behavior, and neuroscience studies the nervous system. They overlap in studying what is commonly called “the mind.”

ScienceBlogs reinitiated a revised “Ask a ScienceBlogger” feature, wherein an expert will respond to readers’ questions. This week they responded to this question:

What’s the difference between psychology and neuroscience? Is psychology still relevant as we learn more about the brain and how it works?

They conclude that studying both psychology and neuroscience is the best way to understand it all: behavior, the nervous system, the mind.

            

Not just for attorneys — do you have a question about an ethical issue pertaining to mediation? The ABA’s Section of Dispute Resolution has formed a committee to provide advisory responses to ethical questions. From the Section’s website:

Our Committee on Mediator Ethical Guidance is now ready to accept your inquiries and provide advisory responses to your requests. Section Chair John Bickerman is pleased to announce this important project for the Section and the field: “There is no greater way for consumers to have confidence in the services that mediators provide them then to know that mediators are following the ethical duties of their profession. As the leader in policy and practice in the field of dispute resolution, the DR Section is pleased to be able to provide guidance to mediators, the parties andlawyers who use their services.”

The current scope of the Committee is limited to the consideration of ethical issues pertaining to mediation. The Committee may accept an inquiry from an ABA member, an individual who is not an ABA member, an organization or may consider an issue on its own initiative. While it may draw on other sources of authority, such as opinions or other guidance issued by state ethics authorities, its focus will be on interpreting the American Bar Association Model Standards of Conduct for Mediators (2005) and applying them to the issue presented.

Here’s their intake form.

Here’s the link to the full ABA announcement.

Thanks to Geoff Sharp, a New Zealander attorney, mediator, and blogger for this!

            

This is not original to me, but it’s funny and timely, what with Easter so soon upon us. Thanks to Science Blogs for this post! Happy Spring!

            

I like the Thinking Ethics blog, and only wish it were easier to link to direct posts on the site-you can navigate to the categories and specific posts from within the site, but it seems to only give the home page http: address. Here’s about some ethical computer games, posted Monday, April 2:

Role playing

Here are three intresting ethical computer games:

You can help stop the crisis in Darfur as you role play in a refugee camp in www.darfurisdying.com

You can see what it is like to live in poverty and try to stay healthy in Haiti in the Unicef Voices of Youth game Ayiti: The Cost of Life

You can save and rebuild an island in the World Food Program’s Food Force.

Here’s a post about another source of ethical games and puzzles (from March 9) :

Games and puzzles

ERC, the Ethics Resource Center, a site devoted to organizational ethics in the US, has a selection of ethical games and puzzles (mostly crosswods). link here

And another (from Feb. 6):

Ethics Games

In case you want to practice - new computer game that is “sweeping the Federal Agencies…”, the US Office of Government Ethics proudly presents… here

Also the Institute of Business Ethics in the UK has some great teaching material - the business cases can be found here.

Thank you, Thinking Ethics!