Pratt et al. (2020) tackle a seeming lack of consensus about the ethical goals of community engagement (CE) in global health research. Their paper “identifies an additional or complementary role fo...

We criticize a view of maternity that equates the natural with the genetic and biological and show how such a practice overdetermines the maternal body and the maternal experience for women who are mothers through adoption and ART . As an alternative, we propose a new framework designed to rethink maternal bodies through the lens of feminist embodiment. Feminist embodied maternity, as we call it, stresses the particularity of experience through subjective embodiment. A feminist embodied maternity emphasizes the physical relations (...) of the subjective lived-body rather than the genetic or biological connections. Instead of universalizing claims about the maternal body, embodied maternity looks to communicable experiences and empathetic understanding. (shrink)

: We criticize a view of maternity that equates the natural with the genetic and biological and show how such a practice overdetermines the maternal body and the maternal experience for women who are mothers through adoption and ART (Assisted Reproductive Technologies). As an alternative, we propose a new framework designed to rethink maternal bodies through the lens of feminist embodiment. Feminist embodied maternity, as we call it, stresses the particularity of experience through subjective embodiment. A feminist embodied maternity emphasizes (...) the physical relations of the subjective lived-body rather than the genetic or biological connections. Instead of universalizing claims about the maternal body, embodied maternity looks to communicable experiences and empathetic understanding. (shrink)

A sustained analysis of the moral permissibility of withholding or of the obligation to disclose information to an adopted child is lacking in the literature on parental duties, disclosures, and adoption. These two sets of questions raise issues that appear to fall within the parameters of the concepts of stewardship and gratitude. I propose that adoptive parents are the stewards of the information they receive concerning their child and I show how stewardship and gratitude can aid adoptive parents as they (...) negotiate the terrain of disclosure. (shrink)

In this analysis I apply a Foucauldian approach to ethics to examine the politically prescribed moral and ethical character required of carers of aged persons at home in Australia and the role of nurses in shaping these behaviours. The work that spousal carers provide, although often founded on love and/or obligation, has been formalized through a variety of policy initiatives and technologies that serve to construct the moral approach they must adopt. This shaping of conduct at the most personal level (...) takes place through the application of codes of behaviour policed largely by nurses. These codes redefine the mode of coexistence between an aged husband and wife and propose a new form of relationship that is derived from and supports policies of the deinstitutionalization of care services for elderly persons. In this way modern carer policy has drawn on knowledge and governance of the self to produce a morality of caring that is both authoritative and scientific. (shrink)

The Ethics of Need: Agency, Dignity, and Obligation argues for the philosophical importance of the notion of need and for an ethical framework through which we can determine which needs have moral significance. In the volume, Sarah Clark Miller synthesizes insights from Kantian and feminist care ethics to establish that our mutual and inevitable interdependence gives rise to a duty to care for the needs of others. Further, she argues that we are obligated not merely to meet others’ needs (...) but to do so in a manner that expresses "dignifying care," a concept that captures how human interactions can grant or deny equal moral standing and inclusion in a moral community. She illuminates these theoretical developments by examining two cases where urgent needs require a caring and dignifying response: the needs of the elderly and the needs of global strangers. Those working in the areas of feminist theory, women’s studies, aging studies, bioethics, and global studies should find this volume of interest. (shrink)

This paper considers the justifications for adhering to a principle of confidentiality within medical practice. These are found to derive chiefly from respect for individual autonomy, the doctor/patient contract, and social utility. It is suggested that these will benefit more certainly if secrecy is rejected and the principle of confidentiality is removed from the area of health care.

An assessment of America's preference for "extra-large" shares examples ranging from mega churches and breast augmentation to landfills and mega-malls, in a cautionary report that reveals some of the consequences of these choices.

M. Clifford-Vaughan; VII—Social Change and Legal Norms, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 67, Issue 1, 1 June 1967, Pages 103–110, https://doi.org.

In this chapter, we critique a concept of resilience that has emerged from contemporary positive psychology and its application to health education. We argue that the present popularity of “resilience” as a strategy for managing mental health discourages educational institutions from providing students with the mental health services they need. Using the tools of American pragmatism, especially the work of John Dewey, we criticize the paradigm of resilience and identify several concrete reformulations of disability studies which would make concrete differences (...) in the lives of those with mental disability. (shrink)

Traditional philosophical discussions of knowledge have focused on the epistemic status of full beliefs. In this book, Moss argues that in addition to full beliefs, credences can constitute knowledge. For instance, your .4 credence that it is raining outside can constitute knowledge, in just the same way that your full beliefs can. In addition, you can know that it might be raining, and that if it is raining then it is probably cloudy, where this knowledge is not knowledge of propositions, (...) but of probabilistic contents. -/- The notion of probabilistic content introduced in this book plays a central role not only in epistemology, but in the philosophy of mind and language as well. Just as tradition holds that you believe and assert propositions, you can believe and assert probabilistic contents. Accepting that we can believe, assert, and know probabilistic contents has significant consequences for many philosophical debates, including debates about the relationship between full belief and credence, the semantics of epistemic modals and conditionals, the contents of perceptual experience, peer disagreement, pragmatic encroachment, perceptual dogmatism, and transformative experience. In addition, accepting probabilistic knowledge can help us discredit negative evaluations of female speech, explain why merely statistical evidence is insufficient for legal proof, and identify epistemic norms violated by acts of racial profiling. Hence the central theses of this book not only help us better understand the nature of our own mental states, but also help us better understand the nature of our responsibilities to each other. (shrink)

The modal logician's notion of possible world and the computer scientist's notion of state of a machine provide a point of commonality which can form the foundation of a logic of action. Extending ordinary modal logic with the calculus of binary relations leads to a very natural logic for describing the behavior of computer programs.

This paper promotes a philosophy derived from the direct distribution of goods to needs that occur in mothering and invisibly in many other aspects of life. Such a philosophy is suggested as an alternative to market based values, which currently permeate society. It is important to bring alternative values to consciousness and validate them for both teachers and children so that the orientation towards the other that characterizes the gift paradigm will not be lost in the fight for survival endemic (...) to a market society. The hope is that we can find solutions that are viable for all. After presenting this philosophy, we show how it already exists among educators and children, and we suggest ways in which it may be validated and promoted in early childhood education. (shrink)

This paper develops a precise understanding of the thesis of moral encroachment, which states that the epistemic status of an opinion can depend on its moral features. In addition, I raise objections to existing accounts of moral encroachment. For instance, many accounts fail to give sufficient attention to moral encroachment on credences. Also, many accounts focus on moral features that fail to support standard analogies between pragmatic and moral encroachment. Throughout the paper, I discuss racial profiling as a case study, (...) arguing that moral encroachment can help us identify one respect in which racial profiling is epistemically problematic. (shrink)

The value of Colin Wilson as an original philosopher - and more.

Introduction: The humanities enrich and transform the practice of medicine. What remains to be seen, however, is how best to integrate humanities into the medical curriculum to optimize both educational and patient-related outcomes. The present study considers the structure of an innovative student-driven humanities curriculum and seeks to understand its strengths and limitations, as well as make recommendations for improvement. Methods: The Penn State College of Medicine, University Park Regional Campus uses an inquiry-based approach to education, whereby students are responsible (...) for creating learning objectives in four core pillars of exploration: Foundational Science, Clinical Science, Health Systems Science, and Health Humanities. This study explores student-derived humanities learning objectives (HLO) across four years of the curriculum. Results: 420 HLOs met criteria for analysis and were coded as instrumental (developing direct clinical skill), non-instrumental (non-skill based), or both. Of these, 125 (30%) were instrumental, 239 (57%) were non-instrumental, and 56 (13%) were coded as both. Most instrumental HLO centered around communication skills. Non-instrumental HLO most commonly focused on bearing witness and critiquing a particular experience within a social and/or political context. Conclusions: Findings from this study contribute to the development of a humanities curriculum in a student-directed learning program. Non-instrumental HLO lacked a theoretical framework to guide student’s investigations to a deeper level of analysis. Student-directed learning offers many strengths, but can be enhanced through external direction from humanities trained faculty, particularly given that many medical students have a limited humanities background. (shrink)

Generic generalizations such as ‘mosquitoes carry the West Nile virus’ or ‘sharks attack bathers’ are often accepted by speakers despite the fact that very few members of the kinds in question have the predicated property. Previous work suggests that such low-prevalence generalizations may be accepted when the properties in question are dangerous, harmful, or appalling. This paper argues that the study of such generic generalizations sheds light on a particular class of prejudiced social beliefs, and points to new ways in (...) which those beliefs might be undermined and combatted. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Leviathan after 350 YearsSharon VaughanTom Sorell and Luc Foisneau, editors. Leviathan after 350 Years. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004. Pp. x + 308. Cloth, $74.00The editors introduce this collection as a testament to the continuing importance of Leviathan in political thought. Divided into three parts, these twelve essays are some of the papers presented at a May 2001 conference to mark the 350th anniversary of Leviathan's publication. Readers might (...) expect a discussion about Leviathan's endurance and relevance as a fundamental text of political philosophy, but this is not the book's main thrust. Instead, the authors engage in a discussion concerning some of the most provocative and controversial questions about Leviathan. Much of the debate centers on how one should interpret it, forcing readers not only to reconsider crucial parts of Hobbes's philosophy, but also the act of interpretation.Part one examines the place that Leviathan holds among Hobbes's political writings. Karl Schumann argues that one should not think of Leviathan as a radical departure from De Cive and that it did not mark the culmination of Hobbes's development as a political philosopher (14). Schumann's essay is not convincing because he effectively points out the consequential ways that Leviathan is distinct. Ted H. Miller suggests, "Leviathan's uniqueness is rooted in its poetic-philosophical innovations"(103). He points out that David Johnston, Quentin Skinner, and others have stressed the significance of its rhetorical style. Miller, however, proposes that it was the context and the company that Hobbes kept during this time that influenced his writing style. Kinch Hoekstra suggests that Hobbes is an unusual de facto theorist and Luc Foisneau believes that Leviathan is unique because of its theory of justice.Part two is devoted to investigating passions and politics in Leviathan. Richard Tuck believes that Hobbes's political philosophy is utopian because it demands a radical transformation of humans as passionate beings. Tuck says that while the Leviathan provides citizens with security, "they are also going to live a life without pride, their sense of their own individual importance reduced to nothing in the face of their commonwealth" (138). Tuck's essay stands in contrast to Tom Sorrell's analysis of the burdens on the sovereign. He concludes that he must be an individual with little, if any, regard for his own ambitions and passions (196). What one is left with is a Hobbesian version of a philosopher king who has his personal appetites in check always looking out for what benefits his subjects. Is [End Page 210] there any guarantee that the sovereign will be non-egotistical and public-spirited? No, because the sovereign has absolute freedom. Sorrell believes, however, that it is in the sovereign's best interest to be unselfish if she is to maintain her sovereignty (193).Quentin Skinner analyzes the classical theory of laughter, relating it to Hobbes's complicated views about it. Political agency in Leviathan is Yves Zarka's topic. It seems that the citizen is merely a subject, but Zarka cautions that one must carefully read the text and remember that certain rights are inalienable. How far one may take what Zarka interprets as the "the right of resistance" remains a debatable question (182). He believes that one might rethink Leviathan as a more complex piece of political philosophy by practicing "back-to front reading" as opposed to a direct-method reading of the text (182). Zarka thinks that citizens may have a more complex and passionate role than commonly thought (182). This is an alluring suggestion, but it is difficult to accept in light of Hobbes's preoccupation with security and obedience.The role of biblical and political authority is the theme for part three. Edwin Curley argues that Hobbes's treatment of covenants with God was possibly a vehicle for him to arouse skepticism about Christianity among his readers. A. P. Martinich rejects Curley's claim and concludes that not only does his argument fail on grounds of logic, but also it requires far too much "reading between the lines" (223). Martinich's analytic rigor and his attention to the process of interpretation raise serious doubts about Curley... (shrink)

Contemporary discourses surrounding adoption have a normative tone and are critical of the ways in which international adoption is power based and exploitative. These discourses have a significant influence on adoptive parents, structuring their actions and opening the door for scrutiny of individual adopters' motives and ethics. As an internationally adoptive parent, I reflect, in this article, on my experience and use it as a vantage point from which to consider alternative perspectives on the ethical debates in the extant adoption (...) literature. The insights gained from my experience can inform adoption practices and the development of more nuanced, less polarized perspectives on the ethics of international adoption and inspire new avenues of research that explore the ways in which adoptive parents navigate their socio-political contexts in ways that are ethically sensitive and workable for them. (shrink)

Existing discussions of legal proof address a host of apparently disparate questions: What does it take to prove a fact beyond a reasonable doubt? Why is the reasonable doubt standard notoriously elusive, sometimes considered by courts to be impossible to define? Can the standard of proof by a preponderance of the evidence be defined in terms of probability thresholds? Why is statistical evidence often insufficient to meet the burden of proof? -/- This paper defends an account of proof that addresses (...) each of these questions. Where existing theories take a piecemeal approach to these puzzles, my theory develops an insight that unifies them—namely, the thesis that legal proof requires knowledge. Although this thesis may seem radical at first, I answer several common objections to it, and I argue that it does better than several competing accounts when it comes to making sense of our intuitions about what legal proof requires. (shrink)

This paper motivates and develops a novel semantics for several epistemic expressions, including possibility modals and indicative conditionals. The semantics I defend constitutes an alternative to standard truth conditional theories, as it assigns sets of probability spaces as sentential semantic values. I argue that what my theory lacks in conservatism is made up for by its strength. In particular, my semantics accounts for the distinctive behavior of nested epistemic modals, indicative conditionals embedded under probability operators, and instances of constructive dilemma (...) containing epistemic vocabulary. (shrink)

This article draws on the concept of “performance” to argue for greater recognition of preexisting practices in the configuration of users. Through an Australian case study of a computer-based dairy decision-support system introduced via a two-day workshop to participating farmers, the article examines the assembling of imputed farmer users in the design of the software. It then explores how the designer and trainers attempt, through the decision-support system, to mobilize their network and align the imputed user with farmers' preexisting performances. (...) The case study highlights that attempts to make workable on-farm the “new” performances of users inscribed in the software are highly contingent on farmers' preexisting knowledge practices. These “old” performances problematize the designer's and trainers' version of imputed users and contribute to partial translation of the decision-support system. A focus on performance is argued to provide a useful starting point in mapping the effects of preexisting knowledge practices on attempts to enroll users in technosocial programs. (shrink)

Dynamic algebras combine the classes of Boolean (B 0) and regular (R ; *) algebras into a single finitely axiomatized variety (B R ) resembling an R-module with scalar multiplication . The basic result is that * is reflexive transitive closure, contrary to the intuition that this concept should require quantifiers for its definition. Using this result we give several examples of dynamic algebras arising naturally in connection with additive functions, binary relations, state trajectories, languages, and flowcharts. The main result (...) is that free dynamic algebras are residually finite (i.e. factor as a subdirect product of finite dynamic algebras), important because finite separable dynamic algebras are isomorphic to Kripke structures. Applications include a new completeness proof for the Segerberg axiomatization of prepositional dynamic logic, and yet another notion of regular algebra. (shrink)

This chapter defines and defends time-slice epistemology, according to which there are no essentially diachronic norms of rationality. The chapter begins by distinguishing two notions of time-slice epistemology, and ends by defending time-slice theories of action under indeterminacy, i.e. theories about how you should act when the outcome of your decision depends on some indeterminate claim. In a recent chapter, J. Robert G. Williams defends a theory of action under indeterminacy which is subject to several objections. An alternative theory is (...) proposed in its place. The resulting discussion highlights a more general moral about action under indeterminacy, namely that time-slice theories are supported by strong analogies with ethical theories. In particular, our understanding of agents torn between interpretations of a decision situation should be guided by our theories of agents torn between incommensurable values. (shrink)

This paper argues that just as full beliefs can constitute knowledge, so can properties of your credence distribution. The resulting notion of probabilistic knowledge helps us give a natural account of knowledge ascriptions embedding language of subjective uncertainty, and a simple diagnosis of probabilistic analogs of Gettier cases. Just like propositional knowledge, probabilistic knowledge is factive, safe, and sensitive. And it helps us build knowledge-based norms of action without accepting implausible semantic assumptions or endorsing the claim that knowledge is interest-relative.