While recognized in a large number of jurisdictions, the privilege against self-incrimination proves hard to justify. This article attempts to develop a rationale for the privilege which avoids the usual pitfalls. It argues that the most compelling rationale for the privilege is that it serves as a distancing mechanism, allowing defendants to disassociate themselves from prosecutions. The resulting account has implications for the scope of the privilege. First, it suggests that no distinction should be drawn between requirements to speak and (...) requirements to provide the authorities with documents, blood samples and the like. Second, it is argued that recognition of a privilege against self-incrimination implies that we should recognize a privilege against other incrimination which has similar force. Attention is also paid to exceptions to the privilege. (shrink)

Conciliationism is a view—well, a family of views—in the epistemology of disagreement. The idea, simply put, is that, in a wide range of cases where you find yourself in disagreement with another reasoner about the truth of some proposition, you are rationally obliged to adjust your credence in the direction of hers. Conciliationism enjoys a fair bit of prima facie plausibility. Most versions of it, however, suffer from a common (and rather obvious) problem: self-incrimination. Although there is some recognition in (...) the recent literature on disagreement that there is a problem in this vicinity, it, more often than not, is completely ignored. When it is not completely ignored, both the conciliationists and their critics tend to frame the problem incorrectly. As a result, they end up focusing most of their attention on pseudo-problems rather than the genuine worry. Furthermore, even when they have hit on the genuine worry, conciliationists have tended to give surprising and implausible responses to it. Even by their own lights, conciliationists aren’t justified in believing their conciliationist theses. In this paper, I argue that it’s time to come clean. Time to look for a view on the epistemic significance of disagreement that we can actually be justified in believing. (shrink)

The privilege against self-incrimination entails that anyone accused of a criminal offence has the right to remain silent. However, waiving the privilege is possible, but such waiver must be voluntary and in accordance with the will of the accused. This article examines the impact of sentence reductions based on confessions on the voluntariness of confessions. I argue that the concept of voluntariness must be interpreted from the perspective of the values and objectives underlying the privilege against self-incrimination. Depending on the (...) perspective chosen (i.e. objectives and values), sentence reductions can be problematic from the standpoint of the privilege against self-incrimination and the voluntariness requirement it entails. However, it should be also noted that moderate incentives can simultaneously promote the realization of these values and objectives, such as material truth. Categorical negative attitude towards all sentence reductions can be detrimental to the values that the privilege and the voluntariness requirement seek to protect. (shrink)

In this essay, I advance a reading of Philosophical Crumbs or a Crumb of Philosophy, published by Søren Kierkegaard under the pseudonym Johannes Climacus. I argue that this book is animated by a poetics of self-incrimination. Climacus keeps accusing himself of having stolen his words from someone else. In this way, he deliberately adopts the identity of a thief as an incognito. To understand this poetics of self-incrimination, I analyze the hypothetical thought-project that Climacus develops in an attempt to show (...) what it means to go further than Socrates. In my reading, I distinguish between a Socratic and a non-Socratic conception of education, both of which rely on an incognito. Socrates takes on the maieutic incognito of an ignorant bystander in order to force his interlocutors to turn inward so that the truth that is already within them can be born. In contrast, the non-Socratic education that Climacus advances as a hypothesis relies on what I call ‘the incognito as a true form’. It is an incognito insofar as it confronts the pupils with a paradox on which the understanding runs aground. It is a true form insofar as its immediate appearance is not a disguise, but a true form. This indirect mode of communication is necessary, without it pupils will not be able to encounter a truth that is not inherent within them. Climacus’ poetics of self-incrimination, I argue, tries to repeat this indirect mode of communication by adopting the incognito of a thief as a true form. (shrink)

My aim in this article is to analyse the incrimination of ontology and ontological manifestations in reason, articulated speech and social order and argue that such an incrimination, which is characteristic of traditional philosophy, can be explained as a phenomenon of onto-theology. Then I demonstrate that the ideas of Levinas - and to some degree the Derridean response to them - suffer from residues of onto-theology to the extent that they preserve and promote the assumption that ontology is essentially violent. (...) I claim that the Levinasian priority of ethics over ontology and the Derridean treatment of the opposition ‘ethics vs ontology’ rest on an epochal understanding of being. Such an understanding arrests time and echoes old religious doctrines that traditional philosophy preserved in a secular form and handed down to contemporary philosophical thinking. By charging Levinasian and Derridean ideas with onto-theology, I unveil what I consider to be one of the last dogmas of Occidental thought, i.e. the assumption that self-interest and violence are somehow endemic in the human condition. I suggest that we overcome this assumption, if we truly wish to view the I-Thou relation Other-wise. Key Words: Derrida • ethics • evil • Fall • Hegel • Heidegger • I-Thou • Kant • Kierkegaard • Levinas • ontology • onto-theology. (shrink)

There is considerable interest in the use of neuroimaging techniques for forensic purposes. Memory detection techniques, including the well-publicized Brain Fingerprinting technique (Brain Fingerprinting Laboratories, Inc., Seattle WA), exploit the fact that the brain responds differently to sensory stimuli to which it has been exposed before. When a stimulus is specifically associated with a crime, the resulting brain activity should differentiate between someone who was present at the crime and someone who was not. This article reviews the scientific literature on (...) three such techniques: priming, old/new, and P300 effects. The forensic potential of these techniques is evaluated based on four criteria: specificity, automaticity, encoding flexibility, and longevity. This article concludes that none of the techniques are devoid of forensic potential, although much research is yet to be done. Ethical issues, including rights to privacy and against self-incrimination, are discussed. A discussion of legal issues concludes that current memory detection techniques do not yet meet United States standards of legal admissibility. (shrink)

This chapter considers an epistemological argument from disagreement which concludes that many of most people’s moral beliefs do not amount to knowledge. Various ways of understanding the argument are considered and it is argued that each relies on an epistemic principle that is under-motivated, overgeneralizes, and is indeed self-incriminating. These problems, it is suggested, infect many conciliationist theses in the epistemology of disagreement. Knowledge, it is argued, can withstand not only acknowledged peer disagreement, but also disagreement with the acknowledged experts. (...) If this is right, then the sort of epistemic principle that is required to move from moral disagreement to the conclusion that many of most people’s moral beliefs do not amount to knowledge has landed well off the mark. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:An I for an I: Projection, Subjection, and Christian Antisemitism in The Service for RepresentingAdam1 Richard J. Prystowsky Irvine Valley College You know well enough how to look in a mirror: Now look at this hand for me, and tell If my heart is sick or healthy. The Servicefor Representing Adam Far from experience producing his idea of the Jew, it was the latter which explained his experience. If (...) the Jew did not exist, the anti-Semite would invent him. Jean-Paul Sartre, Anti-Semite and Jew These wretched Jews, my own kindred, /... have more to be unhappy about than other peoples. The Holy Resurrection No modern theorist has done more to help us understand the nature of inter- and intra-personal and communal violence than has René Girard. Perhaps his most important insight into the workings of such violence, an insight grounding his other provocative discoveries concerning human conflict, is that the antagonistic participants in acts ofinter- and intra-personal and communal violence are "doubles" of each other. By demonstrating that 1 In their hyphenated forms, the terms "anti-Semite," "anti-Semitism," and "anti-Semitic" have sometimes proved more problematic than helpful. In order to avoid "fosterfing] the false impression that there is a wider ethnic entity against which 'anti-Semitism' is leveled" (Telushkin 467), and in light of the importance of the concept of antisemitism to the history of Jewhating, throughout this essay I follow the lead of those scholars who do not hyphenate the words "antisemite," "antisemitism," or "antisemitic." For more information concerning this issue, see Telushkin. 140Richard J. Prystowsky people fight not because they are different, but because they are the same, Girard has shown us how "violence is a great leveler of men" and has helped us to understand the serious consequences that either follow or can follow from mimetic rivalry (Violence 79). For example, he has helped us see how the internal violence occurring in a community in which differentiation has broken down finds its outlet in scapegoating, that mechanism by means of which a community in conflict with itself attempts to save itselfby sacrificing an expendable, arbitrary victim (who lacks a champion but whose real guilt or innocence is irrelevant) onto whom the collective victimizers have projected their own guilt, their own mimetically-oriented self-hatred—their own "sins," we might say. Among other things, Girard's critique of the mimetic rivalry characteristic of what we might call "the conflicted communal Self" also sheds light on the nature of the violence and victimization that we find in the history of Christian persecution of Jews. Without referring to Girard's ideas, the eminent historian Léon Poliakov nevertheless captures a Girardian view of this tragic history when he writes that "to massacre first, and then, from fear of revenge, to accuse afterward; to attribute to the victims one's own aggressive intentions; to impute to them one's own cruelty: from country to country and from century to century, under various disguises, this is the device we find" (106-7). In the present essay, I will attempt to show that such vengeance-laden acts of Christian persecution of Jews, of the Jew-as-Other, derive from antisemitic Christians' mimetic rivalry with Jews—an "I" for an "I," as this essay's title would suggest—and that underlying this rivalry is the introjection ofreal or imagined Jewish self-hatred.2 1 hope to demonstrate that this projected intra-victimization is marked, in part, by Christians' mimetic appropriations of fantasized or real acts of Jewish self-incrimination, punishment, or more generalized suffering. Ultimately, I will try to provide support for the idea that, despite its obvious promise and appeal of love, peace, and brotherhood, Christianity cannot wrest itself entirely from its moorings in real or fantasized Jewish self-hatred, that is, in an appropriation of enacted or imagined Judaism against itself. If my contentions prove even partially legitimate, then an overwhelming question for good-faith Christians is whether or not the peculiar brand of antisemitism discussed above is endemic to Christianity and, if it is, whether 2Sander L. Oilman's Jewish Self-Hatredremains the preeminent work on the relationship between Jewish self-hatred and antisemitism. Among... (shrink)

This is the first book to examine individual rights from an economic perspective, collecting together leading articles in this emerging area of interest and showing the vibrant and expanding scholarship that relates them. Areas covered include The implications of constitutional protections of individual rights and freedoms, including freedom of speech and of the press, The right to bear arms, The right against unreasonable searches, The right against self-incrimination, The right to trial by jury, The right against cruel and unusual punishment, (...) including capital punishment. The focus of these papers is both theoretical and empirical, examining how economics can illuminate the entire sequence of crime and punishment, from the decision to commit a crime, to police methods for apprehending and arresting criminals, to the rules used in trials to the scope of punishment for the convicted. (shrink)

Kempner. You do not have to testify, Professor Schmitt, if you do not want to, and if you think you are incriminating yourself. But if you do testify, then I would be grateful if you would be absolutely truthful, would neither conceal nor add anything. Is that your wish? Schmitt: Yes, of course. Kempner: And if I come to something you might find self-incriminating, you can simply say you prefer to remain silent. Schmitt: I have already been interrogated by the (...) C.I.C. and in the camp. I would be glad to tell you all I know. However, I would like to know what I am being blamed with. (shrink)

This article considers individual rights and fundamental tenets of the criminal justice system in the context of DNA evidence, in particular recent advancements in genomics that have significantly advanced law enforcement investigative capabilities in this area. It discusses a technique known as Investigative Genetic Genealogy (IGG) which utilizes genomic data held by commercial direct-to-consumer ancestry and health companies to investigate the identity of suspects linked to serious crimes. Using this technique, even if only a small proportion of the population (e.g. (...) 5%) has submitted genomic data to these companies, almost anyone in the population can be identified. We discuss this phenomenon in the context of the existing literature and arguments in relation to universal forensic DNA databases, as well as relevant recent developments in both liberal democracies and authoritarian states. We introduce the concept of a quasi-universal forensic DNA database and consider associated implications for the criminal justice system and society from the perspectives of privacy, the right not to self-incriminate, joint rights, and collective responsibility. (shrink)

We examine the asking and answering of `silly questions' in British police interviews with suspects, the courses of action SQs initiate, and the institutional contingencies they are designed to manage. We show how SQs are asked at an important juncture toward the ends of interviews, following police officers' formulations of suspects' testimony. These formulations are confirmed or even collaboratively produced by suspects. We then examine the design of SQs and show how they play a central role in the articulation of (...) suspects' reported `state of mind', and particularly attributing to them criminal intentions constitutive of the offence with which they may be charged. In cases where SQs do not produce unambiguous answers about `state of mind' or intentionality, police officers move toward direct questioning about suspects' intent, thus making explicit the project of SQs in such interviews. Following SQ—Answer sequences, police officers reformulate suspects' testimony, with subtle but crucial differences with regard to suspects' knowledge state and criminal intent. Suspects overwhelmingly align with police officers' formulations of their testimony, and such agreements have the interactional shape of affiliation. Yet SQs may work in ways that are institutionally adversarial with regard to criminal charges, relevant evidence and self-incriminating testimony. (shrink)

The act of interrogation, and the debate over its use, pervades our culture, whether through fictionalized depictions in movies and television or discussions of real-life interrogations on the news. But despite daily mentions of the practice in the media, there is a lack of informed commentary on its moral implications. Moving beyond the narrow focus on torture that has characterized most work on the subject, _An Ethics of Interrogation_ is the first book to fully address this complex issue. In this (...) important new examination of a controversial subject, Michael Skerker confronts a host of philosophical and legal issues, from the right to privacy and the privilege against compelled self-incrimination to prisoner rights and the legal consequences of different modes of interrogation for both domestic criminal and foreign terror suspects. These topics raise serious questions about the morality of keeping secrets as well as the rights of suspected terrorists and insurgents. Thoughtful consideration of these subjects leads Skerker to specific policy recommendations for law enforcement, military, and intelligence professionals. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Introduction Basic Human Rights: Rawls's List Basic Human Rights: Their Nature and Function Basic Human Rights: A Rawlsian Justification Conclusion Acknowledgments Notes.

This article is a critical and interpretive examination of moral and ethical issues that have emerged as the Internet and other digital information forms have evolved. It considers individual expectations of privacy for one's cyberspace communications against the greater public good for unencumbered access, by government and other organizations, to information that may be harmful to others. I argue for the need to find a reasonable balance between the individual's "right" not to disclose information that might be self-incriminating, as codified (...) in the Miranda Rules, and the open communication principles advocated by professional journalists that are essential to a democratic society. (shrink)

Interrogations are a very specific component of any criminal investigation. The answers gained through interrogative process provides information that are considered as direct evidences. In contemporary criminal procedure, the court is not absolved from gaining other evidences, even in cases when the defendant confesses his/her guiltiness. This is a mechanism for excluding the inquisitorial approach for extracting compulsory confessions. The modern procedure uses a variety of mechanisms to guarantee that the defendant will not be compelled to confess guilt. Those mechanisms (...) are part of most important international conventions as International Convention for Civil and Political Rights, the European Convention on Human Rights, the American Convention on Human Rights, the Statutes of International Tribunals and part of different constitutional and legal acts of modern states. A very interesting “highlight” remains the right to silence which guarantees that the defendant might remain silent and it will not be interpreted against him. The defendant, even in cases with direct evidences, can remain silent and cannot be forced to answer given questions. Another “highlight” is that one that appears from the privilege against self-incrimination that allows the defendant to not answer a question, if by answering, he/she may confess guilt or incriminate him/herself. How deep is this privilege? Are there, maybe questions, that he/she are obliged to answer The article will focus in interrogations and the right to silence by most important international acts and domestic acts of different countries and upcoming specifics in the relation interrogations vs. remaining silent. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Horace and the Rhetoric of AuthorityKenneth J. ReckfordEllen Oliensis. Horace and the Rhetoric of Authority. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. xii 1 241 pp. Cloth, $64.95.In a gratifying book, crafted with unusual care, Ellen Oliensis investigates Horace’s self-fashioning in his poetry. “Horace is present,” she argues, “in his personae... not because these personae are authentic and accurate impressions of his true self, but because they effectively construct that (...) self—for Horace’s contemporary readers, for us, and also for Horace himself” (2). As she carefully observes the “faces” Horace makes from early satires and epodes to late epistles, she never assumes that they simply screen a “real” Horace, ambitious and/or subservient, from the public gaze. Horace’s strategies are unmasked, and [End Page 313] his tact (together with some rudeness), and what Oliensis characterizes as a fine, shifting blend of authority and deference; but “the final sum of Horace’s calculations is the making of good poetry, by which I mean poetry that is not exhausted in or fundamentally compromised by the social exchanges in which it participates” (14). This is (as I see it) a rescue operation that succeeds most admirably.Chapter 1 is titled “Face-saving and Self-defacement in the Satires.” In book 1, Horace distinguishes himself from his satiric targets as a discriminating poet and person, worthy of his equally discriminating patron. While his defensive maneuvers ward off envious outsiders, they also and more importantly appeal to Maecenas’ judgment as “overreader.” Oliensis often argues negatively, in terms of what Horace does not do. (Cf. Sherlock Holmes and the dog that didn’t bark.) There is, for example, no mention in Satires 1.6 of the part played by Horace’s poetry in winning Maecenas’ approval, no suggestion that Horace’s father was eager to see him advance socially. So too, in 2.6, Horace’s travails are not attributed to Maecenas; his villa is not connected with Maecenas; there is no self-incriminating “thank you”; the city day does not end with dinner at Maecenas’ house. Horace’s tact, his self-effacement here, are remarkable. Yet even as his satires decry the pursuit of wealth and status, they mark and promote “the poet’s own progress from the obscure margins to the shining center of Roman society” (17). Satires 1.10 proclaims Horace’s newfound authority together with his acceptance into an aesthetic and social elite.In book 2, Oliensis argues, Horace retreats from the role of satirist, giving it (ostensibly) to others, displacing upon them (Ofellus in 2.2, Damasippus in 2.3, Ulysses in 2.5, Davus in 2.7, Nasidienus in 2.8) the attempt to “mend misfortune with art” (51–63). Only later, in Epistles 2.2.49–52, will he admit to his early ambitiousness. For now, “by displacing these autobiographical ‘facts’ onto a series of surrogates in Satires 2, he retroactively exposes the satirist of Book 1” (54). The picture is convincing. We see Horace growing in subtlety and assurance as he moves away from satire—or moves satire in a new direction? I would only ask: did the process begin earlier, with the partial rejection of diatribe satire in 1.3 and Lucilian satire in 1.4? How and where should we draw the line between Horace’s half-ironic denials of aggressive intent and his genuine self-education through satire writing?Chapter 2, on the Epodes, is distinguished by Oliensis’ regard for diversity, the ugly and low stuff along with the bright and lofty. To simplify a complex, intuitive argument: Horace associates himself deferentially with the new center of Octavian and Maecenas, and repels outsiders, but his project fails: because he is forced to recognize too much of himself in scapegoated figures like the upstart slave-tribune of Epodes 4; because attack breeds attack in an unending cycle of vengeance; and because Horace is finally impotent before the dark, irrational forces represented by Canidia. He fails signally to achieve closure in the expected ten-poem book, turning instead (mainly) to erotic subjects, [End Page 314] unsubdued passions. Dactyls compete symbolically with iambs. Finally Horace lets Canidia win—and triumphs... (shrink)

This is a sober, balanced, well-written re-examination of the problems posed by the rules governing the 'privilege against self-incrimination.' The special merit of the study is its careful distinction of cases. The author shows that the meaning and justification for the privilege vary when claimed by a suspect, an accused, or a witness. Further distinctions are required when the privilege is invoked in preliminary investigations of a congressional committee seeking background data for new legislation. The existing rules and practices are (...) subjected to close, well-documented scrutiny issuing in suggestions for reform in each of the distinguished cases.--D. D. O. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Interpretation According to Law References.

This chapter contains sections titled: Terrorism‐as‐Crime Terrorism‐as‐Crime and Police Institutions Counter‐Terrorism and Human Rights in Liberal Democracies at Peace Conclusion.

Regulatory offences are a complex phenomenon, presenting problematic aspects both at the level of criminalisation and at the level of enforcement. The literature abounds in works that study the phenomenon. There is, however, an aspect that has remained largely unexplored. It concerns the relationship between the regulatory framework within which the crime occurs and the procedural safeguards that defendants normally enjoy at trial or at the pre-trial stage: defendants tried for regulatory offences are often denied safeguards that are generally considered (...) as important constituents of trial fairness. Relying on a new conceptualisation of regulatory offences, this paper advances a theory that justifies these exceptional rulings. (shrink)

La presente investigación tuvo como objetivo realizar un análisis del procedimiento abreviado contemplado en el Código Orgánico Integral Penal (COIP), partiendo del criterio de que ciertos aspectos de este procedimiento vulneran derechos fundamentales del investigado. Se destaca particularmente el requisito para el procesado de admitir los hechos que se le imputan para acceder a este procedimiento, lo cual, según la opinión mayoritaria de doctrinarios, compromete el principio de no autoincriminación, la presunción de inocencia y el derecho a un juicio con (...) todas sus fases. El objetivo de esta investigación fue analizar el procedimiento abreviado establecido en el Código Orgánico Integral Penal (COIP), con el propósito de identificar posibles vulneraciones de derechos fundamentales del investigado. Se buscó específicamente evaluar cómo el requisito de admitir los hechos imputados para acceder a este procedimiento podría afectar principios como el de no autoincriminación y la presunción de inocencia. A través de un enfoque cualitativo y utilizando diferentes métodos de análisis, se procuró determinar si el procedimiento abreviado, tal como está configurado, garantiza un debido proceso conforme a los estándares de derechos humanos y constitucionales. La metodología aplicada se sustentó en un enfoque cualitativo, utilizando los métodos inductivo, analítico, sintético y exegético. Se llevó a cabo un análisis documental de la bibliografía relacionada con el tema investigado, así como de instrumentos internacionales de Derechos Humanos, la Constitución de la República de Ecuador, el COIP y jurisprudencia vinculada a la materia. Los resultados de la investigación determinaron que el procedimiento abreviado tal como se encuentra regulado en el COIP beneficia al Estado y al sistema de justicia al agilizar ciertos procesos legales. Sin embargo, se evidenció que este procedimiento puede vulnerar derechos esenciales del procesado, como el principio de no autoincriminación y la presunción de inocencia. Por lo tanto, se concluye que el procedimiento abreviado afecta el debido proceso al comprometer garantías fundamentales. La investigación señala que el procedimiento abreviado regulado en el COIP, si bien puede ser beneficioso para la eficiencia del sistema de justicia, también conlleva riesgos significativos de vulnerar derechos fundamentales del procesado. Por lo tanto, se destaca la necesidad de revisar y modificar este procedimiento para garantizar el respeto absoluto al debido proceso y a las garantías individuales del investigado. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Gert Biesta astutely criticizes thepolitics of learning through which learning has been popularized and exalted. He offers a valuable critical diagnostics of this politics, but, I argue, his conclusions about ‘going beyond learning’ incriminate learning wholesale. Through a close reading of one of Biesta’s related articles, I show that he sweepingly indicts learning per se, and not only its politics in the ‘learning age’. Biesta departs from current theoretical underpinnings of learning but deep down accepts too much of the (...) conventional semantics of learning. His advancing a denaturalization of learning and his dismissing the assumption that learning is omnipresent and inextricable from living make unnecessary and unintended concessions to the hegemonic idiom and politics of learning. Instead of attaching undue weight to ‘beyond learning’ and to ‘refusing the learner identity’, I defend a theorization of learning in plural that complicates both the self-understandings and the critiques of the era. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Men Becoming Gods in "Style"Gioia and Girard on Divinized DesireJoshua Hren (bio)In our secular age we hear seekers of the sacred and religious devotees alike decry the soul-deadening, spirit-dumbing consequences of materialism. René Girard contends that—on the contrary—in the "leveled," horizontal world of a purportedly materialistic modernity this transcendent authority is deviated and distorted but it does not disappear. In his first major work, Deceit, Desire, and the Novel, (...) he argues that "the passion that drives men to seize or gain more possessions is not materialistic; it is the triumph of the mediator, the god with the human face."1 In a materialistic age, the gods are "pulled down from the heaven, the sacred flows over the earth" and men become "gods for each other."2Dana Gioia, former businessman and chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, is no stranger to the economy of divinized desire. The stakes of our passions—whether we are wrecked by dubious wants or able to shed our infernal imitations—pierce his poetry. Gioia cites Girard as a significant influence alongside St. Augustine and Kierkegaard, though he does not indicate whether his own poetic investigations of mimesis are a direct yield of [End Page 149] his encounter with Girard or the independent discovery of attentive artistic intuition.3The refuge of lies so central to Girard is particularly palpable in Gioia's long narrative poem "Style."4 Charlie, the self-deprecating narrator, divinizes his college friend Tom, a business mogul who "prospered like one chosen by the gods."5 Tom uses his easy money to purchase gaudy metamorphoses, hosting magnificent events with his "flawless" wife Eden. An antihero of the unremarkable variety, Charlie attends all Tom's parties until he stops receiving invitations. When he discovers his deity's disappearance is tied to a terminal illness, he descends into the infernal "slums" of Tom's new hideout, and he finds his former hero hell-bent, ready to commit an arson that will erase his own existence in style. Charlie is confronted with a difficult decision that any coward would waver before. He has the chance to become an atheist—at least with respect to his dying god. After painting a portrait of man-made gods, the poem probes the question of whether and how we can cut short our penchant for great deceits.Charlie opens this narrative poem with an invective directed against himself.Just look at me. Isn't it obvious?I have no style. I'm just a human blur.On me expensive clothes look second-hand.They droop or sag. The color's never right.I wear the wrong apparel to the party.I pick the dullest item on the menu.Each haircut brings some new humiliation.6Crucially, we never receive an audit of this dour self-consciousness. By poem's end, no one has corrected or confirmed Charlie's condemnations. He may be right; his might be the antinomy of Midas's modus operandi. His hyperbolic portrait of Tom's greatness suggests that he is less than just to himself. His preoccupation with something as small as a menu item betrays a brutal obsessiveness. He employs the ascetical word "humiliation" in conjunction with a "haircut"—further revealing his unforgiving inner harshness. Charlie "always loved to visit Tom" precisely because he himself is Pathetic, Inc.7Were René Girard Charlie's older brother, he might sit the sad sap down on a comfortable couch and spell out the difficult truth as follows: The anti-hero "dreams of absorbing and assimilating his mediator's being."8 This highfalutin description of "the Other implies an insuperable revulsion for one's own substance."9 We ought not to take seriously the excuses these types give for their [End Page 150] failings and their fawning, for they "hate themselves on a more essential level than that of 'qualities.'"10 When Charlie disparages his badly cut bangs or his mismatched outfits, he's really incriminating his very being."The desire," Girard argues, "is aimed at the mediator's being."11 Charlie evinces this dynamic when he insists that Tom's "success was existential: / It wasn't what... (shrink)

The medical ethicist is a fairly recent addition to the clinical setting. The following four potential roles of the clinical ethicist are identified and discussed: consultant in difficult cases, educator of health care providers, counselor for health care providers and finally patient advocate to protect the interests of patients. While the various roles may sometimes overlap, the roles of educator and counselor are viewed as being more congruent with the education and training of medical ethicists than are the roles of (...) consultant and patient advocate. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In this commentary I evaluate what McGowan’s project would conclude with respect to the treatment of professional Australian Football League player Adam Goodes, who was incessantly ‘booed’ by crowds for the final two years of his career. Analysing Goodes’ case in light of McGowan’s argument leads me to two observations. First, McGowan’s norm-enactment approach is incredibly useful because it explains how words like ‘boo’ (with unstable meaning) can constitute actionable discrimination. Second, however, I wonder if a narrow focus on (...) whether such speech is legally actionable might encourage an overestimation of the power of laws to shepherd new g-norms into social practices. (shrink)

This study investigates the three major educational philosophies behind the medical humanities programs in the United States. It summarizes the characteristics of the Cultural Transmission Approach, the Affective Developmental Approach, and the Cognitive Developmental Approach. A questionnaire was sent to 415 teachers of medical humanities asking for their perceptions of the amount of time and effort devoted by their programs to these three philosophical approaches. The 234 responses constituted a 54.6% return. The approximately 80:20 gender ratio of males to females (...) and other demographic data on age and educational background were consistent with other studies of the field of medical humanities.Reflections on the results in Table II indicate that some changes need to take place in the teaching of the medical humanities if the perceived ideal is to be achieved. In order for the current teachers of the medical humanities to think that the appropriate philosophies behind the teaching of the medical humanities are being implemented as they should be, much less time and effort need to be devoted to the Cultural Transmission Approach. With no other published reports on the educational philosophies behind the medical humanities programs, this study created a new knowledge base about this relatively young and rapidly emerging field. (shrink)

In contrast to theoretical discussions about potential professional liability of clinical ethicists, this report gives the results of empirical data gathered in a national survey of clinical medical ethicists. The report assesses the types of activities of clinical ethicists, the extent and types of their professional liability coverage, and the influence that concerns about legal liability has on how they function as clinical ethicists. In addition demographic data on age, sex, educational background, etc. are reported. The results show that while (...) nearly one third (28.9%) of the ethicists regularly make recommendations about patient care, only 10.8% of them regularly make entries in the medical record; only approximately half (53.0%) of them are covered by professional liability (malpractice) insurance; and the vast majority (84.3%) of them say that concerns about legal liability do not influence the way they function as clinical ethicists. (shrink)

High moral standards and adherence to a moral code have long been strong tenets of the profession of medicine, even though there have been occasional lapses that have led to renewed calls for a revitalization of moral integrity in medicine. Certainly, a moral component has generally been held to be an important aspect of the concept of a physician.

This article identifies five genres of anti-queer hate speech found in The Australian’s Facebook comments sections, exposing and analyzing the ways in which such comments are used to derogate cisgender and (often) heterosexual women. One may be tempted to think of cis-het women as third-party victims of queerphobia; however, this article argues that these genres of anti-queer speech are, in fact, misogynistic. Specifically, it argues that these are instances of cis-hetero-misogynistic hate speech. Cis-hetero-misogyny functions as the “law enforcement branch” of (...) a cis-hetero-patriarchal gender order. Given the existence of such an order, it is clear that cis-het women’s liberation is inextricable from queer liberation (and vice versa). This article argues that to facilitate allyship and challenge this gender order—the order that elicits such hate speech acts—we need an epistemological revolution in the way we recognize and re-cognize human difference. (shrink)

A study of clinical medical ethicists was conducted to determine the various philosophical positions they hold with respect to ethical decision making in medicine and their various positions' relationship to the subjective-objective controversy in value theory. The study consisted of analyzing and interpreting data gathered from questionnaires from 52 clinical medical ethicists at 28 major health care centers in the United States. The study revealed that most clinical medical ethicists tend to be objectivists in value theory, i.e., believe that value (...) judgments are knowledge claims capable of being true or false and therefore expressions of moral requirements and normative imperatives emanating from an external value structure or moral order in the world. In addition, the study revealed that most clinical medical ethicists are consistent in the philosophical foundations of their ethical decision making, i.e., in decision making regarding values they tend not to hold beliefs which are incompatible with other beliefs they hold about values. (shrink)

The enormous growth in medical humanities programs during the past decade has resulted in an extensive literature concerning the content of the discipline and the issues that have been addressed. Comparatively little attention, however, has been devoted to the structure of the discipline of medical humanities concerning the process or the theoretical aspects of the pedagogy of teaching the discipline. This report explicitly addresses the pedagogical aspects of the discipline by comparing and contrasting two different basic approaches to the discipline (...) referred to as the classical humanities approach and the humanistic psychology approach which roughly approximate the cognitive and affective approaches respectively. These two approaches are compared and contrasted in terms of their goals, objectives, methods of implementation, philosophical assumptions and evaluational techniques. (shrink)

After noting why the issue of the use of animals in medical education and research needs to be addressed, this article briefly reviews the historical positions on the role of animals in society and describes in more detail the current positions in the wide spectrum of positions regarding the role of animals in society. The spectrum ranges from the extremes of the animal exploitation position to the animal liberation position with several more moderate positions in between these two extremes. Then (...) the philosophical issue of the moral agency of animals is discussed in terms of an explication of the concept of rights and the concept of personhood. Further research is suggested concerning institutional policies regarding medical students who refuse to do physiology dog labs or other assignments which involve the suffering and/or death of animals. (shrink)

The prominent call to legalise same-sex marriage in Australia raises questions concerning whether its achievement will result in amplified societal acceptance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, and on what grounds this acceptance will take place. Same-sex marriage may not challenge heteronormative and patriarchal features typically associated with marriage, and may serve to reinforce a hierarchy that promotes traditional marriage as the ideal relationship structure. This may result in only assimilationist acceptance of LGBT people. However, the consequence of (...) inclusion to marriage ought to reflect social acceptance of LGBTs as people worthy of equal treatment in dignity and in rights, regardless of perceived differences or similarities to a supposed majority standard. This article argues that justice would be best served by introducing and promoting a variety of State-sanctioned unions whilst simultaneously introducing same-sex marriage. This ‘pluralisation strategy’ would increase awareness and legitimacy of other relationship-recognition options, promoting respectful acceptance of LGBT and heterosexual people alike. (shrink)

Hate speech is one of the most important conceptual categories in anti‐oppression politics today; a great deal of energy and political will is devoted to identifying, characterizing, contesting, and penalizing hate speech. However, despite the increasing inclusion of gender identity as a socially salient trait, antipatriarchal politics has largely been absent within this body of scholarship. Figuring out how to properly situate patriarchy‐enforcing speech within the category of hate speech is therefore an important politico‐philosophical project. My aim in this article (...) is twofold: first, I argue that sexist speech, though oppressive, is not hate speech. Second, I argue that misogynistic speech is hate speech, even when it is intradivisional. This is important because recognizing that the concepthate speechapplies to certain forms of patriarchy‐enforcing speech is another step in clarifying what is wrong with the practice, and how bad it is in relation to other abuses. Consequently, this article provides a more nuanced account of the kinds of expressions that can and should count as instances of hate speech. (shrink)

The most important distinction in value theory is the subjective-objective distinction which determines the epistemological status of value judgments about medical intervention. Ethical decisions in medical intervention presuppose one of three structures of justification — namely, an inductive approach, a deductive approach which can be either consequentialist or non-consequentialist, and a uniquely ethical approach. Inductivism and deductivism have been discussed extensively in the literature and are only briefly described here. The uniquely ethical approach which presupposes value objectivism is analyzed in (...) detail. This method involves a purely ethical inference which moves from facts to values directly with an emphasis on reason which involves a non-logical justification (as opposed to illogical). It involves the use of natural practical arguments which have an imperative conclusion but no imperative premise and exhibit a value-requiredness between two states of affairs. (shrink)

This reissued work, originally published in 1985, is a uniquely broad and original survey of theories and beliefs about the growth, behaviour, performance and reform of the governments of modern Western democracies. After analysing the external pressures which have shaped modern governments, the author examines four different schools of political thought which seek to explain the behaviour and performance of governments, and which offer different remedies for the pluralism, corporatism and bureaucracy. To examine and test these general theories, the author (...) looks closely at how governments actually work. The book is illustrated with examples drawn from various Western societies. The final chapters present the author’s own conclusion about the future role of government, the limits of market philosophy, the future of politics, and the principles and problems of institutional reform. (shrink)