Built-in decision thresholds for AI diagnostics are ethically problematic, as patients may differ in their attitudes about the risk of false-positive and false-negative results, which will require that clinicians assess patient values.

Recent work has emphasized the role of context in shaping the diversification strategies of social enterprises (SEs), but our understanding remains superficial. We identify two types of context-driven diversification strategies—market development diversification (MDD) and market functioning diversification (MFD)—depending on the type of voids being addressed. We then empirically test how these diversification strategies impact the performance of SEs on the twin dimensions of financial growth and social impact. Using a mixed-method approach of qualitative interviews and a longitudinal database of Indian (...) microfinance firms (MFIs), we find that while MFD positively impacts financial growth, MDD has a positive effect on social impact. Furthermore, we find that the strategic fit (or lack of it) between the SE’s legal form and the type of diversification enhances (undermines) financial growth. However, the strategic fit between the legal form and diversification choice does not amplify social impact. The study contributes to product diversification literature, which has paid limited attention to the role of context. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue for a conditional parity thesis: if we are agents with respect to our intentions, we are agents with respect to our beliefs. In the final section, I motivate a categorical version of the parity thesis: we are agents with respect to belief and intention. My aim in this paper is to show that there is no unique challenge facing epistemic agency that is not also facing agency with respect to intention. My thesis is ambitious on (...) two fronts. First, the parity thesis is a substantive thesis about the nature of belief and intention. I argue that there is a structural parity of belief and intention; the status of whether they are agential stands and falls together. Second, the parity thesis illuminates the nature of agency. It constrains what counts as a satisfactory account of agency: either we must accept agency of both belief and intention, or we must reject both. In the final section, I argue that we have prima facie reason to accept agency of belief and intention. Finally, I diagnose why there has been such resistance to epistemic agency. Epistemic agency is problematic, but its problems are problems with agency, not problems with epistemic agency. (shrink)

OBJECTIVES: To compare the practices of local research ethics committees and the time they take to obtain ethical approval for a multi-centre study. DESIGN: A retrospective analysis of outcome of applications for a multi-centre study to local research ethics committees. SETTING: Thirty-six local research ethics committees covering 38 district health authorities in England. MAIN MEASURES: Response of chairmen and women, the time required to obtain approval, and questions asked in application forms. RESULTS: We received replies from all 36 chairmen contacted: (...) four (11%) granted their approval, and 32 (89%) required our proposal to be considered by their local research ethics committee. Three committees asked us to attend their meetings. The application was approved by all 36 local research ethics committees but the time to obtain ethical approval varied between six to 208 days. One third of the committees did not approve the project within three months, and three took longer than six months. There was considerable variation in the issues raised by local research ethics committees and none conformed exactly to the Royal College of Physicians' guidelines. CONCLUSION: Obtaining ethical approval for a multi-centre study is time-consuming. There is much diversity in the practice of local research ethics committees. Our data support the recommendation for a central or regional review body of multi-centre studies which will be acceptable to all local research ethics committees. (shrink)

Objectives: to assess physicians’ and patients’ views in Saudi Arabia towards involving the patient versus the family in the process of diagnosis disclosure and decision-making, and to compare them with views from the USA and Japan.Design: A self-completion questionnaire was translated to Arabic and validated.Participants: Physicians from different specialties and ranks and patients in a hospital or attending outpatient clinics from 6 different regions in KSA.Results: In the case of a patient with incurable cancer, 67% of doctors and 51% of (...) patients indicated that they would inform the patient in preference to the family of the diagnosis . Assuming the family already knew, 56% of doctors and 49% of patients would tell the patient even if family objected . However, in the case of HIV infection, 59% of physicians and 81% of patients would inform the family about HIV status without the patient’s consent . With regards to withholding ventilatory support, about 50% of doctors and over 60% of patients supported the use of mechanical ventilation in a patient with advanced cancer, regardless of the wishes of the patient or the family. Finally, the majority of doctors and patients were against assisted suicide.Conclusions: Although there was more recognition for a patient’s autonomy amongst physicians, most patients preferred a family centred model of care. Views towards information disclosure were midway between those of the USA and Japan. Distinctively, however, decisions regarding life prolonging therapy and assisted suicide were not influenced to a great extent by wishes of the patient or family, but more likely by religious beliefs. (shrink)

In this paper, I try to demonstrate a problem with two medieval European views of existence: The property view and the essence view. Adopting a style of reasoning employed by the Indian Madhyamaka philosopher Nāgārjuna, I argue that both the property view and the essence view understand the relation between an object and its existence in terms of difference: The former understands the difference as the difference between an object and its property of existence, and the latter, as the difference (...) between an object’s essence and existence. Neither understanding is without problems, and both lack explanatory power. We must reject both the views. (shrink)

Clinical ethics support, including ethics consultation, has become established in the field of medical practice throughout the world. This practice has been regarded as useful, most notably in the UK and the USA, in solving ethical problems encountered by both medical practitioners and those who receive medical treatment. In Japan, however, few services are available to respond to everyday clinical ethical issues, although a variety of difficult ethical problems arise daily in the medical field: termination of life support, euthanasia and (...) questions about patient autonomy. In light of these conditions, a group of 17 volunteer educators and researchers from the area of biomedical ethics, including the authors, have formed the Clinical Ethics Support and Education Project, and began providing Japan’s first small team clinical ethics consultation service in October, 2006. Members include scholars of biomedical ethics, scholars of philosophy and ethics, legal professionals and legal scholars, nurses and doctors, consisting of five women and 12 men. Consultation teams, made up of a small number of members, were organised each time a request for consultation was received. Over approximately 15 months (October 2006–December 2007), the programme received 22 consultation requests from medical practitioners and medical institutions, and three from the families of patients. In this paper, we will discuss the status of our consultation service and examples of consultation cases we have handled. In addition, we will examine the process of evaluating small team clinical ethics consultation services, as well as the strengths and weakness of such programmes. (shrink)

The central focus of this paper is to motivate and explore the question, when is it permissible to endorse a psychologizing explanation of a sincere interlocutor? I am interested in the moral question of when (if ever) we may permissibly dismiss the sincere reasons given to us by others, and instead endorse an alternative explanation of their beliefs and actions. I argue that there is a significant risk of wronging the other person, and so we should only psychologize when we (...) are in a position to know that they are in bad faith. (shrink)

Traditionally the domain of scientists, the history of science became an independent field of inquiry only in the twentieth century and mostly after the Second World War. This process of emancipation was accompanied by a historiographical departure from previous, 'scientistic' practices, a transformation often attributed to influences from sociology, philosophy and history. Similarly, the liberal humanists who controlled the Cambridge History of Science Committee after 1945 emphasized that their contribution lay in the special expertise they, as trained historians, brought to (...) the venture. However, the scientists who had founded the Committee in the 1930s had already advocated a sophisticated contextual approach: innovation in the history of science thus clearly came also from within the ranks of scientists who practised in the field. Moreover, unlike their scientist predecessors on the Cambridge Committee, the liberal humanists supported a positivistic protocol that has since been criticized for its failure to properly contextualize early modern science. Lastly, while celebrating the rise of modern science as an international achievement, the liberal humanists also emphasized the peculiar Englishness of the phenomenon. In this respect, too, their outlook had much in common with the practices from which they attempted to distance their project. (shrink)

Recent data indicate that under a specific posthypnotic suggestion to circumvent reading, highly suggestible subjects successfully eliminated the Stroop interference effect. The present study examined whether an optical explanation could account for this finding. Using cyclopentolate hydrochloride eye drops to pharmacologically prevent visual accommodation in all subjects, behavioral Stroop data were collected from six highly hypnotizables and six less suggestibles using an optical setup that guaranteed either sharply focused or blurred vision. The highly suggestibles performed the Stroop task when naturally (...) vigilant, under posthypnotic suggestion not to read, and while visually blurred; the less suggestibles ran naturally vigilant, while looking away, and while visually blurred. Although visual accommodation was precluded for all subjects, posthypnotic suggestion effectively eliminated Stroop interference and was comparable to looking away in controls. These data strengthen the view that Stroop interference is neither robust nor inevitable and support the hypothesis that posthypnotic suggestion may exert a top-down influence on neural processing. (shrink)

Experiments designed to test Special Relativity are reviewed and their capabilities of distinguishing Special Relativity from Absolute Space-Time theories is analyzed. Of two specific forms of Absolute theories proposed in recent years, we show that one is refuted by past experiments while the other is still in contention.

Cotton examines Plato 's ideas about education and learning, with a particular focus on the experiences a learner must go through in approaching philosophical understanding.