Pain, suffering and positive emotions in patients in vegetative state/unresponsive wakefulness syndrome (VS/uws) and minimally conscious states (MCS) pose clinical and ethical challenges. Clinically, we evaluate behavioural responses after painful stimulation and also emotionally-contingent behaviours (e.g., smiling). Using stimuli with emotional valence, neuroimaging and electrophysiology technologies can detect subclinical remnants of preserved capacities for pain which might influence decisions about treatment limitation. To date, no data exist as to how healthcare providers think about end-of-life options (e.g., withdrawal of artificial nutrition (...) and hydration) in the presence or absence of pain in non-communicative patients. Here, we aimed to better clarify this issue by re-analyzing previously published data on pain perception (Prog Brain Res 2009 177, 329–38) and end-of-life decisions (J Neurol 2010 258, 1058–65) in patients with disorders of consciousness. In a sample of 2259 European healthcare professionals we found that, for VS/uws more respondents agreed with treatment withdrawal when they considered that VS/uws patients did not feel pain (77%) as compared to those who thought VS/uws did feel pain (59%). This interaction was influenced by religiosity and professional background. For MCS, end-of-life attitudes were not influenced by opinions on pain perception. Within a contemporary ethical context we discuss (1) the evolving scientific understandings of pain perception and their relationship to existing clinical and ethical guidelines; (2) the discrepancies of attitudes within (and between) healthcare providers and their consequences for treatment approaches, and (3) the implicit but complex relationship between pain perception and attitudes toward life-sustaining treatments. (shrink)

This article explores the trend of increasing automation in law enforcement and criminal justice settings through three use cases: predictive policing, machine evidence and recidivism algorithms. The focus lies on artificial-intelligence-driven tools and technologies employed, whether at pre-investigation stages or within criminal proceedings, in order to decode human behaviour and facilitate decision-making as to whom to investigate, arrest, prosecute, and eventually punish. In this context, this article first underlines the existence of a persistent dilemma between the goal of increasing the (...) operational efficiency of police and judicial authorities and that of safeguarding fundamental rights of the affected individuals. Subsequently, it shifts the focus onto key principles of criminal procedure and the presumption of innocence in particular. Using Article 6 ECHR and the Directive (EU) 2016/343 as a starting point, it discusses challenges relating to the protective scope of presumption of innocence, the burden of proof rule and the _in dubio pro reo_ principle as core elements of it. Given the transformations law enforcement and criminal proceedings go through in the era of algorithms, big data and artificial intelligence, this article advocates the adoption of specific procedural safeguards that will uphold rule of law requirements, and particularly transparency, fairness and explainability. In doing so, it also takes into account EU legislative initiatives, including the reform of the EU data protection _acquis_, the E-evidence Proposal, and the Proposal for an EU AI Act. Additionally, it argues in favour of revisiting the protective scope of key fundamental rights, considering, _inter alia_, the new dimensions suspicion has acquired. (shrink)

Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and games set a new domain in understanding people’s motivations in gaming, behavioral implications of game play, game adaptation to player preferences and needs for increased engaging experiences in the context of HCI serious games (HCI-SGs). When the latter relate with people’s health status, they can become a part of their daily life as assistive health status monitoring/enhancement systems. Co-designing HCI-SGs can be seen as a combination of art and science that involves a meticulous collaborative process. The (...) design elements in assistive HCI-SGs for Parkinson’s Disease (PD) patients, in particular, are explored in the present work. Within this context, the Game-Based Learning (GBL) design framework is adopted here and its main game-design parameters are explored for the Exergames, Dietarygames, Emotional games, Handwriting games, and Voice games design, drawn from the PD-related i-PROGNOSIS Personalized Game Suite (PGS) (www.i-prognosis.eu) holistic approach. Two main data sources were involved in the study. In particular, the first one includes qualitative data from semi-structured interviews, involving 10 PD patients and four clinicians in the co-creation process of the game design, whereas the second one relates with data from an online questionnaire addressed by 104 participants spanning the whole related spectrum, i.e., PD patients, physicians, software/game developers. Linear regression analysis was employed to identify an adapted GBL framework with the most significant game-design parameters, which efficiently predict the transferability of the PGS beneficial effect to real-life, addressing functional PD symptoms. The findings of this work can assist HCI-SG designers for designing PD-related HCI-SGs, as the most significant game-design factors were identified, in terms of adding value to the role of HCI-SGs in increasing PD patients’ quality of life, optimizing the interaction with personalized HCI-SGs and, hence, fostering a collaborative human-computer symbiosis. (shrink)

Hypocretin regulates brain reward function and cocaine consumption in rats. The hypocretinergic (Hcrt) system is implicated in energy homeostasis, feeding and sleep regulation. Hypocretinergic cell bodies are located in the lateral hypothalamus (LH) and project throughout the brain. The aim of the present studies was to investigate the role of the Hcrt system in regulating brain reward function and the reinforcing properties of cocaine in rats. Intracranial self-stimulation (ICSS) thresholds provide an accurate measure of brain reward function in rats. Here (...) we show that a single injection of Hcrt-1 (5 µg icv) induced persistent, long-lasting elevations in ICSS thresholds in drug-naïve rats. Indeed, Hrct-1 elevated ICSS thresholds for 36 h, with peak elevations between 6 and 12 hours after injection. Hrct-1-induced threshold elevations were attenuated by an antibody known to neutralize the binding of hcrt-1 to its receptors. Taken together, these observations suggest that Hrct-1 negatively regulates brain reward function in rats. Because Hrct-1 negatively regulates brain reward function, we hypothesized that it may attenuate the increased brain reward function usually observed after cocaine consumption, and thereby alter cocaine self-administration behavior. A daily injection of Hrct-1 (1 µg icv), for 4 consecutive days, slightly increased cocaine self-administration (0.25 mg/infusion) in rats. Overall, these data demonstrate that Hrct-1 negatively regulates brain reward function, and as such may indirectly alter cocaine self-administration. Given the well-established role of hypocretin neurons in regulating feeding behavior and sleep, we hypothesize that hypocretinergic regulation of brain reward function may provide a mechanism by which appropriate and competing behaviors (e.g. sleep or feeding) may be engaged to maintain energy homeostasis. (shrink)

David Ricardo was a hugely influential British political economist and stock trader. This volume, first published in 1923, contains five important pamphlets published by him, edited and with an overarching introductory essay by E. C. K. Gonner. Each essay relates either to monetary and financial subjects - including the high price of Bullion, monetary theory and the position of the Bank of England - or to the agricultural conditions of Britain and proposed solutions to the problems discussed. This is a (...) fascinating and detailed work, which will be of great value to those with an interest in Ricardo’s theories and British economic history. (shrink)

Tsc question of the date of Ctesibius has been much obscured of late years by those German scholars1 who assert that Ctesibius the pneumatic and hydraulic engineer mentioned by Vitruvius IX. 8. 2 is distinct and separate from Κτησίβιος Κτησίβιος μηΧανικός who is mentioned by Athenaeus Mechanicus , Philo of Byzantium , and Hedylus ap. Athenaeum Naucratitam Deipn. XI., p. 497, d-e = Anthologia Graeca ed. Cougny, Paris , 1890, Vol. III., p. 298, n. 67.

The crisis of western civilization is a crisis of public philosophy. This is the charge of Public Philosophy and Political Science, a stunning new collection of essays edited by E. Robert Statham Jr. Vividly cataloging the decay of the moral and intellectual foundations of civic liberty, the book portrays a generation of Americans alienated from institutions built on public philosophy. The work exposes the failure of America's political scientists to acknowledge and understand this alarming crisis in the American body politic. (...) The distinguished contributors examine the evolution of public philosophy; the inextricable relationship between politics and philosophy; and the interplay between public philosophy, the constitution, natural law, and government. They reveal the dire threat to deliberative democracy and the fundamental order of constitutional society posed by public philosophy's waning power to refine, cultivate, and civilize. The work is an indictment of a society which has discarded a way of life rooted in natural law, democracy and the traditions of civility; and is a denunciation of an educated elite that has divorced itself from the standards upon which public philosophy rests. It is essential reading for philosophers and political and social scientists seeking to resurrect the standards of American public life. (shrink)

Can there be such a thing as moral science, or a science of morality? And if so, what sense has the word science in such a connection? In the middle of the last century such a question would probably have seemed superfluous. Utilitarians, Comtists, and not a few “evolutionists” would all have claimed to be moralists, with this advantage over the metaphysical or theological moralists of an earlier day that their own moral doctrines were “scientific”.

Robert E. Butts (1928-1997) was a philosopher and historian of science whose central concerns were the distinction between the rational and the irrational. He viewed scientific rationality as our major defence against the various conditions that encourage witch hunts and similar outbursts of irrationality, with all their attendant pain and terror. Butts saw himself as a pragmatic realist, combining what he took to be the best aspects of logical empiricism with a historically informed pragmatism, deeply appreciative of the methods of (...) science, trying to describe a kind of rationality essential in the struggle to preserve human values. This volume gathers previously unpublished essays and lectures with some previously published, thematically related essays. It includes essays and lectures on philosophical aspects of the European witch hunt, on scientific rationality and methodology, and on the relationships between science and philosophy exhibited in the writings of such historically significant figures as Leibniz, D'Alembert, Hume, Kant, Carnap and Kuhn. (shrink)