Social epidemiology has made a powerful case that health determined not just by individual-level factors such as our genetic make-up, access to medical services, or lifestyle choices, but also by social conditions, including the economy, law, and culture. Indeed, at the level of populations, evidence suggests that these “structural” factors are thepredominantinfluences on health. Legal scholars in public health, including those in the health and human rights movement, have contended that human rights, laws, and legal practices are powerfully linked to (...) health. Social epidemiology and health-oriented legal scholarship are complementary in their focus and their research needs. Legal scholarship has identified plausible ways in which legal and human rights factors could be influencing health, but empirical evidence has been limited. (shrink)

The study of letters, by Norman Foerster.--Language, by J.C. McGalliard.--Literary history, by René Wellek.--Literary criticism, by Austin Warren.--Imaginative writing, by W.L. Schramm.--Notes.--Bibliography (p. 239-255).

For this second edition, the editors have returned to Austin's original lecture notes, amending the printed text where it seemed necessary.

First published in 1962, contains the William James Lectures delivered at Harvard University in 1955. It sets out Austin's conclusions in the field to which he directed his main efforts for at least the last ten years of his life. Starting from an exhaustive examination of his already well- known distinction of performative utterances from statements, Austin here finally abandons that distinction, replacing it by a more general theory of 'illocutionary forces' of utterances which has important bearings on (...) a wide variety of philosophical problems. (shrink)

This book is the one to put into the hands of those who have been over-impressed by Austin 's critics....[Warnock's] brilliant editing puts everybody who is concerned with philosophical problems in his debt.

Among mycologists, questions persist about what entities should be treated as the fundamental units of fungal populations. This article articulates a coherent view about populations of heterokaryotic fungi and the individuals that comprise them. Using Godfrey-Smith’s minimal concept of a Darwinian population, I argue that entities at two levels of the biological hierarchy satisfy the minimal concept in heterokaryotic fungi: mycelia and nuclei. I provide a preliminary answer to the question of how to understand the relation between these two populations. (...) This article contributes to discussions about the nature of biological individuality, organismality, and evolutionary transitions. (shrink)

Eukaryogenesis is widely viewed as an improbable evolutionary transition uniquely affecting the evolution of life on this planet. However, scientific and popular rhetoric extolling this event as a singularity lacks rigorous evidential and statistical support. Here, we question several of the usual claims about the specialness of eukaryogenesis, focusing on both eukaryogenesis as a process and its outcome, the eukaryotic cell. We argue in favor of four ideas. First, the criteria by which we judge eukaryogenesis to have required a genuinely (...) unlikely series of events 2 billion years in the making are being eroded by discoveries that fill in the gaps of the prokaryote:eukaryote “discontinuity.” Second, eukaryogenesis confronts evolutionary theory in ways not different from other evolutionary transitions in individuality; parallel systems can be found at several hierarchical levels. Third, identifying which of several complex cellular features confer on eukaryotes a putative richer evolutionary potential remains an area of speculation: various keys to success have been proposed and rejected over the five-decade history of research in this area. Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, it is difficult and may be impossible to eliminate eukaryocentric bias from the measures by which eukaryotes as a whole are judged to have achieved greater success than prokaryotes as a whole. Overall, we question whether premises of existing theories about the uniqueness of eukaryogenesis and the greater evolutionary potential of eukaryotes have been objectively formulated and whether, despite widespread acceptance that eukaryogenesis was “special,” any such notion has more than rhetorical value. (shrink)

The discovery of mouse embryonic stem cells in 1981 transformed research in mammalian developmental biology and functional genomics. The subsequent generation of human pluripotent stem cells (PSCs) and the development of molecular reprogramming have opened unheralded avenues for drug discovery and cell replacement therapy. Here, I review the history of PSCs from the perspective that long‐term self‐renewal is a product of the in vitro signaling environment, rather than an intrinsic feature of embryos. I discuss the relationship between pluripotent states captured (...) in vitro to stages of epiblast in the embryo and suggest key considerations for evaluation of PSCs. A remaining fundamental challenge is to determine whether naïve pluripotency can be propagated from the broad range of mammals by exploiting common principles in gene regulatory architecture. (shrink)

Using a Solomon four-group design, we investigate the effect of a case-based critical thinking intervention on students’ critical thinking skills. We randomly assign 31 sessions of business classes to four groups and collect data from three sources: in-class performance, university records, and Internet surveys. Our 2 × 2 ANOVA results showed no significant between-subjects differences. Contrary to our expectations, students improve their critical thinking skills, with or without the intervention. Female and Caucasian students improve their critical thinking skills, but males (...) and non-Caucasian do not. Positive performance goals and negative mastery goals enhance and decrease improvements of their CTA scores, respectively. ACT and age are related to pre- and post-test. Gender is related to pre-test. GPA is related to post-test. Results shed light on the Pygmalion effect, the Galatea effect, ability, motivation, and opportunity as signals for human capital, and business ethics. (shrink)

A summary of the existing literature related to moral distress (MD) and the paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) reveals a high-tech, high-pressure environment in which effective teamwork can be compromised by MD arising from different situations related to: consent for treatment, futile care, end-of-life decision making, formal decision-making structures, training and experience by discipline, individual values and attitudes, and power and authority issues. Attempts to resolve MD in PICUs have included the use of administrative tools such as shift worksheets, the (...) implementation of continuing education, and encouragement to report. The literature does not yet show these approaches to be effective in the resolution of MD. The need to acknowledge MD among PICU teams is discussed and an argument made that, to facilitate understanding among team members, practice stories need to be shared. (shrink)

A recent development in biology has been the growing acceptance that holobionts, entities comprised of symbiotic microbes and their host organisms, are widespread in nature. There is agreement that holobionts are evolved outcomes, but disagreement on how to characterize the operation of natural selection on them. The aim of this paper is to articulate the contours of the disagreement. I explain how two distinct foundational accounts of the process of natural selection give rise to competing views about evolutionary individuality.

John Austin's classic work that has had a profound influence on the study of English and American law presents Austin's distinction between "positive law" (i.e.

Medical discourse in the contemporary United States is rife with military metaphors. These metaphors have come under vigorous criticism over the last few decades but to no avail; the militaristic tendency has proven tenacious. This essay suggests that its tenacity stems, at least in part, from a dualistic understanding of medicine unaddressed by prior criticisms. For an alternative, this essay turns to Augustine of Hippo, balancing close readings of works that deal explicitly with medical themes—The Catholic Way of Life and (...) the Manichean Way of Life (De moribus) and The Nature of the Good (De natura boni)—with a constructive approach. By adapting Augustine's privative account of evil, we can understand disease as a condition of loss and treatment as a task of restoration. This reconfiguration shifts the focus of our interpretive discourses from malicious invaders to a fuller affirmation of the lived experiences of those who are ill. (shrink)

The model of atonement presented in Anselm of Canterbury's Cur Deus Homo has aroused a host of worries from theologians. The gist of their criticism is that Anselm inscribes redemptive violence into theology and thus encourages passive acquiescence to abusive power structures or even licenses the violence of abusers. Some suggest that the way forward would be to jettison Anselm's account and develop alternatives that are not liable to the same abuses. This paper argues that while alternatives may be desirable, (...) Cur Deus Homo looms so large in theological imaginations as to defy jettisoning. We should instead try to perform better readings. This paper presents a close reading of this text as a monastic meditation on mortality oriented less toward resolving a problem of systematic theology than drawing readers into a renewed experience of devotion to God. To do that, Anselm works to rewrite the meaning of human mortality, making it less about the necessity of losing one's life and more about the possibility of a gift of death. The ethical paradigm that emerges is far from a complete moral vision, but is still more alluring than the one about which Anselm's contemporary critics worry. (shrink)

Cooper, Austin Christian Spirituality can be approached from numerous points on the theological compass: Sacred Scripture is an obvious source, but so are almost any of the theological disciplines. This paper will be concerned with it as emanating from Church History.

Cooper, Austin John Henry Newman was born in 1801, converted to the Catholic Church in 1845 and died in 1890. That is, he spent the first half of his life in the Church of England. He was to exercise a profound influence on both Communions in Australia. The young Newman was elected a Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford, in April 1822. Despite the declining fortunes of his family, his own career was off to a promising start. Two years later (...) he was ordained Deacon at Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford on 13 June 1824. This was a very solemn commitment indeed. He thought he should give himself totally to the service of the Gospel. This attitude prompted him to write to the CMS (the Church Missionary Society) in London seeking information regarding service as a missionary. He followed up his letter with a visit to the CMS London Headquarters on July 3, 1824 - just two weeks after his ordination as deacon. (shrink)

Cooper, Austin Some years ago a priest who was dying told me that he had not had a spiritual director for years: he just kept reading St Teresa. Having a continuing conversation with a holy person by engaging with his or her writings would seem to conform to our beliefs: in the Apostles' Creed we affirm that the Holy Spirit enlivens the church and the communion of saints. And T. S. Eliot articulated the truth in poetic terms when he (...) wrote, 'the communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living'. (shrink)

Cooper, Austin Review(s) of: The Bloomsbury guide to Christian spirituality, by Richard Woods and Peter Tyler, eds. (London: Bloomsbury, 2012), pp. viii + 422, $65.00.

Law and the Humanities: An Introduction brings together a distinguished group of scholars from law schools and an array of the disciplines in the humanities. Contributors come from the United States and abroad in recognition of the global reach of this field. This book is, at one and the same time, a stock taking both of different national traditions and of the various modes and subjects of law and humanities scholarship. It is also an effort to chart future directions for (...) the field. By reviewing and analyzing existing scholarship and providing thematic content and distinctive arguments, it offers to its readers both a resource and a provocation. Thus, Law and the Humanities marks the maturation of this 'law and' enterprise and will spur its further development. (shrink)

The book uses Zen Buddhism as the opening wedge for an extraordinarily wide-ranging exploration of consciousness.

This essay considers the possibility that prominent theories of the posthuman may draw problematic forms of inspiration from ideas about the "primitive" human. This would complicate how the post in posthuman is defined by current scholarship. It would also suggest that there are potentially concerning racial politics, hitherto unnoticed, embedded within certain modes of posthuman theorizing. In assessing these concerns, the essay develops an analysis of the unexpected racializing and fetishistic dimensions commonly at work in the idea of networks, and (...) looks at the ways networks and new animistic ontologies may in certain ways perpetuate the same Eurocentric humanist biases that they aim to critique. (shrink)

‘Unfair to Facts’ is a follow-up on Ch. 5, addressing objections Peter Strawson raised against Austin’s view of truth as a description of the conditions that must be satisfied if we are to say of a statement that it is true. Austin addresses the objection that his description of these conditions is due to a misunderstanding about the use of ‘fact’, arguing, against Strawson, that facts are not pseudo-entities and that the notion of ‘fitting the facts’ is not (...) a useless notion. (shrink)

Side effects are ubiquitous in medicine and they often play a role in treatment decisions for patients and clinicians alike. Philosophers and health researchers often use side effects to illustrate issues with contemporary medical research and practice. However, technical definitions of ‘side effect’ differ among health authorities. Thus, determining the side effects of an intervention can differ depending on whose definition we assume. Here I review some of the common definitions of side effect and highlight their issues. In response, I (...) offer an account of side effects as jointly (i) unintended and (ii) effects due to the causal capacities or invariances of an intervention. I discuss (i) by examining the intentions or reasons behind therapeutic interventions, and I discuss (ii) by appealing to a manipulationist model of causation. The analysis here highlights that side effects are conceptually distinct from related outcomes like adverse events, adverse drug reactions, and placebo effects. The analysis also allows for reflection on the utility of ‘side effect’ as a technical term in medical research and practice. (shrink)

βριс φυτεει τραννον βριс κτλ. Thus the MSS, Schol. and Stobaeus 4.8. 11 . βριν φυτεει τυραννον βριс κτλ. Thus Blaydes, followed recently by R. P. Winnington-Ingram, JHS 91 , 126 = Sophocles. An interpretation , p. 192 ; R. D. Dawe, Sophoclis Tragoediae , i. 156 and Sophocles. Oedipus Rex , pp. 18, 61,182 f. ; R. W. B. Burton, The Chorus in Sophocles' Tragedies , p. 164 ; J. Diggle, CRn.s. 32, 14.

Mixed lineage leukemia (MLL) fusion protein (FP)‐induced acute leukemia is highly aggressive and often refractory to therapy. Recent progress in the field has unraveled novel mechanisms and targets to combat this disease. Menin, a nuclear protein, interacts with wild‐type (WT) MLL, MLL‐FPs, and other partners such as the chromatin‐associated protein LEDGF and the transcription factor C‐Myb to promote leukemogenesis. The newly solved co‐crystal structure illustrating the menin–MLL interaction, coupled with the role of menin in recruiting both WT MLL and MLL‐FPs (...) to target genes, highlights menin as a scaffold protein and a central hub controlling this type of leukemia. The menin/WT MLL/MLL‐FP hub may also cooperate with several signaling pathways, including Wnt, GSK3, and bromodomain‐containing Brd4‐related pathways to sustain MLL‐FP‐induced leukemogenesis, revealing new therapeutic targets to improve the treatment of MLL‐FP leukemias. (shrink)

McCoy and colleagues (2023) offer a reflective framework for data ethics and governance with several historical bioethics principles as a foundation. Their framework is one among a plethora of othe...

Climate change is a wicked problem with causes and consequences overlapping with other wicked problems and no single solution (Hulme 2015). For example, the frequent droughts associated with climate change exacerbate another major problem facing humanity as we enter the Anthropocene: how to produce adequate food to feed a growing population without increasing pollution or “more food with low pollution (MoFoLoPo)” (Davidson et al. 2015). Soils represent an intersection of these two wicked problems, because they are integral to food production (...) through agriculture and also are an important component of global climate models. Recent focus in the field of soil carbon cycling has facilitated a transformation in our understanding of the processes that control this important resource. This understanding is critical to responding to both wicked problems. (shrink)