"The largest Ebola outbreak to date—first detected in December 2013 and still ongoing as of April 2015—has cast new light on the shortfalls of international public health systems.1 As in previous health crises, scrutiny has reemerged over the pharmaceutical industry’s ability and willingness to innovate new medicines for underserved disease areas. The public debate has intensified following revelations that promising drug candidates to treat Ebola had gone undeveloped despite compelling preclinical results.2 This lack of development is especially troubling because it (...) occurred after a recently implemented U.S. incentive scheme—the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) tropical disease priority review voucher program—designed to counteract exactly this problem. Taking Ebola as a case in point, it is useful to examine the short history and ongoing refinement of this voucher program, since it represents one of the most significant legislative efforts to systematically address the relative absence of com- mercial rewards for drugs targeting tropical diseases. This analysis evaluates the voucher program’s effectiveness for both stimulating private sector innovation and achieving positive health impacts among populations most severely burdened by tropical diseases. It then proposes specific recommendations for how law- makers can improve the program’s legislation to better achieve these objectives. ". (shrink)

Rapid advancements in machine learning techniques allow mass surveillance to be applied on larger scales and utilize more and more personal data. These developments demand reconsideration of the privacy-security dilemma, which describes the tradeoffs between national security interests and individual privacy concerns. By investigating mass surveillance techniques that use bulk data collection and machine learning algorithms, we show why these methods are unlikely to pinpoint terrorists in order to prevent attacks. The diverse characteristics of terrorist attacks—especially when considering lone-wolf terrorism—lead (...) to irregular and isolated footprints. The irregularity of data affects the accuracy of machine learning algorithms and the mass surveillance that depends on them which can be explained by three kinds of known problems encountered in machine learning theory: class imbalance, the curse of dimensionality, and spurious correlations. Proponents of mass surveillance often invoke the distinction between collecting data and metadata, in which the latter is understood as a lesser breach of privacy. Their arguments commonly overlook the ambiguity in the definitions of data and metadata and ignore the ability of machine learning techniques to infer the former from the latter. Given the sparsity of datasets used for machine learning in counterterrorism and the privacy risks attendant with bulk data collection, policymakers and other relevant stakeholders should critically re-evaluate the likelihood of success of the algorithms and the collection of data on which they depend. (shrink)

"This book contains ideas to develop interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary views on economy and society. It aims to disseminate heterodox ideas on various subjects related to economics and global society. The book is organised in six parts. Part 1 contains the key lectures of Backhaus on the concept of state sciences and of Klamer on the importance of culture for economics. Parts 2- 6 contain successively contributions in the areas of economic paradigms and theories, population and society, corporate issues, environment, and (...) international relations. Examples of the content are: - the changes of family life cycles due to the rise of non-traditional households; - subjective and objective inflation rates after the introduction of the Euro; - the economics of genetic engineering; - the contribution of foreign direct investment to the economic development of host countries; - the inaccuracy of economic models applied in places characterized by extreme income disparities; - the improvement of political and corporate governance; - evolutionary thinking and emission trading; - freedom and order in the European Union; - the reform of social policy in Europe. The book provides interesting creative multi-disciplinary ideas with respect to various topical issues concerning the contemporary global society. It is highly recommended for economists and social scientists in search of broad views on social science and society.". (shrink)

The sixth decade of this century may be considered a period of dynamic development of the Soviet ethics. In contrast with the post-revolutionary period, the ethics does not limit itself to a normative reflection, but starts also extensive studies in the theory of ethics. According to the authors of the present article, there are all reasons to believe that the marxist ethics will become a scientific discipline in a full sense of the word. The purpose of the article is not (...) to discuss all problems involved in the contemporary Soviet ethics, but above all to outline main problems and trends of its development. The authors distinguish following aspects of the ethical investigations: philosophical, sociological, social-psychological, axiological, pedagogical, historical, gnoseological, logical, and metaethical. Together with a critical evaluation of solutions of certain problems, they criticize some abstractive and ahistorical, in their opinion, approach to ethics which has been manifested above all in works of Y. A. Milner-Irinin and P. M. Egides. (shrink)

Title: Thinking Matter: Materialism in Eighteenth-Century BritainPublisher: University of Minnesota PressISBN: 0816660581Author: John W. YoltonTitle: Perceptual Acquaintance from Descartes to ReidPublisher: University of Minnesota PressISBN: 0816611629Author: John W. Yolton.

PurposeThe relation between fear of childbirth and gestational age is inconclusive, and self-reported need for help regarding this fear has never been investigated. This study aimed to determine the prevalence and course of FoC according to gestational age, to identify risk factors for the development of FoC, the influence of this fear on preferred mode of delivery, and self-reported need for help.MethodsNulliparous pregnant women of all gestational ages completed an online survey. The study consisted of a cross-sectional and a longitudinal (...) analysis. Women who completed the survey in the first or second trimester were approached again in their third trimester. The Wijma Delivery Expectancy Questionnaire Version A was used with a cut-off score ≥ 85 to define presence of fear of childbirth. Questionnaires indexing social support, anxiety, symptoms of depression, preferred mode of delivery, and self-reported need for help were included.ResultsIn total, 364 women were enrolled at T0, and 118 out of 184 eligible women were included in the longitudinal analysis. Point prevalence of FoC at T0 was 18.4% with no significant difference between trimesters. In the longitudinal sample, the prevalence of FoC decreased from 18.6% to 11.0%, p = 0.004. Although mean scores for FoC decreased significantly, p < 0.001, scores increased in 41 women. The presence of FoC was associated with elevated anxiety, less family support, prenatal care of the obstetrician by choice, preference for a cesarean section, and for pain relief. Women with FoC were more likely to actively seek for help compared to women without FoC.ConclusionWhile FoC is common in each trimester, prevalence decreases over the course of pregnancy. Women with FoC are often actively seeking for help, suggesting that this fear should be addressed better, and help should be offered accordingly. (shrink)

The eighteenth century saw the publication of many scientific and technical dictionaries, particularly in France, one of the most important being P. J. Macquer's Dictionnaire de chymie. Both the original text of 1766 and the revised and enlarged version of 1778 were translated into several languages, sometimes with authoritative notes and additions by the translators. No mere list of definitions, Macquer's work contained long articles that made it a comprehensive treatise on chemistry, and it set the pattern for many subsequent (...) chemical dictionaries. We have endeavoured to give an account of the circumstances in which the various editions, reprints and translations were published, and we add detailed bibliographical descriptions of them. Bibliographical purists consider that all the copies of a book printed from the same setting of type constitute an ‘edition’, and that there is a new edition when all or most of the type has been reset. However, Macquer described his revised and expanded text of 1778 as the ‘second edition’ and this designation has been adopted by subsequent writers, even though the original text was reprinted several times from different settings of type before 1778. In order to avoid confusion we therefore refer to all versions of the 1766 and 1778 editions as ‘issues’, ‘printings’ or ‘reprints’ of the first and second edition respectively. (shrink)

BackgroundClinical Ethics Support (CES) services are offered to support healthcare professionals in dealing with ethically difficult situations. Evaluation of CES is important to understand if it is indeed a supportive service in order to inform and improve future implementation of CES. Yet, methods to measure outcomes of CES are scarce. In 2014, the European Moral Case Deliberation Outcomes Instrument (Euro-MCD) was developed to measure outcomes of Moral Case Deliberation (MCD). To further validate the instrument, we tested it in field studies (...) and revised it. This paper presents the Euro-MCD 2.0 and describes the revision process.MethodsThe revision process comprised an iterative dialogue among the authors as Euro-MCD-project team, including empirical findings from six Euro-MCD field-studies and input from European experts in CES and theory. Empirical findings contained perceptions and experiences of MCD outcomes among healthcare professionals who participated in MCDs in various settings in Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands. Theoretical viewpoints on CES, literature on goals of CES and MCD and ethics theory guided the interpretation of the empirical findings and final selection of MCD outcomes.ResultsThe Euro-MCD 2.0 Instrument includes three domains: Moral Competence, Moral Teamwork and Moral Action. Moral Competence consists of items about moral sensitivity, analytical skills and virtuous attitude. Moral Teamwork includes open dialogue and supportive relationships and Moral Action refers to moral decision-making and responsible care. During the revision process, we made decisions about adding and reformulating items as well as decreasing the number from 26 to 15 items. We also altered the sentence structure of items to assess the current status of outcomes (e.g. ‘now’) instead of an assumed improvement over time (e.g. ‘better’) and we omitted the question about perceived importance.ConclusionsThe Euro-MCD 2.0 is shorter, less complex and more strongly substantiated by an integration of empirical findings, theoretical reflections and dialogues with participants and experts. Use of the Euro-MCD 2.0 will facilitate evaluation of MCD and can thereby monitor and foster implementation and quality of MCD. The Euro-MCD 2.0 will strengthen future research on evaluation of outcomes of MCD. (shrink)

In order to study early human development while avoiding the burdens associated with human embryo research, scientists are redirecting their efforts towards so-called human embryo-like structures (hELS). hELS are created from clusters of human pluripotent stem cells and seem capable of mimicking early human development with increasing accuracy. Notwithstanding, hELS research finds itself at the intersection of historically controversial fields, and the expectation that it might be received as similarly sensitive is prompting proactive law reform in many jurisdictions, including the (...) Netherlands. However, studies on the public perception of hELS research remain scarce. To help guide policymakers and fill this gap in the literature, we conducted an explorative qualitative study aimed at mapping the range of perspectives in the Netherlands on the creation and research use of hELS. This article reports on a subset of our findings, namely those pertaining to (the degrees of and requirements for) confidence in research with hELS and its regulation. Despite commonly found disparities in confidence on emerging biotechnologies, we also found wide consensus regarding the requirements for having (more) confidence in hELS research. We conclude by reflecting on how these findings could be relevant to researchers and (Dutch) policymakers when interpreted within the context of their limitations. (shrink)