Charlotte Perkins Gilman and John Dewey were both pragmatists who recognized the need to restructure the environment to bring about social progress. Gilman was even more of a pragmatist than Dewey, however, because she addressed problems he did not identify-much less confront. Her philosophy is in accord with the spirit of Dewey's work but in important ways, it is more consistent, more comprehensive and more radical than his instrumentalism.

In commenting on Susan Bordo's discussion of gender bias, I both support and build on her contention that women's exclusion from philosophical discourse has been epistemologically and politically significant. But I also explore difficulties associated with applying the concept of gender and I voice concern about how to characterize the perspectives we share as women. Finally, I consider some theoretical and political limitations of utilizing gender as an analytical category.

Several recent papers dealing with Plato's position on the imperfection of the phenomenal world draw heavily on the differences between two kinds of predicates in order to show the following: In the middle dialogues, Plato posits Forms only as referents of what the writers call incomplete predicates. He does not posit Forms as referents for complete predicates. When interpreters ignore the differences between these kinds of predicates, they ascribe too radical a view regarding the imperfection of the phenomenal world to (...) the middle dialogues. The ontology of these dialogues includes sensible particulars which retain their identity over time even though they are continually changing in some respect or other. (shrink)

ObjectivePhysical isolation measures, known as lockdown or shelter-in-place, experienced during coronavirus disease 2019 have the potential to cause psychological distress. This study was conducted to examine parents’ perceived stress and whether reports of rewards and challenges during lockdown impact stress.MethodsData were collected using a cross-sectional online survey in New South Wales, Australia, across the 4-week lockdown. The survey was completed by 158 parents of children aged under 6 years. Stress was measured using the short form of the Perceived Stress Scale. (...) Rewards and challenges were reported in response to two open-ended questions.ResultsThere was a weak negative correlation between PSS-4 scores and days in isolation, with parents who had spent longer in isolation reporting fewer stress symptoms. The relationship between time in isolation and stress was moderated by the degree to which parents described more rewards than challenges: parents who perceived high rewards and low challenges reported lower PSS-4 scores with more days in lockdown, whereas parents who perceived low rewards and high challenges reported higher PSS-4 scores with more days in lockdown. The moderation model examining associations between time in isolation and rewards ratio explained 13% of the variance in PSS-4 scores.ConclusionLockdowns are not uniformly or consistently negative experiences for parents. Identifying positive aspects of the experience may serve to buffer negative mental health risks across time. Understanding resilience strategies is critical for supporting current psychological wellbeing and to adequately prepare for future pandemic experiences. (shrink)

While we may use the Gospels and Paul’s letters to justify eating with wild abandon and enjoying every bite, we should revisit the greater principle in the New Testament: to feed others to the point of self-sacrifice in order to honor the integrity of the community.

This best-selling anthology of readings with case studies provides insightful and comprehensive treatment of ethical issues in medicine. Appropriate for courses taught in philosophy departments as well as in schools of medicine and nursing, the collection covers provocative topics such as conflicts of interest in medicine, advance directives, physician-assisted suicide, and the rationing of health care. The text's effective pedagogical features include chapter introductions, argument sketches, explanations of medical terms, headnotes, and annotated bibliographies.

Recent articles in biomedical ethics have begun to explore both the relevance of family interests in treatment decisions and the resultant ramifications for physicians' obligations to patients. This article addresses two important questions regarding physicians' obligations vis-a-vis family interests: (1) What should a physician do when the exercise of patient autonomy threatens to negate the patient's moral obligations to other family members? (2) Does respect for patient autonomy typically require efforts on the part of physicians to keep patients' treatment decisions (...) from being influenced by family considerations? A series of clarifications about the concept of autonomy is also presented. (shrink)

In its seventh edition, "Social Ethics: Morality and Social Policy" continues to provide material that will encourage reflective and critical examination of key contemporary moral problems. With additional readings and a new organization that groups related chapters together under four categories, this edition enhances the teachability that was the most salient characteristic of previous editions. The text maintains its ability to bring the central issues into clear focus, while allowing supporting arguments for widely diverse positions to be presented by those (...) who embrace them. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to extend the previous research on ethics in retailing. Prior research of Dornoff and Tankersley (1985–1976), Gifford and Norris (1987), Norris and Gifford (1988), and Burns and Rayman (1989) examined the ethics orientation of retail sales persons, sales managers, and business school students. These studies found the college students less ethically-oriented than retail sales people and retail managers. The present study attempts to extend the research on ethics formation to a geographically and academically diverse (...) sample, and to determine if retail management experience in the form of a professional practicum or internship, or entry level management training programs, such as experienced by recent graduates, are critical factors in the formation of business ethics. The sample consisted of thirty-three students majoring in Human Ecology with a concentration in Retail Merchandising and 51 recent graduates of the retail Merchandising program. The series of fourteen vignettes developed by Dornoff and Tankersley (1975–1976) was used. An acknowledged limitation of this study is the validity of the questionnaire developed by Dornoff and Tankersley due to the method of development and new laws concerning warranties and credit etc. which have occurred since 1976. The instrument was used, however, to maintain consistency with earlier studies for the purpose of comparison of groups. No significant differences were found in the students' perceptions of the fourteen actions presented in the vignettes, but the range of the responses in the post-internship tests increased in many cases. The alumni appeared to be slightly more ethical than the students but not as ethical as the managers surveyed in 1986 by Norris and Gifford. Indications are that the critical point of ethics formation may be at the mid-management level and that internships and management training programs have little effect on the ethical perceptions of participants. These findings are consistent with studies such as Gable and Topol (1988), and Jordan and Davis (1990) which showed high Machiavellian scores among young retailing executives, often buyers, as opposed to upper level retailing management. Scales with measure Machiavellianism, or manipulativeness, have been used as an alternative method of examining business ethics. (shrink)

Biomedical Ontologies integrate diverse biomedical data and enable intelligent data-mining and help translate basic research into useful clinical knowledge. We present the RNA Ontology (RNAO), an o...

Eduard Pernkopf’s Atlas of Topographical and Applied Human Anatomy is a four-volume anatomical atlas published between 1937 and 1963, and it is generally believed to be the most comprehensive, detailed, and accurate anatomy textbook ever created. However, a 1997 investigation into “Pernkopf’s Atlas,” raised troubling questions regarding the author’s connection to the Nazi regime and the still unresolved issue of whether its illustrations relied on Jewish or other political prisoners, including those executed in Nazi concentration camps. Following this investigation, the (...) book was removed from both anatomy classrooms and library bookshelves. A debate has ensued over the book’s continued use, and justification for its use has focused on two issues: there is no definitive proof the book includes illustrations of concentration camp prisoners or Jewish individuals in particular, and there is no contemporary equivalent to this text. However, both points fail to address the central importance of the book, not simply as part of anatomy instruction, but also as a comprehensive historical narrative with important ethical implications. Having encountered a first edition copy, these authors were given a unique opportunity to engage with the text through the respective humanities lenses of history, ethics, and narrative. In doing so, an instructive and profound irony has surfaced: Nazis, including Pernkopf, viewed specific groups of people as less than human, giving rise to unthinkable atrocities perpetuated against them. However, these same individuals became the sources for the creation of the Atlas, which served as the model for primary instruction on the human form for more than half of the twentieth century. In this article, we recount the difficult and somewhat opaque provenance of this book, engage the ethical questions surrounding both its creation and its use, and ultimately propose a pedagogical methodology for its continued use in medical education. (shrink)

In late March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia introduced mandatory 14-day supervised quarantine at hotels and other designated facilities for all international arrivals. From July 2020, most states and territories introduced a fixed charge for quarantine of up to $3220 per adult. The introduction of the fee was rationalised on the basis that Australians had been allowed sufficient time to return and there was a need to recover some of the cost associated with administering the program. Drawing (...) on an empirical study of 58 returned Australian citizens and residents quarantined between March 2020 and January 2021, this paper aims to explore how people experienced paying for hotel quarantine, particularly with respect to fairness and relatedly, the principle of reciprocity. Reciprocity requires that the state has an obligation to assist individuals in discharging their duty to comply with public health measures and avoid disproportionate burdens accruing to populations or individuals. Though participants had varying opinions on whether they thought it fair to be charged for their quarantine, for many, the fee constituted a significant burden and source of stress. Given the undertaking of quarantine is primarily for the benefit of the public good, we argue the financial cost imposed on individuals does not meet the demands of reciprocity. It is imperative that future quarantine and isolation arrangements consider seriously the need to minimise burdens of individuals subject to such measures, and that fees do not become a new norm in public health and infectious disease control. (shrink)

This research project investigated the extent to which nurses engage in two important kinds of ethical behaviours: ethical activism (where they try to make hospitals more receptive to nurses’ participation in ethics deliberations) and ethical assertiveness (where they participate in ethics deliberations even when not formally invited). This research probed not only the extent to which nurses engage in these ethical behaviours but also whether this is influenced by professional, training and organizational factors. A random sample of 165 nurses from (...) three major hospitals in Los Angeles provided the data. Regression analyses indicate that both ethical activism and ethical assertiveness are strongly influenced by nurses’ perceptions of the receptivity of hospitals to their inclusion in ethics deliberations. In addition, nurses’ education in ethics is a significant predictor of ethical activism. The findings have important implications for the content of nurses’ ethics training as well as for expanding the boundaries of nurses’ participation in ethics deliberations. The authors define ethics deliberations as specific meetings of a number of people to discuss an ethical issue, such as one regarding the care of a patient. (shrink)

The shift to a market economy in post-communist Eastern Europe has had a profound impact on science and scientists across the region, leading to reforms in research management practices and to drastic cuts in funding levels everywhere. Many countries are moving to a system of competitive research grants awarded on the basis of peer review. The introduction of peer review is not simply a technical matter. It signifies a fundamental change in the social structure of science, enhancing profession-al autonomy and (...) giving working scientists a voice in the allocation of resources. This book combines first-hand accounts of the reform process with analyses of the strengths and weaknesses of both peer review and quantitative indicators. (shrink)

The Medicaid Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnostic and Treatment benefit offers health care coverage specifically targeted to meet the needs to low-income children and children with disabilities. This article provides a brief overview of EPSDT and then discusses how states are working to bring vision, hearing, and oral health services to children through EPSDT.

Our objective is to test an optimality model of human fertility that specifies the behavioral requirements for fitness maximization in order (a) to determine whether current behavior does maximize fitness and, if not, (b) to use the specific nature of the behavioral deviations from fitness maximization towards the development of models of evolved proximate mechanisms that may have maximized fitness in the past but lead to deviations under present conditions. To test the model we use data from a representative sample (...) of 7,107 men living in Albuquerque, New Mexico, between 1990 and 1993. The model we test proposes that low fertility in modern settings maximizes number of grandchildren as a result of a trade-off between parental fertility and next generation fertility. Results do not show the optimization, although the data do reveal a trade-off between parental fertility and offspring education and income.We propose that two characteristics of modern economies have led to a period of sustained fertility reduction and to a corresponding lack of association between income and fertility. The first is the direct link between costs of investment and wage rates due to the forces of supply and demand for labor in competitive economies. The second is the increasing emphasis on cumulative knowledge, skills, and technologies in the production of resources. Together they produce historically novel conditions. These two features of modern economies may interact with evolved psychological and physiological mechanisms governing fertility and parental investment to produce behavior that maximizes the economic productivity of lineages at the expense of fitness. If cognitive processes evolved to track diminishing returns to parental investment and if physiological processes evolved to regulate fertility in response to nutritional state and patterns of breast feeding, we might expect non-adaptive responses when returns from parental investment do not diminish until extremely high levels are reached. With high economic payoffs from parental investment, people have begun to exercise cognitive regulation of fertility through contraception and family planning practices. Those cognitive processes maynot have evolved to handle fitness trade-offs between fertility and parental investment. (shrink)

This is part of a complete set of Jane Austen's novels collating the editions published during the author's lifetime and previously unpublished manuscripts. The books are illustrated with 19th century plates and incorporate revisions by experts in the light of subsequent research.

Moran rightly links performance of speech acts to instituting second‐personal normative relations. He also maintains that an audience's recognition of the speaker's intention in speaking is sufficient for the speaker's success in doing the speech act intended. The claim is true on some ways of understanding speech act verbs, but false on others. This complexity of speech act verbs can be explained by seeing how speech acts need to be understood in the context of shared life and cooperative action.

Drawing on a qualitative study of women who cared for their elderly mothers, this article explores women's experiences of feeling responsible for elderly relatives. The minimal provision of public services for old people and the relative absence of brothers and husbands from family caregiving emerge as material constraints shaping women's sense of obligation. This is affirmed by ideologies and assumptions about women's association with caring and family ties that permeate subjects' accounts of their situations. Translating their sense of obligation into (...) their lives is a contradictory process characterized by ambivalence and guilt that stifle complaint. Further exploration of the social processes that sustain the inequitable division of caring labor can contribute to interpretations, practices, and policies that benefit rather than constrain women. (shrink)

This enlightening book presents new perspectives on how women's bodies are viewed and absorbed in popular culture, and considers some of the ways in which the body is central to questions of women's sexual and other identities.

When everyone can be a publisher, what distinguishes the journalist? This article considers contemporary challenges to institutional roles in a digital media environment and then turns to three broad journalistic normative values - authenticity, accountability, and autonomy - that affect the credibility of journalists and the content they provide. A set of questions that can help citizens determine the trustworthiness of information available to them emerges from the discussion.

Corporations are developing more cost‐effective payment arrangements with health care providers and are shifting costs away from expensive forms of treatment. Although employees may have fewer options as a result, quality of care need not be affected.

In one volume, this book brings together a new English translation of Plato's _Meno_, a selection of illuminating articles on themes in the dialogue published between 1965 and 1985 and an introduction setting the _Meno_ in its historical context and opening up the key philosophical issues which the various articles discuss. A glossary is provided which briefly introduces some of the key terms and indicates how they are translated. The _Meno_ is an excellent introduction to Plato and philosophy.