Interpreting Shakespeare’s seminal work ‘Hamlet’ through the lens of biocentrism offers an illuminating paradigm shift from traditional analyses. Biocentrism, a philosophical standpoint positing the intrinsic value of all living beings and the fundamental interconnectedness of life, contrasts sharply with the anthropocentric viewpoint that places humans at the centre of the universe’s hierarchy. This re-evaluation not only enriches our understanding of the play’s enduring themes, characters, and narrative arcs but also aligns Shakespeare’s work with contemporary environmental and ethical discussions. At the (...) heart of ‘Hamlet’ lie profound contemplations of existence, morality, and the human condition—themes that resonate deeply with biocentric philosophy. (shrink)

Recognizing the potential hidden artistic contributions of persons with dementia opens new opportunities for interpretation and potential communication. This visual essay explores the authors’ responses to the fragile objects of art produced by a person with severe dementia and examines what may be learned from them.

Dementia is more than a disease. What dementia is, how it is understood, and how it is experienced is influenced by multiple factors including our societal preoccupation with individual identity. This essay introduces empirical and theoretical evidence of alternative ways of understanding dementia that act as a challenge to common assumptions. It proposes that dementia be understood as an experience of systems, particularly networks of people affected by the diagnosis. Taking this step reveals much about the dementia experience, and about (...) what can be learned from persons with dementia and their networks of family, friends, and carers. It also suggests that dementia may be best thought of as an ecology that arises from the interaction between neuropathological change, people, language, and meaning. While challenging, this perspective may provide new ways of responding to dementia and caring for those affected by it. (shrink)

Learning from the profound challenge of dementia is an urgent priority. Success will require a critical deconstruction of current cultural and linguistic representations of this condition, and a kindling of novel and courageous approaches to re-conceptualise dementia's meaning and experience. This symposium collects provocative ideas arising from various discourses, theoretical perspectives, and methodolgical approaches to explore new ways to understand dementia.

Among the far-reaching impacts of COVID-19 is its impact on care systems, the social and other systems that we rely in to maintain and provide care for those with “illness.” This paper will examine these impacts through a description of the influence on palliative care systems that have arisen within this pandemic. It will explore the impact on the meaning of care, how care is performed and identified, and the responses of palliative care systems to these challenges. It will also (...) highlight the current and potential future implications of these dynamics within the unfolding crisis of this pandemic. (shrink)

Real Language Series General Editors:Jennifer Coates, Jenny Cheshire, Euan Reid This is a sociolinguistics series about the relationships between language, society and social change. Books in the series draw on natural language data from a wide range of social contexts. The series takes a critical approach to the subject, challenging current orthodoxies, and dealing with familiar topics in new ways. Gender and Discourse offers a critical new approach to the study of language and gender studies. Women moving into the (...) public domains of power traditionally monopolised by men are creating new identities for themselves, and the language that is used by them and about them offers an insight into gender roles. Clare Walsh reviews the current dominance/difference debates, and proposes a new analytical framework which combines the insights of critical discourse and feminist perspectives on discourse to provide a new perspective on the role of women in public life. A superbly accessible book designed for students and researchers in the field, the book features: - topical case studies from the arenas of politics, religion and activism- a new analytical framework, also summarised in chart form so the reader can apply their own critical analyses of texts. - written and visual text types for the reader's own linguistic and semiotic analysis. 'This important book takes up a neglected question in the study of language and gender - what difference women make to the discourse of historically male-dominated institutions - and brings to bear on it both the insights of feminist scholarship and evidence from women's own testimony. Clare Walsh's analysis of the dilemmas women face is both subtle and incisive, taking us beyond popular 'Mars and Venus' stereotypes and posing some hard questions for fashionable theories of language, identity and performance. (shrink)

This introduction to a special section on ‘Photography and the State’ reflects on trends in photography theory exemplified in essays by Jens Andermann, Ariella Azoulay, Andrea Noble, and Bronwyn Law-Viljoen. It suggests that the contributors make a powerful argument for photography’s emergent contribution to theories of the state and of sovereignty. It situates this work in the context of a growing body of scholarship (by theorists such as Natalia Brizuela, Paula Cortés-Rocca, Clare Harris, Chris Pinney, and Karen Strassler) attuned (...) to photography’s role in political imagination in post-colonial and post-imperial spaces, and underscores movement of the field away from inter-subjective conceptions of photographic ethics and debates about indexicality. (shrink)

Materializing absence, Jenny Hockey, Carol Komaromy and Kate Woodthorpe -- Never say die: CPR in hospital space, Susie Page -- Making hospice space, Ken Worpole -- Dying spaces in dying places, Carol Komaromy -- The materialities of absence after stillbirth: historical perspectives, Jan Bleyen -- Distributed personhood and the transformation of agency: an anthropological perspective on inquests, Susan Langer -- Behind closed doors? corpses and mourners in English and American funeral premises, Sheila Harper -- Private grief in public spaces: interpreting (...) memorialisation in the contemporary cemetary, Kate Woodthorpe -- Wandering lines and cul-de-sacs: trajectories of ashes in the United Kingdom, Leonie Kellaher, Jenny Hockey and David Prendergast -- Natural burial: the de-materialising of death?, Andy Clayden, Jenny Hockey and Mark Powell -- What will the neighbours say? reactions to field and garden burial, Tony Walter and Clare Gittings -- Memorialising the suicide victim: "walking the walk," Caroline Simone -- Potent reminders: an examination of responses to roadside memorials in Ireland, Una McConville and Regina McQuillan -- Geographies of the spirit world, Douglas J. Davies -- Recovering presence, Jenny Hockey, Carol Komaromy and Kate Woodthorpe. (shrink)

Deep Rivers: Selected Writings on Tamil Literature. By François Gros. Translated by M. P. Boseman. Edited by Kannan M. and Jennifer Clare. Institut Français de Pondichéry Publications Hors Série, vol. 10. Pondichéry: Institut Français de Pondichéry and Tamil Chair, Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of California at Berkeley, 2009. Pp. xxxviii + 519.

Much of the philosophical work on perception has focused on vision. Recently, however, philosophers have begun to correct this ‘tunnel vision’ by considering other modalities. Nevertheless, relatively little has been written about the chemical senses—olfaction and gustation. The focus of this paper is olfaction. In light of new physiological and psychophysical research on olfaction, I consider whether olfactory experience is object-based. In particular, I explore the claim that “odor objects” constitute sensory individuals. It isn’t obvious—at least at the outset—whether they (...) meet the widely accepted principles of object individuation and recognition at work in the visual and auditory cases. Among the general issues I consider, then, is whether these traditional principles form necessary, or simply sufficient, conditions on object perception. As we see, at the very least, considering the object-recognition model of olfaction challenges us to look more closely at well-entrenched models of object perception. But the payoff of doing so is high. We not only learn something about a modality that philosophers have historically neglected; by asking new questions and challenging old assumptions, we also further our understanding of perception in general. (shrink)

Hastings Center Report, Volume 52, Issue S1, Page S21-S23, March‐April 2022.

In "What the Nose Doesn't Know", I argue that there are no olfactory illusions. Central to the traditional notions of illusion and hallucination is a notion of object-failure—the failure of an experience to represent particular objects. Because there are no presented objects in the case of olfactory experience, I argue that the traditional ways of categorizing non-veridical experience do not apply to the olfactory case. In their place, I propose a novel notion of non-veridical experience for the olfactory case. In (...) his (2011), Stevenson responds to my claim that there are no olfactory illusions. Although he agrees that it is natural—or at least commonplace—to think there are no olfactory illusions, he argues that there are and provides examples of them, many of which he suggests have analogues in the visual and auditory domains. In this paper, I examine the nature of the disagreement between us. I argue that Stevenson fails to argue against my conclusion that there are no olfactory illusions. (shrink)

Legal decision-making emphasizes, in a very self-conscious way, the justificatory significance of reasons. This paper argues that the obligation to provide reasons for choices, which must be articulated and structured around a set of generally shared and publicly comprehensible categories of thought, can serve to make the space of possible choices ‘concept sensitive’ in a very useful way. In particular, concept sensitivity has the effect of restricting certain movements within the choice space so that some of the systematic difficulties in (...) achieving an equilibrium in social choice which arise out of an excess of rational doing are avoided. The resulting equilibrium is path dependent. But because it is dependent on a choice path which ‘makes sense’ (or is ordered by thought precisely because it is concept sensitive), it is not the sort of arbitary path-dependent social choice which originally concerned Kenneth Arrow. This paper illustrates these points with examples from criminal law procedure, contract law and constitutional law. (shrink)

This study examines the relation between firms’ corporate philanthropic giving and their performance in three other social domains – employee relations, environmental issues, and product safety. Based on a sample of 384 U.S. companies and using data pooled from 1998 through 2000, we find that worse performers in the other social areas are both more likely to make charitable contributions and that the extent of their giving is larger than for better performers. Analyses of each separate area of social performance, (...) however, indicate that the relation between giving and negative social performance (cited concerns) only holds for the environmental issues and product safety areas. We find no significant association between corporate philanthropy and employee relations concerns. In general, these findings suggest that corporate philanthropy may be more a tool of legitimization than a measure of corporate social responsibility. (shrink)

ObjectivesTo describe reporting of informed consent in pragmatic trials, justifications for waivers of consent and reporting of alternative approaches to standard written consent. To identify factors associated with (1) not reporting and (2) not obtaining consent.MethodsSurvey of primary trial reports, published 2014–2019, identified using an electronic search filter for pragmatic trials implemented in MEDLINE, and registered in ClinicalTrials.gov.ResultsAmong 1988 trials, 132 (6.6%) did not include a statement about participant consent, 1691 (85.0%) reported consent had been obtained, 139 (7.0%) reported a (...) waiver and 26 (1.3%) reported consent for one aspect (eg, data collection) but a waiver for another (eg, intervention). Of the 165 trials reporting a waiver, 76 (46.1%) provided a justification. Few (53, 2.9%) explicitly reported use of alternative approaches to consent. In multivariable logistic regression analyses, lower journal impact factor (p=0.001) and cluster randomisation (p<0.0001) were significantly associated with not reporting on consent, while trial recency, cluster randomisation, higher-income country settings, health services research and explicit labelling as pragmatic were significantly associated with not obtaining consent (all p<0.0001).DiscussionNot obtaining consent seems to be increasing and is associated with the use of cluster randomisation and pragmatic aims, but neither cluster randomisation nor pragmatism are currently accepted justifications for waivers of consent. Rather than considering either standard written informed consent or waivers of consent, researchers and research ethics committees could consider alternative consent approaches that may facilitate the conduct of pragmatic trials while preserving patient autonomy and the public’s trust in research. (shrink)

In this paper, I write about nurses of colour who have made significant contributions to nursing, yet are actively ignored in traditional nursing textbooks related to colonized thinking. One consequence of this is that when we think about comparing the disparities of the past to the present day, we see that we have not made much of a difference. The disparity is still huge. I call on all of us as nurses to challenge ourselves to think beyond the box of (...) colonized thought to what we know is true. (shrink)

College cheating is prevalent, with rates ranging widely from 9 to 95% (Whitley, 1998). Research has been exclusively conducted with enrolled college students. This study examined the prevalence of cheating in a sample of college alumni, who risk less in disclosing academic dishonesty than current students. A total of 273 alumni reported on their prevalence and perceived severity of 19 cheating behaviors. The vast majority of participants (81.7%) report having engaged in some form of cheating during their undergraduate career. The (...) most common forms of cheating were “copying from another student's assignment” and “allowing others to copy from your assignment.” More students reported cheating in classes for their major than other classes. Males and females cheated at the same rates in classes for their major, and males reported higher rates of cheating than females in nonmajor classes. Respondents reported that their top reasons for cheating were “lack of time” and “to help a friend.”. (shrink)

College cheating is prevalent, with rates ranging widely from 9 to 95%. Research has been exclusively conducted with enrolled college students. This study examined the prevalence of cheating in a sample of college alumni, who risk less in disclosing academic dishonesty than current students. A total of 273 alumni reported on their prevalence and perceived severity of 19 cheating behaviors. The vast majority of participants report having engaged in some form of cheating during their undergraduate career. The most common forms (...) of cheating were “copying from another student's assignment” and “allowing others to copy from your assignment.” More students reported cheating in classes for their major than other classes. Males and females cheated at the same rates in classes for their major, and males reported higher rates of cheating than females in nonmajor classes. Respondents reported that their top reasons for cheating were “lack of time” and “to help a friend.”. (shrink)

A characteristically Humean pattern of explanation starts by claiming that we have a certain kind of feeling in response to some objects and then takes our having such feelings to provide an explanation of how we come to think of those objects as having some feature that we would not otherwise be able to think of them as having. This core pattern of explanation is what leads Simon Blackburn to dub Hume ‘the first great projectivist.’ This paper critically examines the (...) philosophical and textual basis for interpreting Hume as a causal projectivist. I argue that projectivist interpretations of Hume's account of causation are motivated by two convictions: that beliefs about causation, according to Hume, are not just beliefs about regularity relations and that believing that two events are necessarily connected, according to Hume, is not merely having a belief about something that occurs in one's mind. I suggest that the latter conviction is worth revisiting, both for textual and philosophical reasons. (shrink)

It’s been argued that there are no diachronic norms of epistemic rationality. These arguments come partly in response to certain kinds of counterexamples to Conditionalization, but are mainly motivated by a form of internalism that appears to be in tension with any sort of diachronic coherence requirements. I argue that there are, in fact, fundamentally diachronic norms of rationality. And this is to reject at least a strong version of internalism. But I suggest a replacement for Conditionalization that salvages internalist (...) intuitions, and carves a middle ground between conservatism and evidentialism. (shrink)

climate are both linked to an organization's ability to retain healthcare professionals and increase their level of job satisfaction, leaders have a corollary responsibility to address moral distress. We recommend that leaders should provide access to ethics education and resources, offer interventions such as ethics debriefings, establish ethics committees, and/or hire a bioethicist to develop ethics capacity and to assist with addressing healthcare provider moral distress....

I ask whether figure-ground structure can be realized in touch, and, if so, how. Drawing on the taxonomy of touch sketched in Katz's 1925 The World of Touch, I argue that the form of touch that is relevant to such consideration is a species of immersed touch. I consider whether we can feel the space we are immersed in and, more specifically, the empty space against which the surfaces of objects, as I shall urge, “stand out.” Harnessing M. G. F. (...) Martin's account of bodily awareness and touch, I defend a positive thesis, pace Graham Nerlich on whose The Shape of Space I otherwise rely, both to defend the supposition that empty space can in principle be felt and to argue that touching empty space is not a mere species of absence perception. Along the way, I defuse a causal worry that might be thought to arise in the case of touching empty space. (shrink)

ABSTRACTResearchers have suggested that religious individuals engage primarily in intuitive over analytic processing. We investigated a connection between specific aspects of religiosity and the attribution of causation to social and physical events. College undergraduates completed measures of religiosity online and were asked to determine the causes of events that varied in type, outcome, and likelihood, as well as the personality characteristics of the protagonist. Individuals with greater intrinsic religious orientation, fundamentalism, who viewed God as loving, who were more dogmatic, and (...) had an external locus of control were more likely to attribute supernatural phenomena to events compared to those lower in those traits. Supernatural causation was invoked more often when the character of the protagonist and the outcome of social event matched in valence than when they did not match. Individuals low and high in religiosity.. (shrink)

This case study details how and why integrating storytelling, empathy, and inclusive practice shifted QSuper, a large Australian finance organisation, from minimal awareness to moral awareness then moral capability in the delivery of services to Indigenous customers. During the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation, and Financial Services Industry, QSuper were recognised for their exemplary service with Indigenous customers (Hayne, Interim report: Royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services industry, Volume 1. Commonwealth of Australia, (...) 2018; _Transcript of Proceedings, 13 August_, Commonwealth of Australia, 2018). This position was in stark contrast to the inaccessible service offerings of other financial organisations where some used predatory practices to sell unethical financial products to Indigenous Australians (Hayne, Interim report: Royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services industry, Volume 1. Commonwealth of Australia, 2018; Hayne, Final report: Royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services industry, Volume 1. Commonwealth of Australia, 2019a). Storytelling garned from visiting customers in remote communities and other meaningful activities involving inclusive practice to facilitate ethical decision-making in finance is different to standard functionalist finance approaches (Schinckus, Int Rev Financ Anal 40:103–106, 2015). Two empathetic questions asked within QSuper complementing the storytelling, were: “What is the right thing to do by the customer?” and “How would I feel if this were my mother?” Exploration into the lived reality of moral capacity is important based on the Commission finding many of the 490,000 finance staff do not know how to provide ethical services to vulnerable customers, in particular remote Indigenous customers (Australian Bureau of Statistics. Labour force, Australia, detailed. ABS. Retrieved from https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour/employment-and-unemployment/labour-force-australia-detailed /latest-release, 2021; Hayne, Final report: Royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services industry, Volume 1. Commonwealth of Australia, 2019a). Furthermore, there is minimal literature on the role of Indigenous storytelling to heighten moral awareness in the finance industry which was found to lead to better ethical outcomes. (shrink)

Psychiatrists working with war veterans have, in recent years, constructed ‘moral injury’ as a separate manifestation of war trauma that is distinct from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. This paper argues that for moral degradation to occur, it necessarily involves one’s commissions or omissions that transgresses one’s personal morality, and hence, distinguishes sufferers of moral injury from PTSD sufferers who were witnesses to traumatic and morally abhorrent events. To this end, it clarifies how some of the situations surrounding moral injury are misunderstood, (...) by discussing the process of moral reasoning in the context of moral dilemmas, dirty hands, and moral blind alleys. Finally, it concludes that when we conceptualise moral injury as being caused by one’s commissions and omissions in moral dilemmas, we find that shame and guilt are situation-appropriate responses with a role to play in what ethics mean. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Feminist Studies 44, no. 2. © 2018 by Feminist Studies, Inc. 363 Ashley Glassburn Falzetti What Makes an Interdisciplinary Feminist Scholar? Preparing for the Unknown in a Skill-centered Curriculum I first read the 1998 special issue of Feminist Studies “Disciplining Feminism? The Future of Women’s Studies” in a monthly reading group of scholars from across the globe working on PhDs in women’s, gender, feminist, and/or queer studies (WGFQS).1 We (...) began meeting informally in the halls of the National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA) annual conference, discussing how our training compared and what sort of support was out there for scholars dissertating in WGFQS.2 What surprised us most while we re/read these articles was that the concerns about the field had not changed much in the twelve years that had passed since their original publication. Now that twenty years have passed, the concerns remain even though some of the controversies are settled. Despite claims about the impossibility of the women’s studies PhD, doctoral programs have flourished. In their introduction to the 1998 special issue, Nancy Hewitt and 1. I use WGFQS PhDs to refer to people who have earned a PhD from an interdisciplinary WGFQS doctoral program. The majority of WGFQS doctoral programs were founded on the ideals of interdisciplinarity. Some doctoral programs retained a joint-degree model that honors the multi-disciplinary origins of the field by requiring a major in a disciplinary field, such as English, history, psychology, or law. 2. The most active participants of this group included Sonja Thomas (who coordinated the discussions), Jennifer Musto, Stephanie Clare, Evangeline Heiliger, and Laura Foster. 364 Ashley Glassburn Falzetti Susan S. Lanser focus on the relationship between disciplinary formations and the possibility of formal preparation to conduct interdisciplinary research.3 As graduate programs were expanding, the role of methods in curriculum centered concerns over the efficacy of interdisciplinary training. Now that a critical mass of PhDs is trained in interdisciplinary WGFQS, a new understanding of the role of methods is emerging. Interdisciplinary feminist questions require scholars to employ new research skills regularly throughout their careers, thus preparing junior scholars to ask and answer questions well is more efficient than studying a range of methods. The Problem of Methods Throughout the early literature on WGFQS, there is slippage between discussing interdisciplinary methods and feminist methodology.4 Methods refer to the techniques researchers use to gather data, what Sally Kitch and Mary Margaret Fonow define in their study of WGFQS dissertations as “a technique for gathering evidence.”5 Feminist methodologies involve the ethical, political, and epistemological concerns that mark research as a distinctively feminist approach to inquiry. Slipping between discussions of feminist methodologies (on the dynamics of power, representation, and knowledge production) and disciplinary methods (how researchers gather data) has contributed to the sticky association of feminist interdisciplinarity as a “problem of methods.” Vivian May, one of the earliest WGFQS PhDs and former NWSA president, argues that the continued attachment to such disciplinary parameters “defused that potential” of interdisciplinarity as a means of transforming feminist modes of knowledge production.6 Arguments that feminist interdisciplinarity could be a more just or a more contextually objective 3. Nancy Hewitt and Susan S. Lanser, “Preface,” Feminist Studies 24, no. 2, special issue, “Disciplining Feminism? The Future of Women’s Studies” (Summer 1998): 236. 4. In addition to the 1998 special issue of Feminist Studies, see NWSA Journal 12, no. 2 (Summer 2000) and response essays across feminist studies journals between 2000 and 2003. 5. Sally L. Kitch and Mary Margaret Fonow, “Analyzing Women’s Studies Dissertations: Methodologies, Epistemologies, and Field Formation,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 38, no. 1 (Autumn 2012): 99–126. 6. Vivian May, “Disciplinary Desires and Undisciplined Daughters,” NWSA Journal 14, no. 1 (Spring 2002): 144. Ashley Glassburn Falzetti 365 approach to inquiry fueled the desire to build WGFQS PhD programs; however, the concern that interdisciplinarity is always already undisciplined led many departments to rely on disciplinary methods training when designing curriculum. The focus on methods as a means to interdisciplinarity assumes that traditional disciplines are best suited to intellectual inquiry or at least that WGFQS scholars need a disciplinary rationale for... (shrink)

Part graphic novel, part feminist and philosophical analysis, The Pregnancy ≠ Childbearing Project explores how pregnancy can be a meaningful and distinct phenomenon from childbirth and does not equate with childbearing or the production of children.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was met with condemnation from the European Union and the United States as an "unprovoked and unjustified military aggression" that undermines the liberal international order. However, some international relations scholars, such as John Mearsheimer, argue that Russia had genuine security concerns with regard to Ukraine and that the invasion was a response to the threat of NATO membership for Ukraine. Both liberal and realist perspectives on the invasion rely on the assumption of rational, (...) cost-benefit calculations by actors, but cultural factors and irreconcilable non-material interests may also be at play in shaping the actions and motivations of states. Understanding the cultural and national identity factors at play in the invasion of Ukraine is complex and difficult, but they cannot be ignored in attempting to understand and address the conflict. (shrink)

Dugald Stewart claims that conjectural history is ‘the peculiar glory of the latter half of the eighteenth century’. Yet it is hard to see why, in his view, conjectural histories are not merely confabulated just-so stories. This paper examines Stewart's views about the epistemic and moral value of conjectural history.

Previous research has identified different moral judgments in liberals and conservatives. While both care about harm/fairness (‘individualizing’ foundations), conservatives emphasize in-group/authority/purity (‘binding’ foundations) more than liberals. Thus, some argue that conservatives have a more complex morality. We suggest an alternative view—that consistent with conservatism as ‘motivated social cognition’, binding foundation activation satisfies psychological needs for social structure/security/certainty. Accordingly, we found that students who were dispositionally threat-sensitive showed stronger binding foundation activation, and that conservatives are more dispositionally threat-sensitive than liberals. We (...) also found that in a heightened threat situation liberals (especially social liberals) showed increased binding foundation activation. These results support the view that the binding foundations function differently in our moral cognition than the individualizing foundations. (shrink)

Since 1997 there has been a significant increase in the number and percentage of Kansas farmers who are women. Using Reskin and Roos’ model of “job queues and gender queues” I analyze changes in the agricultural industry in Kansas that resulted in more women becoming “principal farm operators” in the state. I find there are three changes largely responsible for women increasing their representation in the occupation: an increase in the demand for niche products, a decrease in the average farm (...) size, and greater societal acceptance of women as farmers. This study adds to the growing literature on women principal farm operators in developed countries, and is among the first to explore why women are becoming a larger percentage of the occupation in the United States. (shrink)

Describes the life and accomplishments of the scientist whom many scholars believe is both America's greatest philosopher and the father of American psychology.

As scholars integrate empirical approaches to ethical questions in healthcare, relational autonomy theory must inform research design and change practice. Qualitative approaches are well suited to issues where patient values play a central role, and they can be combined with relational autonomy theory to investigate the factors influencing autonomy-rich experiences. This paper draws upon my experience conducting bioethics research related to clinical trial decision-making to develop a systematic method for applying relational autonomy as a theoretical lens to qualitative health research. (...) The resultant practical guide utilizes Susan Sherwin’s theory of relational autonomy and presents an empirical method responsive to autonomy-relevant questions. (shrink)

The temporal period between the moment of deliberation and the execution of the intention varies widely—from opening an umbrella when one feels the first raindrops hit to planning and writing a book. I investigate the distinctive ability that adult human beings have to deliberate for their far future selves exhibited at the latter end of this temporal spectrum, which I term prospective deliberation. What grounds it when it is successful? And, why does it fail in some cases? I shall argue (...) that an agent is warranted in deliberating for a future self when her reasons give her the right kind of cross-temporal authority. I argue that this authority is distinctive and cannot be accounted for by theories of agential authority that take desires, value judgments, or willings as the ground of authority in standard cases of deliberation. According to the theory I propose having the right kind of cross-temporal agential authority is not only a matter of having epistemic access to a future self’s reasons or being the same metaphysical person as a future self, it requires confidence that the agent’s reasons support undertaking such a normative commitment and that that future self will see the normative force of those reasons as the agent sees them. In other words, cross-temporal agential authority requires that the past self and the future self share a normative perspective. I show that this further condition only obtains if the agent sees her reasons in deliberation as having certain features. (shrink)

Take full advantage of your dSLR camera, and do it with confidence Many people buy dSLR cameras for their flexibility, but find themselves so intimidated by all the options and controls that they rarely venture beyond the automatic mode. With a friendly tone and clear, understandable instruction, photographer and educator Jen Bebb introduces you to every mode and setting on your sophisticated dSLR. After thoroughly explaining shutter speed, aperture, depth of field, ISO, and basic composition, she offers direction on what (...) each camera mode does and when it should be used. You'll gain the confidence to use the entire feature set you paid for. Beginning dSLR users are often intimidated by the scene, semi-automatic, and fully manual modes on their cameras; this guide gently explains each mode and setting Uses a conversational tone and liberal examples to define and explain basic concepts including shutter speed, aperture, ISO, depth of field, and composition Covers how each camera mode works and when to consider using it Helps those new to dSLR photography to gain confidence and begin taking advantage of all the flexibility a dSLR offers Written by a professional photographer who is also known for her skill as an instructor, Beyond Auto Mode encourages new and less experienced dSLR users to take the next step toward creative control. (shrink)

It has now been 10 years since the framework for public health legal preparedness was put forth as a model to meet new public health challenges in the 21st century. Public health legal preparedness is defined as the “attainment by a public health system of specified legal of standards essential to the preparedness of the public health system.” The framework has continued to develop over time and four core elements have emerged to make up the basis for public health legal (...) preparedness. The four core elements are: laws and legal authorities; competency in using laws effectively and wisely; coordination of legally based interventions across jurisdictions and sectors; and information on public health laws and best practices. (shrink)

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 11, Issue 8, Page 33-35, August 2011.