The approach to critical realism, by D. Drake.--Pragmatism versus the pragmatist, by A. O. Lovejoy.--Critical realism and the possibility of knowledge, by J. B. Pratt.--The problem of error, by A. K. Rogers.--Three proofs of realism, by G. Santayana.--Knowledge and its categories, by R. W. Sellars.--On the nature of the datum, by C. A. Strong.

The covariant Klein-Gordon equation requires twice the boundary conditions of the Schrödinger equation and does not have an accepted single-particle interpretation. Instead of interpreting its solution as a probability wave determined by an initial boundary condition, this paper considers the possibility that the solutions are determined by both an initial and a final boundary condition. By constructing an invariant joint probability distribution from the size of the solution space, it is shown that the usual measurement probabilities can nearly be recovered (...) in the non-relativistic limit, provided that neither boundary constrains the energy to a precision near ℏ/t 0 (where t 0 is the time duration between the boundary conditions). Otherwise, deviations from standard quantum mechanics are predicted. (shrink)

Provider claims to conscientious objection have generated a great deal of heated debate in recent years. However, the conflicts that arise when providers make claims to the "conscience" are only a subset of the more fundamental challenges that arise in health care practice when patients and providers come into conflict. In this piece, the author provides an account of patient-provider conflict from within the moral tradition of St. Thomas Aquinas. He argues that the practice of health care providers should be (...) understood as a form of practical reasoning and that this practical reasoning must necessarily incorporate both "moral" and "professional" commitments. In order to understand how the practical reasoning of provider should account for the needs and commitments of the patient and vice versa, he explores the account of dependence provided by Alasdair MacIntyre in his book Dependent Rational Animals. MacIntyre argues that St. Thomas’ account of practical reasoning should be extended and adapted to account for the embodied vulnerability of all humans. In light of this insight, providers must view patients not only as the subjects of their moral reflection but also as fellow humans upon whom the provider depends for feedback on the effectiveness and relevance of her practical reasoning. The author argues that this account precludes responsive providers from adopting either moral or professional conclusions on the appropriateness of interventions outside the individual circumstances that arise in particular situations. The adoption of this orientation toward patients will neither eradicate provider-patient conflict nor compel providers to perform interventions to which they object. But this account does require that providers attend meaningfully to the suffering of patients and seek feedback on whether their intervention has effectively addressed that suffering. (shrink)

This volume brings together flux essays by an eminent scholar on the origins, development, and import of Kant's philosophy, chiefly in its metaphysical aspects. Four of these were separately published between 1924 and 1926, but until now have been difficult to obtain, despite great demand. Their appearance here will be welcomed. The thesis emerging from these studies is that the critical philosophy originates in metaphysical probings concerning the nature and presuppositions of being, and issues in doctrines which, despite psychological, epistemological, (...) and ethical presentation, are intended to have definite ontological import. --L. K. B. (shrink)

A time-symmetric formulation of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics is developed by applying two consecutive boundary conditions onto solutions of a time- symmetrized wave equation. From known probabilities in ordinary quantum mechanics, a time-symmetric parameter P0 is then derived that properly weights the likelihood of any complete sequence of measurement outcomes on a quantum system. The results appear to match standard quantum mechanics, but do so without requiring a time-asymmetric collapse of the wavefunction upon measurement, thereby realigning quantum mechanics with an important (...) fundamental symmetry. (shrink)

There is a great deal of interest in the relation between the status of women and fertility—by humanists, academics and policy-makers concerned with bringing about fertility declines. The three aspects of women's status most frequently linked to fertility are their education, employment and type of husband-wife interaction. Research to date has not given us a clear and consistent explanation of these relationships and has not confirmed causality. The effects of these three factors on fertility vary considerably across national boundaries and (...) even within different sectors of the same society. Some of the assumptions held by both researchers and policymakers must be re-thought in the interests of more useful future research and of sounder policy. (shrink)

Mind uploading speculation and debate often concludes that a procedure described as gradual in-place replacement preserves personal identity while a procedure described as destructive scan-and-copy produces some other identity in the target substrate such that personal identity is lost along with the biological brain. This paper demonstrates a chain of reasoning that establishes metaphysical equivalence between these two methods in terms of preserving personal identity.

Stone, J. Thoughts on supposed "Death of law".--Krishna Iyer, V. R. Jurisprudence and jurisconscience.--Sharma, G. S. Law and social change in India.--Sharma, S. D. The concept of justice in Manu.--Chand, H. Legal values for a developing country.--Ramarao, T. S. The new international law relating to the rights and duties of States.--Sinha, B. S. Custom and customary law in Indian jurisprudence.--Mazumdar, D. L. Techno-economic structure of our industrial society.--Subrahamanian, N. Law and social change.

Background: Emergency exception to informed consent regulation was introduced to provide a venue to perform research on subjects in emergency situations before obtaining informed consent. For a study to proceed, institutional review boards need to determine if the regulations have been met.Aim: To determine IRB members’ experience reviewing research protocols using emergency exception to informed consent.Methods: This qualitative research used semistructured telephone interviews of 10 selected IRB members from around the US in the fall of 2003. IRB members were chosen (...) as little is known about their views of exception to consent, and part of their mandate is the protection of human subjects in research. Interview questions focused on the length of review process, ethical and legal considerations, training provided to IRB members on the regulations, and experience using community consultation and notification. Content analysis was performed on the transcripts of interviews. To ensure validity, data analysis was performed by individuals with varying backgrounds: three emergency physicians, an IRB member and a layperson.Results: Respondents noted that: emergency exception to informed consent studies require lengthy review; community consultation and notification regulations are vague and hard to implement; current regulations, if applied correctly, protect human subjects; legal counsel is an important aspect of reviewing exception to informed-consent protocols; and IRB members have had little or no formal training in these regulations, but are able to access materials needed to review such protocols.Conclusions: This preliminary study suggests that IRB members find emergency exception to informed consent studies take longer to review than other protocols, and that community consultation and community notification are the most difficult aspect of the regulations with which to comply but that they adequately protect human subjects. (shrink)

In this study, we examined students' attitudes toward cheating and whether they would report instances of cheating they witnessed. Data were collected from three educational institutions in Singapore. A total of 518 students participated in the study. Findings suggest that students perceived cheating behaviors involving exam-related situations to be serious, whereas plagiarism was rated as less serious. Cheating in the form of not contributing one's fair share in a group project was also perceived as a serious form of academic misconduct, (...) although a majority of the students admitted having engaged in such behavior. With regard to the prevalence of academic cheating, our findings suggest that students are morally ambivalent about academic cheating and are rather tolerant of dishonesty among their peers. On the issue of whether cheating behaviors should be reported, our findings revealed that a majority of students chose to take the expedient measure of ignoring the problem rather than to blow the whistle on their peers. Implications of our findings are discussed. (shrink)

This volume aims to contextualize the development and reception of Husserl’s transcendental-phenomenological idealism by placing him in dialogue with his most important interlocutors – his mentors, peers, and students. Husserl’s “turn” to idealism and the ensuing reaction to Ideas I resulted in a schism between the early members of the phenomenological movement. The division between the realist and the transcendental phenomenologists is often portrayed as a sharp one, with the realists naively and dogmatically rejecting all of Husserl’s written work after (...) the Logical Investigations. However, this understanding of the trajectory of the phenomenological movement ignores the extensive and intricate contours of the idealism-realism debate. In addition to helping us better interpret Husserl’s attempts to defend his idealism, reconsidering the idealism-realism debate elucidates the relationship and differences between Husserl's phenomenology and the broader landscape of early 20th century German philosophy, particularly the Munich phenomenologists and the Neo-Kantians. The contributions to this volume reconsider many of the early interpretations and critiques of Husserl, inviting readers to assess the merits of the arguments put forward by his critics while also shedding new light on their so-called “misunderstandings” of his idealism. This text should be of interest to researchers working in the history of phenomenology and Husserlian studies. (shrink)

The wounds inflicted by Homer's warriors fascinate readers, since they are vividly described and often curious or even grotesque. Commentators have struggled to explain some of them since commentaries began: some of the explanations are more curious than the wounds. Not surprisingly, the commentaries have not usually been graced by a high standard of anatomical or, especially, physiological background knowledge, and are often misleading in these respects. When such knowledge is applied, some wounds which have appeared problematic become realistic, but (...) some which have been accepted as straightforward become problematic. (shrink)

A text book designed for a course in philosophy which is both introductory and terminal. Seeking to present philosophy not as a subject to be learned but as a task to be pursued, it presents short extracts from philosophers major and minor, arranged around topics "fundamental in a philosophy of life." On each topic are presented two conflicting solutions of the same problem. A capable instructor will be able to utilize these readings to advantage.--L. K. B.

BackgroundSystems medicine is the name for an assemblage of scientific strategies and practices that include bioinformatics approaches to human biology ; “big data” statistical analysis; and medical informatics tools. Whereas personalized and precision medicine involve similar analytical methods applied to genomic and medical record data, systems medicine draws on these as well as other sources of data. Given this distinction, the clinical translation of systems medicine poses a number of important ethical and epistemological challenges for researchers working to generate systems (...) medicine knowledge and clinicians working to apply it.DiscussionThis article focuses on three key challenges: First, we will discuss the conflicts in decision-making that can arise when healthcare providers committed to principles of experimental medicine or evidence-based medicine encounter individualized recommendations derived from computer algorithms. We will explore in particular whether controlled experiments, such as comparative effectiveness trials, should mediate the translation of systems medicine, or if instead individualized findings generated through “big data” approaches can be applied directly in clinical decision-making. Second, we will examine the case of the Riyadh Intensive Care Program Mortality Prediction Algorithm, pejoratively referred to as the “death computer,” to demonstrate the ethical challenges that can arise when big-data-driven scoring systems are applied in clinical contexts. We argue that the uncritical use of predictive clinical algorithms, including those envisioned for systems medicine, challenge basic understandings of the doctor-patient relationship. Third, we will build on the recent discourse on secondary findings in genomics and imaging to draw attention to the important implications of secondary findings derived from the joint analysis of data from diverse sources, including data recorded by patients in an attempt to realize their “quantified self.”SummaryThis paper examines possible ethical challenges that are likely to be raised as systems medicine to be translated into clinical medicine. These include the epistemological challenges for clinical decision-making, the use of scoring systems optimized by big data techniques and the risk that incidental and secondary findings will significantly increase. While some ethical implications remain still hypothetical we should use the opportunity to prospectively identify challenges to avoid making foreseeable mistakes when systems medicine inevitably arrives in routine care. (shrink)

This elementary introduction aims "to present a unified picture of Science"; it shows little concern for serious argument or alternative positions.--L. K. B.

A technical but lucid and relatively elementary discussion of the development of the physical concepts of space and time and the bearing of the parity hypothesis of Lee and Yang on the future course of this development.--L. K. B.

A revised edition of a work originally published in 1952, this book offers an entertaining exposé of various pseudoscientific fads and cults, from dowsing and flying saucers to flat earth theories and dianetics. It includes brief but responsible chapters on the theories of Wilhelm Reich, Count Korzybski, and J. B. Rhine.--L. K. B.

This well-translated and slightly revised edition of El Hombre en la Encrucijada approaches the problem of social crisis and creative integration of conflicting strains into higher "forms of material and spiritual life" with Spanish intimacy and terseness and with wide erudition in unusual combination with a sense of reality. Part II treats the modern period as a series of crises, roughly describable as the inception, spread, and ultimate failure of secular, scientific intellectualism. This work combines the usual "cultural heritage" and (...) "crisis" themes with striking success.--L. K. B. (shrink)

Noting the shift from the old science-vs.-religion conflicts to the cooler query, "In what sense and to what extent, if any, does religion involve knowledge?" Randall surveys the history of the question on the way to developing his thesis. Religion is socially indispensable, he holds; in it beliefs function not primarily as expressions of truth but as non-cognitive symbols directing the group's "organized expression of the feelings, actions, and beliefs... centering around the emotionally significant and valuable elements of their social (...) experience." Still, religion involves a kind of insight inasmuch as the use of its symbolism transforms experience and the way we view it; and there remains within it an important role for intelligence--"to clarify...the values to which we are actually consecrated."--L. K. B. (shrink)

Not a philosophical analysis or explication, this compact, lyrical study remains deliberately within the "organic" categories of biblical speech--which it is part of its purpose to exemplify--and with considerable success communicates the Christian conception of ethical life as man's response to God's self-revealing activity in history, to be understood only in terms of "the living continuity between man-in-God and man-in-man."--L. K. B.

The chief of these five essays is the effort of a composer and conductor, deeply attached to Kant and widely read in mathematics and popularized physics, to disclose in "music's innate design" a key to the nature of "subliminal" reality, the "Ever Present." Result: both the order of music and the order of subliminal reality are elliptical. The accompanying essays, of chiefly biographical interest, present a philosophical critique of the new mathematics and geometry by a doctrinaire young Kantian. -- L. (...) K. B. (shrink)