As a means of conveying difficult personal experiences, illness narratives and their analysis have the potential to increase awareness of patients’ lives and circumstances. Becoming sensitised to the linguistic texture of narrative offers readers a means of increasing narrative understanding. Using the fictional narrative of The Bell Jar , this paper outlines a novel method for exploring the language of illness narratives. Corpus stylistics provides new insights into narrative texture and demonstrates the importance of recurrent linguistic features in shaping meaning. (...) The paper concludes by proposing the application of a similar methodology to non-fictional illness narratives in therapeutic contexts. (shrink)

Some authors, such as Felix Oppenheim, Will Kymlicka and Ronald Dworkin, have claimed that the notion of degrees of freedom makes no sense, or in any case plays no part in a liberal theory of justice. Their various arguments can be classed as ontological, epistemological and normative, given that they aim to show, respectively, that there is no such thing as overall freedom, that overall freedom cannot be measured, and that overall has no normative importance. For these authors the (...) freedom of a person to do a specific thing is the only kind of freedom that exists, or the only kind that we can know about, or the only kind that matters. In answer to the ontological objection, it can be shown that there is such a thing as overall freedom if there is such a thing as specific freedoms, given that one can quantify over each of the elements of the triadic relation in which a specific freedom consists. The normative objection is answered in chapters 2 and 3, and the epistemological objection in chapters 7-9. (shrink)

For two decades, egalitarian analytical philosophers have sought to identify the metric to be employed in order to ascertain whether any distribution is equal or not. This essay provides a review of the seminal contributions to this debate by Amartya Sen, Ronald Dworkin, Richard Arneson and G.A. Cohen.

I Several years ago, when the Carter administration announced that it would support congressional action to end the public fund ing of abortions, the President was asked at a press conference whether he thought that such a policy was unfair; he responded, "Life is unfair." His remarks provoked a storm of controversy. For other than those who, for principled reasons, opposed abor tion on any grounds, it seemed that the President's comments were cruel, violating what was thought to be (...) an American com mitment to providing equal access to health services to all citi zens, regardless of their capacity to pay. Those sentiments had, in fact, been reflected in public opinion polls that had, for at least three decades, indicated that Americans supported the propo sition that the government should guarantee health care to all. Ultimately, those beliefs had been translated into the oft-ex 1 pressed political demand for a one-class system of health care. This commitment to equality is rather remarkable. American society evidences a striking willingness to tolerate vast inequal ities with regard to income and wealth. While it guarantees ed ucation to all children, there is not even a pretense that the children of the wealthy and the children of the poor ought to get precisely the same kind of schooling. While some commitment 'Hazel Erskine. "The Polls: Health Insurance," Public Opinion Quarterly, XXXIX (Spring, 1975), 128-143. (shrink)

Discourse around assisted colonization focuses on the ecological risks, costs, and uncertainties associated with the practice, as well as on its technical feasibility and alternative approaches to it. Nevertheless, the ethical underpinnings of the case for assisted colonization are claims about the value of species. A complete discussion of assisted colonization needs to include assessment of these claims. For each type of value that species are thought to possess it is necessary to determine whether it is plausible that species possess (...) the type of value and, if so, to what extent their possessing it justifies assisted colonization. I conducted such an assessment for each of the predominant types of value ascribed to species: ecological, instrumental (including option value), existence, and intrinsic value (including interest‐based, objective, and valuer‐dependent intrinsic value). The vast majority of species, including several that have been proposed as candidates for assisted colonization, have much less value than is often presumed. Moreover, with respect to some types of value, assisted colonization would not fully preserve the value of the target species even if it were to keep the target species in existence. Therefore, the case for assisted colonization is significantly weaker and more qualified than its advocates often suppose. There may be exceptional species for which assisted colonization is well justified—and for this reason, case‐by‐case assessment is necessary—but in general the burden of justification generated by the ecological risks associated with assisted colonization is not met by the value potentially preserved by assisted colonization. This suggests that assisted colonization ought to have, at most, a very minor role in the portfolio of ecosystem management practices, even as it pertains to species conservation under conditions of rapid climate change. (shrink)

In this paper I explore the extent to which a perspectival understanding of scientific knowledge supports forms of “scientific pluralism.” I will not initially attempt to formulate a general characterization of either perspectivism or scientific pluralism. I assume only that both are opposed to two extreme views. The one extreme is a (monistic) metaphysical realism according to which there is in principle one true and complete theory of everything. The other extreme is a constructivist relativism according to which scientific claims (...) about any reality beyond that of ordinary experience are merely social conventions. (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to call the separation of reason and religion into question.

The problem of providing mandated medical care has become commonplace as correctional systems in the United States struggle to manage unprecedented increases in its aging prison population. This study explores older incarcerated women’s perceptions of prison health care policies and their day-to-day survival experiences. Aggregate data obtained from a sample of 327 older women residing in prison facilities in five Southern states were used to identify a baseline of health conditions and needs for this vulnerable group. With an average of (...) 4.2 chronic health conditions, frequently histories of victimization, and high rates of mental health issues, the women’s experiences of negotiating health care was particularly challenging. By incorporating the voices of older women, we expose the contradictions, dilemmas, and obstacles they experience in their attempts to obtain health care. It is clear from the personal accounts shared that, despite court mandates, penal harm practices such as delaying or denying medical treatment as well as occasional staff indifferences are common in women’s prisons. With older women having the greatest need for health care, an age- and gender-sensitive approach is recommended. (shrink)

First published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

All these specialist aspects of one life are different facets of the intellectual diamond which scintillates in the huge quarry of The Bertrand Russell Archives at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario. This is the quintessential man, the bundle of contradictions passionately dedicated to intellect, at times carrying the rational argument to irrational extremes; the natural-born emotional adventurer forever hampered by orphaned youth and too-early marriage. This Russell in the round is greater than the sum of his constituent parts, a man of (...) epic proportions, struggling through a lifetime beset with frustration and near-disaster; in youth the constitutional sceptic, in old age the sometimes splendid figure with "courage never to submit or yield.". (shrink)

This paper critically appraises the applied action-guide approach to bioethics and finds it wanting in two ways: it is tethered to a social contract view of the doctor-patient relationship that is largely incompatible with experiences of illness and care; and, as a formalist doctrine, it lacks critical edge and tends toward accommodationism. An alternative approach is recommended that involves interpreting moral experience by means once associated with the rhetorical arts — practical reasoning, hermeneutics, casuistry, and thick description.

Toward the end of the Nomadology plateau of A Thousand Plateaus, Deleuze and Guattari differentiate an ambulant holey space from the smooth space of the nomadic war machine and the striated space of the sedentary State apparatus. Although Deleuze and Guattari only discuss the concept briefly, holey space provides a useful means of framing their remarks on music in general. Music’s holey space is a quasi-territory determined by processes of following sonic movement-matter. Its instruments differ from nomadic weapons and sedentary (...) tools, being characterized by directions of injection, ejection and parajection; the vector of lines of the universe and extemporality; the model of free play; the trait of expression of incantation; and the tonality of affects-percepts. A paradigmatic instance of musical holey space is John Luther Adams’ Inuksuit as performed on the U.S.-Mexico border in 2018. (shrink)

Professor Veatch's writings have a special significance here. In recent years he has been more concerned than most to accept this responsibility, and more concerned than many to insist upon its importance. Drawing out some of the implications of his earlier Intentional Logic and still—as then—relatively unconcerned about the fate of any particular necessary truth, he has attempted to relate a realistic doctrine of necessity to some non-realistic doctrines. His is, it should be remarked, not a realism which for its (...) logical inspiration finds anything of use in such random realists as Peirce or Cook Wilson; rather, there are muffled echoes of the early Russell and Moore, confident quotations from Aquinas, and a very firm reliance on the finality of the Aristotelian predicables. (shrink)

Disturbed by these acrimonious arguments, the authors - former colleagues and university-press board members - embarked on an ambitious project to reexamine a number of major literary and philosophical works dealing with the liberal arts and education. With their discussions ranging from Plato to Rousseau, from Cicero to Vico, from Erasmus to Matthew Arnold, Sousa and Weinsheimer offer not a history of education philosophy but an examination of the present.

In October of 2009, Trevor Keezer was terminated by Home Depot for refusing to remove a pin from his uniform declaring “One Nation under God, Indivisible.” Mr. Keezer, a cashier with Home Depot, contended that the button he had worn for over one year before any action was taken by his employer expressed his support for American troops and his Christian faith. Were the actions taken by his employer warranted or was Mr. Keezer the victim of arbitrary religious discrimination unrelated (...) to job performance? Religion is becoming an increasingly polarizing issue in the workplace, forcing retail managers to balance the respective interests of employees, coworkers, and patrons of retail establishments. And from all indications, if legislation pending in Congress is enacted, maintaining the balance will become more problematic. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn April of 2000, Diana Levine went to a clinic in Vermont suffering from a migraine headache. She was given the drug Demerol for the migraine symptoms and Phenergan for nausea. Complications with the administration of Phenergan ultimately resulted in Ms. Levine contracting gangrene, necessitating the amputation of her right arm. Ms. Levine sued the drug maker, Wyeth Pharmaceutical, in state court and prevailed. The lower court's decision was appealed by Wyeth to the state supreme court where the ruling was (...) confirmed. Wyeth next appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court which, to the surprise of many observers, affirmed the judgment of the state supreme court. At issue was the fundamental question of the ability of consumers to obtain redress against negligent manufacturers in state courts. Wyeth's arguments to the Court were based upon preemption: Foodand Drug Administration approval of a drug preempts the ability of injured consumers like Ms. Levine to recover in state courts despite years of precedent to the contrary. Ability to recover damages in state courts represents, perhaps, the most important safety net available to consumers injured by defective products. A ruling by the Supreme Court that FDA‐approved labeling of pharmaceuticals preempts the reach of the state courts would have severely compromised the balance of power between consumers and producers. (shrink)

Le Temple d’Hathor à Dendara: Relevés et étude architecturale. By Pierre Zignani. Bibliothèque d’Étude, vol. 146/1. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale, 2010. Pp. xii + 425, 39 plates.

Papers presented at a symposium on philosophy and medicine at the Institute for the Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch in 1974 were published in the inaugural volume of this series.