Registered nurses in psychiatric-mental health nursing continuously balance the ethical principles of duty to do good (beneficence) and no harm (non-maleficence) with the duty to respect patient choices (autonomy). However, the problem of nurses’ level of control versus patients’ choices remains a challenge. The aim of this article is to discuss how nurses accomplish their simultaneous responsibility for balancing patient safety (beneficence and non-maleficence) with patient choices (autonomy) through the theory of protective empowering. This is done by reflecting on interview (...) excerpts about caring from 17 registered nurses taking part in a grounded theory study conducted in three acute urban psychiatric hospital settings in Canada. The interplay between the protective and empowering dimensions of the theory of protective empowering was found to correspond with international, national, and local nursing codes of ethics and standards. The overall core process of protective empowering, and its associated reflective questions, is offered as a new lens for balancing patient safety with choices. (shrink)

This highly readable book is aimed at anyone with an interest in the food they eat. In conversational tone, and avoiding academic jargon, it provides an honest and objective account of the consequences of food consumption choices and policies, through the lens of economics.

Why are we interested in history at all? Why do we feel the need to distinguish between past and present? In this book, the author argues that the past originates from an experience of rupture separating past and present. Think of the radical rupture with Europe's past that was effected by the French and the Industrial Revolutions. Sublime Historical Experience investigates how the notion of sublime historical experience complicates and challenges existing conceptions of language, truth, and knowledge. These experiences of (...) rupture are paradoxical since they involve both the separation of past and present and, at the same time, the effort to overcome this separation in terms of historical knowledge. The experience unites feelings of loss/pain with those of love/satisfaction, and thus is in agreement with how sublime experience is ordinarily defined. The experience is also precognitive since it precedes historical knowledge. As such it is a challenge to traditional conceptions of the relationship between experience and truth or language. It compels us to disconnect the notions of experience and truth. (shrink)

ch. 1. A-L -- ch. 2. M-S -- ch. 3. T-I︠A︡.

This work penetrates difficult ethical issues by examining human experience and reasoning in conjunction with actual choices of action.

Vleeskens, F. D. A. Spinoza en zijn tijd.--Klever, W. N. A. Ervaring en rede.--Petry, M. J. De Regenboog.--Bend, J. G. van der. Spinoza's liberale rechtsstaat.--Sperna Weiland, J. Vrijheid.

Dr Taylor's book analyses the disease concept as it developed in medical history and seeks to clarify it with the help of concepts largely derived from logical class theories. A solution is proposed to the problem of how to distinguish between the class of 'patients' and the class of 'healthy persons' which corresponds to the actual diagnostic practices of doctors. The earliest theories of disease postulated concrete entities which exist independently of the body. The notion of disease entity has lost (...) its original ontological connotations and instead its important feature has become the possession of a unitary and self-contained character. Dr Taylor describes the modern theories as essentially 'reactive' in character, that is the symptoms of a disease are the bodily reactions to the 'noxae'. After seeing the subject in its historical content, Dr Taylor goes on to discuss in detail the notion of the classification of diseases, making extensive use of modern views on the logic of classes. (shrink)

Looks at similarities between Eastern philosophy and Western physics, the connection between cell communicatioin and the immune system, and linguistic properties of the genetic code.

An adamant fan of Darwin, F.W. Headley attempts to argue the difficulties of believing in Socialism and Darwinism simultaneously and highlights issues which could prevent Socialism from being put into practice. Originally published in 1909, this study uses examples of communities in countries such as England and India to illustrate Headley’s key belief that societies only function well if they do not interfere with the fight for existence and natural selection. This title will be of interest to students of Philosophy, (...) Sociology and Anthropology. (shrink)