Berkeley's essay on vision was published in the spring of 1709. It was recognised at once as a book of considerable importance, and there was a second edition within the first year. The author was still only 24. His design, he wrote, was to show the ‘manner we perceive by sight the distance, magnitude and situation of objects’. Hitherto, writers on optics had ‘proceeded on wrong principles’.

The poet’s words: “A man’s reach should exceed his grasp” are not merely a command of what ought to be , they are a description of what is. Man has always been stretching himself beyond his own measure. He has a sense of the Infinite: Eternity has been set in his heart: he has not been content to look only on the things seen, his gaze has ever been towards the Unseen. Whatever stage of development he may have reached, he (...) seeks for, and strives after, what is above and beyond himself and his world. In science he tries to get behind the phenomenal reality as his senses apprehend it, to the noumenal , mind. In philosophy he endeavours to bring the multiplicity of his experience, outer and inner, into a unity that will evidence itself to his reason as coherent, and not contradictory. In morality he is not content with the customs and standards of the society of which he is a member; but conscious of their inadequacy, he conceives and aspires to realize an ideal adequate to his nature; his ought to be is always challenging his is . The impulse or motive of progress in all spheres of human interest and activity is “the best is yet to be.”. (shrink)

Patrick Lancaster Gardiner is best known and most widely esteemed for his work on the nature of historical explanation. By addressing the problem of the limits of objectivity in relation to a variety of philosophical issues, he presciently identified the source of a number of philosophical disputes well before they had properly developed. This was certainly the case in Gardiner's treatment of historical explanation, and it is true also of his later treatment of the claims of the personal versus (...) the impersonal in ethical life. (shrink)

The primary problems of philosophy are those "whose answers directly bear on our lives." Scriven believes definitive answers to primary questions can be given and justified, and he gives his answers in a straightforward, vigorous, no-holds-barred manner: judgments of greatness in art are usually best construed as expressions of personal preference; there is no God; "man is not just an animal or a machine, but yet he is an animal and a machine"; brain determinism is in no way incompatible (...) with free choice; it is rational to be moral. The work is intended as an introductory text, and could be good as such, despite the tendency for arguments to give way to sermons. The student would be forced to come to grips with philosophical questions by coming to grips with Scriven. Since alternative positions are not always indicated or presented in the strongest light, there is something left for the teacher to do.—A. E. J. (shrink)

There is limited knowledge about cancer patients' experiences of uncertainty while waiting for genome sequencing results, and whether prolonged uncertainty contributes to psychological factors in this context. To investigate uncertainty in patients with a cancer of likely hereditary origin while waiting for genome sequencing results, we collected questionnaire and interview data at baseline, and at three and 12 months follow up. Participants had negative attitudes towards uncertainty at baseline, and low levels of uncertainty at three and 12 months. Uncertainty about (...) genome sequencing did not change significantly over time [t = 0.660, p = 0.510]. Greater perceived susceptibility for cancer [r = 0.14, p < 0.01], fear of cancer recurrence [r = 0.19, p < 0.01], perceived importance of genome sequencing [r = 0.24, p < 0.01], intention to change behavior if a gene variant indicating risk is found [r = 0.29, p < 0.01], perceived ability to cope with results [r = 0.36, p < 0.01], and satisfaction with decision to have genome sequencing [r = 0.52, p < 0.01] were significantly correlated with negative attitudes towards uncertainty at baseline. Multiple primary cancer diagnoses [B = −2.364 [−4.238, −0.491], p = 0.014], lower perceived ability to cope with results [B = −0.1.881 [−3.403, −0.359], p = 0.016] at baseline, greater anxiety about genome sequencing [B = 0.347 [0.148, 0.546], p = 0.0012] at 3 months, and greater perceived uncertainty about genome sequencing [B = 0.494 [0.267, 0.721] p = 0.000] at 3 months significantly predicted greater perceived uncertainty about genome sequencing at 12 months. Greater perceived uncertainty about genome sequencing at 3 months significantly predicted greater anxiety about genome sequencing at 12 months [B = 0.291 [0.072, 0.509], p = 0.009]. Semi-structured interviews revealed that while participants were motivated to pursue genome sequencing as a strategy to reduce their illness and risk uncertainty, genome sequencing generated additional practical, scientific and personal uncertainties. Some uncertainties were consistently discussed over the 12 months, while others emerged over time. Similarly, some uncertainty coping strategies were consistent over time, while others emerged while patients waited for their genome sequencing results. This study demonstrates the complexity of uncertainty generated by genome sequencing for cancer patients and provides further support for the inter-relationship between uncertainty and anxiety. Helping patients manage their uncertainty may ameliorate psychological morbidity. (shrink)

This poem, first printed by Scaliger in his Ausonianae lectiones, lib. II c. 29, from a MS in the possession of Cuiacius, will also be found in Burman's anthologia Latina, vol. II p. 321, in Meyer's, no. 1032, and in Baehrens' poetae Latini minores, vol. V p. 350. In date, combining as it does the prosody of plānetae with the syntax of sex (for sexiens) denos, it can hardly be earlier than Prudentius and may easily be much later. It is (...) edited by Riese from eight MSS better than the Cuiacian, three of the 9th century, three of the 10th, one of the 11th, and one of the 12th: the best of these, and the only one of which he professes to give a full collation, is C, Aug. 167 at Karlsruhe. (shrink)

Is the tonal ordering of music, and the order of European triadic tonality in particular, the developed manifestation of an essential musical structure—a structure naturally suited to our human capacity to organize sounds musically? Historically and geographically, triadic tonality is a highly local phenomenon, limited to music beginning in the mid-seventeenth century and, until the nineteenth century, almost wholly confined to the Western European musical tradition. Some theorists accordingly regard tonality as a dispensable aesthetic convention—and one which, moreover, has had (...) its day. For many listeners, however, works within this tradition possess a distinctive ability to embody musical movement and expression. This paper examines Roger Scruton's defense of tonality as developed in the European common practice period. I examine his reasons for supposing that tonality is an ineliminable feature of sounds heard and understood as music. Those reasons, I conclude, are inconclusive; on their own they do not show that tonality either will or should persist as an authoritative musical order. Triadic tonality has, at best, an uncertain future. (shrink)

A well-chosen selection of readings from ancient and medieval philosophy, including such seldom-anthologized figures as Origen, Tertullian, Walter Burley, and Pomponazzi, and such seldom anthologized works as Augustine's De Magistro. One outstanding feature of the book is the inclusion of new translations of the pre-Socratics by John Wilkinson and of Aquinas' On Being and Essence by John Wellmuth. Several selections from Aquinas and Scotus plus Burley's On the Existence of Universals appear in English for the first time, all translated by (...) Wellmuth. Chapter introductions vary considerably in quality. This is probably the best work of its kind available.—A. E. J. (shrink)

The 86 verses of Dorotheus printed at the end of Koechly's Manetho, 33 of which had already been published by Salmasius in his exercitationes Plinianae or his diatribae de annis climactericis, were edited by Iriarte from a scrap of manuscript at Madrid, into which they had been copied, as we now know, from the first book of the astrological treatise of Hephaestion of Thebes, who took Dorotheus for his chief authority. To these 86 verses nearly 300 more, by far the (...) most of which are preserved in the second and third books, still unpublished, of Hephaestion's work, have now been added, in the catalogus codicum astrologorum Graecorum vol. vi pp. 67 and 91–113, by Mr W. Kroll, the best editor they could have found ; a scholar who combines critical talent, knowledge of Greek, and knowledge of astrology, more happily than any of his associates, and who has emended much of the very corrupt text with conspicuous ability and success. A good many additional corrections, chiefly grammatical and metrical, have been made by Mr Ludwich in the Rheinisches Museum for 1904, pp. 42–54. (shrink)

Increased knowledge of the gene–disease associations contributing to common cancer development raises the prospect of population stratification by genotype and other risk factors. Individual risk assessments could be used to target interventions such as screening, treatment and health education. Genotyping neonates, infants or young children as part of a systematic programme would improve coverage and uptake, and facilitate a screening package that maximises potential benefits and minimises harms including overdiagnosis. This paper explores the potential justifications and risks of genotyping children (...) for genetic variants associated with common cancer development within a personalised screening programme. It identifies the ethical and legal principles that might guide population genotyping where the predictive value of the testing is modest and associated risks might arise in the future, and considers the standards required by population screening programme validity measures . These are distinguished from the normative principles underpinning predictive genetic testing of children for adult-onset diseases—namely, to make best-interests judgements and to preserve autonomy. While the case for population-based genotyping of neonates or young children has not yet been made, the justifications for this approach are likely to become increasingly compelling. A modified evaluative and normative framework should be developed, capturing elements from individualistic and population-based approaches. This should emphasise proper communication and genuine parental consent or informed choice, while recognising the challenges associated with making unsolicited approaches to an asymptomatic group. Such a framework would be strengthened by complementary empirical research. (shrink)

The field of bioethics is calling for a new generation of scholars equipped with the normative, empirical, and practical knowledge and expertise to prioritize equity concerns largely underrepresent...

There is a well-established relationship between isolation and both morbidity and mortality in the context of addiction recovery, yet the protective effects of intimate and familial relationships have not been adequately assessed. The current paper uses the European Life In Recovery database to assess the association between relationship status and living with dependent children on recovery capital of people in recovery from drug addiction, operationalised by the Strengths And Barriers Recovery Scale. The study participants were drawn from the REC-PATH study (...) and supplemented by a second sample recruited by the Recovered Users Network across various European countries, resulting in a combined sample of 1,313 individuals completing the survey, primarily online. The results show that, in recovery, those who are married or co-habiting reported significantly greater recovery strengths and fewer barriers to recovery, and reported greater gains in recovery capital across their recovery journeys. Similar associations are found for participants who have dependent children living with them. There is also some indication that this association is stronger for female than for male participants. Finally, having more people that one can rely on and a greater proportion of people in recovery in the social network are both linked to greater recovery capital and greater self-reported growth in recovery capital. We conclude that this study provides further evidence in favour of a “social cure” in recovery, in which close familial ties are associated with stronger recovery resources. (shrink)

The Covid‐19 pandemic has revealed myriad social, economic, and health inequities that disproportionately burden populations that have been made medically or socially vulnerable. Inspired by state and local governments that declared racism a public health crisis or emergency, the Anti‐Racism in Public Health Act of 2020 reflects a shifting paradigm in which racism is considered a social determinant of health. Indeed, health inequities fundamentally rooted in structural racism have been exacerbated by the Covid‐19 pandemic, which calls for the integration of (...) antiracist praxis to promote ethical public health research processes. This commentary describes ways in which antiracist praxis—which emphasizes empowerment of traditionally marginalized populations—offers strategies to explicitly address power imbalance, stigmatization, and other consequences of structural racism in public health research. (shrink)

In an essay entitled “Freedom and Personality” I have contended that “intelligence is a principle of indetermination within us.” As I find that my argument, though to myself it appears incontrovertible, has not produced conviction in some quarters where I had hoped it might be effective, I can only suppose that, presumably by my own fault, it was not stated as clearly as it should have been. This must be my excuse for returning to the subject; in doing so I (...) shall try to be, to the best of my power, at once brief and lucid. (shrink)

_In _Challenging the One Best System_, a team of leading education scholars offers a rich comparative analysis of the set of urban education governance reforms collectively known as the “portfolio management model.”_ They investigate the degree to which this model—a system of schools operating under different types of governance and with different degrees of autonomy—challenges the standard structure of district governance famously characterized by David Tyack as “the one best system.” The authors examine the design and enactment of (...) the portfolio management model in three major cities: New Orleans, Los Angeles, and Denver. They identify the five interlocking mechanisms at the core of the model—planning and oversight, choice, autonomy, human capital, and school supports—and show how these are implemented differently in each city. Using rich qualitative data from extensive interviews, the authors trace the internal tensions and tradeoffs that characterize these systems and highlight the influence of historical and contextual factors as well. Most importantly, they question whether the portfolio management model represents a fundamental restructuring of education governance or more incremental change, and whether it points in the direction of meaningful improvement in school practices. Drawing on a rigorous, multimethod study, _Challenging the One Best System_ represents a significant contribution to our understanding of system-level change in education. (shrink)

We study the groups Gal L and Gal KP, and the associated equivalence relations EL and EKP, attached to a first order theory T. An example is given where EL≠ EKP. It is proved that EKP is the composition of EL and the closure of EL. Other examples are given showing this is best possible.

Cognitive theories of depression assert that negative self-referent cognition has a causal role in the development and maintenance of depression symptoms, but few studies have examined temporal associations between these constructs using intensive, longitudinal sampling strategies. In three samples of undergraduate students, we examined associations between change in self-referent processing and depression across 5 daily assessments (Sample 1, N = 303, 1,194 measurements, 79% adherence), 7 daily assessments (Sample 2, N = 313, 1,784 measurements, 81% adherence), and 7 weekly assessments (...) (Sample 3; N = 155, 833 measurements, 81% adherence). Random intercept cross-lagged panel models indicated large cross-lagged effects in two of the three samples (Samples 1 and 3 but not Sample 2), such that more negative self-referent thinking than usual was significantly associated with a subsequent increase in depression symptoms at the next time lag. Notably, change in depression from usual was not associated with increases in negative self-referent processing at the next time point in any sample. These findings suggest that change in negative self-referent processing may be causally linked to future increases in depression on a day-to-day and week-to-week basis, although confidence in this conclusion is tempered somewhat by a lack of replication in Sample 2. (shrink)

Introduction The goal of this project was to develop and validate a new tool to evaluate learners' knowledge and skills related to research ethics. Methods A core set of 50 questions from existing computer-based online teaching modules were identified, refined and supplemented to create a set of 74 multiple-choice, true/false and short answer questions. The questions were pilot-tested and item discrimination was calculated for each question. Poorly performing items were eliminated or refined. Two comparable assessment tools were created. These assessment (...) tools were administered as a pre-test and post-test to a cohort of 58 Indian junior health research investigators before and after exposure to a new course on research ethics. Half of the investigators were exposed to the course online, the other half in person. Item discrimination was calculated for each question and Cronbach's α for each assessment tool. A final version of the assessment tool that incorporated the best questions from the pre-/post-test phase was used to assess retention of research ethics knowledge and skills 3 months after course delivery. Results The final version of the REKASA includes 41 items and had a Cronbach's α of 0.837. Conclusion The results illustrate, in one sample of learners, the successful, systematic development and use of a knowledge and skills assessment tool in research ethics capable of not only measuring basic knowledge in research ethics and oversight but also assessing learners' ability to apply ethics knowledge to the analytical task of reasoning through research ethics cases, without reliance on essay or discussion-based examination. These promising preliminary findings should be confirmed with additional groups of learners. (shrink)

Although the Neo-Darwin Theory of Evolution is one of the most celebrated theories in science, nonetheless it has received many criticisms. These criticisms are documented and a new transdisciplinary theory of origin is introduced. Darwin's original argument was that natural selection, through heritable changes, changed simple organisms over time. These heritable changes are responsible for the complex plethora of life seen around us today. Darwin's original theory, however, was deconstructed after the fact into a mutation-based theory. This mutation-based theory in (...) its current form is an insufficient and indeed unnecessary transdisciplinary explanation. A subsequent statistical comparison between the six extant scientifically based primary theories of origin was undertaken and based on current biological knowledge a statistically significantly best fit phenotypic model emerged. (shrink)

Cicero's essay On Friendship (Laelius de amicitia) is of interest as much for the light it sheds on Roman society as for its embodiment of ancient philosophical views on the subjects of friendship. The Dream of Scipio was excerpted in late antiquity from Cicero's De Republica, a dialogue in six books which now only survives in fragmentary form. In the excerpt, which probably formed the conclusion to the dialogue, Cicero describes his vision of the cosmos and the rewards of immortality (...) that the good statesman can expect after death. This work is particularly important for its influence on later literature in the Middle Ages and Renaissance.Both dialogues are examples of the best Ciceronian prose. They are presented in this volume in the context of Cicero's philosophical writing. Their place in ancient thought and their literary characteristics are discussed fully in the introduction, while individual points of interpretation are dealt with in the commentary. The text of both works is new and will also be published in a forthcoming volume in the Oxford Classical Texts series. There is a separate appendix of notes on textual points. Text with translation and commentary. (Aris and Phillips 1991). (shrink)

Habituation is defined as a decline in responding to a repeated stimulus. After more than eighty years of research, there is an enduring consensus among researchers on the existence of 9-10 behavioral regularities or parameters of habituation. There is no similar agreement, however, on the best approach to explain these facts. In this paper, we demonstrate that the Sometimes Opponent Processes (SOP) model of stimulus processing accurately describes all of these regularities. This model was proposed by Allan Wagner as (...) a quantitative elaboration of Priming Theory, which states that the processing of a stimulus, and therefore its capacity to provoke its response, depends inversely on the degree to which the stimulus is pre-represented in short-term memory. Using computer simulations, we show that all the facts involving within-session effects or short-term habituation might be the result of priming from recent presentations of the stimulus (self-generated priming). The characteristics involving between-sessions effects or long-term habituation would result from the retrieval of the representation of the stimulus from memory by the associated context (associatively-generated priming). (shrink)

The excuse for publishing a new anthology of texts in ancient philosophy is that the effort is not a duplication of previous attempts, either in terms of the texts offered or the interpretations tendered. It is impossible to meet the first criterion for the pre-Socratics, since there is a concise and relatively agreed upon canon of material. What then of the interpretations offered in this volume? They are scant, unimaginative, and, in some cases, misleading. This is especially true in the (...) case of the sophists. Thus, Callicles' long speech from the Gorgias is quoted as representative of sophistical doctrine on the antithesis between nature and convention. The practice of quoting Plato on the sophists is hazardous at best. Why not, instead, print and analyze those intriguing fragments one and two of Antiphon's Περὶ ληθείας? Or if Plato is to be trusted in regard to the sophists, why not quote Protagoras' remarks in the Platonic dialogue of that same name? Or the excursion in the Theaetetus? These selections would present a much more complete picture of Protagoras' doctrines than the seven lines from the doxographical tradition that the editors supply. In addition, there appears to be little logic in the bibliographies. The only secondary source suggested for the sophists is Untersteiner's book. Havelock's The Liberal Temper in Greek Politics is equally controversial, but certainly more reliable. Or if J. H. Loenen's "Was Anaximander an Evolutionist?" could be dredged up from Mnemosyne, surely some material from the other journals could have been found for the sophists. After the pre-Socratics, the book offers about eighty-five pages of selections from Plato, one hundred pages from Aristotle, twenty-five pages from Hellenistic stoicism, Epicureanism, and skepticism and a concluding twenty pages from Plotinus. A novel and quite useful feature of the book is a thematic table which topically indexes the texts according to the editors' conception of the main branches of philosophy.--E. A. R. (shrink)

A non-technical review of the state of various of the life sciences—biology, genetics, ethology-as they provide data upon which to erect a philosophy of life. The philosophical problems taken up include emergence, the mind-body relation, and the relevance of evolutionary theory to questions in ethics. Thorpe is at his best when he is operating within the field of scientific biology, not so much as one reporting the results of specific research, but as one making an attempt to see some (...) unity in the total enterprise and results of the life sciences. From this perspective Thorpe finds organicism an hypothesis that is supported much more heavily than any form of reductivism, even at the level of molecular biology where Thorpe questions the mechanistic model that has been imposed, via information theory, on such elemental biological phenomena as gene structure and the working of DNA. Thorpe's philosophizing, however, though often suggestive, never takes the form of sustained argument, and one is sometimes hard put to draw the line between it and bits of biological speculation. Provocative and summative rather than definitive or original, but still quite worthwhile.—E. A. R. (shrink)

After a skillful interweaving of the ideas of past philosophers, which have been rapidly, but for the most part fairly, run through under his critical glance, Walsh concludes that Metaphysics as the explication of the first principles of discourse is not only possible, but unavoidable if one is to be a serious philosopher. But having accepted this much of the Aristotelian notion of Metaphysics-as-analysis, Walsh registers a modernized Kantian caveat in which he rejects the Ontological pretensions that some metaphysicians have (...) entertained: e.g., Aristotle's conception of Metaphysics as being also the science of separate substance. Consistent with this rejection is a rejection of a meaningful isomorphism between the first principles of discourse and the first principles of being. Thus, the former are in no way absolute, but must be seen in the context of the cultural and linguistic community in which they occur. In taking up the question of the justification of a set of metaphysical principles, Walsh avoids the fashionable but impossibly vague umbrella-term, "pragmatic justification," which he recognizes is a relic from the brasher days of Verificationism; but he still concludes that metaphysical statements can be neither true nor false, but, at best, consistent. There is much to take issue with in this book, but its clear style and frank but judicious appraisals of the opinions of other philosophers make it both a stimulating and informative introduction to the subject.—E. A. R. (shrink)

The translation here of Chenu's by now classic work is a slightly revised form of the original 1950 French edition, Introduction à l'étude de saint Thomas d'Aquin. The bibliography has been brought up to date and the translators have added two helpful indexes, one giving abbreviations used in the citations and a table of the Aquinian texts referred to, the other giving a list of Latin and Greek technical terms and the places where they occur and are defined or explained (...) in Chenu's text. Chenu's book has been a handbook in the best sense of the word since the time of its first appearance and English-language students of St. Thomas can be extremely grateful for this translation.—E. A. R. (shrink)

Researchers summoned a Baltimore County woman to an office at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health last spring to tell her the bad news. They had found a genetic threat lurking in her 7-year-old son's DNA—a mutant gene that almost always triggers a rare form of colon cancer. It was the same illness that led surgeons to remove her colon in 1979. While the boy, Michael, now 8, is still perfectly healthy, without surgery he is almost certain to develop (...) cancer by age 40.This genetic fortune-telling was no parlor trick. It was the product of astonishing advances in recent decades in understanding how genes build and regulate our bodies. And as scientists pinpoint new genes and learn to forecast the onset of more inherited disorders, millions of people are likely to demand their medical prognosis. (shrink)

Hare and Vlastos write on Plato, Anscombe, Ackrill, MacKinnon, Owen, and Bambrough on Aristotle, while Ryle gives some of the history of "Dialectic in the Academy." All of the essays were written especially for this volume, and most show a disappointing lack of polish. Vlastos' "Degrees of Reality in Plato" is an exception, and his thesis is an interesting reworking of a familiar criticism. Bambrough has the best offering on Aristotle: an approving assessment of Aristotle's doctrine and method of (...) employment of equivocal terms, an employment which Bambrough praises as "A Paradigm of Philosophy," and compares favorably with the Wittgensteinian doctrine of family resemblances.—E. A. R. (shrink)

Ferm's expanded Christian Theology makes Christianity scarcely distinguishable from the best of all possible ethical systems—and nothing more. But Christianity has always claimed to be much more, as have most religions. This claim can be challenged of course, but not by Ferm's uncritical and outdated use of biblical scholarship and criticism. He is careful to state that most of what he says about the historical status of Christianity is his opinion, and we can leave it at that.—E. A. R.

Along with other complete selections this volume contains the complete text of the Praise of Folly, The Handbook of the Militant Christian, and The Complaint of Peace. Dolan's translation achieves a freshness that recaptures the spirit that Erasmus' original texts must have had when he first published them. The commentary by Dolan is sympathetic and scholarly. This is by far the best inexpensive introduction to the thought of Erasmus.—E. A. R.

Edelstein's death in 1965 came when he had completed only four of eight projected chapters on the idea of progress in antiquity, and these four chapters in the history of this idea take us from Xenophanes to the start of the Augustan Age. What the book is best in is scholarship of the footnote sort. Edelstein's major thesis is that the ancients exhibited something more than an isolated or peripheral interest in progress, and that, consequently, the supposed antithesis between (...) the pagan, cyclic notion of time and the Christian, linear and progressive notion of time is a misguided oversimplification. But in his introduction, in which he discusses the notion of progress in general, Edelstein has failed to give an account of the relation of the notion of progress to the notion of historical time which would provide the critically justified ground for saying that emphasis on progress requires similar conceptions of time. Progressivism, after all, is, and in antiquity often was, compatible with catastrophism; and the latter is, at least in its ancient garb, out of step with the eschatological notion of history which finds expression in the Judaeo-Christian tradition. What Edelstein has done is to draw our attention to the polymorphous and detailed thought on progress in antiquity—often despite his own attempts to force a unity or organicism on the phenomena where there appears to be none. But when we go in search of the wider context, the conviction persists that the repeated forms and instances of progressivism in antiquity strain at but do not break free from the hegemony of moira and eternal return—even though it be not eternal return of the same.—E. A. R. (shrink)

This is a competent and sympathetic introduction to the life and thought of Leibniz. It reads, on the surface, like an encyclopedia article or a chapter in a critical history of philosophy. But there is a meta-critical strain governing the exposition. Within a limited space, Van Peursen has molded a presentation which manages to balance considerations of what was central to Leibniz' philosophy from Leibniz' point of view with issues which have special relevance for contemporary philosophy. For example, Van Peursen (...) devotes his longest chapter, "The Logic of an Optimal World: Truth, Freedom, God," to the teleological and ethical roots of Leibniz' ontology. Leibniz preferred to stress the nature/grace and best-of-all-possible-worlds aspects of this teleological ontology. But contemporary philosophy has difficulty relating to this way of expressing the Platonic notion of the primacy of the good over the true. So Van Peursen, while not neglecting Leibniz' focus, also draws attention to a modern reworking of this point: the idea, familiar to contemporary semiotic, that syntactics must ultimately be grounded in pragmatics. Beginning students will find this introduction readable and genuinely helpful. Teachers of philosophy will benefit from the author's historical acuity as well as the clarity of exposition. An index and a brief bibliography are included.--E. A. R. (shrink)

OBJECTIVES: To analyse the attitudes of medical personnel towards terminally ill patients and their right to be fully informed. DESIGN: Self-administered questionnaire composed of 56 closed questions. SETTING: Three general hospitals and eleven health centres in Granada (Spain). The sample comprised 168 doctors and 207 nurses. RESULTS: A high percentage of medical personnel (24.1%) do not think that informing the terminally ill would help them face their illness with greater serenity. Eighty-four per cent think the patient's own home is the (...) best place to die: 8.9% of the subjects questioned state that the would not like to be informed of an incurable illness. CONCLUSION: In our opinion any information given should depend on the patient's personality, the stage of the illness and family circumstances. Our study confirms that a hospital is not the ideal environment for attending to the needs of the terminally ill and their families. (shrink)

This slim volume can best be characterized as a condensed reworking of the theme of The Phenomenon of Man. Of course, as more and more of Teilhard's work becomes available, it becomes clear that everything he wrote is an earlier transcription or later reworking of the themes of "corpusculization," "biogenesis," "noogenesis," in short, Teilhard's dominantly stated theme of "anthropogenesis." To these teleologically generated levels of emergence of the primordial unity of spirit and matter-categoreally expressed in terms of the internal (...) relatedness of "inner" and "outer"—the theologian, and indeed Teilhard, would want to add Christogenesis—what St. Paul terms "the filling out of Christ's body." It seems hopeless to expect that Teilhard's sweeping synthesis will ever be able to meet the logical tests required by even the broad consensus in contemporary philosophy of science. Perhaps this consensus will have to be adjusted. But insofar as Teilhard claims to have presented a scientific theory, some criteria of meaning and truth will have to be met. But this is a challenge, not a rebuttal.—E. A. R. (shrink)

There are sound scholarly reasons for regarding anything published about or written by Teilhard de Chardin as "hot copy," but in the case of the present volume of letters it appears to be cult interests that are being exploited rather than scholarly interests that are being served. In the first place this translation includes only the second half of the French original, Lettres d'Hastings et de Paris. The French text included all of Teilhard's letters to his parents from 1908 through (...) his induction into the French Army in 1914, not simply the letters between 1912-after Teilhard returned to Paris from his scholasticate at Ore Place to resume his studies in biology and paleontology—and 1914. The publisher has inexcusably failed to note this fact in the proper place, viz., in de Lubac's introduction which was written for all of the letters, not simply for those from 1912 on. In the second place, it is simply not true to say, as the dust cover does, that these letters "provide another and indispensible key to the genesis of his [Teilhard's] thought." These letters bear witness to Teilhard's filial piety and provide, at best, obscure and oblique references to his intellectual growth. The letters are not valueless, but this English edition has been handled irresponsibly from the point of view of amount of material included, emphasis indicated, and price asked.—E. A. R. (shrink)

Quality and service improvement (QSI) research employs a broad range of methods to enhance the efficiency of healthcare delivery. QSI research differs from traditional healthcare research and poses unique ethical questions. Since QSI research aims to generate knowledge to enhance quality improvement efforts, should it be considered research for regulatory purposes? Is review by a research ethics committee required? Should healthcare providers be considered research participants? If participation in QSI research entails no more than minimal risk, is consent required? The (...) lack of consensus on answers to these questions highlights the need for ethical guidance. Three distinct approaches to classifying QSI research in accordance with existing ethical principles and regulations can be found in the literature. In the first approach, QSI research is viewed as distinct from other types of healthcare research and does not require regulation. In the second approach, QSI research falls within regulatory guidelines but is exempt from research ethics committee review. In the third approach, QSI research is deemed to be part of the learning healthcare system and, as such, is subject to a different set of ethical principles entirely. In this paper, we critically assess each of these views. While none of these approaches is entirely satisfactory, we argue that use of the ethical principles governing research provides the best means of addressing the numerous questions posed by QSI research. (shrink)

Despite recent advances in HIV prevention and treatment, high HIV incidence persists among people who inject drugs. Difficult legal and political environments and lack of services for PWID likely contribute to high HIV incidence. Some advocates question whether any HIV prevention research is ethically justified in settings where healthcare system fails to provide basic services to PWID and where implementation of research findings is fraught with political barriers. Ethical challenges in research with PWID include concern about whether research evidence will (...) be translated into practice; concerns that research might exacerbate background risks; and ethical challenges regarding the standard of HIV prevention in research. While these questions arise in other research settings, for research with PWID, these questions are especially controversial. This paper analyses four ethical questions in determining whether research could be ethically acceptable: Can researchers ensure that research does not add to the burden of social harms and poor health experienced by PWID? Should research be conducted in settings where it is uncertain whether research findings will be translated into practice? When best practices in prevention and care are not locally available, what standard of care and prevention is ethically appropriate? Does the conduct of research in settings with oppressive policies constitute complicity? We outline specific criteria to address these four ethical challenges. We also urge researchers to join the call to action for policy change to provide proven safe and effective HIV prevention and harm reduction interventions for PWID around the world. (shrink)

The third volume of Bréhier's seven volume history to be translated, and, like the previous two volumes, it is handsomely put together. Bréhier is perhaps at his best on the Medieval period in the history of philosophy, and, therefore, this volume will still be of value for serious students. As with the other volumes, the bibliographies have been updated.—E. A. R.

Twenty essays by fifteen British and American writers representing some of the best anglo-american Platonic scholarship dating, chiefly, from the fifties but with essays by Cherniss, Ryle, Vlastos, and Hackforth dating from the thirties. The later dialogues are the focus with nine of the essays treating the Theory of Forms explicitly. Included are essays by Ryle and Runciman on the Parmenides, and also the Vlastos-Geach exchange on the Third Man Argument. The Timaeus is covered by Cherniss' "On the Relation (...) of the Timaeus to Plato's Later Dialogues," and also by Vlastos' "The Disorderly Motion in the Timaeus" and Morrow's "Necessity and Persuasion in Plato's Timaeus." In all, a welcome collection.—E. A. R. (shrink)

With some exceptions, it appears that the non-incarcerated world spends little time, if any at all, thinking about how prisoners are treated, whether during detainment or incarceration, after release, or when being put to state-sanctioned death. Of course, in part this is understandable, as the processes of punishment for breaking the social contract have moved from being public spectacle (once serving as a display of the sovereign’s power and as simultaneous warning and entertainment for lookers-on) to a private and “strange (...) scientifico-juridical complex” (Foucault 1995, 19) with the veneer of “modernity” and “civility,” theoretically drawing a clear line between the horrors of the crimes committed and those of the punishment (Sarat 2014). But even in the 21st century, the distinction is fuzzy at best. Incarcerated populations around the globe continue to be at greater risk of infectious diseases than non-incarcerated persons in the same communities (see da Cruz and Rich 2014), prison .. (shrink)

Background Genuine uncertainty on superiority of one intervention over the other is called equipoise. Physician-investigators in randomized controlled trials need equipoise at least in studies with more than minimal risks. Ideally, this equipoise is also present in patient-participants. In pediatrics, data on equipoise are lacking. We hypothesize that 1) lack of equipoise at enrolment among parents may reduce recruitment; 2) lack of equipoise during participation may reduce retention in patients assigned to a less favoured treatment-strategy. Methods We compared preferences of (...) parents/patients at enrolment, documented by a questionnaire, with preferences developed during follow-up by an interview-study to investigate equipoise of child-participants and parents in the BeSt-for-Kids-study. This trial in new-onset Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis-patients consists of three strategies. One strategy comprises initial treatment with a biological disease-modifying-antirheumatic-drug, currently not standard-of-care. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 23 parents and 7 patients, median 11 months after enrolment. Results Initially most parents and children were not in equipoise. Parents/patients who refused participation, regularly declined due to specific preferences. Many participating families preferred the biological-first-strategy. They participated to have a chance for this initial treatment, and would even consider stopping trial-participation when not randomized for it. Their conviction of superiority of the biological-first strategy was based on knowledge from internet and close relations. According to four parents, the physician-investigator preferred the biological-first-strategy, but the majority stated that she had no preferred strategy. In phase 2, preferences tended to change to the treatment actually received. Conclusions Lack of equipoise during enrolment did not reduce study recruitment, mainly due to the fact that preferred treatment was only available within the study. Still, when developing a trial it is important to evaluate whether the physicians’ research question is in line with preferences of the patient-group. By exploring so-called ‘informed patient-group’-equipoise, successful recruitment may be enhanced and bias avoided. In our study, lack of equipoise during trial-participation did not reduce retention in those assigned to a less favoured option. We observed a change for preference towards treatment actually received, possibly explained by comparable outcomes in all three arms. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Demography of Roman Egypt. Cambridge Studies in Population, Economy and Society in Past Time 23John WhitehorneRoger S. Bagnall and Bruce W. Frier. The Demography of Roman Egypt. Cambridge Studies in Population, Economy and Society in Past Time 23. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. xix + 354 pp. 22 figs. 21 tables. Cloth, $49.95.“And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from (...) Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.... And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.” Thus the familiar words of Luke 2:1, 3, telling of the return of Joseph and Mary from Nazareth to be registered in their own home town of Bethlehem.We have no census returns from ancient Judaea. What we do have, however, are 300 or so returns from Roman Egypt, written on papyrus and submitted to the local authorities in connection with a similar house-to-house census which was held every 14 years from early in the reign of Augustus until the mid-third century A.D. The returns detail the composition of individual households, including in many cases tenants and slaves as well as family members, and constitute perhaps the best source available for the study of any ancient population. It is these texts which form the basis of Bagnall and Frier’s study.This is not, of course, the first time that the demographic importance of this body of evidence has been recognised. The information contained in the census returns was brought together and comprehensively discussed as long ago as the 1950s by M. Hombert and C. Préaux, Recherches sur le recensement dans l’Égypte romaine, Leiden 1952. But many more documents have been published since then and the science of demography itself has developed considerably in the last 40 years. As a result The Demography of Roman Egypt represents a quantum leap forward in the study of Roman Egypt’s population.The book is divided into two parts. The first, written mainly by Frier, analyses and interprets the data and makes use of the techniques of modern demography [End Page 341] to construct as full a picture as possible of the population of Roman Egypt throughout the 250 years covered by the census returns. The second consists of a Catalogue, in which Bagnall sets out all the known returns in their chronological and topographical order. Bagnall has examined all available texts, many in the original, and corrected and improved the reading of many of them in a series of articles in BASP 1990–93. His results are summarised here in a form comprehensible to the nonspecialist reader and there can be no doubt that the study’s database is as accurate, complete and up-to-date as is humanly possible to make it.This does not mean, however, that what finally emerges from the evidence is anywhere near a complete portrait of an ancient population. The majority of the census returns come from only three nomes (the Arsinoite with its three merides, the Oxyrhynchite, and Prosopite, representing the Fayum, Middle Egypt and the Delta respectively) out of a total of some 50. They are concentrated almost entirely in the second century A.D., with the examples from the Prosopite deriving almost entirely from the census of 173. Nevertheless throughout their work the authors remain alert to the chronological and geographical limitations of their data and sensible of the dangers of pushing their conclusions too far. The result is the construction of a hypothetical population, which probably corresponds quite closely to the historical ancient population of the Arsinoite and the Oxyrhynchite, which remain the two best documented regions of Greco-Roman Egypt.The first part of the book begins with a chapter on the history of the census insofar as it is known, the census process and the uses which the government made of the information extracted. Chapter 2 considers the value of the census returns as demographic evidence and the relationship of the census population as reconstructed from the data to the actual population of Roman Egypt. In Chapters 3–8 we are introduced to the census population itself, with chapters... (shrink)