The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held, in Brader v. Allegheny General Hospital, 167 E3d 832, that the Health Care Quality Improvement Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 11101-11152, shields a Pennsylvania hospital from a surgeon's claims of contract violations.The plaintiff, Alan Brader, M.D., joined Allegheny General Hospital's provisional medical staff in July 1988. During the next two years, he performed several abdominal aortic aneurysm repairs and various other operations. Several of Brader's patients sustained serious injuries or died during (...) surgery from complications. In 1989, Brader's supervisors, Drs. Daniel Diamond and George Magovern, met to discuss their dissatisfaction with Brader's behavior, his departures from hospital protocol, as well as his disruptive presence in the hospital. From 1989 to 1990, Brader continued to perform surgical procedures on incoming patients, and he continued to violate hospital notification protocol and lost a patient during surgery. In spring 1990, the Quality Assurance Department compiled data on AAA procedures for the hospital's physicians. (shrink)

Dans les sociétés pluralistes, qui n'ont pas en commun un ensemble de valeurs éthiques, sociales et politiques, l'interprétation juridique est sous tension permanente. Les interprétations justes - c'est-à-dire les interprétations qui reflètent une conception partagée de la justice - peuvent être juste des interprétations ; autrement dit, des interprétations qui correspondent seulement aux aspirations et aux intérêts de différents groupes sociaux. Dans ce livre, Michel Rosenfeld s'affronte à cette crise de l'interprétation juridique. Il présente une évaluation critique des principaux (...) courants de la théorie du droit contemporaine aux Etats-Unis et en France et propose une approche différente. L'analyse de Michel Rosenfeld porte aussi bien sur le néo-formalisme, le pragmatisme, la théorie du discours, que la théorie autopoiétique. Elle comporte un examen des thèses des principaux auteurs et notamment de Habermas, Rorty, Posner, Luhmann, Dworkin, Fish et Weinrib. Pour remédier à certaines insuffisances de ces thèses, à propose la théorie du pluralisme compréhensif, fondée sur une conception matérielle du pluralisme. Cette approche transforme le fait du pluralisme en un principe normatif. A partir des intuitions de la déconstruction, il répond à cet appel de Derrida, auquel on n'a pas prêté une attention suffisante, à un engagement à combler la distance entre soi et l'autre, sans sacrifice de l'un ou de l'autre. Michel Rosenfeld montre que la théorie du pluralisme compréhensif permet de surmonter les limitations du libéralisme, du républicanisme et du communautarisme, tout en évitant les apories du monisme et du relativisme. " Les interprétations justes " est un outil pour s'orienter et sortir des labyrinthes théoriques et, à ce titre, il s'adresse à ceux qui s'occupent de théorie du droit, de droit constitutionnel, de philosophie sociale, de science politique ou de théorie critique, comme à ceux qui, à partir de points de vue disciplinaires divers, s'intéressent aux textes, à l'interprétation et qui partagent, dans une perspective postmoderne, le souci de la justice. (shrink)

On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of C. S. Lewis’s death, a special annotated edition of his Christian classic, The Screwtape Letters, with notes and excerpts from his other works that help illuminate this diabolical masterpiece. Since its publication in 1942, The Screwtape Letters has sold millions of copies worldwide and is recognized as a milestone in the history of popular theology. A masterpiece of satire, it offers a sly and ironic portrayal of human life and foibles from the (...) vantage point of Screwtape, a highly placed assistant to “Our Father Below.” At once wildly comic, deadly serious, and strikingly original, The Screwtape Letters comprises the correspondence of the worldly-wise devil Screwtape and his nephew Wormwood, a novice demon in charge of securing the damnation of an ordinary young man. For the first time, The Screwtape Letters will be presented in full-text accompanied by helpful annotations in a striking two-color format. These annotations will give fans a deeper, more nuanced understanding of the popular book, providing background information, explanations of terms, historical significance, and excerpts from Lewis’s other works that more fully explain the ideas in this volume. For both expert Lewis fans and casual readers, The Screwtape Letters: Annotated Edition will be a beautiful and insightful guide to a beloved classic. (shrink)

in American Philosophical Quarterly 44 (3), July 2007, pp. 259-72. Argues that epistemically normative claims are made true by the same facts as, but do not mean the same as, certain natural-sounding claims.

I argue that mind-independence realism should be characterised in terms of what I call 'essential', rather than 'modal', independence from our mental lives. I explore the connections between the two kinds of independence, and argue that characterizations in terms of essence respect more intuitions about what realism is, harmonize better with standard characterizations of anti-realism, and avert the threat of subversion from Blackburn's quasi-realist.

A repackaged edition of the revered author's classic work that examines the four types of human love: affection, friendship, erotic love, and the love of God—part of the C. S. Lewis Signature Classics series. C.S. Lewis—the great British writer, scholar, lay theologian, broadcaster, Christian apologist, and bestselling author of Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, The Chronicles of Narnia, and many other beloved classics—contemplates the essence of love and how it works in our daily lives in one of (...) his most famous works of nonfiction. Lewis examines four varieties of human love: affection, the most basic form; friendship, the rarest and perhaps most insightful; Eros, passionate love; charity, the greatest and least selfish. Throughout this compassionate and reasoned study, he encourages readers to open themselves to all forms of love—the key to understanding that brings us closer to God. (shrink)

This chapter attempts to put structure on some of the different philosophical uses of ‘intuition’. It argues that ‘intuition’-hood is associated with four bundles of symptoms: a commonsensicality bundle; an a prioricity and immediacy bundle, and a metaphilosophical bundle. Tentatively suggesting that the word ‘intuition’ as used by philosophers is best regarded as ambiguous, the chapter offers a much simpler view concerning the meaning of ‘intuition’ in philosophy. With some of the attacks on ‘intuition’ as an epistemic source explored, the (...) chapter concludes that one significant kind of philosophical ‘intuition’, related to a prioricity and conceptual truth, can be defended against a range of typical epistemological challenges. (shrink)

We argue that it would seem to be a mistake to blame Liar-like paradox on certain features of the object language, since the effect can be created with very minimal object languages that contain none of the usual suspects (truth-like predicates, reference to their own truth-bearers, negation, etc.).

C. S. Lewis' article addresses a critically important issue on which Howard Ahmanson comments. Professor Oliver O'Donovan addresses the same issue in a sermon in Christ Church Oxford on Trinity Sunday 1997. We publish the three articles together in the year of the fiftieth anniversary of the independence of India and Pakistan and invite correspondence on the issues at stake. Eds.

Boghossian claims that we can acquire a priori knowledge by means of a certain form of argument, our grasp of whose premises relies on the existence of implicit definitions. I discuss an objection to his ‘analytic theory of the a priori’. The worry is that in order to employ this kind of argument we must already know its conclusion. Boghossian has responded to this type of objection in recent work, but I argue that his responses are unconvincing. Along the way, (...) I resist Ebert’s reasons for thinking that Boghossian’s argument fails to transmit warrant from its premises to its conclusion. (shrink)

forthcoming in R. Cameron, B. Hale and A. Hoffmann (ed.s), The Logic, Epistemology and Metaphysics of Modality, Oxford University Press. Presents a concept-grounding account of modal knowledge.

v. 1. Religions and their doctrines. -- v. 2. Religion and morality. -- v. 3. Religion and nation building. -- v. 4. Philosophy of religious tolerance.