This paper examines whether the modern bioethical principles of respect for autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, and justice proposed by Beauchamp and Childress are existent in, compatible with, or acceptable to the leading Chinese moral philosophy—the ethics of Confucius. The author concludes that the moral values which the four prima facie principles uphold are expressly identifiable in Confucius’ teachings. However, Confucius’ emphasis on the filial piety, family values, the “love of gradation”, altruism of people, and the “role specified relation oriented ethics” will (...) inevitably influence the “specification” and application of these bioethical principles and hence tend to grant “beneficence” a favourable position that diminishes the respect for individual rights and autonomy. In contrast, the centrality of respect for autonomy and its stance of “first among equals” are more and more stressed in Western liberal viewpoints. Nevertheless, if the Confucian “doctrine of Mean” and a balanced “two dimensional personhood” approach are properly employed, this will require both theorists and clinicians, who are facing medical ethical dilemmas, of searching to attain due mean out of competing moral principles thus preventing “giving beneficence a priority” or “asserting autonomy must triumph”. (shrink)

Since the discovery of incommensurability in ancient Greece, arithmeticism and geometricism constantly switched roles. After ninetieth century arithmeticism Frege eventually returned to the view that mathematics is really entirely geometry. Yet Poincaré, Brouwer, Weyl and Bernays are mathematicians opposed to the explication of the continuum purely in terms of the discrete. At the beginning of the twenty-first century ‘continuum theorists’ in France (Longo, Thom and others) believe that the continuum precedes the discrete. In addition the last 50 years witnessed the (...) revival of infinitesimals (Laugwitz and Robinson—non-standard analysis) and—based upon category theory—the rise of smooth infinitesimal analysis and differential geometry. The spatial whole-parts relation is irreducible (Russell) and correlated with the spatial order of simultaneity. The human imaginative capacities are connected to the characterization of points and lines (Euclid) and to the views of Aristotle (the irreducibility of the continuity of a line to its points), which remained in force until the ninetieth century. Although Bolzano once more launched an attempt to arithmetize continuity, it appears as if Weierstrass, Cantor and Dedekind finally succeeded in bringing this ideal to its completion. Their views are assessed by analyzing the contradiction present in Grünbaum’s attempt to explain the continuum as an aggregate of unextended elements (degenerate intervals). Alternatively a line-stretch is characterized as a one-dimensional spatial subject, given at once in its totality (as a whole) and delimited by two points—but it is neither a breadthless length nor the (shortest) distance between two points. The overall aim of this analysis is to account for the uniqueness of discreteness and continuity by highlighting their mutual interconnections exemplified in the nature of a line as a one-dimensional spatial subject, while acknowledging that points are merely spatial objects which are always dependent upon an extended spatial subject. Instead of attempting to reduce continuity to discreteness or discreteness to continuity, a third alternative is explored: accept the irreducibility of number and space and then proceed by analyzing their unbreakable coherence. The argument may be seen as exploring some implications of the view of John Bell, namely that the “continuous is an autonomous notion, not explicable in terms of the discrete.” Bell points out that initially Brouwer, in his dissertation of 1907, “regards continuity and discreteness as complementary notions, neither of which is reducible to each other.”. (shrink)

Children, because of age-related reasons, are a vulnerable population, and protecting their health is a social, scientific and emotional priority. The increased susceptibility of children and fetuses to environmental agents has been widely discussed by the scientific community. Children may experience different levels of chemical exposure than adults, and their sensitivity to chemical toxicities may be increased or decreased in comparison with adults. Such considerations also apply to unborn and newborn children. Therefore, research on children is necessary in both clinical (...) and environmental fields, to provide age-specific relevant data regarding the efficacy and safety of medical treatments, and regarding the assessment of risk from unintended environmental exposure. In this context, the stakeholders are many, including children and their parents, physicians and public health researchers, and the society as a whole, with its ethical, regulatory, administrative and political components. The important ethical issues are information of participants and consent to participate. Follow-up and protection of data should be discussed in the context of biobanks, where children obtain individual rights when they become adults. It is important to realise that there are highly variable practices within European countries, which may have, in the past, led to differences in practical aspects of research in children. A number of recommendations are provided for research with children and environmental health. Environmental research with children should be scientifically justified, with sound research questions and valid study protocols of sufficient statistical power, ensuring the autonomy of the child and his/her family at the time of the study and later in life, if data and samples are used for follow-up studies. When children are enrolled, we recommend a consent dyad, including parental informed consent and the child’s assent and/or informed consent from older minors. For evaluation of the studies including children, a paediatrician should always be involved in the research ethics committee. (shrink)

Austin's lecture on this topic contributes little to the problem of freedom of the will, and so in my discussion of his ideas I shall stop short of the difficult part of that problem. His most important positive suggestion is that hypotheticals should be divided into two classes, conditionals and pseudo-conditionals. He claims that neglect of this distinction has been the cause of mistakes in certain forms of the dispositional analysis of the statement that an agent could have acted otherwise, (...) and he then goes on to criticise all forms of that analysis using arguments which do not depend on the difference between the two kinds of hypothetical.This discussion will be in two parts. In the first I shall take up Austin's distinction between conditionals and pseudos and criticise it and develop it at length, because it seems to me to be the most important thing in his lecture. Since I shall not have space for comment on fortuitous errors made by defenders of the dispositional analysis of the claim that an agent could have acted otherwise, I shall concentrate on the essential features of that analysis. (shrink)

This comment calls attention to the nature of the Aristotelian and classical logics, and the difficulty of representing their judgments and inferences by means of Venn diagrams. The meaning of ‘all’ in the different calculi produces problems. A second problem is that the specification of existence in Venn diagrams for statements and arguments cannot be restricted to a single class, overlooked by Wiebe. This problem is further complicated by his adoption of classical (Renaissance) syllogistic, which is inconsistent. Aristotle’s term logic (...) is consistent. So also is the medieval extension, though the inclusion of singular premisses renders it less perspicuous though more flexible. (shrink)

Analytische annotatie: Rechtsfilosofische beschouwing.

MARXISM AND LIBERALISM edited by Ellen Frankel Paul, Fred D. Miller, Jr., Jeffrey Paul and John Ahrens New York: Basil Blackwell, 1986. 223 pp., $14?95 (paper) LIBERALISM by John Gray Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1986. 106 pp., $9.95 (paper).

Human embryonic stem cell research can bring about major biomedical breakthroughs and thus contribute enormously to human welfare, yet it raises serious moral problems because it involves using human embryos for experiment. The “moral status of the human embryo” remains the core of such debates. Three different positions regarding the moral status of the human embryo can be categorised: the “all” position, the “none” position, and the “gradualist” position.The author proposes that the “gradualist” position is more plausible than the other (...) two positions. Confucius’s moral principle of jen, which proposes a unique theory of “love of gradation”, and the principle of yi, which advocates “due treatment for persons”, are then explored. The author then argues that our moral obligations to do good to other living organisms, persons, and our families are different.Putting together the “gradualist” position on the human embryo, and Confucius’s theories of “love of gradation” and “due treatment for persons”, the author concludes that the early embryo has less ethical significance than the later fetus and adult human. The moral obligation we have toward persons is clearer and stronger than that which we have toward human embryos. Embryo research is justifiable if it brings enormous welfare to human persons that cannot be otherwise achieved. The “love of gradation” requires us, however, to extend love and respect towards other entities according to their different status. We should therefore be very cautious in using human embryos for research, acknowledging the gradualist nature of their moral status. (shrink)

THE LEFT AND RIGHTS: A CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS OF SOCIALIST RIGHTS by Tom Campbell Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1983. 296 pp., $12.95 Campbell's attempt to construct a socialist version of rights and the rule of law fails because it does not draw on individualism. Campbell's positive rights are ineffective barrien to both the schemes of Utopian visionaries who command political authority and more mundane sources of the abuse of power. He leaves unanswered the question of who will determine the extent (...) of the ?needs?; that would constitute socialist rights, in the absence of unlimited resources to fulfill them. And his rejection of individualism ¡eaves him no means of adjudicating among conflicting positive claim?rights. (shrink)

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