This book is about the never-ending need we have to make choices. If you think about it, we have to decide what time to wake up every morning, what to wear (unless we need to wear a uniform), what to have for breakfast (if we eat breakfast), lunch and dinner (and if we eat in restaurants, what to order), and our need to make all kinds of other choices all day long. Some of our choices are mundane, (...) like what to have for breakfast (if we eat breakfast): to have coffee or tea (and if so, plain or with milk), cereal, toast or a bagel (and if so, what kind: plain, with poppy seeds, with everything) or a sweet roll, eggs (if so, fried, soft boiled, scrambled), and so on. Most of the choices we make are not important, and we often develop habits to relieve us of having to think about our choices. For example, I have the same thing for breakfast every day: a bowl of oatmeal with chia seeds and flax seeds, hot milk, a cup of espresso coffee with hot milk, and half a bagel with butter. Occasionally, I have a soft-boiled egg, as well. But other choices we have to make are life-changing, such as how to live (single, living with a partner, or getting married), what kind of education to get, what kind of job or profession to choose, where to live and what kind of house to buy (if you can afford a house), whom to vote for, and so on. After reading this book, you will better understand the role that the choices we make play in society and culture and in our everyday lives." -- Back cover. (shrink)

Is it rational to be moral? How do rationality and morality fit together with being human? These questions are at the heart of David Schmidtz's exploration of the connections between rationality and morality. This inquiry leads into both metaethics and rational choice theory, as Schmidtz develops conceptions of what it is to be moral and what it is to be rational. He defends a fairly expansive conception of rational choice, considering how ends as well as means can be rationally chosen (...) and explaining the role of self-imposed constraints in a rational life plan. His moral theory is dualistic, ranging over social structure as well as personal conduct and building both individual and collective rationality into its rules of recognition for morals. To the "why be moral" question, Schmidtz responds that being moral is rational, but he does not assume we have reasons to be rational. Instead, Schmidtz argues that being moral is rational in a particular way and that beings like us in situations like ours have reasons to be rational in just that way. This approach allows him to identify decisive reasons to be moral; at the same time, it explains why immorality is as prevalent as it is. This book thus offers a set of interesting and realistic conclusions about how morality fits into the lives of humanly rational agents operating in an institutional context like our own. (shrink)

Is it rational to be moral? How do rationality and morality fit together with being human? These questions are at the heart of David Schmidtz's exploration of the connections between rationality and morality. This inquiry leads into both metaethics and rational choice theory, as Schmidtz develops conceptions of what it is to be moral and what it is to be rational. He defends a fairly expansive conception of rational choice, considering how ends as well as means can be rationally chosen (...) and explaining the role of self-imposed constraints in a rational life plan. His moral theory is dualistic, ranging over social structure as well as personal conduct and building both individual and collective rationality into its rules of recognition for morals. To the "why be moral" question, Schmidtz responds that being moral is rational, but he does not assume we have reasons to be rational. Instead, Schmidtz argues that being moral is rational in a particular way and that beings like us in situations like ours have reasons to be rational in just that way. This approach allows him to identify decisive reasons to be moral; at the same time, it explains why immorality is as prevalent as it is. This book thus offers a set of interesting and realistic conclusions about how morality fits into the lives of humanly rational agents operating in an institutional context like our own. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Jewish Choices, Jewish Voices: Body ed. by Elliot N. Dorff and Louis E. NewmanGeoffrey ClaussenJewish Choices, Jewish Voices: Body Edited by Elliot N. Dorff and Louis E. Newman Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2008. 134 pp. $16.00This volume, focused on Jewish attitudes toward the human body, is the first volume of the Jewish Choices, Jewish Voices series published by the Jewish Publication Society. Subsequent volumes focus (...) on money, power, sex and intimacy, war and national security, and social justice. Each volume in the series presents hypothetical case studies involving modern moral questions, a collection of classical and contemporary sources relevant to the case studies, and a collection of short essays by a range of contemporary American Jews reflecting on these materials or on other related issues. Elliot Dorff and Louis Newman, the preeminent scholars of Jewish ethics who edited this first volume in the series, explain in their introduction that they sought to gather together “a variety of authors with many different Jewish beliefs and approaches” (xvi). They do not claim to present “what Judaism says,” but, rather, to anthologize a variety of Jewish perspectives. In doing so, they seek to follow the approach of the Bible and the Talmud, both of which contain “many, many voices articulating often diverse points of view” (xvi).On the other hand, Dorff and Newman reject the idea that “anything goes” when it comes to Jewish views about the body. They indicate that modern American Jews may be tempted to endorse such a perspective, accustomed as they are to the American notion that “I own my body.” But, Dorff and Newman suggest, American Jews would do well to consider the contrary notions that animate much of classical Jewish thought on the body: that God is the true owner of every human body, and that God makes demands about how one should use one’s body. The case studies that follow challenge readers to keep these ideas in mind as they consider duties to limit one’s body weight, refrain from tattooing one’s body, and avoid high-risk behaviors.The essays that make up the heart of this book do by and large embrace Dorff and Newman’s challenge. A few do so quite confidently, such as the one Orthodox contributor to the volume, who declares God’s ownership of human bodies to be “the attitude of Torah Judaism.” But a similar view is also upheld by less traditionally inclined authors such as Adam Goodkind, a college student who expresses his doubts about conventional Jewish observance and theology but who sees the idea of not owning one’s body as reflecting the “common sense” of the Jewish tradition. [End Page 213]Many of the essays are also linked by their view of Judaism as a tradition that does not disparage bodily pleasures. Such pleasures should be greatly valued, a number of authors stress, at least within certain limits. Goodkind takes a stronger stance, opining that “part of being a good Jew is getting a maximum amount of enjoyment out of life” (43). Such talk is not surprising—it fits well with the this-worldly ethos of contemporary American Judaism. But it is worth noting that the more ascetic and otherworldly voices found in the tradition are largely absent from this volume.The volume may not showcase the full breadth of traditional Jewish perspectives, but it does demonstrate how thoughtful and generally liberally minded American Jews do think about key ethical questions when they are asked to consider them through a Jewish lens. And while the essays in the volume are somewhat uneven in quality, they tend to be marked by moral sensitivity and by the creative application of traditional Jewish ideas. This first book in the Jewish Choices, Jewish Voices series offers stimulating reflections about the human body, and it also offers a fine introduction to the patterns of moral reasoning found among many contemporary American Jews.Geoffrey ClaussenElon UniversityCopyright © 2013 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

Abstract“Choices” about nonmedical aging‐related matters, such as housing, are weirdly extreme in the long last stage of life in America. In my experiences accompanying my parents to consultations with physicians, elder‐care lawyers, and social service providers, a middle‐class older adult's presumed choices are the high‐end assisted living facility—or the Medicaid spend‐down. Nothing in between. Experts in aging and housing are calling attention to this “forgotten middle”—the millions of older Americans like my mother, people who are neither rich (...) nor poor and whose needs in this long last stage of life cannot reliably be met through publicly funded health insurance or personal savings. (shrink)

Ideal for students with little or no background in philosophy, Ethical Choices: An Introduction to Moral Philosophy with Cases provides a concise, balanced, and highly accessible introduction to ethics. Featuring an especially lucid and engaging writing style, the text surveys a wide range of ethical theories and perspectives including consequentialist ethics, deontological ethics, natural and virtue ethics, the ethics of care, and ethics and religion.Each chapter of Ethical Choices also includes compelling case studies that are carefully matched with (...) the theoretical material. Many of these cases address issues that students can relate directly to their own lives: the drinking age, student credit card debt, zero tolerance policies, grade inflation, and video games. Other cases discuss current topics like living wills, obesity, human trafficking, torture "lite," universal health care, and just-war theory. The cases provide students with practice in addressing real-life moral choices, as well as opportunities to evaluate the usefulness and applicability of each ethical theory. Every case study concludes with a set of Thought Questions to guide students as they reflect upon the issues raised by that case.Ethical Choices is enhanced by several pedagogical features. These include summaries at the end of each section, lists of key terms, questions For Reflection and Discussion at the end of each chapter, Guidelines for a Case Study Analysis, and suggestions For Further Reading that include Internet sources. Starred sections indicate more advanced material that may be included at the instructor's discretion. A companion website at www.oup.com/us/burnor contains additional resources for both students and instructors: chapter outlines, flashcards of key terms, sets of Helpful Hints to further aid students in mastering the material, and an additional chapter on our Moral Obligations Towards the Future. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Literature 30.1 (2006) 174-189 [Access article in PDF] Sophie's Choice: Letting Chance Decide Suzanne Dovi University of Arizona When, if ever, should individuals facing a genuine moral dilemma adopt a random decision procedure to determine the outcome of that dilemma? Or to put the question more metaphorically, is it ever morally preferable to determine the outcome of a moral dilemma by flipping a coin? In this paper, (...) I will argue that sometimes it is. To make this argument, I consider a particularly agonizing moral dilemma—the one found in William Styron's Sophie's Choice. Drawing on this famous example of a moral dilemma, I identify three salient features of a moral dilemma that make it morally permissible, and even morally preferable, for an agent to adopt a random decision procedure to determine its outcome. By 'morally preferable,' I do not mean to imply that an agent is morally required to adopt a random decision procedure to determine the outcome of a moral dilemma. As will be seen, I disagree with the view that humans must always pursue the most morally preferable course of action. Nevertheless, I contend that agents should adopt a random decision procedure when faced with a moral dilemma that possesses three salient features. These three features are: (1) when there is clearly no "better" outcome from the range of choices available to the agent; (2) when particular kinds of moral burdens (guilt burdens) can be alleviated by that agent adopting a random decision procedure; and (3) when the alternatives were given to, and not made by, the agent. The first two salient features are necessary for it to be morally permissible [End Page 174] to decide a moral dilemma using a random decision procedure. The third feature is not necessary since a person could, due to her morally permissible decisions, face a moral dilemma whose outcome could be legitimately determined by a random decision procedure. However, I maintain that all three features are jointly sufficient for determining when it is morally preferable to adopt a random decision procedure to decide the outcome of a moral dilemma. I Hard choices are decisions that require us to choose among conflicting goals, purposes, values, or goods that are very important to us. Such choices pervade our lives. According to David Schmidtz, to face such a hard choice can be "the price of the richness and complexity of a life well-lived. To have both ideals and loved ones is to run the risk of having to make decisions under unresolved conflicts of value."1 Although hard choices are often ordinary, some hard choices can also be genuine moral dilemmas.2For my purposes, hard choices become genuine moral dilemmas when an agent cannot avoid violating his or her deeply held moral beliefs. Moreover, genuine moral dilemmas are dilemmas that have no "right" answer. So, for example, genuine moral dilemmas occur when an agent faces a decision between outcomes that are, as far as the agent can reasonably determine, equally bad or incommensurable. Indeed, some genuine moral dilemmas can involve choices between such horrible outcomes that it does not make sense to use moral language to justify their decisions—that is, to provide reasons for thinking that one outcome is preferable to another. In these cases, genuine moral dilemmas do not offer any possibility for moral redemption: the agent cannot morally justify choosing one outcome over another. Thus, genuine moral dilemmas can impose serious (and potentially devastating) moral costs on the decision-maker.William Styron's Sophie's Choice presents an example of such a genuine moral dilemma. Sophie Zawistowska has been asked to choose which of her two children, Eva or Jan, will be sent to the gas chamber in Auschwitz. An SS doctor, Fritz Jemand von Niemand, will grant a dispensation to only one of Sophie's children. If she does not choose which one should live, Dr. von Niemand will send both to their death. Sophie chooses her daughter Eva to go to the gas chamber. Her son, Jan, is sent to the Children's Camp and she... (shrink)

The 1994 edition is here enlarged with new sections on the goals and allocation of medicine and human cloning. There is no index.

We present a rational model of consumer choice, which can also serve as a behavioral model. The central construct is λ\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$\lambda $$\end{document}, the marginal utility of money, derived from the consumer’s rest-of-life problem. It provides a simple criterion for choosing a consumption bundle in a separable consumption problem. We derive a robust approximation of λ\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$\lambda $$\end{document} and show how to incorporate liquidity (...) constraints, indivisibilities, and adaptation to a changing environment. We find connections with numerous historical and recent constructs, both behavioral and neoclassical, and draw contrasts with standard partial equilibrium analysis. The result is a better grounded, more flexible, and more intuitive description of consumer choice. (shrink)

On 22 January 2019, New York state passed the Reproductive Health Act (RHA), which specifies three circumstances under which a healthcare provider may perform an abortion in New York: (1) the patient is within twenty-four weeks of pregnancy, (2) the fetus is non-viable, or (3) the abortion is necessary to protect the patient’s life or health. The first one, that of abortion being accessible within the first twenty-four weeks of pregnancy, is not unique to New York, as many other (...) states allow medical professionals to provide abortions during this time. The latter two have caused significant controversy because they detail certain circumstances in which abortions would be accessible after twenty-four weeks. This paper will focus on these latter two circumstances. I will first argue that any debate or discussion about (2) must go beyond the conventional debate about the ethics of abortion and incorporate, more appropriately, a discussion on euthanasia and the ethics of end-of-life care for nascent human life. In particular, it requires us to consider the morality of non-voluntary active euthanasia for non-viable fetuses, rather than just a discussion of the ethics of late term abortions. When it comes to (3), I will argue that assessing its moral permissibility actually raises some legitimate moral concerns, even from a reproductive rights perspective. On certain readings, it seems as if condition (3) would allow for the termination of a healthy fetus for reasons not related to the mother’s physical health or life. If this is the case, I argue, the right to an abortion would be construed as a right to fetal termination, rather than just fetal evacuation. However, I will argue that there are good reasons that pro-choice advocates should interpret the right to an abortion as a right to fetal evacuation instead of termination, and if this is the case, a woman should not be able to demand the death of a healthy fetus if ending the pregnancy safely via fetal evacuation would suffice. (shrink)

TWO OBJECTIONS are often levelled against Aristotle's theory of practical inference. The first is that he fails to discuss adequately the nature of reasoning about the ends of good living. Thus, while there is no shortage of examples of technical deliberation, such as how a doctor deliberates to bring about healing, we have no comparable examples of how a person of determinate character deliberates to promote the ends of that character. The second is that while Aristotle has an account of (...) how we reason to a decision to act now, he lacks a more general account of intention that can accommodate both present intention and future intention--that is, intending now to act later. The two challenges, I want to argue, are related, though often not by the objectors. Deliberation about how best to live over the course of a life requires a continuing interest in one's future self and a capacity to decide upon future ends that constrain the present and are constrained by it. An Aristotelian conception of the good life, with its intrinsic sense of completeness and unity, requires this close knit of present and future. But if this is so, then the capacity to deliberate about the future and to regulate the present in light of future plans will be particularly urgent in the case of living such a life. Deliberation about future intentions should, if anywhere, play a prominent role here. It will be a severe limitation on Aristotle's view if his account of deliberation precludes such a role for practical reason. (shrink)

Abstract:Respect for persons protects patients regarding their own healthcare decisions. Patient informed choice for altruism (PICA) is a proposed means for a fully autonomous patient with decisionmaking capacity to limit his or her own treatment for altruistic reasons. An altruistic decision could bond the patient with others at the end of life. We contend that PICA can also be an advance directive option. The proxy, family, and physicians must be reminded that a patient’s altruistic treatment refusal should be respected.

Christians, health care, and basic moral reasoning -- When life ends -- Chronic illness, suffering, and Christian responses -- Organ donation and heroic medicine -- Scarce resources and Christian compassion -- Abortion -- Assisted reproduction and embryo selection -- Embryo research and cloning -- What happened to the neighbors? global health care -- The global challenge of HIV/AIDS -- Concluding thoughts.

Fundamentals -- Beginning-of-life issues -- Reproductive technologies -- Contraception, sterilization, and natural family planning -- End-of-life issues -- Cooperation with evil -- Respect for the body -- The ten commandments for health care professionals and patients.

Since the concept of the living wills emerged nearly 50 years ago, there have been practical challenges in translating the concept of an advance directive into documents that are clinically useful across various healthcare settings and among different patient populations and cultures. Especially, challenging has been the reliance in most ADs on pre-selected “choices” about specific interventions which either revolve around broad themes or whether or not to utilize particular interventions, both of which about most laypersons know little and, (...) more importantly, lacking context, prove to be of limited meaningfulness. Moreover, whether by foundational frame, decade-long misunderstanding in medicine and bioethics, or different societal customs, these ADs present decision-making responsibility for initiating, continuing, or withdrawing medical interventions as a patient responsibility—creating a burden for which most patients are unprepared—and hence reducing healthcare providers’ responsibility to mere technical application or customer service. At our institution, significant efforts have focused on embracing the unique and complementary responsibilities of patients and physicians for enabling appropriate plans of care. This includes re-structuring our AD form to more accurately represent patient’s values as the frame within which physicians are responsible for determining appropriate care. Rather than specifying interventions, the AD makes patients responsible for specifying what matters to them as well as what they value in terms of function, interaction, and level of acceptable burden, thus providing clear goals for clinicians to pursue—or when goals are not reachable by available medical interventions, to acknowledge and allow for logical shifts to what may be achieved, including, in end of life contexts, care focused on respect and dignity. (shrink)

If you developed Alzheimer disease, would you want to go all the way to the end of what might be a decade‐long course? Some would; some wouldn't. Options open to those who choose to die sooner are often inadequate. Do‐not‐resuscitate orders and advance directives depend on others' cooperation. Preemptive suicide may mean giving up years of life one would count as good. Do‐it‐yourself methods can fail. What we now ask of family and clinicians caring for persons with dementia, and (...) of patients given no better option than to go on with lives they may not want, is unacceptable. To explore how one might better control one's own dying and avoid burdening others with overwhelming care and morally painful choices, we propose a thought experiment: an advance directive implant that would enable persons with early dementia, while competent, to arrange their own deaths without the subsequent intervention of anyone else. (shrink)

Life Choices is the second edition of a collection of “some of the very best articles published in the Hastings Center Report over the last 28 years”. The collection has two main aims: to provide a challenging text for classrooms and to serve as a testimony to the achievements of the Hastings Center. The first edition was published in 1994 to mark the 25th anniversary of the Hastings Center's foundation. The Hastings Center, based in New York state, is (...) the oldest independent, non-partisan interdisciplinary research institute of its kind in the world and has become a highly influential organisation. The center's mission is the study of the moral problems that arise out of the rapid advances in medicine and biology, and collaboration with policy makers, both in the private and public sphere, to aid the analysis of the ethical dimension of their work. The collection is organised around themes which reflect the center's research …. (shrink)

A collection celebrating some of the best essays from the Blackwell journals, Bioethics and Developing World Bioethics. Contributors include Helga Kuhse, Michael Selgelid and Baroness Mary Warnock, former Chair of the British Government’s Committee of Inquiry into Human Fertilization and Embryology’s. Traces some of the most important concerns of the 1980s, such as the ethics of euthanasia, reproductive technologies, the allocation of scarce medical resources, surrogate motherhood, through to a range of new issues debated today, particularly in the field of (...) genetics. Includes contributions that are still as hotly debated today as they were 20 years ago and serves as a salutary reminder that free and open discussion is vital to the health of the discipline itself. Includes eight sections comprising some of the journals' best publications in methodological issues, the health care professional-patient relationship, public health ethics, research ethics, genetics, as well as beginning- and end-of-life issues. Will serve the academic bioethicists as well as students of bioethics as an excellent source book. (shrink)

This paper raises fundamental questions about the claims of art historian David Freedberg and neuroscientist Vittorio Gallese in their article "Motion, Emotion and Empathy in Esthetic Experience." It does so from several perspectives, all of them rooted in the dynamic realities of movement. It shows on the basis of neuroscientific research how connectivity and pruning are of unmistakable import in the interneuronal dynamic patternings in the human brain from birth onward. In effect, it shows that mirror neurons are contingent on (...) morphology and corporeal-kinetic tactile-kinesthetic experience. Accordingly, it poses and answers the overlooked but seminally important question of how mirror neurons come to be. The original neuromuscular research of Parma neuroscientists and the findings of Marc Jeannerod concerning kinesthesia support the answer that the "underpinnings" of visual art appreciation are themselves underpinned. An abbreviated phenomenological analysis of movement and its implications regarding the fact that the making of all art is quintessentially contingent on movement, hence a dynamic enterprise, further bolster the given answer as does a brief review of an empirical phenomenological analysis of the natural dynamic congruency of emotions and movement. In the end, the paper shows that movement and life are of a piece in the creation and appreciation of art as in everyday life. (shrink)

I argue that the metaphysical capacity of autonomy is not intrinsically valuable; it is valuable only when used in relation to a community's values and instrumentally for making the proper choices that will promote one's own and the community's well-being. I use the example of the choice to take one's life by suicide to illuminate this view. I articulate a plausible African conception of personhood as a basis for the idea of relational autonomy. I argue that this conception (...) is better understood as a social-moral thesis, and not a metaphysical thesis. A metaphysical thesis gives an account of the abstract nature of an atomic individual, his agency, and rational choice. The social-moral thesis indicates that personhood and autonomy are positive and relational to the life plans, well-being, material conditions, and the best means for achieving them that are made available and possible by harmonious living in a community. This idea of autonomy is not just having the capacity of freewill; it also involves how such freewill is used, in terms of how an individual's choices are guided by internalized communal values. (shrink)

Finnish is one of the few existent Finno-Ugric languages, a language without articles, and with only one, genderless word for the pronouns “she” and “he”. Due to this, the problems faced by the Finnish translators of The Second Sex differed in some ways from those discussed after the publication of the new English translation. This chapter describes the genesis of the second, unabridged Finnish translation, the choices made by the translators as well as the philosophical interpretations motivating those (...) class='Hi'>choices. In addition, Beauvoir’s way of understanding the concept of becoming is analyzed. The chapter ends with a discussion of the philosophy of translation and of the reception of the second Finnish translation. (shrink)

Defending Life is arguably the most comprehensive defense of the pro-life position on abortion - morally, legally, and politically - that has ever been published in an academic monograph. It offers a detailed and critical analysis of Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey as well as arguments by those who defend a Rawlsian case for abortion-choice, such as J. J. Thomson. The author defends the substance view of persons as the view with the most explanatory power. (...) The substance view entails that the unborn is a subject of moral rights from conception. While defending this view, the author responds to the arguments of thinkers such as Boonin, Dworkin, Stretton, Ford and Brody. He also critiques Thomson's famous violinist argument and its revisions by Boonin and McDonagh. Defending Life includes chapters critiquing arguments found in popular politics and the controversy over cloning and stem cell research. (shrink)

Background: Choice to live and die at home is supported by palliative care policy; however, health resources and access disparity impact on this choice in rural Australia. Rural end-of-life home care is provided by district nurses, but little is known about their role in advocacy for choice in care. Objectives: The study was conducted to review the scope of the empirical literature available to answer the research question: What circumstances influence district nurse advocacy for rural client choice to live (...) and die at home?, and identify gaps in the knowledge. Method: Interpretive scoping methodology was used to search online databases, identify suitable studies and select, chart, analyse and describe the findings. Results: 34 international studies revealed themes of ‘the nursing relationship’, ‘environment’, ‘communication’, ‘support’ and ‘the holistic client centred district nursing role. Discussion: Under-resourcing, medicalisation and emotional relational burden could affect advocacy in rural areas. Conclusion: It is not known how district nurses overcome these circumstances to advocate for choice in end-of-life care. Research designed to increase understanding of how rural district nurses advocate successfully for client goals will enable improvements to be made in the quality of end-of-life care offered. (shrink)

I propose a novel view on hard choices. It broadens the concept to include not only ‘classic’ hard choices but also transformative and aspirational choices. I argue that a choice is hard when an individual does not have an all-things-considered reason to choose one option over another and the objects of choice are ultimate ends. Construing hard choices in this way supports and explains the widely held assumption that, when faced with hard choices, it is (...) impermissible to choose arbitrarily. More specifically, it shows that it is impermissible to choose arbitrarily by plumping, and yet legitimate to do so by picking. Understanding hard choices in the way I propose sheds light on the fact that there are moral and agential constraints that limit the space of permissible decision-making procedures when confronted with ‘classic’ hard, transformative, and aspirational choices. Delineating these constraints, in turn, can provide guidance to critically appraise current theories of practical rationality. (shrink)

This paper outlines the effectiveness of films as a pedagogical tool for teaching philosophy. For the author, a film skillfully explores philosophical issues, capturing students’ attention and providing a setting for discussion. The author focuses on the use of Lars von Trier's Zentropa as a beneficial tool for discussion of Kierkegaard’s Either/Or. The film adequately illustrates the two positions of the aesthete and the judge, and demonstrates the adverse affects of avoiding choice in one's life. The film can also (...) be useful in an introductory course and a class on existentialism because it attends to the larger philosophical questions of how one should live their life. (shrink)

In this volume, Sir Alan Peacock, one of Britain's most noted public economists, poses the question as to whether the history of economic thought is an essential part of the training of public finance economists. He argues that the perspective gained by studying the origins of public choice analysis can offer an important stimulus to scientific progress. The first lecture analyses the increasing popularity in recent years of the modernist, anti-historical point of view. The second criticises those theories of growth (...) in government expenditure which ignore the political process. The third lecture draws on Adam Smith and David Hume to extend the conventional economic model of bureaucracy. In the final lecture, Peacock considers the problem of controlling public sector growth and points to ways of overcoming them. The book ends with short commentaries by seven public economists. (shrink)

Learner Voice, Learner Choice offers fresh, forward-thinking supports for teachers creating an empowered, student-centered classroom. Learner agency is a major topic in today's schools, but what does it mean in practice, and how do these practices give students skills and opportunities they will need to thrive as citizens, parents, and workers in our ever-shifting climate? Showcasing authentic activities and classrooms, this book is full of diverse instructional experiences that will motivate your students to take an agile, adaptable role in their (...) own learning. This wealth of pedagogical ideas-from specific to open-ended, low-tech to digital, self-expressive to collaborative, creative to critical-will help you discover the transformative effects of providing students with ownership, agency, and choice in their learning journeys. (shrink)

This research studies the optimal consumption, investment, and life insurance choices for a wage earner with habit formation, inflation risk, and mortality risk. The wage earner has access to a risk-free asset, an index bond, and a stock in a financial market. The index bond hedges inflation risk, while life insurance hedges mortality risk. The aim of the wage earner is to maximize the expected utility of consumption, bequest, and terminal wealth, where the utility of consumption comes (...) from the part of the consumption that exceeds a minimum consumption requirement given by the habit level. By using the dynamic programming method, we provide and prove a verification theorem and obtain closed-form expressions for the value function, the optimal life insurance premium rate, and the optimal investment and consumption strategies. Numerical results reveal that habit formation and mortality force change play important roles in the financial behaviors of the wage earner. Especially, the impacts of the expected inflation rate and consumption habit on the optimal strategies are mutual restraint; increasing mortality force raises the demand for life insurance; and the effects of other parameters are also affected by consumption habit and mortality force change. (shrink)

(2011). Life and Death Choices in Neonatal Care: Applying Shared Decision-Making Focused on Parental Values. The American Journal of Bioethics: Vol. 11, No. 2, pp. 35-36.

ABSTRACT Lee claims that foetuses and adult humans are phases of the same identical substance, and thus have the same moral status because: first, foetuses and adults are the same physical organism, and second, the development from foetus to adult is quantitative and thus not a change of substance. Versus the first argument, I contend that the fact that foetuses and adults are the same physical organism implies only that they are the same thing but not the same substance, much (...) as living adults and their corpses are the same thing (same body) but not the same substance. Against Lee's second argument, I contend that Lee confuses the nature of a process with the nature of its result. A process of quantitative change can produce a change in substance. Lee also fails to show that foetuses are rational and thus have all the essential properties of adults, as required for them to be the same substance. Against the pro‐choice argument from asymmetric value (that only the fact that a human has become conscious of its life and begun to count on its continuing can explain human life's asymmetric moral value, i.e. that it is vastly worse to kill a human than not to produce one), Lee claims that foetus's lives are asymmetrically valuable to them before consciousness. This leads to counterintuitive outcomes, and it confuses the goodness of life (a symmetric value that cannot account for why it is worse to kill a human than not produce one) with asymmetric value. (shrink)

The prelims comprise: Introduction Controversial Choices Kinds of Normative Reasons for Action Limits on Respect for Autonomy Children and Controversial Choice Controversial Choices and the Duty to Strive Toward Perfection and Full Autonomy Acknowledgments Notes References.

I use a theorem from machine learning, called the “No Free Lunch” theorem to support the claim that non-epistemic values are essential to theory choice. I argue that NFL entails that predictive accuracy is insufficient to favor a given theory over others, and that NFL challenges our ability to give a purely epistemic justification for using other traditional epistemic virtues in theory choice. In addition, I argue that the natural way to overcome NFL’s challenge is to use non-epistemic values. If (...) my argument holds, non-epistemic values are entangled in theory choice regardless of human limitations and regardless of the subject matter. Thereby, my argument overcomes objections to the main lines of argument revealing the role of values in theory choice. At the end of the paper, I argue that, contrary to common conception, the epistemic challenge arising from NFL is distinct from Hume’s problem of induction and other forms of underdetermination. (shrink)

This book offers a comprehensive overview and critique of the most important political and philosophical interpretations of the basic results of social choice, assessing their plausibility and seeking to identify the links between the theory of social choice and the more traditional issues of political theory and philosophy. In this regard, the author eschews a strong methodological commitment or technical formalism; the approach is instead based on the presentation of political facts and illustrated via numerous real-life examples. This allows (...) the reader to get acquainted with the philosophical and political dispute surrounding voting and collective decision-making and its links to social choice theory. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:ULTIMATE END AND COMMON GOOD GREGORY FROELICH University of Alaska Anchorage, Alaska IN HUMAN ACTION what is last in execution is first in intention. For just this reason Thomas Aquinas begins the secunda jmrs of the Summa Theologiae with a consideration of man's ultimate end. It is the end and the end alone that renders intelligible all those choices and activities that human life comprises. " Finis (...) enim. (shrink)

This article is about the information relevant to decision-making capacity in refusal of life-prolonging medical treatment cases. We examine the degree to which the phenomenology of the options available to the agent—what the relevant states of affairs will feel like for them—forms part of the capacity-relevant information in the law of England and Wales, and how this informational basis varies across adolescent and adult medical treatment cases. We identify an important doctrinal phenomenon. In the leading authorities, the courts appear (...) to count the first-personal phenomenology of the available options among the information that adolescents seeking to refuse life-prolonging treatment must understand and appreciate in order to possess capacity; adults are not held to this (higher) standard. We evaluate this differential treatment in light of philosophical work on transformative choice—decisions involving options whose sensory character, and effect on our values and preferences, are grasped only through experience itself. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Pregnancy: Before and After McFall, Shimp, and Thomson's Ailing Violinist Pro‐Choice Does Not Mean Pro‐Abortion Notes.

With advice that combines ancient spiritual traditions with the common sense of the 21st century, this book offers soothing and practical guidance to the frazzled decision-maker. Those concerned about making the best choices can find techniques for broadening their way of thinking and effectively solving problems that also make sense for them spiritually. From everyday choices to landmark decisions, this book will simplify problem-solving and guide readers through all stages of life.

In this essay, I review some results that suggest that rational choice theory has interesting things to say about the virtues. In particular, I argue that rational choice theory can show, first, the role of certain virtues in a game-theoretic analysis of norms. Secondly, that it is useful in the characterization of these virtues. Finally, I discuss how rational choice theory can be brought to bear upon the justification of these virtues by showing how they contribute to a flourishing (...) class='Hi'>life. I do this by discussing one particular example of a norm - the requirement that agents to honor their promises of mutual assistance - and one particular virtue, trustworthiness. (shrink)

Freud justified his extensive theorizing about dreams by the observation that they were “the royal road” to something much more general: namely, our unconscious mental life. The current preoccupation with the theory of excuse in criminal law scholarship (including my own) can be given a similar justification, for the excuses are the royal road to theories of responsibility generally. The thought is that if we understand why we excuse in certain situations but not others, we will have also gained (...) a much more general insight into the nature of responsibility itself. Nowhere has this thought been more evident than in the century-old focus of criminal law theoreticians on the excuse of insanity, a focus that could not be justified by the importance of the excuse itself.In this paper I wish to isolate two theories of excuse, each of which instantiates its own distinctive theory of responsibility. One is what I shall callthe choice theory of excuse, according to which one is excused for the doing of a wrongful action because and only because at the moment of such action's performance, one did not have sufficient capacity or opportunity to make the choice to do otherwise. Such a choice theory of excuse instantiates a more general theory of responsibility, according to which we are responsible for wrongs we freely choose to do, and not responsible for wrongs we lacked the freedom (capacity and opportunity) to avoid doing. The second I shall callthe character theory of excuse, according to which one is excused for the doing of a wrongful action because and only because such action is not determined by (or in some other way expressive of) those enduring attributes of ourselves we call our characters. (shrink)

The past four decades of research in the social sciences have shed light on two important phenomena. One is that human decision-making is full of predicable errors and biases that often lead individuals to make choices that defeat their own ends (i.e., the bad choice phenomenon), and the other is that individuals’ decisions and behaviors are powerfully shaped by their environment (i.e., the influence phenomenon). Some have argued that it is ethically defensible that the influence phenomenon be utilized to (...) address the bad choice phenomenon. They propose that “choice architects” learn about the various ways in which choices can be influenced and directed by the environment, and then work to design environments, broadly construed, that influence individuals towards choices that make them better off. Those who advocate intentionally creating choice environments that lead people to better choices believe that doing so is ethically permissible because (1) it makes people better off, and (2) it does so in a way that is entirely compatible with individual liberty. The evaluation of these two claims is the main focus of this paper. (shrink)

As we attempt to move on from the Covid-19 pandemic, the mounting pressures on health and social care are striking for all to see. Many of the articles in this issue speak to this theme: access to...

Frank Bubb and Tibor Machan raise objections to Mack's "Problematic Arguments in Randian Kthics." Bubb argues that a universalization test allows Rand to condemn every parasitic action—even ones that serve the agent's survival. But this universalization test is faulty; it calls upon individuals to act as would be rational if the world were not as it is. Machan argues that Rand can hold that the fundamental choice between life and death is ungrounded without being a subjectivist. But Machan does (...) not successfully differentiate the putatively ungrounded choice between life and death from other choices that he admits are arbitrary. (shrink)

In order to create a truly meaningful life, we must first accept that the problem is never other people. "The real problem," Sam Silverstein maintains, "is what we believe about other people." Silverstein's new book shows why everything we have been taught about accountability is wrong. Contrary to popular belief, accountability is not a way of doing. Accountability is a way of thinking. It is how we think about ourselves and others. And it is the highest form of leadership. (...) The secret to creating accountable relationships, and elevating the personal benchmark that Silverstein calls the The Accountability Index, lies in making ten critical choices that support an accountable mindset. I Am Accountable offers a comprehensive plan to help you establish and leverage that mindset, deepen commitments, create lasting meaning in your life and relationships, transform the culture within your organization, and foster positive change in the larger community. (shrink)

Many “anti-vaxxers” oppose COVID-19 vaccination mandates on the grounds that they wrongfully infringe on bodily autonomy. Their view has been expressed with the slogan “My Body, My Choice,” co-opted from the pro-choice abortion rights movement. Yet, many of those same people are pro-life and support abortion restrictions that are effectively a kind of gestation mandate. Both vaccine and gestation mandates impose restrictions on bodily autonomy in order to prevent serious harms. This article evaluates the defensibility of the anti-vax pro- (...) class='Hi'>life position. We argue that the case for opposing gestation mandates on grounds of bodily autonomy is much stronger than the case for opposing vaccine mandates—even if fetuses have full moral status. Thus, there is a deep tension in being a pro-life, COVID anti-vaxxer concerned with bodily autonomy. (shrink)

Francis Beckwith’s Defending life: a moral and legal case against abortion choice defends the pro-life position on moral, legal and political grounds. In this critical notice I consider three key issues and argue that Beckwith’s treatment of each of them is unpersuasive. The issues are: (1) whether abortion is politically justified by the principle that we should err on the side of liberty in the face of reasonable disagreement over the moral status of the fetus; (2) whether the (...) fetus’s natural capacity or genetic propensity to develop rationality and communication is sufficient to give it a moral right to life; and (3) whether abortion is morally justified on the basis of bodily rights. I also show that Beckwith’s book fails to consider several important issues and arguments. (shrink)