In this groundbreaking new study, Ben Ware carries out a bold reassessment of the relationship between modernism and ethics, arguing that modernist literature and philosophy offer more than simply a snapshot of the moral conflicts of the past: they provide a crucial point of reference for today's emancipatory struggles. Modernism in this assessment is characterized not only by a concern with language and aesthetic creativity, but also by a preoccupation with the question of how to live. Investigating ethical ideas in (...) Wittgenstein, Beckett, Kierkegaard, Kant, Cavell, Marx, Henry James and Lacan, Ware demonstrates how these thinkers can bring us to a new understanding of a constellation of issues which contemporary radical thought must re-visit: utopia, repetition, perfectionism, subtraction, negativity, critique, absence, duty, revolution and political love. The result is a timely and provocative intervention, which re-draws the boundaries for future debates on the ethics and politics of modernism. (shrink)

In this groundbreaking new study, Ben Ware carries out a bold reassessment of the relationship between modernism and ethics, arguing that modernist literature and philosophy offer more than simply a snapshot of the moral conflicts of the past: they provide a crucial point of reference for today’s emancipatory struggles. Modernism in this assessment is characterized not only by a concern with language and aesthetic creativity, but also by a preoccupation with the question of how to live. Investigating ethical ideas in (...) Wittgenstein, Beckett, Kierkegaard, Kant, Cavell, Marx, Henry James and Lacan, Ware demonstrates how these thinkers can bring us to a new understanding of a constellation of issues which contemporary radical thought must re-visit: utopia, repetition, perfectionism, subtraction, negativity, critique, absence, duty, revolution and political love. The result is a timely and provocative intervention, which re-draws the boundaries for future debates on the ethics and politics of modernism. (shrink)

fasc. 1. Principes généraux; équations d'Einstein. Dynamique et optique. Repérages non einsteiniens. Avec une "Note sur le système Giorgi."--fasc. 2. Le champ statique à symétrie sphérique. Avec la collaboration de J. Moulis.

Question 6: Whether God as infinite is an object of theology from the Prologue to the Commentary on the Sentences written by William is a polemic with Giles of Rome and Henry of Ghent. The former contends that God is the subject of theology through the specific notion, namely as Saviour, while the latter asserts that God’s infinity is accessible to men’s knowledge only if it is understood as something added to the proper object of theology, i.e. to God. (...) William sharpens Henry’s criticism of Giles and puts forward thesis claiming that God’s infinity is knowable as the direct object of theology. William’s proof of the cognoscibility of infinity paved the way to John Duns Scotus’s developed conception of infinity as the principal divine attribute. (shrink)

In this paper several recent factor- and dimension-based models of precedential constraint are formally investigated and an alternative dimension-based model is proposed. Simple factor- and dimension-based syntactic criteria are identified for checking whether a decision in a new case is forced, in terms of the relevant differences between a precedent and a new case, and the difference between absence of factors and negated factors in factor-based models is investigated. Then Horty’s and Rigoni’s recent dimension-based models of precedential constraint are critically (...) examined. An alternative to their reason models is proposed which is less expressive but arguably easier to apply in practice. (shrink)

A Lacanian approach to murder scene investigation. What if Jacques Lacan—the brilliant and eccentric Parisian psychoanalyst—had worked as a police detective, applying his theories to solve crimes? This may conjure up a mental film clip starring Peter Sellers in a trench coat, but in Lacan at the Scene, Henry Bond makes a serious and provocative claim: that apparently impenetrable events of violent death can be more effectively unraveled with Lacan's theory of psychoanalysis than with elaborate, technologically advanced forensic tools. (...) Bond's exposition on murder expands and develops a resolutely Žižekian approach. Seeking out radical and unexpected readings, Bond unpacks his material utilizing Lacan's neurosis-psychosis-perversion grid. Bond places Lacan at the crime scene and builds his argument through a series of archival crime scene photographs from the 1950s—the period when Lacan was developing his influential theories. It is not the horror of the ravished and mutilated corpses that draws his attention; instead, he interrogates seemingly minor details from the everyday, isolating and rephotographing what at first seems insignificant: a single high heeled shoe on a kitchen table, for example, or carefully folded clothes placed over a chair. From these mundane details he carefully builds a robust and comprehensive manual for Lacanian crime investigation that can stand beside the FBI's standard-issue Crime Classification Manual. (shrink)

Norbert Wiener and J.B.S. Haldane suggested during the early thirties that the profound changes in our conception of matter entailed by quantum theory opens the way for our thoughts, and other experiential or mind-like qualities, to play a role in nature that is causally interactive and effective, rather than purely epiphenomenal, as required by classical mechanics. The mathematical basis of this suggestion is described here, and it is then shown how, by giving mind this efficacious role in natural process, the (...) classical character of our perceptions of the quantum universe can be seen to be a consequence of evolutionary pressures for the survival of the species. (shrink)

Of all the developments in twentieth century physics, none has given rise to more heated debates than the changes in our understanding of science precipitated by the quantum revolution''. In this revolution, Niels Bohr's dramatically non-classical theory of the atom proved to be the springboard from which the new atomic physics drew it's momentum. Furthermore, Bohr's contribution was crucial not only because his interpretation of quantum mechanics became the most widely accepted view but also because in his role as educator (...) and spokesman for atomic physics Bohr was very much the patron spirit of the entire quantum revolution. The conceptual framework which he proposed to provide a new viewpoint for understanding the quantum theoretical description of atomic systems became for most of this century the dominant outlook of countless productive experimental and theoretical physicists. He called this new framework complementarity''. (shrink)

An eminent philosopher explains why we owe it to future generations to take immediate action on global warming Climate change is the supreme challenge of our time. Yet despite growing international recognition of the unfolding catastrophe, global carbon emissions continue to rise, hitting an all-time high in 2019. Unless humanity rapidly transitions to renewable energy, it may be too late to stop irreversible ecological damage. In The Pivotal Generation, renowned political philosopher Henry Shue makes an impassioned case for taking (...) immediate, radical action to combat global warming. Shue grounds his argument in a rigorous philosophical analysis of climate change’s moral implications. Unlike previous generations, which didn’t fully understand the danger of burning carbon, we have the knowledge to comprehend and control rising carbon dioxide levels. And unlike future generations, we still have time to mitigate the worst effects of global warming. This generation has the power, and thus the responsibility, to save the planet. Shirking that responsibility only leaves the next generation with an even heavier burden—one they may find impossible to bear. Written in direct, accessible language, The Pivotal Generation approaches the latest scientific research with a singular moral clarity. It’s an urgently needed call to action for anyone concerned about the planet’s future. (shrink)

{\large \bf A QUANTUM THEORY OF THE MIND--BRAIN INTERFACE} \footnote{This work was supported by the Director, Office of Energy Research, Office of High Energy and Nuclear Physics, Division of High Energy Physics of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract..

This paper proposes a formal top-level model of explaining the outputs of machine-learning-based decision-making applications and evaluates it experimentally with three data sets. The model draws on AI & law research on argumentation with cases, which models how lawyers draw analogies to past cases and discuss their relevant similarities and differences in terms of relevant factors and dimensions in the problem domain. A case-based approach is natural since the input data of machine-learning applications can be seen as cases. While the (...) approach is motivated by legal decision making, it also applies to other kinds of decision making, such as commercial decisions about loan applications or employee hiring, as long as the outcome is binary and the input conforms to this paper’s factor- or dimension format. The model is top-level in that it can be extended with more refined accounts of similarities and differences between cases. It is shown to overcome several limitations of similar argumentation-based explanation models, which only have binary features and do not represent the tendency of features towards particular outcomes. The results of the experimental evaluation studies indicate that the model may be feasible in practice, but that further development and experimentation is needed to confirm its usefulness as an explanation model. Main challenges here are selecting from a large number of possible explanations, reducing the number of features in the explanations and adding more meaningful information to them. It also remains to be investigated how suitable our approach is for explaining non-linear models. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with Davidson's argument that very general properties of the theory of interpretation make the skeptical claim that most of our beliefs could turn out to be false insupportable. Conceived as a 'straight' answer to the skeptic Davidson's argument is not especially convincing. In particular, Davidson's answer to the skeptic presupposes a framework that allows for a new and seemingly more radical skepticism according to which we might not even have beliefs at all. Nevertheless, there is a (...) sense in which Davidson's account of content remaps the conceptual terrain in a fashion that absolves us of the need to rule out the scenarios the skeptic describes. The paper will both present the problems Davidson's position has as a 'straight' solution to skepticism, and discuss the way in which his externalism does weaken the strength of the skeptical challenge. (shrink)

The system presented by the author in The Logical Foundations of Statistical Inference suffered from certain technical difficulties, and from a major practical difficulty; it was hard to be sure, in discussing examples and applications, when you had got hold of the right reference class. The present paper, concerned mainly with the characterization of randomness, resolves the technical difficulties and provides a well structured framework for the choice of a reference class. The definition of randomness that leads to this framework (...) is simplified and clarified in a number of respects. It resolves certain puzzles raised by S. Spielman and W. Harper in their contributions to Profiles: Henry E. Kyburg, Jr. and Isaac Levi 1982). (shrink)

Originally published in 1925, this book provides an overview of the philosophy of Johannes Scotus Erigena. Bett explains Erigena's thinking as well as the influence he had over later philosophers, despite the fact that his writings were banned by the Pope. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in medieval philosophy and Erigena's philosophy in particular.

I just returned from a small conference attended by Basil Hiley, among a pestigious group of 17. An Oxford Philosopher of Science, S. Saunders, asserted strongly a point that I have often made, namely that the theory has never been extended to the relativistic case involving particle creation. Hiley did not disagree, but I believe admitted that this was indeed the case. So that is one reason why the theory as it stands is inadequate.

One of the most influential of the Victorian philosophers, Henry Sidgwick was the author of the masterpiece of utilitarianism, The Methods of Ethics. He also made important contributions to fields such as economics, political theory, and classics. An active champion of higher education for women, he founded Cambridge's Newnham College in 1871. He attended Rugby School and then Trinity College, Cambridge, where he remained his whole career. In 1859 he accepted a lectureship in classics, and held this post for (...) ten years. He then changed direction and in 1869 took up a lectureship in moral philosophy. In this book, published in 1886, Sidgwick gives an objective summary of ethical philosophies throughout history. He considers general issues in ethics and then gives a detailed critique of the work of major philosophers from early Greek thinkers through to his nineteenth-century contemporaries. (shrink)

It is sometimes thought that the renowned essayist Isaiah Berlin was incapable of writing a big book. But in fact he developed some of his most important essays--including "Two Concepts of Liberty" and "Historical Inevitability"--from a book-length manuscript that he intended to publish but later set aside. Published here for the first time, Political Ideas in the Romantic Age is the only book in which Berlin lays out in one continuous account most of his key insights about the history of (...) ideas in the period that he made his own--the Romantic age. Distilling his formative early work in the history of ideas, the book also contains much that is not found elsewhere in his writings. The last of Berlin's posthumous books, it is of great interest both for his treatment of the subject and for what it reveals about his intellectual development. Written for a series of lectures at Bryn Mawr College in 1952, and heavily revised and expanded by Berlin afterward, the book argues that the political ideas of the Romantic age are still largely our own--down to the language and metaphors they are expressed in. Vividly expounding the central political ideas of leading European thinkers in the period 1760-1830, including Helvetius, Condorcet, Rousseau, Saint-Simon, Hegel, Schelling, and Fichte, the book is written in Berlin's characteristically accessible style. The book has been carefully prepared by Berlin's longtime editor Henry Hardy, and Joshua L. Cherniss provides an illuminating introduction that sets it in the context of Berlin's life and work. (shrink)

{\large \bf A QUANTUM THEORY OF THE MIND--BRAIN INTERFACE} \footnote{This work was supported by the Director, Office of Energy Research, Office of High Energy and Nuclear Physics, Division of High Energy Physics of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract..

Population-based genomics studies have proven successful in identifying genetic variants associated with diseases. High-quality biospecimens linked with informative health data from diverse segments of the population have made such research possible. However, the success of biobank research depends on the willingness of the public to participate in this type of research. We aimed to explore the factors associated with the willingness of the public to participate in biobank research from four low- and middle-income countries in the Arab region (Egypt, Jordan, (...) Morocco, and Sudan). We used a previously validated questionnaire to assess several constructs that included the public’s perceptions, attitudes, and willingness to participate in biobank research. We recruited 967 participants. More than half did not have prior awareness of biobanks. Participants’ willingness to donate biospecimens and health data was less than 10%. Our results also showed that participants harbored concerns with trust, privacy, and with data-sharing involving international researchers. Predictors of willingness to participate in biobank research included no previous involvement in research and positive attitudes toward biobanks. Finally, our study showed several differences between the four countries regarding several of the investigated constructs. We conclude there should be additional efforts to raise public awareness and enhance perceptions of the public in biobanking research to enhance trust. We further recommend qualitative research to explore the underlying factors that contribute to the public’s concerns with international data sharing that would enhance global health. (shrink)

So much for the Aesthetic. We can now proceed to the Analytic, the philosophical importance of which is much greater. Kant's main contentions in this part of his work can be summed up in; two propositions: human understanding contains certain a priori concepts, and on these are based certain non-empirical principles; these concepts are only general concepts of a phenomenal object, and therefore the principles in question are only prescriptive to sense-experience. As has already been said, interest in the first (...) proposition has distracted attention from the fact that the important thing Kant has to say is contained in the second. (shrink)

BackgroundBiobanks have recently been established in several low- and middle-income countries in the Arab region of the Middle East. We aimed to explore the views of biobank managers regarding the challenges, ethical issues, and governance arrangements of their biobanks.MethodsIn-depth semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of eight biobank managers from Egypt, Jordan, and Sudan. Interviews were performed either face-to-face, by phone, or via Zoom and lasted approximately 45–75 min. After verbal consent, interviews were recorded and then transcribed. (...) The authors performed a thematic analysis of the transcripts independently and then integrated the themes via a consensus process.ResultsBiobank managers discussed the main challenges in establishing their biobanks. These included the staff’s lack of experience and training, limited funds, deficit awareness of biobanks, obtaining funding from different sources. Only four reported they were active in distributing biospecimens and health data to researchers. Six biobanks used a broad consent model, one used tiered consent, and another allowed participants to opt-out of being recontacted. Five managers avoided partnerships with pharmaceutical companies due to concerns with unfavorable reactions from the community. Five managers did not have clear policies for returning research results to the donors. Five expressed challenges with sample and data sharing with international collaborators; all five used material transfer agreements. The biobank managers revealed variable governance arrangements and activities with community involving awareness and educational efforts rather than active engagement. Several expressed the importance of transparency with the operations of their biobanks and gaining the trust of their stakeholders.ConclusionManagers of biobanks in LMICs in the Arab Middle East encounter financial, operational, and social challenges toward their sustainability efforts. Discussions with key stakeholders are warranted to manage ethical issues involving informed consent, privacy, data sharing, and the return of results. We recommend that biobank managers in the Arab Middle East form collaborative networks within the region and internationally, develop trusting governance relationships with their stakeholders, and pursue engagement activities with their communities to enhance trust. (shrink)

Raz's method is as unusual, and as admirable, as the substance of his sometimes rather unfortunately labeled "perfectionist liberalism"—unfortunate because "it is not perfectionist in the more ordinary sense of the term" in that it recognizes that "imperfect ways of life may be the best which is possible for people" and "is strongly pluralistic", while understanding its fundamental value of well-being as the active and autonomous making of a life of one's own. Raz's approach is simultaneously alert to the complexity (...) of argument, to a degree that practitioners of practical ethics sometimes are not, and aware of the limits of theorizing, as devotees of theoretical ethics rarely are. Thus, while scorning "supermarket liberalism" and rejecting, in company with Rawls, "hand-to-mouth piecemeal intuitionism", Raz also doubts whether ideal theory in the Rawlsian mode is "a meaningful enterprise", emphasizing wisely, in my judgment, that "not everything we know can be exhaustively stated in the abstract". The "dense webs of complex actions and interactions" that give meaning to our lives "defy explicit learning or comprehensive articulation. They are available only to those who have or can acquire practical knowledge of them, that is, knowledge embodied in social practices and transmitted by habituation". (shrink)

This paper reviews the history of AI & Law research from the perspective of argument schemes. It starts with the observation that logic, although very well applicable to legal reasoning when there is uncertainty, vagueness and disagreement, is too abstract to give a fully satisfactory classification of legal argument types. It therefore needs to be supplemented with an argument-scheme approach, which classifies arguments not according to their logical form but according to their content, in particular, according to the roles that (...) the various elements of an argument can play. This approach is then applied to legal reasoning, to identify some of the main legal argument schemes. It is also argued that much AI & Law research in fact employs the argument-scheme approach, although it usually is not presented as such. Finally, it is argued that the argument-scheme approach and the way it has been employed in AI & Law respects some of the main lessons to be learnt from Toulmin’s The Uses of Argument. (shrink)

The curiously sweeping assumption that all reference is ‘ultimately’ singular — even in the case of plural or non-count reference — is presented and examined. In the case of plural reference, especially when associated with collective predication, the assumption takes the form of the thought that this is reference to collective entities, plural objects, or sets. Perhaps the most suggestive and profound, albeit notorious idea of this genre is Russell’s doctrine of the ‘class as many’. George Boolos’ explicitly ‘no-class’ approach (...) to the logic of plurality is then compared favourably with ‘reductive’ approaches. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Proceedings of the ALSC (1995 Convention)Patrick HenryGiven the oppressively politicized character of academic literary studies today, it took courage and conviction to found a new literary society in 1994. The Association of Literary Scholars and Critics is dedicated to the study of literature as a source of pleasure and insight. This would be banal were it not for the way in which culture wars, identity politics, and race and (...) gender issues have come to dominate university literature departments. More than merely a handful of scholars wish to reverse this trend: in less than two years, the ALSC has grown to 1800 members and its first conference, held in Minneapolis, September 22–24, 1995, was a notable success.Because we favor a true pluralism, and like many others are tired of the predictable posturing that permeates so much literary scholarship today, we invited the ALSC to publish its first conference proceedings in our pages. The meeting offered much variety, with classicists and modernists, poets, fiction writers, and critics trading ideas on literature and aesthetics. Despite worries by its detractors that the ALSC represents reaction or blind traditionalism, there was a refreshing openness to the proceedings, with lucid examples of critical reading and topics from metaphor in Dickens and Auden’s Alcaic stanza in “In memory of Sigmund Freud,” to the Islamic influence on Dante’s Commedia—a connection that belies the charge that the Western canon is inevitably Eurocentric. If the ALSC can revive a sense of wonder before the greatest works of literary art and provide an alternative to the complacency and pretentiousness of contemporary theory, it deserves support from us all.For twenty years it has said on our inside back cover that Philosophy and Literature “owes allegiance to no particular school or style of criticism or philosophy.” Our only loyalty is to literature and philosophy; they constitute our field of interest. It has never been our aim to adopt the correct ideology. We remain skeptical of ideological commitments and will continue to publish exciting jargon-free articles representative of the entire spectrum of approaches to literature and philosophy.Copyright © 1996 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

Humanity's so far leaderless approach to dealing with rapidly accelerating climate change embodies a profoundly tragic catch-22 that has, among other twists and contradictions, transmuted justice into paralysis.

Physical scientists were driven during the late twenties to abandon a fundamental idea that had reigned since the time of Issac Newton To obtain a rationally coherent and practically useful theory of all physical phenomena they turned to a pragmatic approach The core idea was that the basic physical theory was no longer directly about a physical world that was conceived to exists apart from anyone s knowledge of it Rather the theory was regarded as being directly about certain of (...) our knowings This switch appears to be exactly what is needed to establish a rationally coherent theoretical foundation for the science of consciousness For it converts the immediate objects of psychological and physical theories into things of the same kind namely human experiencings rather than things of disparate kinds separated by an unbridgable conceptual gap Within this pragmatic quantum approach certain particular aspects of human brain structure entail the existence of macroscopic quantum e ects that are linked to our conscious experiences Moreover our conscious thoughts have causal e ects that can both enhance our prospects of survival and work e ectively against thermal noise in the creation of the brain states that guide our behaviour.. (shrink)

Thank you for bringing Bigaj’s book to my attention. I promised to give you my comments after I got hold of it. As you indicated, Bigaj’s book seems largely devoted to analyzing my various arguments that the non-locality claim [that theories that reproduce certain predictions of quantum, and that embrace the idea that choices of experiments can be treated, effectively, as localized “free choices”, must allow some sort of faster-than-light transfer of information] can be strengthened by using the framework of (...) counterfactual reasoning [as contrasted to hidden-variable frameworks that effectively assume the existence of an underlying “reality” that determines, for each of the (four) alternative possible combinations of measurements between which the experimenters are considered able to freely choose, which outcome appears.] The non-existence of an underlying ‘determining reality’ would nullify the Bell-type (hidden-variable) proofs of the need for some sort of faster-than-light transfer of information. But counterfactual-based proofs can overcome that limitation. (shrink)

Isaiah Berlin was one of the greatest thinkers of the twentieth century - a man who set ideas on fire. His defence of liberty and plurality was passionate and persuasive and inspired a generation. His ideas - especially his reasoned rejection of excessive certainty and political despotism - have become even more prescient and vital today.But who was the man behind such influential views? In Search of Isaiah Berlin tells the compelling story of a decades-long collaboration between Berlin and his (...) editor, Henry Hardy, who made it his vocation to bring Berlin's huge body of work into print. Hardy discovered that Berlin had written far more than people thought, much of it unpublished. As he describes his struggles with Berlin, who was almost on principle unwilling to have his work published, an intimate and revealing picture of the self-deprecating philosopher emerges. This is a unique portrait of a man who gave us a new way of thinking about the human predicament, and whose work had for most of his life remained largely out of view. (shrink)

This volume presents seventeen essays by one of the world's leading scholars on Kant. Henry E. Allison explores the nature of transcendental idealism, freedom of the will, and the concept of the purposiveness of nature. He places Kant's views in their historical context and explores their contemporary relevance to present day philosophers.

The idea of a single scientific method, shared across specialties and teachable to ten-year-olds, is just over a hundred years old. For centuries prior, science had meant a kind of knowledge, made from facts gathered through direct observation or deduced from first principles. But during the nineteenth century, science came to mean something else: a way of thinking. The Scientific Method tells the story of how this approach took hold in laboratories, the field, and eventually classrooms, where science was once (...) taught as a natural process. Henry M. Cowles reveals the intertwined histories of evolution and experiment, from Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection to John Dewey's vision for science education. Darwin portrayed nature as akin to a man of science, experimenting through evolution, while his followers turned his theory onto the mind itself. Psychologists reimagined the scientific method as a problem-solving adaptation, a basic feature of cognition that had helped humans prosper. This was how Dewey and other educators taught science at the turn of the twentieth century-but their organic account was not to last. Soon, the scientific method was reimagined as a means of controlling nature, not a product of it. By shedding its roots in evolutionary theory, the scientific method came to seem far less natural, but far more powerful. This book reveals the origin of a fundamental modern concept. Once seen as a natural adaptation, the method soon became a symbol of science's power over nature, a power that, until recently, has rarely been called into question. (shrink)

Introduction: On trying to be an Aristotelian or a Thomist in today's world -- QUIETING VARIOUS OF THE ALARMS AND EXCURSIONS IN RECENT PHILOSOPHY: Can philosophy ever be a thing for Hoosiers? -- Folly and sense in present-day philosophy -- Is Quine a metaphysician? -- Richard Rorty's would-be deconstruction of analytic philosophy -- WHAT PRICE ETHICS IN THE EYES OF MODERN MORAL PHILOSOPHERS? : Telos and teleology in Aristotelian ethics -- Variations, good and bad, on the theme of right reason (...) in ethics -- Language and ethics: 'What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba?' -- In appreciation and refutation of Alan Gewirth's principle of general consistency -- Ethical egoism, new style: should its trademark be libertarian or Aristotelian? -- A CONCLUDING MISCELLANY, RANGING FROM A DEFENSE OF THE HUMANITIES TO A DEFENSE OF NATURAL LAW: The what and why of the humanities -- Why need a general be human? -- The poor, hapless humanities -- Natural law: dead or alive? -- Can John Finnis bright of a revival of natural law? -- Natural law and the"is"-"ought" question: queries to Finnis and Grisez -- A poor benighted philosopher looks at the issue of judicial activism / Henry B. Veach. (shrink)

Background: Concerns have been expressed regarding the adequacy of ethics review systems in developing countries. Limited data are available regarding the structural and functional status of Research Ethics Committees (RECs) in the Middle East. The purpose of this study was to survey the existing RECs in Egypt to better understand their functioning status, perceived resource needs, and challenges. Methods: We distributed a self-administered survey tool to Egyptian RECs to collect information on the following domains: general characteristics of the REC, membership (...) composition, ethics training, workload, process of ethics review, perceived challenges to effective functioning, and financial and material resources. We used basic descriptive statistics to evaluate the quantitative data. Results: We obtained responses from 67% (12/18) of the identified RECs. Most RECs (10/12) have standard operating procedures and many (7/12) have established policies to manage conflicts of interests. The average membership was 10.3 with a range from 7-19. The predominant member type was physicians (69.5% of all of the REC members) with little lay representation (13.7%). Most RECs met at least once/month and the average number of protocols reviewed per meeting was 3.8 with a range from 1-10. Almost three-quarters of the members from all of the 12 RECs indicated they received some formal training in ethics. Regarding resources, roughly half of the RECs have dedicated capital equipment (e.g., meeting room, computers, office furniture, etc); none of the RECs have a formal operating budget. Perceived challenges included the absence of national research ethics guidelines and national standards for RECs and lack of ongoing training of its members in research ethics. Conclusion: Our study documents several areas of strengths and areas for improvements in the operations of Egyptian RECs. Regarding strengths, many of the existing RECs meet frequently, have a majority of members with prior training in research ethics, and have written policies. Regarding areas for improvements, many RECs should strive for a more diverse membership and should receive more financial resources and administrative support personnel. We recommend that RECs include more individuals from the community and develop a continuing educational program for its members. Institutional officials should be aware of the resource capacity needs of their RECs. (shrink)

Professor Parkinson's book on Spinoza's theory of knowledge makes a serious attempt to consider this theme in isolation. The author argues that an understanding of this particular theory is a prerequisite to any understanding of Spinoza's theory of ethics or his metaphysical views. The text also discusses Spinoza's interests, especially the influence of science on the development of his thought, and ultimately provides a critical account of the philosopher's methodology, theory of truth, and theory of differing kinds of knowledge.