Health research ethics training is highly variable, with some researchers receiving little to none, which is why ethical frameworks represent critical tools for ethical deliberation and guiding responsible practice. However, these documents' voluntary and abstract nature can leave health researchers seeking more operationalised guidance, such as in the form of checklists, even though this approach does not support reflection on the meaning of principles nor their implications. In search of more reflective and participatory practices in a pandemic context with distance (...) learning, this study explored whether co-design could support engagement and reflection on ethical principles amongst early-stage health researchers. In a pilot test using the Swiss Personalized Health Network's ethical framework for Responsible Usage of Personal Data in Health Research as a case study, we engaged health researchers to design visuals of four ethical principles. In two online workshops, participants (N = 10, N = 8) completed activities such as individual reflection, collaborative ideation, sketching, prototyping, discussion, and feedback. Our analysis shows that the co-design process helped foster in-depth engagement and reflection on the meaning and relevance of the SPHN ethical principles. Participants reported enjoying the experience, and most felt that visuals could motivate engagement with ethical frameworks. This study demonstrates the feasibility of a participatory, design-oriented approach to promote engagement with research ethics among early-career health researchers and highlights key challenges and lessons learned. In doing so, it lays the foundation for future research to investigate the impact of design-oriented, participatory learning to foster reflection and deliberation in ethics education. (shrink)

In numerous texts Leibniz claimed that while metaphysical necessity is inconsistent with free choice, moral necessity is not. A question naturally arises concerning what Leibniz took moral necessity to be. In a series of recent articles Michael Murray has argued that the concept of moral necessity Leibniz utilized is one developed and deployed by a group of 17th century Spanish Jesuits. This chapter argues that Leibniz's commitment to certain deep metaphysical principles suggests otherwise.

pt. 1. De dicto: Necessary and contingent truths, by G. W. Leibniz. New essays concerning human understanding, by G. W. Leibniz. Introduction to the critique of pure reason, by Immanuel Kant. On the nature of mathematical truth, C. G. Hempel. Two dogmas of empiricism, by W. V. O. Quine. In defense of a dogma, by H. P. Grace and P. F. Strawson. The a priori and the analytic, by A. Quinton. The truths of reason, by R. Chisholm.--pt. 2. De re: (...) Reference and modality, by W. V. O. Quine. De re et de dicto, by A. Plantinga. World and essence, by A. Plantinga.--Bibliography (p. 200-202). (shrink)

Background Despite the bourgeoning of digital tools for bioethics research, education, and engagement, little research has empirically investigated the impact of interactive visualizations as a way to translate ethical frameworks and guidelines. To date, most frameworks take the format of text-only documents that outline and offer ethical guidance on specific contexts. This study’s goal was to determine whether an interactive-visual format supports frameworks in transferring ethical knowledge by improving learning, deliberation, and user experience.Methods An experimental comparative study was conducted with (...) a pre-, mid-, and post-test design using the online survey platform Qualtrics. Participants were university based early-stage health researchers who were randomly assigned to either the control condition (text-only document) or the experimental condition (interactive-visual). The primary outcome variables were learning, (measured using a questionnaire), deliberation (using cases studies) and user experience (measured using the SED/UD Scale). Analysis was conducted using descriptive statistics and mixed-effects linear regression.Results Of the 80 participants, 44 (55%) used the text-only document and 36 (45%) used the interactive-visual. Results of the knowledge-test scores showed a statistically significant difference between participants’ post-test scores, indicating that the interactive-visual format better supported understanding, acquisition, and application of the framework’s knowledge. Findings from the case studies showed both formats supported ethical deliberation. Results further indicated the interactive-visual provided an overall better episodic and remembered user experience compared with the text-only document.Conclusions Our findings show that ethical frameworks formatted with interactive and visual qualities provide a more pleasing user experience and are effective formats for ethics learning and deliberation. These findings have implications for practitioners developing and deploying ethical frameworks and guidelines (e.g., in educational or employee-onboarding settings), in that the knowledge generated can lead to more effective dissemination practices of normative guidelines and health data ethics concepts. (shrink)

I appreciate Benson Mates's generous review of my book, and also the editor's willingness to allow me to comment on it. There is one point where Professor Mates attributes to me a view I did not intend to assert, although what I did say is so compressed that even I have had some difficulty divining my intentions. And it may well be that Professor Mates will find the view that I did intend to assert even less satisfactory than the view (...) that he attributes to me, which I did not intend to assert. (shrink)

Damaris Cudworth, later Lady Masham, was born in 1659 and died in 1708. She was the daughter of Ralph Cudworth, the wife of Sir Francis Masham, and the close friend, confidante, and, ultimately, caretaker of John Locke. Her philosophical writings — and writings to or about philosophers — consist in the following: (1) an account of Locke's life contained in a letter to Jean le Clerc; (2) various letters — mostly personal — to Locke; (3) letters to various other philosophers, (...) including Van Limborch, Shaftesbury, and Leibniz; (4) two monographs, each published anonymously: A Discourse Concerning the Love of God, which appeared in 1696, and Occasional Thoughts in Reference to a Vertuous or Christian Life, which appeared in 1705. This chapter focuses on correspondence between Masham and Leibniz. The correspondence is printed in volume 3 of Gerhardt's Die Philosophischen Schriften von Leibniz. (shrink)

How cell commitment and differentiation are controlled in the early stages of embryogenesis is a problem that has long fascinated developmental biologists. Retinoic acidinduced differentiation of embryonal carcinoma cells in culture provides a model in which these questions can be explored. Recent work has yielded exciting insights into the central series of molecular changes which drives the commitment of these cells to formation of a new phenotype. Interacting with the key molecules in this central pathway is a variety of transcription (...) factors, many of which show changes in availability and/or activity during differentiation. In various combinations, these modulate the activities of genes involved in both cell proliferation and in the production of extracellular matrix and other proteins characteristic of differentiated cells. (shrink)

There is much scholarly disagreement with regard to the program of the Enlightenment. Something in the vicinity of agreement is achievable provided one remains suitably vague. I intend to take advantage of that. One item that seems to me characteristic of the Enlightenment is the general (and admittedly, vague) idea that human reason is the ultimate arbiter in all matters concerning warranted human belief—matters of religion included. And I have no doubt that Leibniz’s philosophizing properly understood, contributes to that general (...) idea. In what follows, I concentrate on some aspects of Leibniz’s thinking that seem to me especially relevant to this theme. (shrink)

In the early twentieth century, the body was seen as both an ontogenetic and a phylogenetic entity. In the former case, its individual development, it was manifestly changeable, developing from embryo to maturity and thence to a state of decay. But in the latter case, concerning its development as a species, the question was an open one. Was its phylogenetic nature a stationary snapshot of the slow process of evolution, or was this too mutable? Historians have emphasised that the question (...) of acquired inheritance remained open into the twentieth century; this paper explores how various constructions of the individual as a phylogenetic episode—a stage in the race’s evolution—related to representations of the body in the same period.A discussion of the work of the brothers Josef and Karel Čapek offers a contextualised answer to the question of bodily representation. Karel Čapek explored the nature of the ‘average man’ through two different organisms, the robot and the amphibian, epitomes respectively of corporeal permanence and plasticity. Josef Čapek , along with other members of the Group of Plastic Artists, explored visual representations of the body that challenged cubist Bergsonian norms. In so doing, he affirmed what his brother also held: that despite the constrictions imposed by the oppressive political conditions in which the Czechs found themselves, the individual body was a fragile but fluid entity, capable of effecting change upon the future evolution of humankind. (shrink)