Every year, unfavorable environmental factors significantly affect crop productivity and threaten food security. Plants are sessile; they cannot move to escape unfavorable environmental conditions, and therefore, they activate a variety of defense pathways. Among them are processes regulated by stress‐associated proteins (SAPs). SAPs have a specific zinc finger domain (A20) at the N‐terminus and either AN1 or C2H2 at the C‐terminus. SAP proteins are involved in many biological processes and in response to various abiotic or biotic constraints. Most SAPs play (...) a role in conferring transgenic stress resistance and are stress‐inducible. The emerging field of SAPs in abiotic or biotic stress response regulation has attracted the attention of researchers. Although SAPs interact with various proteins to perform their functions, the exact mechanisms of these interactions remain incompletely understood. This review aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of SAPs, covering their diversity, structure, expression, and subcellular localization. SAPs play a pivotal role in enabling crosstalk between abiotic and biotic stress signaling pathways, making them essential for developing stress‐tolerant crops without yield penalties. Collectively, understanding the complex regulation of SAPs in stress responses can contribute to enhancing tolerance against various environmental stresses through several techniques such as transgenesis, classical breeding, or gene editing. (shrink)

A passive brain–computer interface based upon functional near-infrared spectroscopy brain signals is used for earlier detection of human drowsiness during driving tasks. This BCI modality acquired hemodynamic signals of 13 healthy subjects from the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of the brain. Drowsiness activity is recorded using a continuous-wave fNIRS system and eight channels over the right DPFC. During the experiment, sleep-deprived subjects drove a vehicle in a driving simulator while their cerebral oxygen regulation state was continuously measured. Vector phase analysis (...) was used as a classifier to detect drowsiness state along with sleep stage-based threshold criteria. Extensive training and testing with various feature sets and classifiers are done to justify the adaptation of threshold criteria for any subject without requiring recalibration. Three statistical features along with six VPA features were used. The average accuracies for the five classifiers are 90.9% for discriminant analysis, 92.5% for support vector machines, 92.3% for nearest neighbors, 92.4% for both decision trees, and ensembles over all subjects’ data. Trajectory slopes of CORE vector magnitude and angle: m and m are the best-performing features, along with ensemble classifier with the highest accuracy of 95.3% and minimum computation time of 40 ms. The statistical significance of the results is validated with a p-value of less than 0.05. The proposed passive BCI scheme demonstrates a promising technique for online drowsiness detection using VPA along with sleep stage classification. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Limb-Loosening and the Care of History: Tracing a Motif in Vergil GEORGE SAAD the counter-voice of eros in epic While the Homeric world clearly underlies Vergil’s Aeneid, this Roman appropriation of Greek epic is not without complications. Vergil, taking the whole of history as his theme, develops a world subject to cosmic forces beyond the might and craft of Homeric heroes. To overcome enemies is no mean feat, (...) but how is the world itself overcome? How does the hero move history? Prior to writing the Aeneid, Vergil had already found this world-conquering power in amor and labor improbus,1 which conquer all things. Love and unrelenting toil always step beyond their limits. Unlike Achilles, they rage on after the bodies are buried. Always unsatisfied, they cut deeper than the superficial, personal manipulations of sword and stratagem. These forces reach beyond the satisfaction of any finite objective, encompassing and reshaping the entire world. As Vergil is more than an epic poet, the Aeneid transcends the presuppositions of Homeric epic. Against the wider horizon of world history, the epic form becomes the contingent expression of an outmoded worldview, one now seen from outside itself and suspended in comparison with other possible alternatives. And so, though Vergil sings of arms and the man, it is not at all clear that he means to exult the armed man. The ambiguity of Vergil’s commitments has been expressed in Adam Parry’s reading of Vergil as counterposing “two voices” in the Aeneid, 2 a main voice of Roman triumph and a counter -voice questioning the Roman imperial project. This counter -voice ties Vergil to genres outside of epic, genres with their arion 28.2 fall 2020 44 limb-loosening and the care of history own often opposing views of the human condition. Sappho offers one such critique of epic from the erotic perspective of lyric when she asks if any military pageantry could really be more beautiful than the object of her desire (Sappho LP 16). Though the sentiment comes from Greek lyric, it perfectly applies to the crisis of value-commitments Aeneas faces across his journey, most obviously (but not exclusively) in abandoning Dido for Roman glory. The conflicting voices Parry found within the Aeneid are thus analogous to the contrast between epic and lyric, between a view of the world as violence redeemed by public renown and a view of the world as love contained within personal intimacy. Even in Vergil’s most quintessentially epic moments, the deaths of great heroes, an echo of the lyrical voice is present. A formula repeated at the beginning and end of the epic—solvuntur frigore membra—describes the introductory surrender of Aeneas during the storm (Aen 1.92) as well as the concluding death of Turnus at Aeneas’ own hands (Aen 12.951). The hero and his rival both fall with their “limbs slack in a chill,”3 one in desperate supplication, the other in death. What exactly does this mean? Do the limbs seize up in a kind of terror, stiffening in rigor mortis as frigore would suggest? Or is the stress on the solvuntur, as the limbs loosen with a free sensuality evocative of lyrical eroticism? On the most basic physical level, solvere describes the body as somehow coming apart and losing its unified form, yet in these uses it also suggests the opposite, a rigid stiffening of the body. There is clearly more than a physical account intended in each of these expressions. Some deeper semantic sense unites the physical descriptions. Vergil is not entirely innovating with this expression, as Homer uses a similar phrase to describe the deaths of Patroclus and Hector (Il. 16.856–57; 22.68). I aim to demonstrate how this epic formula draws upon a literary tradition which supplies the wider semantic sense necessary to contextualize these passages in Vergil. The epic poets are relying upon a George Saad 45 long-standing motif to describe the loosening of boundaries between individual and world in a moment of bittersweet release. While this motif arises throughout Greek literature, it is especially characteristic of lyric. The loosening of the limbs becomes especially conspicuous in Vergil because this... (shrink)

In a recent article in this journal, Abram Brummett argues that new and future assisted reproductive technologies will provide challenging ethical questions relating to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) persons. Brummett notes that it is likely that some clinicians may wish to conscientiously object to offering assisted reproductive technologies to LGBT couples on moral or religious grounds, and argues that such appeals to conscience should be constrained. We argue that Brummett's case is unsuccessful because he: does not adequately interact (...) with his opponents’ views; equivocates on the meaning of ‘natural’; fails to show that the practice he opposes is eugenic in any non‐trivial sense; and fails to justify and explicate the relevance of the naturalism he proposes. We do not argue that conscience protections should exist for those objecting to providing LGBT people with artificial reproductive technologies, but only show that Brummett's arguments are insufficient to prove that they should not. (shrink)

Diabetes self-management is a crucial part in the management of diabetic patients. Most randomized controlled clinical trials reported significant benefits by diabetes self-management education on DSM behaviors and metabolic control. Although the randomized clinical trials are the gold standard method in assessing the effectiveness of any intervention, including DSME interventions, the outcomes of these studies may reflect exaggerated effects; because in most of these studies, subjects in control group receive usual care with no any DSME. The lack of such education (...) in the control group had many drawbacks: make blindness impossible; at which non blinded studies may result in false-positive findings; it may be unethical to recruit patients for participation in DSME studies as control subjects, most of these studies with long periods of follow up, without any direct benefit to them during the study period; the lack of direct benefit to control subjects in any clinical trial may results in high attrition rate. The high attrition rate in clinical trials especially in the control group can lower the statistical power of the study results; thus, the DSME program would appear to have positive effects even if the program had no real benefit. This problem of the DSME exaggerated effects can be solved partially through providing control subjects with education about some DSM behaviors or comparing the effect of DSME through different educational approaches. (shrink)

Given that most of the adults’ life is spent in the workplace, and because the quality of working life has a significant effect on family life and community health, it is crucial to study the components involved in the improvement of the workplace and people’s health in the work environment. Therefore, by examining the common literature of Islamic values, spirituality and spiritual health, an attempt has been made in this research to explain organisational values and spiritual health in the management (...) of organisations and to analyse the relationship of these variables with each other in Iraq using an Islamic approach. Similar to any other community, an Islamic community requires management proportional to its specific circumstances. In fact, an Islamic community needs a type of management that intertwines with divine and Islamic values and ethical principles and prioritises Islamic ideals. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the role of organisational values in the improvement of Islamic values of Iraqi Muslims. To this end, 2800 employees selected from 30 oil and chemical compound manufacturing organisations are examined. According to the results, the Islamic values governing the Iraqi organisations play an effective role in the improvement of employees’ spiritual health.Contribution: Divine and religious values and Islamic ethics have always been considered in Islamic communities, where formal and informal procedures are taken into consideration. An Islamic approach to management is combined with Islamic values, behaviours and ethics, and these values affect Islamic administration. Therefore, a proper understanding of Islamic values will help develop the right plan for human resource management, as well as the maintenance of organisational and community health. (shrink)

The Yazidi community is one of the largest minority groups in Iraq, who have suffered the most. They have been subjected to marginalization and trauma for decades, which has not been documented adequately in the past. The study adopted a descriptive exploratory research to collect and investigate historical evidence regarding the marginalization and traumatic experience of the Yazidi minority in Iraq and explore whether the western secularism could be helpful in achieving restorative justice and rehabilitation. Through the study of available (...) data in interdisciplinary sources, an attempt was made to fill the literature gap. The current study perceived whether the western so-called secularism could be effective in bringing reconciliation of the Yazidi minority with the Government of Iraq and the KRG. The study also found out that the Yazidi community does not need a European-style revolutionary and atheistic secularism which does not recognize any social, religious or political affiliation in the name of democratic principles. What the Yazidi community needs is a region specific, US-led political-religious initiative, equipped with principles of non-violence, peaceful coexistence, justice, and accessibility to equal human rights and a shared vision along with the majority of the Iraqi population and recognition by the KRG, failing which the Yezidi will continue to be considering themselves as a separate ethnic group and represent as the failure of western secularism. (shrink)

Following Chalmers, I take the most promising response to the meta-problem to be a realizationist one on which (roughly) consciousness plays a role in realizing the processes that explain why we think that there is a hard problem of consciousness. I favour an interactionist dualist version of realizationism on which experiences are non-physical states that non-redundantly cause problem judgments. This view is subject to the challenges of specifying laws that would enable experiences to cause problem judgments and of explaining why (...) it's not a lucky coincidence that experiences' causal and rational powers converge on problem judgments. I propose a strategy for solving the meta-problem and meeting these challenges. According to it, a fundamental teleological law operates on normative features of experiences in ways that bias experiences towards causing effects that they rationalize, including problem judgments. I conclude by applying the strategy to other luck-avoidance challenges. (shrink)

The Quest for Happiness Is a Universal Fact. It is a scientific fact, which means we can measure happiness, we can assess it, and we can devise strategies to make ourselves happy and fulfilled human beings. So says Professor Gad Saad, the author of the sensational bestseller The Parasitic Mind and the irrepressible host of The Saad Truth podcast. In this provocative, entertaining, and life-changing new book, he roams through the scientific studies, culls the wisdom of ancient philosophy (...) and religion, and draws on his extraordinary personal experience as a refugee from war-torn Lebanon turned academic celebrity. (shrink)

This paper defends the view that discovering that our universe is fine-tuned should make us more confident that other universes exist. My defense exploits a distinction between ideal and non-ideal evidential support. I use that distinction in concert with a simple model to disarm the most influential objection—the this-universe objection—to the view that fine-tuning supports the existence of other universes. However, the simple model fails to capture some important features of our epistemic situation with respect to fine-tuning. To capture these (...) features, I introduce a more sophisticated model. I then use the more sophisticated model to show that, even once those complicating factors are taken into account, fine-tuning should boost our confidence in the existence of other universes. (shrink)

As ever more advanced digital systems are created, it becomes increasingly likely that some of these systems will be digital minds, i.e. digital subjects of experience. With digital minds comes the risk of digital suffering. The problem of digital suffering is that of mitigating this risk. We argue that the problem of digital suffering is a high stakes moral problem and that formidable epistemic obstacles stand in the way of solving it. We then propose a strategy for solving it: Access (...) Monitor Prevent (AMP). AMP uses a ‘dancing qualia’ argument to link the functional states of certain digital systems to their experiences—this yields epistemic access to digital minds. With that access, we can prevent digital suffering by only creating advanced digital systems that we have such access to, monitoring their functional profiles, and preventing them from entering states with functional markers of suffering. After introducing and motivating AMP, we confront limitations it faces and identify some options for overcoming them. We argue that AMP fits especially well with—and so provides a moral reason to prioritize—one approach to creating such systems: whole brain emulation. We also contend that taking other paths to digital minds would be morally risky. (shrink)

Dualism holds that some mental events are fundamental and non-physical. I develop a prima facie plausible causal argument for dualism. The argument has several significant implications. First, it constitutes a new way of arguing for dualism. Second, it provides dualists with a parity response to causal arguments for physicalism. Third, it transforms the dialectical role of epiphenomenalism. Fourth, it refutes the view that causal considerations prima facie support physicalism but not dualism. After developing the causal argument for dualism and drawing (...) out these implications, I subject the argument to a battery of objections. Some prompt revisions to the argument. Others reveal limitations in scope. It falls out of the discussion that the causal argument for dualism is best used against physicalism as a keystone in a divide and conquer strategy. (shrink)

This paper examines the ethical foundations of the Islamic financial industry which is strongly criticized for its similarity with conventional finance. In this paper, we argue that this criticism is based on the consequentialist reasoning. The deontological considerations are largely ignored when the focus is on aggregate returns and associated product features. We build an economic model which allows us to examine the implementation of deontological rules in the Islamic financial products along with examining their consequences. We show that the (...) market forces may cause the returns and the attributes of Islamic financial products to converge with conventional finance even though the industry may be adhering to the Islamic deontological rules. We build a model to show that there may exist ‘Epsilon States’ where the deontological rules are followed by the Islamic finance industry, but their impact is not significant. We argue that the source of these ‘Epsilon States’ could be either moral uncertainty or costly monitoring. The presence of these ‘Epsilon States’ enable Islamic financial institutions with weak ethical commitments to create financial products where the deontological rules are followed, but their impact remains insignificant. (shrink)

En este trabajo se sostiene que la teoría del derecho iberoamericana ha malinterpretado la teoría del razonamiento jurídico de Jeremy Waldron, presentándola como una teoría formalista de la adjudicación, y a Waldron como un positivista excluyente. Esto se debe a una lectura sesgada de su teoría del derecho, que se explica, a su vez, por la imagen que el constitucionalismo ha construido en torno a Waldron, como un opositor de Dworkin. Este trabajo muestra que Waldron suscribe a una teoría “dworkiniana” (...) del razonamiento jurídico, la que opera como eslabón entre su teoría de la democracia y su teoría más reciente de la dignidad humana. Ambas cuestiones han sido virtualmente ignoradas por el medio académico hispanoparlante. (shrink)

Plant production is diverse in the Asir region, and there are many methods of analysis. Perhaps factor analysis is one of the most important statistical methods through which productive power can be measured in various geographical regions. In this study, factor analysis was used to measure the developments of plant production in the agricultural sector in the Asir region, Saudi Arabia. The factor analysis showed the presence of three main factors that together explained about %86.55 of the total variation in (...) the development of plant production in the governorates of the Asir region. The study showed three mathematical algorithms that can measure the development of plant production in the Asir region according to the three main factors: First factor equation λ1=44.250%=-0.521*X_1 0.810*X_2+0.78*X_3+0.842*X_4+0.755*X_5 Second factor equation λ2=24.960%-0.228*X_1+0.352*X_2+0.936*X_3-0.226*X_4-0.380*X_5 The third factor equation λ3=17.344%0.796*X_1+0.291*X_2+0.104*X_3+0.339*X_4-0.153*X_5 -The study classified the governorates of the Asir region, based on the results of the analysis, into three groups, according to negative and positive 0.933-0.975 and includes Bisha - Abha - Ahad Rafaida - Khamis Mushait - in Al-Furn - Al-Barak, while the second group represents the category of 0.897-0.548 and includes the governorates of Mahayel, Asir - Tanmomah - Al-Namas - Tathleeth. The third group includes the category of 0.255--0234 and includes the governorates Sarat Ubaidah - Al-Majadra and Bariq - Tareeb - Dhahran Al-Janoub and Al-Harajah - Rijal Almaa. (shrink)

BackgroundParole officers are one of many actors in the legal system charged with interpreting and enforcing the law. Officers not only assure that parolees under their supervision comply with the terms of their release, but also monitor and control parolees’ criminal behavior. They conduct their jobs through their understanding of their official mandate and make considered and deliberate choices while executing that mandate. However, their experiences as legal actors may impact their implicit cognitions about parolees. This experiment is the first (...) of its kind to examine implicit associations between the self and parolees among actors of the legal system.ObjectiveThe present study examines the implicit cognitive consequences of the quality of the parole officer-parolee relationship from the perspective of the parole officer; specifically, whether parole officers who are reminded of positive experiences with parolees implicitly associate more with the group parolees than those reminded of a negative experience. In addition, we explore the moderating effects of parole officers’ subjective professional orientation and identification.MethodEighty-four New Jersey parole officers participated in the study. First, an experimental manipulation of either a past positive or negative experience was administered via a writing task. Participants then completed an Implicit Association Test to measure associations between the self-concept of parole officers with parolees who are part of the group criminal, followed by measures of professional orientation and identification.ResultsParticipants who were reminded of a positive experience with a parolee exhibited stronger associations between self and the group parolee when compared to those who were reminded of a negative experience. Neither professional orientation nor parole officer group identification were related to implicit associations and did not moderate the effect of the past experience reminder on implicit associations.Conclusion and ImplicationsImplicit cognitions of parole officers may influence their behaviors and interactions with those whom they supervise. Positive reminders affect implicit self-associations with parolees presumably via empathy, which is known to affect the quality of therapeutic and supervision relationships; thus, theoretically, leading to improved outcomes for both officers and parolees. (shrink)

A contemporary orientation of the hospital experience model must encompass the clients’ religious-spiritual dimension. The objective of this paper is to share a previous experience, highlighting at least five reasons hospitals should invest in this direction, and an equal number of steps required to achieve it. In the first part, the text discourses about five reasons to invest in religious-spiritual support programs: 1. Religious-spiritual wellbeing is related to better health; 2. Religious-spiritual appreciation is a standard for hospital accreditation; 3. To (...) undo religious-spiritual misunderstandings that can affect treatment; 4. Patients demand a religious-spiritual outlook from the institution; and 5. Costs may be reduced with religious-spiritual support. In the second part, the text suggests five steps to implement religious-spiritual support programs: 1. Deep institutional involvement; 2. Formal staff training; 3. Infrastructure and resources; 4. Adjustment of institutional politics; and 5. Agreement with religious-spiritual leaders. The authors hope the information compiled here can inspire hospitals to adopt actions toward optimization of the healing experience. (shrink)

This work scrutinizes different elements of a philosophical disagreement about the understanding of justice between John Rawls and Gerald Cohen. Rawls uses the original position device where representative members of society hypothetically meet to select the best principles for their social cooperation. More convincing seems Cohen s conceptual analysis method which proposes an unveiling of the concept of justice in order to judge what is just.".

Arianne Shahvisi has argued that a doctor’s conscientious objection to abortion is a misuse of their authority which unduly burdens patients and, moreover, does not succeed in its aim of exculpating objectors from participating in perceived evil. We examine these claims in this response. First, we ask what the ‘conscience clause’ really requires of doctors and whether Shahvisi has interpreted it correctly. Second, we explore the notions of vulnerability and power in the doctor–patient relationship and cast doubt on Shahvisi’s claims (...) about these. Third, we tackle Shahvisi’s claim that conscientious objection is self-defeating because it entails remaing causally implicated in a chain of events leading to abortion. We show that this claim entails absurdity, then revisit the classical framework for the ethics ethics of co-operation to show that conscientious objection can suceed in exculpating objectors from perceived wrongdoing. We briefly critically evaluate the General Medical Council’s guidance on conscie... (shrink)

Though not myself a physicalist, I develop a new argument against antiphysicalist positions that are motivated by zombie arguments. I first identify four general features of phenomenal states that are candidates for non-physical types; these are used to generate different types of zombie. I distinguish two antiphysicalist positions: strict dualism, which posits exactly one general non-physical type, and pluralism, which posits more than one such type. It turns out that zombie arguments threaten strict dualism and some pluralist positions as much (...) as they threaten physicalism—indeed, more so, since such positions need zombies to motivate them as alternatives to physicalism—and that the only pluralist position that escapes zombie arguments has a radically inflated ontology. (shrink)

Debate persists over the place of conscience in medicine. Some argue for the complete exclusion of conscientious objection, while others claim an absolute right of refusal. This paper proposes that claims of conscientious objection can and should be permitted if they concern kinds of actions which fall outside of the normative standard of medicine, which is the pursuit of health. Medical practice which meets this criterion we call medicine qua medicine. If conscientious refusal concerns something consonant with the health-restoring aims (...) of medicine, it entails a desertion of professional duty. If, however, it relates to something other than medicine qua medicine, it can rightly be refused. It thus becomes possible to test instances of conscientious objection to determine their validity, and thereby conserve both the principle of conscientious objection and define its scope. This test of conscience prevents arbitrary discrimination, and preserves doctors’ agency. It is a theoretical razor rooted in the pra... (shrink)

Experiences tend to be followed by states for which they provide normative reasons. Such harmonious correlations cry out for explanation. Theories that answer or diminish these cries thereby achieve an advantage over theories that do neither. I argue that the main lines of response to these cries that are available to biological theorists—theorists who hold (roughly) that conscious subjects are generally biological entities—are problematic. And I argue that panpsychism—which holds (roughly) that conscious subjects are ubiquitous in nature—provides an attractive response (...) to these explanatory cries. Taken together, these considerations underwrite a kind of ‘psychophysical fine-tuning’ argument in support of panpsychism, one that is reminiscent of cosmological fine-tuning arguments in favor of multiverse hypotheses. (shrink)

The chief motivation for epiphenomenalist dualism is its promise to solve dualism’s causal exclusion problem without inducing causal overdetermination or violations of the causal closure of the physical. This paper argues that epiphenomenalist dualism is itself susceptible to an exclusion problem. The problem exploits symmetries of determination and influence generated by a wide class of physical theories. Further, I argue that there is an interference effect between solving epiphenomenalist dualism's exclusion problem and using epiphenomenalist dualism as a solution to the (...) causal exclusion problem. What emerges is an overlooked, empirically-motivated challenge to epiphenomenalist dualism. (shrink)

Protecting the environment and its natural resources is an issue of great importance at the local and global levels. The phenomenon of environmental pollution resulting from the work of oil companies is one of the dangerous phenomena facing the environment in Iraq in general, and the environment of Kirkuk Governorate in particular, as the latter is considered one of the governorates rich in mineral resources, especially oil, as it contains six oil fields, and it contains the largest oil field in (...) Iraq. Estimates indicate that it produces (40%) of the total Iraqi oil, so it suffers from a significant increase in the proportions of toxic and environmentally polluting gases resulting from the work of these companies in it. The work of oil companies from exploration, extraction and refining oil will naturally result in the emission of many gases that are highly toxic, dangerous and harmful to human health. The most important of these gases are carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, hydrocarbon compounds, hydrogen sulfide and other gases that pollute the environment, which has resulted in the spread and increase in the number of patients with respiratory diseases in a clear and increasing manner in the governorate. This increase in environmental costs falls on society as a whole, so it was necessary to identify and measure environmental costs from the society’s point of view and work to re-charge them to oil companies by applying the environmental tax. (shrink)

SummaryThis article focuses on the analysis of sensibility in the works of three major late eighteenth-century philosophers: Smith, Cabanis and the young Wilhelm von Humboldt. It analyses to what extent Smith's concept of sympathy influenced Cabanis in France and Humboldt in Germany. It argues that modern anthropology, based on a specific theory of sensibility, assumes a strong connection between knowledge acquisition and life in society. This article reveals the strong links between the three authors which were made possible precisely because (...) of their common philosophical background. It proves, for the first time, that Humboldt had access to Condillac's ideas before 1798, since in an early work on the state, the former makes numerous borrowings from speeches Cabanis wrote for Mirabeau, which were in turn strongly influenced by Condillac. (shrink)

With O’Donovan’s characteristic erudition, The Disappearance of Ethics reflects on the imperilment of ethics as an intellectual discipline, and applies theology to strengthen its foundations. In th...

Natural law is probably the most misrepresented and, therefore, unfairly dismissed ethical theory. If current academic ethics were a battlefield, it would be littered with the felled strawmen alleg...

This paper argues that healthcare aims at the good of health, that this pursuit of the good necessitates conscience, and that conscience is required in every practical judgement, including clinical...

Some physical theories predict that almost all brains in the universe are Boltzmann brains, i.e. short-lived disembodied brains that are accidentally assembled as a result of thermodynamic or quantum fluctuations. Physicists and philosophers of physics widely regard this proliferation as unacceptable, and so take its prediction as a basis for rejecting these theories. But the putatively unacceptable consequences of this prediction follow only given certain philosophical assumptions. This paper develops a strategy for shielding physical theorizing from the threat of Boltzmann (...) brains. The strategy appeals to a form of phenomenal externalism about the physical basis of consciousness. Given that form of phenomenal externalism, the proliferation of Boltzmann brains turns out to be benign. While the strategy faces a psychophysical fine-tuning problem, it both alleviates cosmological fine-tuning concerns that attend physics-based solutions to Boltzmann brain problems and pays explanatory dividends in connection with time’s arrow. (shrink)

The conventional historical account of the concept of brain death credits developments and discoveries of the twentieth century with its inception, emphasizing the role of technological developments and professional conferences, notably the 1968 Ad Hoc Committee of the Harvard Medical School to Examine the Definition of Brain Death. This essay argues that the French physician Eugène Bouchut anticipated the concept of brain death as early as 1846. Correspondence with Bouchut’s understanding of brain death and one important contemporary concept of brain (...) death is established then contrasted with current trends of defining death as the death of the brain. The philosophical factors that influenced Bouchut and the later developments of concepts of brain death are considered, with special reference to mechanistic philosophy and vitalism. (shrink)

Florence Ashley has argued that requiring patients with gender dysphoria to undergo an assessment and referral from a mental health professional before undergoing hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is unethical and may represent an unconscious hostility towards transgender people. We respond, first, by showing that Ashley has conflated the self-reporting of symptoms with self-diagnosis, and that this is not consistent with the standard model of informed consent to medical treatment. Second, we note that the model of informed consent involved in cosmetic (...) surgery resembles the model Ashley defends, and that psychological assessment and referral is recognised as an important aspect of such a model. Third, we suggest that the increased prevalence of psychiatric morbidity in the transgender population arguably supports the requirement of assessment and referral from a mental health professional prior to undergoing HRT. (shrink)

Respect for Autonomy has been a mainstay of medical ethics since its enshrinement as one of the four principles of biomedical ethics by Beauchamp and Childress’ in the late 1970s. This paper traces the development of this modern concept from Antiquity to the present day, paying attention to its Enlightenment origins in Kant and Rousseau. The rapid C20th developments of bioethics and RFA are then considered in the context of the post-war period and American socio-political thought. The validity and utility (...) of the RFA are discussed in light of this philosophical-historical account. It is concluded that it is not necessary to embrace an ethic of autonomy in order to guard patients from coercion or paternalism, and that, on the contrary, the dominance of autonomy threatens to undermine those very things which have helped doctors come to view and respect their patients as persons. (shrink)

In her paper ‘Cosmetic surgery and conscientious objection’, Minerva rightly identifies cosmetic surgery as an interesting test case for the question of conscientious objection in medicine. Her treatment of this important subject, however, seems problematic. It is argued that Minerva's suggestion that a doctor has a prima facie duty to satisfy patient preferences even against his better clinical judgment, which we call Patient Preference Absolutism, must be regarded with scepticism. This is because it overlooks an important distinction regarding autonomy's meaning (...) and place in clinical practice, and it makes obsolete the important concepts of expert clinical judgment and beneficence. Finally, we discuss two ideas which emerge from consideration of cosmetic surgery in relation to conscientious objection. These are the possible analogy between clinical judgment and conscientious objection, and the possible role the goals of medicine can play in defining the scope of conscientious objection. (shrink)

Gauge invariance of a manifestly covariant relativistic quantum theory with evolution according to an invariant time τ implies the existence of five gauge compensation fields, which we shall call pre-Maxwell fields. A Lagrangian which generates the equations of motion for the matter field (coinciding with the Schrödinger type quantum evolution equation) as well as equations, on a five-dimensional manifold, for the gauge fields, is written. It is shown that τ integration of the equations for the pre-Maxwell fields results in the (...) usual Maxwell equations with conserved current source. The analog of the O (3, 1) symmetry of the usual Maxwell theory is found to be O (3, 2) or O (4, 1), depending on the space-time Fourier spectrum of the field. We argue that the structure that is relevant to the description of radiation in interaction with matter evolving in a timelike sense is that of O (3, 2). The noncovariant form of the field equations is given; there are two fields of electric type and one (divergenceless) magnetic type field. The Noether currents are studied, and some remarks are made on second quantization. (shrink)