Many drugs have therapeutic off-label uses for which they were not originally designed. Some drugs designed to treat neuropsychiatric and other disorders may enhance certain normal cognitive and affective functions. Because the long-term effects of cognitive and affective enhancement are not known and may be harmful, a precautionary principle limiting its use seems warranted. As an expression of autonomy, though, competent individuals should be permitted to take cognition- and mood-enhancing agents. But they need to be aware of the risks in (...) chronic use of these agents and to take responsibility for their effects. A reasonable middle ground between these positions is to warn those who choose to enhance that doing so entails risks. (shrink)

Although there are suggestions that the environmental attitudes of men and of women differ, there have been few studies that study and evaluate these differences at the workplace. Given the claim of Ecofeminist writers about the environmental superiority of women's environmental attitudes, and the proclaimed need of business to change attitudes and behaviour with regard to the environment, this is a surprise. The paper is based on 1022 (37% from women) questionnaires which were collected in a U.K. pharmaceutical company, and (...) it compares the empirical results with environmental attitude archetypes, such as those prescribed by O'Riordan. However, the attitude clusters that were found do not correspond greatly with such theoretical modes of environmental ethics. Instead, it appears that women were more likely to be actively involved in environmental behaviour, and showed greater scepticism towards the role of technology in the search for solutions to environmental problems. In addition, men sought to a much greater extent a consistency between an environmental rationality and their behaviour. Men's attitudes were also much more influenced by their position in the organisational hierarchy. There were few significant differences across age groups. (shrink)

Adamson argues that Marxism "teaches us how to interpret social and historical reality, and to relate that interpretation to our current political concerns.".

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 11, Issue 8, Page 48-49, August 2011.

The »dynamic personalism« developed by Karol Wojtyla as a philosophical basis for Catholic sexual ethics attempts to integrate the experiential perspective of modern phenomenology and the traditional concept of nature. The article points out that the use of phenomenology in the service of a preconceived ontology neglects the epistemological problern and reduces human action to a process in which nature appears as a quasi causal agent. In a second step it focusses on the concept of person in the ecumenical discussion (...) of bioethics. (shrink)

The following paper is a modified version of Ihe Edward S. O’Donnell, S.J., Distinguished Lecture, delivered at Marquette University in November of 1986, The original title of the lecture was, “The Fare of Theology 1986, or the Painful Process of Doctrinal Development.” Following a historical exegesis of the notion of responsibility for theologians. I offer a summary of dominant factors underlying the issue of doctrinal development in theology, and conclude with some recommendations relating to the present tasks facing theologians.

In Human Nature, Hobbes argues for what I call the ‘Great Deception Thesis’: “whatsoever accidents or qualities our senses make us think there be in the world, they are not there, but are seemings and apparitions only.” I argue that both the thesis and Hobbes’ arguments for it have been misunderstood. Rather than arguing for indirect realism or a primary/secondary quality distinction, Hobbes claims that no sensory experience resembles its object. I conclude by showing how Hobbes can account for the (...) usefulness of images even in the absence of any resemblance between those images and the objects that cause them. If I am right, Hobbes presents a distinctive and intriguing theory of perception, one that emphasizes the dynamic nature of experience. (shrink)

En este texto el A. se propone mostrar que es posible emplear algunas técnicas de la lógica modal para reflexionar en torno al problema de la existencia de Dios. En la primera parte se presenta la estructura general de la lógica modal,su simbología y los diversos sistemas que recientemente han sido propuestos. En la segunda parte, el A. sugiere la posibilidad de formular en términos modales la prueba ontológica de San Anselmo. El texto culmina extrayendo algunas consecuencias de esta formulación.