Recent buzzes around big data, data science and artificial intelligence portray a data-driven future for healthcare. As a response, Europe's key players have stimulated the use of big data technologies to make healthcare more efficient and effective. Critical Data Studies and Science and Technology Studies have developed many concepts to reflect on such overly positive narratives and conduct critical policy evaluations. In this study, we argue that there is also much to be learned from studying how professionals in the healthcare (...) field affectively engage with this strong European narrative in concrete big data projects. We followed twelve hospital-based big data pilots in eight European countries and interviewed 145 professionals between 2018 and 2020. In this study, we introduce the metaphor of dreams to describe how professionals link the big data promises to their own frustrations, ideas, values and experiences with healthcare. Our research answers the question: how do professionals in concrete data-driven initiatives affectively engage with European Union's data hopes in their ‘dreams’ – and with what consequences? We describe the dreams of being seen, of timeliness, of connectedness and of being in control. Each of these dreams emphasizes certain aspects of the grand narrative of big data in Europe, makes particular assumptions and has different consequences. We argue that including attention to these dreams in our work could help shine an additional critical light on the big data developments and stimulate the development of responsible data-driven healthcare. (shrink)

Céline Pérol nous offre un parcours quasiment initiatique pour comprendre dans la longue durée le destin si singulier de Marthe, la sœur de Marie-Madeleine et de Lazare. Marthe est longtemps restée dans l’ombre de sa glorieuse fratrie et son culte ne s’est que rarement individualisé. Dans les Évangiles, elle est l’hôtesse du Christ à Béthanie (Lc 10, 38-42), qu’elle accueille activement dans sa maison alors que Marie ne se préoccupe que de rester aux pieds du Christ. Elle est (...) celle qui a tant... (shrink)

ABSTRACT Kant famously claims that we have all freely chosen evil. This paper offers a novel account of the much-debated justification for this claim. I reconstruct Kant’s argument from his affirmation that we all have a price – we can all succumb to temptation. I argue that this follows a priori from a theoretical principle of the Critique of Pure Reason, namely that all empirical powers have a finite, changeable degree, an intensive magnitude. Because of this, our reason can always (...) be overpowered by sensible inclinations. Kant moreover holds that this necessary feature of our moral psychology should not have been the case: We ought to instead be like the divine human being, for whom the moral law yields a greater incentive than any possible temptation. On Kant’s view, we are thus responsible for having a price, and the synthetic a priori fact that we do proves that we each made an initial choice of evil. (shrink)

Edited by Marthe Chandler and Ronnie Littlejohn, this work is a collection of expository and critical essays on the work of Henry Rosemont, Jr., a prominent and influential contemporary philosopher, activist, translator, and educator in the field of Asian and Comparative Philosophy. The essays in this collection take up three major themes in Rosemont's work: his work in Chinese linguistics, his contribution to the theory of human rights, and his interest in East Asian religion. Contributions include works by the (...) leading scholars in Chinese philosophy in the Western world and Rosemont's close associates: Roger T. Ames, Bao Zhiming, Mary Bockover, Marthe Chandler, Ewing Y. Chinn, Erin M. Cline, Fred Dallmayr, Jeffrey Dippmann, Herbert Fingarette, Harrison Huang, Eric Hutton, Philip J. Ivanhoe, David Jones, William La Fleur, Ronnie Littlejohn, Ni Peimin, Michael Nylan, Harold Roth, Sumner Twiss, Tu Weiming, David Wong, with responses from Henry Rosemont, Jr. and a brief Reminiscence by Noam Chomsky. (shrink)

An increasing number of people seek medical attention for mild cognitive symptoms at older age, worried that they might develop Alzheimer’s disease. Some clinical practice guidelines suggest offering biomarker testing in such cases, using a brain scan or a lumbar puncture, to improve diagnostic certainty about Alzheimer’s disease and enable an earlier diagnosis. Critics, on the other hand, point out that there is no effective Alzheimer treatment available and argue that biomarker tests lack clinical validity. The debate on the ethical (...) desirability of biomarker testing is currently polarized; advocates and opponents tend to focus on their own line of arguments. In this paper, we show how the method of reflective equilibrium can be used to systematically weigh the relevant arguments on both sides of the debate to decide whether to offer Alzheimer biomarker testing. In the tradition of RE, we reflect upon these arguments in light of their coherence with other argumentative elements, including relevant facts, ethical principles, and theories on societal ideals or relevant concepts, such as autonomy. Our stance in the debate therefore rests upon previously set out in-depth arguments and reflects a wide societal perspective. (shrink)

What is it that makes a mental state conscious? Recent commentators have proposed that for Kant, consciousness results from differentiation: A mental state is conscious insofar as it is distinguished, by means of our conceptual capacities, from other states and/or things. I argue instead that Kant’s conception of state consciousness is sensory: A mental state is conscious insofar as it is accompanied by an inner sensation. Interpreting state consciousness as inner sensation reveals an underappreciated influence of Crusius on Kant’s view, (...) solves some long-standing puzzles concerning Kant’s difficult doctrine of self-affection, and sheds light on his theory of inner experience. (shrink)

Sharing within communities has gained popularity in recent years. However, taking part in a community also comes with a certain amount of risk. This perceived amount of risk can be contained by regulations within a community as well as by potential participants’ trust in the community and the other members. We argue for a relation between regulation and the willingness to take the risk of joining a sharing community with trust as mediator. Thereby, we distinguish between two kinds of regulation (...) (soft and harsh regulation) and two kinds of trust (implicit and reason-based trust) on two different levels (vertical and horizontal trust). In one laboratory and one online experiment with overall 432 participants, we found that the compound of high soft and low harsh regulation increases participants’ willingness to take the risk of participation and the effect of soft regulation is mediated mainly by vertical and horizontal reason-based trust. Based on our results, we encourage sharing communities to count on soft regulation in order to increase potential members’ trust in the community and therefore take the risk to participate. (shrink)

According to Kant each person has an empirical character, which is ultimately grounded in one’s free choice. The popular Causal Laws interpretation of empirical character holds that it consists of the causal laws governing our psychology. I argue that this reading has difficulties explaining moral change, the ‘gradual reformation’ of our empirical character: Causal laws cannot change and hence cannot be gradually reformed. I propose an alternative Causal Powers interpretation of empirical character, where our empirical character consists of our mind’s (...) causal powers. The resulting picture of empirical character allows for moral change and Kantian weakness of will. (shrink)

Does Kant hold that we can have intuitions independently of concepts? A striking passage from § 13 of the Critique of Pure Reason appears to say so explicitly. However, it also conjures up a scenario where the categories are inapplicable to objects of intuition, a scenario presumably shown impossible by the following Transcendental Deduction. The seemingly non-conceptualist claim concerning intuition have therefore been read, by conceptualist interpreters of Kant, as similarly counterpossible. I argue that the passage in question best supports (...) an underappreciated middle position where intuition requires a pre-conceptual use of the understanding. Such pre-conceptual use of the understanding faces both textual and systematic objections. I show that these objections can be rebutted. (shrink)

Dans la genese de sa constitution, la philosophie n'a pu faire l'economie d'une confrontation avec la musique qui fournissait aux anciens Grecs les schemes fondamentaux de la culture. De cette confrontation Platon est le temoin. Scindant la musique, il privilegie l'Harmonique, qui en est la partie theorique, sans toutefois lui reconnaitre la titre de science supreme. Correlativement, il condamne comme dysharmonie, tumulte fracassant et perturbateur de l'ordre cosmique, l'harmonie chromaticiste dont il s'emploie, non sans paradoxe, a decrire le detail. Par (...) cette lecture en filigrane des Dialogues de Platon, l'auteur se propose de reconstruire la pensee qui procede de l'harmonie chromaticiste et de montrer son importance dans l'elaboration de la philosophie fondatrice. Au carrefour des disciplines du savoir antique, ce livre s'adresse non seulement aux philosophes, mais aussi a tous ceux qui, musiciens ou stylisticiens, s'interessent a la forme musicale. (shrink)

Are the pure intuitions of space and time, for Kant, dependent upon the understanding's activity? This paper defends the recently popular Self-Affection Thesis : namely, that the pure intuitions require an activity of self-affection—an influence of the understanding on the inner sense. Two systematic objections to this thesis have been raised: The Independence objection claims that SAT undermines the independence of sensibility; the Compatibility objection claims that certain features of space and time are incompatible with being the products of the (...) understanding's activity. I show that the resources to rebut these objections can be found in Kant's account of causal influence. (shrink)

Using Li Zehou's theories of aesthetics, argues for the importance of the arts to philosophy.

This article seeks to explore the early stages of American film theory, wherecinephiliabecame a site of aesthetic interest and criticism thanks to the theorization of cinema as a conversational medium. Following Stanley Cavell’s analysis of a distinct form of moviegoing in America, based on the casual conversation about movies, I argue that a reinterpretation of Emerson’s ordinary aesthetics has been at the core of early film theory, especially in Vachel Lindsay’s writings. In order to illustrate the relation between the defence (...) of a new medium and the attempt to define a quintessentially American art form, this article focuses on the concept of “conversation” that Lindsay uses to describe film spectatorship and to provide a new critical apparatus to grasp the specificity of film aesthetics. (shrink)

The last chapter examines the tense system used by ordinarily competent speakers of English to discuss past, present, and future events, actual and possible events, and various combinations of these. I present a systematic method for translating English sentences containing certain compound verb tenses and embedded tense constructions into a logical language using tense operators. Finally I show how the usual semantics for these operators reflects the truth conditions of the original English sentences. I argue, however, that a tense logical (...) semantics reflecting the use of tense in English will contain a partially ordered tense structure rather than one that is linearly ordered or branching. ;The third chapter discusses logic of 'unless'. I show that many of the previously puzzling features of this word can be understood by considering the tenses of the verbs in the sentences joined by 'unless'. In a number of cases it turns out that 'unless' should not be interpreted as a truth-functional connective at all, but is best understood as an intensional, tense connective. ;In the second chapter I discuss Quine's doctrine of eternal sentences. I take Quine's position to be that all the information important for logic and science presented in tensed English sentences can also be presented by eternal sentences which use timeless verbs and data and clock times. I argue that in so far as logic and science are concerned with an analysis of the reasons for human action, and with the explanation and prediction of specific events, eternal sentences lose indexical information that is necessary to accomplish these tasks. ;The first chapter investigates what may be called the standard view of propositions. On this view propositions are abstract objects that are timelessly true , and serve both as the meanings of sentences and as the objects of propositional attitudes. Although this view was widely held by a previous generation of logicians and is found in many textbooks today, there are serious difficulties in the view. I show that many of these difficulties stem from the claim that propositions are timelessly true . The standard view has been revised in two general ways. The first sort of revision allows propositions to be sometimes true and sometimes false. This position is consistent with the development of tense logic as one of the intensional logics. The second sort of revision replaces the notion of timeless propositions with that of eternal sentences which always have the same truth value. On this view tense logic is not worth serious philosophic attention since its basic notion, that of truth at a time, can be eliminated in favor of eternal truth. ;The first part of the project examines two major sources of criticism of tense logic: the view that logic is concerned with timeless propositions, and Quine's doctrine of eternal sentences. The second part of the project discusses several problems in logical theory that the use of tense logic can clarify or resolve, and that alternative theories are unable to present accurately, much less to elucidate. ;In the past few years there has been increasing interest in the logic of indexicals, including the temporal indexical 'now', and in the relationship between tense and modality. Although modern tense logic has reached a high level of technical sophistication, often specifically in response to this interest, many philosophers remain skeptical about the value of tense logic as a philosophic tool. This thesis addresses that skepticism and argues that it is unjustified. (shrink)

A well-known trilemma faces the interpretation of Kant’s theory of affection, namely whether the objects that affect us are empirical, noumenal, or both. I argue that according to Kant, the things that affect us and cause representations in us are not empirical objects. I articulate what I call the Causal Power Argument, according to which empirical objects cannot affect us because they do not have the right kind of power to cause representations. All the causal powers that empirical objects have (...) are moving powers, and such powers can only have spatial effects. According to Kant, however, the representations that arise in us as a result of the affection of our sensibility are non-spatial. I show that this argument is put forward by Kant in a number of passages, and figures as a decisive reason for rejecting empirical affection and instead endorsing affection by the things in themselves. (shrink)

The conversations between Meno and Socrates and between Mencius and King Xuan are philosophical dramas whose "plots" are intellectual arguments. Although both texts present historical characters at particular times in their lives, the texts were written some years after the events they describe by disciples of Socrates and Mencius. The authors had a number of motives: they wanted to represent what the characters thought and said, to explain the philosophical theories underlying the dramatic plots, and to justify the failure of (...) their mentors to teach something very important. Meno did not learn how to live a good life. Xuan did not become a sage king. It is argued here that while both dramas end in failure, Socrates leaves the conversation confidently optimistic about the future. The conversation between Mencius and Xuan, on the other hand, has deeply tragic overtones. (shrink)

Although the historical dispute between introspective psychology and ontological behaviorism encourages the belief that attitudes do not exist, this belief is misguided. Even the Hacking test, suggested by someone with grave doubts about behavioral science, supports the claim that attitudes are “just as real as neutrinos.” Nevertheless, the progress of a science of attitudes may be severely limited by the influence of exogenous factors, factors including normative beliefs about how we should treat the people to whom attitudes are attributed. In (...) so far as these beliefs prevent scientists from experimenting on people and their institutions, particle physics has resources unavailable to survey research. Thus a serious examination of behavioral science leads to some surprising conclusions as to which sciences are the “hard” ones and which ones are simply easier. (shrink)

This paper examines two models used in survey research to explain voting behavior. Although the models rely on the same data they make radically different predictions about the political future. Nevertheless, both models may be more or less correct. The models represent interacting systems and it may be impossible to get a super model of the interactions between their elements. In the natural sciences causal relationships between the elements of interacting models can often be ignored. Because voting behavior models describe (...) phenomena that are roughly the same size, the reciprocal relationships between elements of different models severely restrict the predictive power of voting behavior models. Certain analogies, and disanalogies, between the use of models in natural and social science explain why the social sciences cannot predict many of the events they are able to explain. (shrink)

Chapters 8, "On Religion and Ritual," and 9, "The Religious Dimensions of Role-Bearing Family Lives," of Against Individualism continue the discussion between Henry Rosemont and Huston Smith that began in Rationality and Religious Experience. The conversations concern the nature of religion, religious experience, and the object of that experience. Rosemont argues that there are certain "homoversals," behaviors that cannot be entirely accounted for by physical or cultural environments.1 Language learning and facial recognition are homoversals, as is what Rosemont calls a (...) "religious impulse … a subjective sense human beings appear to have about being in the presence of something larger than themselves, something that... (shrink)

In this paper, I take a critical look at Sartorio’s book Causation and Free Will (2016). Sartorio offers a rich defence of an actual-sequence view of freedom, which pays close attention to issues in the philosophy of causation and how they relate to freedom. I argue that although this focus on causation is illuminating, Sartorio’s project nevertheless runs into some serious difficulties. Perhaps most worrying amongst them is whether the agent-based reason-sensitivity account, offered by Sartorio, is consistent with Frankfurt-style cases (...) – the very cases which are provided as the sole reason to endorse an actual-sequence view of freedom. I suggest that given that powers and causation are so intimately bound together, the debate is skewed somewhat by thinking of these as rivals. (shrink)

It is widely believed that there must be a conflict between food production and conservation, and that development must be related to economics. Both these beliefs are questioned. It is suggested that ecological agriculture, which includes ethologically and ecologically sound animal management can reduce conflicts between conservation and food production. African elephants are taken as an example illustrating different attitudes to conservation. It is proposed that, rather than developing further the present common conservation attitude of ' wildlife apartheid', the future (...) of elephants in many parts of Africa may rest on bringing them closer to the voters where the welfare of neither the human nor elephant is compromised. Here, they can act as both as workers, and as ' wildlife ambassadors'. This approach needs further research and development, but preliminary results show significant possibilities for reducing these apparently conflicting land use interests in some geographical areas. (shrink)

_A portion of the revenue from this book’s sales will be donated to Doctors Without Borders to assist the humanitarian work of nurses, doctors, and other health care providers in the fight against COVID-19 and beyond._ _Concepts and Cases in Nursing Ethics_ is an introduction to contemporary ethical issues in health care, designed especially for Canadian audiences. The book is organized around six key concepts: beneficence, autonomy, truth-telling, confidentiality, justice, and integrity. Each of these concepts is explained and discussed with (...) reference to professional and legal norms. The discussion is then supplemented by case studies that exemplify the relevant concepts and show how each applies in health care and nursing practice. This new fourth edition includes an added chapter on end-of-life issues, and it is revised throughout to reflect the latest developments on topics such as global health ethics, cultural competence, social media, and palliative sedation, as well as ethical issues relating to COVID-19. (shrink)

By registering different health benefits on a common scale, CEA allows us to assess the relative social importance of different health care interventions and opens the way for the allocation decisions of health care policy. If it is really to be effective, however, CEA must be recalibrated so that it better reflects some of our widely held beliefs about the merits of different kinds of treatment.

By registering different health benefits on a common scale, CEA allows us to assess the relative social importance of different health care interventions and opens the way for the allocation decisions of health care policy. If it is really to be effective, however, CEA must be recalibrated so that it better reflects some of our widely held beliefs about the merits of different kinds of treatment.

Concepts and Cases in Nursing Ethics maps the ethical landscape of contemporary nursing. The book is the product of a collaboration between philosopher-ethicist Michael Yeo, nurse-ethicist Anne Moorhouse, and six representatives of various areas of professional nursing. It thus combines philosophical and ethical analysis with nursing knowledge and experience in a manner that is both understandable and relevant. The book is organized around six main concepts in nursing ethics: beneficence, autonomy, confidentiality, truth-telling, justice, and integrity. A chapter is devoted (...) to the elucidation of each of these concepts. In each chapter, historical background and conceptual analysis are supplemented by case studies that exemplify issues and show how the concept applies in nursing practice. In this new edition, the materials in each chapter have been updated to reflect recent developments in nursing and more generally in health care. In addition, a totally new chapter on ethical theory has been added. Complete with bibliographies and study questions for further analysis of cases, this book is ideally suited for textbook use. It will help both practitioners and students to deal better with the clinical problems and issues that are encountered in the field. However, it's simple prose and clear exposition of complex issues will make Concepts and Cases in Nursing Ethics attractive to anyone concerned about health care. (shrink)