An anencephalic infant, who came to be known as Baby K, was born at Fairfax Hospial in Falls Church, Virginia, on October 13, 1992. From, the moment of birth and repeatedly thereafter, the baby's mother insisted that aggressive measures be pursued, including cardiopulmonary resuscitation and ventilator support, to keep the baby alive as long as possible. The physicians complied. However, following the baby's second admission for respiratory failure, the hospital sought declaratory relief from the court permitting it to forgo emergency (...) life support on the grounds that “a requirement to provide respiratory assistance would exceed the prevailing standard of medical care,” and that “because any treatment of their condition is futile, the prevailing standard of medical care for infants with anencephaly is to provide warmth, nutrition, and hydration.” The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled in favor of the baby's mother, citing the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act , which contained no “standard of care” exception to the requirement to provide “treatment necessary to prevent the material deterioration of the individual's condition.” An appeal to the United States Supreme Court was rejected. The baby died some two and one-half years later of cardiac arrest during her sixth visit to the emergency department of Fairfax Hospital for respiratory failure. (shrink)

Current methods of obtaining consent for emergency neonatal research are flawed. They risk aggravating the distress of parents of preterm and other sick neonates. This distress, and the inevitable time constraints, compromise understanding and voluntariness, essential components of adequately informed consent. Current practice may be unjust in over-representing babies of more vulnerable and deprived parents. The research findings may thus not be generalisable. Informing parents antenatally about the possible need for emergency neonatal research, with presumed consent and scope for opting (...) out, would address these problems. It would spare parents of sick neonates, already terrified by their baby's illness, further distress. Experience with opting out suggests that recruitment might increase, thus generating earlier results, without compromising parental understanding of the nature and purpose of the research. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the work of Emmanuel Levinas and René Girard and argues that both of them have as their central problem the phenomenon of human violence and both try to address this problem from their own religious tradition, Jewish for Levinas, Christian for Girard. They both pursue the concept of nonviolence to an extreme point in what each calls saintliness or holiness and both can be considered religious prophets of this extreme version of nonviolence.

According to the expressive view of voting, a voter derives expressive utility from casting a vote. We present two possible sources of expressive utility: social interaction with voters having the same political preferences, and interestingness of the election. First, it has been suggested that a voter's expressive utility may increase when there are more voters having the same political preference. We extend this line of study and test the hypothesis that a voter's expressive utility increases as the number of voters (...) having the same political preferences increases in the local community, where interaction occurs more frequently with others than it does with others in distant communities. Second, we propose and test the other hypothesis, that voters’ expressive utility is larger when the election is more interesting. Using 2008 parliamentary election data from Korea, where the election consists of both 245 single-member districts and only one nationwide district for proportional representatives, we find supporting evidence for these two arguments: the turnout rate is significantly and positively related to the share of proportional representation votes for the largest party in each single-member district; the turnout rate is also significantly and positively related to the number of polls for single-member district election conducted by major broadcasting companies, which we use as a proxy variable for interestingness of the election. (shrink)

Fluctuating asymmetry (FA) is small deviations from perfect symmetry in normally bilaterally symmetrical traits. We examined the relationship between FA of five body traits (ear height, length of three digits, and ankle circumference) and self-reported scores of physical and verbal aggression in a sample of 90 boys aged 10 to 15 years. The relationships between FA and scores of aggression (particularly physical aggression) were found to be negative; in other words, the most symmetrical boys showed highest aggression. One trait (ankle (...) circumference) showed the characteristics of “ideal” FA—parametric mean of zero and a normal distribution. Mean asymmetries calculated from six repeated measures of ankle FA in 30 subjects taken over a period of five months showed strong negative associations with scores of physical aggression which were independent of age, height, and weight.It is argued that soft tissue “cyclical” FA (as opposed to “fixed” bony FA) is dependent on the secretion of hormones: for example, cortisol. Causal associations between behavioral traits such as aggresion and hormones will lead to similar correlations between FA and behavior. (shrink)

Under the influence of recurrent deleterious mutation and selection, asexual and sexual populations reach a deterministic equilibrium with individuals carrying 0,1,2,. . . harmful mutations. When a favourable mutation (aA) occurs in an asexual population it will usually occur in an individual who has one or more (k) deleterious mutations. Muller's ratchet then applies as A will thereafter never occur in an individual with less than k mutations. If the selective advantage of A is less than the selective disadvantage of (...) k harmful mutations then A will not spread. If it is greater it may spread carrying k deleterious mutations to fixation. Sexual populations are not affected in this way. A will spread through the population experiencing genomes with 0,1,2,. . . deleterious mutations in accordance with the deterministic equilibrium. (shrink)

Impostors, confidence artists, and artful deceivers seem to have achieved a strange kind of popularity and even prestige in our contemporary political landscape, for reasons that remain elusive, especially given how harmful and socially unwanted such behaviors ostensibly are. Herman Melville’s 1857 novel, The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade, helps us shift our perspective on this seemingly irrational phenomenon because it points out how being susceptible to dupery is linked to the enjoyment of fiction itself. This insight also highlights the importance of (...) epistemological failure in the recent “return to aesthetics” in literary studies, where the positive dimension of unconsciously “willing one’s dupery” directly links aesthetic form to politics. The logic that connects aesthetics to unconscious enjoyment is then elaborated in the work of psychoanalytic thinkers such as Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Helene Deutsch and others to raise particular questions about how and why the enjoyment of being duped has been associated with feminine sexuality. Reading Melville’s novel while considering psychoanalytic concepts such as the “as if” personality, imposture, and interpassivity illuminates how confidence games play upon the ruses of sexuality, which have profound implications for why the public remains in thrall to the workings of known deceivers. (shrink)

Under the influence of deleterious mutation and selection a population will reach equilibrium and contain individuals with [0, 1, 2 - - mutations.] This deterministic equilibrium distribution is exactly the same for asexual and sexual populations. The size of the optimal class , i.e. the class with the smallest number of mutations, is determined by the genome mutation rate and the average selective disadvantage of the mutations. A large U and small s gives a very small n o. If n (...) o is small in an asexual population it will be lost by drift and this causes a reduction in the mean fitness of the population . It is argued that diploidy increases U and reduces s. Values of U and s observed from Drosophila indicate a diploid would have a vanishingly small n o. The argument suggests Muller's ratchet is more powerful than previously accepted in asexual species derived from diploid sexual ancestors. (shrink)

There is evidence that asexual reproduction has a long-term disadvantage when compared to sexual reproduction. This disadvantage is usually assumed to arise from the more efficient incorporation of advantageous mutations by sexual populations. We consider here the effect on asexual and sexual populations of changes in the fitness of harmful mutations. It is shown that the re-establishment of equilibrium following environmental change is generally faster in sexual populations, and that the mutational load experienced by the sexual population can be significantly (...) less during this period than that experienced by an asexual one. Changes in the fitness of harmful mutations may therefore impose a greater long-term disadvantage on asexual populations than those which are sexual. (shrink)

In July 1787, Dr John Elliot, apothecary and scientist, assaulted Miss Mary Boydell in the streets of London. Elliotś defenders sought his acquittal on the grounds of insanity, and cited as proof a paper in which he alleged the existence of intelligent life on the surface of the sun. He has since become a stock character in the history of astronomy, routinely cited as a pathetic example of the ignorance of his age. His reputation is undeserved since his claims were (...) well within the canon of the era, and since his anti-social behaviour may well be explained by considering the hazards of his profession. Rather than serving as an exemplar of science gone awry, Elliot's dilemma can provide an opportunity for fresh analysis of late eighteenth-century thought on solar structure and on the processes that sustain it. (shrink)

A model is proposed which implicates molecular recognition systems as the major controlling factors in life cycle expression. It is envisaged that such systems are important in immune functioning and catabolic, metabolic molecule recognition at both inter- and intea-cellular level. These recognition systems have the following characteristics: Specific recognition molecules , e.g. vertebrate antibodies, invertebrate agglutinins and plant agglutinins may recognise specific substances, e.g. antigens, catabolic and metabolic molecules. The range of possible recognisable substances is very wide and variable. The (...) recognisers may themselves be recognised by other recognisers. Recognisers are usually produced in large amounts only on presentation of the appropriate recognisable molecule. The progressive introduction of new recognisable molecules increases the recogniser interaction, this interaction causing depression of some recogniser types and facilitation of other types among which may be recognisers specific for self components . Low juvenile viability is associated with a restricted range of available recognisers, high adult viability with increasing recogniser range and some auto-immunity/immune depression, senescence with a wide range of available recognisers and extensive auto-immunity/immune depression.Life cycle patterns and their control are discussed. It is suggested control mechanisms may include: Dietary restriction and in some periods complete nutritional abstinence. Specific recogniser depression, genes implicated here are the various antigens found on cell surfaces, in the serum and in various body fluids of vertebrates, e.g. ABO, MNSs, P, Rh, Le and other blood groups, the ABO and Le secretor antigens and the HL-A antigens. In addition the immune response and mixed lymphocyte culture loci are implicated. Finally life cycle control is discussed with relation to sexual selection. (shrink)

Sustained attention, a key cognitive skill that improves during childhood and adolescence, tends to be worse in some emotional and behavioural disorders. Sustained attention is typically studied in non-affective task contexts; here, we used a novel task to index performance in affective versus neutral contexts across adolescence (N = 465; ages 11–18). We asked whether: (i) performance would be worse in negative versus neutral task contexts; (ii) performance would improve with age; (iii) affective interference would be greater in younger adolescents; (...) (iv) adolescents at risk for depression and higher in anxiety would show overall worse performance; and (v) would show differential performance in negative contexts. Results indicated that participants performed more poorly in negative contexts and showed age-related performance improvements. Those at risk of depression performed more poorly than those at lower risk. However, there was no difference between groups as a result of affective context. For anxiety there was no difference in performance as a function of severity. However, those with higher anxiety showed less variance in their reaction times to negative stimuli than those with lower anxiety. One interpretation is that moderate levels of emotional arousal associated with anxiety make individuals less susceptible to the distracting effects of negative stimuli. (shrink)

Social capital has as its key element the value of social relationships to generate positive outcomes, both for the key parties involved and for wider society. Some authors have noted that social capital nevertheless has a dark side. There is a moral element to such a conceptualisation, yet there is scarce discussion of ethics within the social capital literature. In this paper ethical theory is applied to four traditions or approaches to economic social capital: neo-capitalism; network/reputation; neo-Tocquevellian; and development. Each (...) is considered in detail and subject to ethical analysis by the application of utilitarianism, Kantianism, justice and rights, and ethic of care. Accordingly, the assumption that social capital is either value-neutral or a force for good is critiqued, and a framework for understanding social capital from an ethics perspective is presented. (shrink)

Research into the potential associations between tinnitus and cognition has investigated specific cognitive domains in laboratory settings despite adults with tinnitus reporting broad cognitive difficulties in every-day life. To address this limitation, the present study compared performance and perceived exertion on a visual office-like task in 38 adults with tinnitus and 38 adults without tinnitus matched for age, sex and educational background. All participants were also assessed for hearing, anxiety and depression, and participants with tinnitus were also assessed for tinnitus (...) handicap. No associations were found between presence of tinnitus and cognitive performance and perceived exertion on the visual office-like task when corrected for standard and extended high frequency hearing thresholds, anxiety, and depression. The correction for extended high frequency average hearing threshold was significant for performance but not perceived exertion on the visual office-like task. Overall, the results showed extended high frequency hearing, but not tinnitus, was associated with every-day cognitive performance. This indicates clinical testing of hearing thresholds above 8 kHz could support clinicians’ identification and management of cognitive difficulties. One management method suggested by the current findings would include provision of auditory stimulation at frequencies exceeding the frequency response of many current hearing aids. (shrink)

Cognitive Science, Volume 46, Issue 6, June 2022.