Issues of race have traditionally been addressed in medical school curricula in a didactic manner. However, medical school curricula often lack adequate opportunity for the application of learning material relating to race and culture. When confronted with acts of racism in clinical settings, students are left unprepared to respond appropriately and effectively. Forum Theatre offers a dynamic platform by which participants are empowered to actively engage with and become part of the performance. When used in an educational context, Forum Theatre (...) can be a powerful tool for students to interact with a wide variety of social issues. This paper describes the process by which one medical school designed a workshop in the Forum Theatre style to equip students to respond to racism observed in clinical settings. Based on real student experiences, the Responding to Racism in the Clinical Setting workshop was designed to give students an opportunity to combine cultural humility, communication theory and conflict resolution skills in order to prepare for interactions in clinical stages of medical education. As a result of workshop evaluations, surveys, and written reflections, the authors propose that Forum Theatre is a novel teaching modality for incorporating issues of race and culture into medical curriculum. (shrink)

' What comes through strongly in this book are Weil's power of analysis and criticism, her love of truth and hunger for justice, her commitment to non-violence, ...

The logical fatalist holds that the past truth of future tense propositions is incompatible with libertarian freedom. The theological fatalist holds that the combination of God’s past beliefs with His essential omniscience is incompatible with libertarian freedom. There is an ongoing dispute over the relation between these two kinds of fatalism: some philosophers believe that the problems are equivalent while others believe that the theological problem is more difficult. We offer a diagnosis of this dispute showing that one’s view of (...) the modal status of God’s existence and God’s rdation to free creatures should determine one’s position on the relation between the two fatalisms. (shrink)

Understanding each patient's situation or lived experience evolves from a nurse's sincere communication with the patient. Through rhetoric, the nurse's use of competent language and expressions is more likely to engage the patient in a dialogical discussion that brings forth an open, honest display of feelings and emotions. Through hermeneutics, the nurse gains an accurate understanding and interpretation of a patient's beliefs, values, and situations that supports explanations of meaning. Thus, with rhetoric being the words or expressions that give rise (...) to hermeneutics or the interpretation, the blending of the two creates a rhetorical–hermeneutical relationship that provides accurate understanding of a patient's true lived experience. Consequently, knowing the patient depends upon the nurse's rhetorical competence and accurate assessment of each patient's authentic self. Nurses should seek to interpret and understand the lived experiences of patients in order to limit or prevent misunderstandings and inaccuracies in communication. The truth that emerges from the expressed rhetorical–hermeneutical interrelationship will enhance nurses’ sensitivity to patient matters, produce relationship outcomes that emerge from a consistent and effectively applied set of interpersonal principles, and more importantly, successfully influence nurses’ lives and those of their patients with meaning that ultimately improves the human condition. Thus, nurses’ communication and perceptive understanding of each patient's world or lived experience becomes an integral and necessary component to effectively carrying out the practice role of caregiving. (shrink)

At the close of the recent Boston Symposium, a panel discussion was held on the general theme of the conference. The following are the remarks of Professor J. N. Findlay of Yale, recorded and transcribed here with his permission.

The emergence of the field of health care at a distance, or “telehealth,” has been embedded within discourses of high ambition about health improvement, seamless services, empowerment, and independence for patients. In this article, the authors examine how telehealthcare technologies assume certain forms of patients—or “telepatients”—who can be mobilized and combined with images and artifacts that speak for them in the clinical encounter. Second, a tentative intervention is made in these emerging identities in the form of facilitating some alternative discourses (...) about telehealthcare. The aim is to stimulate debate by presenting and contrasting these different approaches to technology development. Such differences take material and discursive shape in the making and unmaking of telepatients, showing important interferences in the shaping of identity and possibilities for governance and participation. (shrink)

Many critics of libertarian freedom have charged that freedom is incompatible with indeterminism. We show that the strongest argument that has been provided for this claim is invalid. The invalidity of the argument in question, however, implies the invalidity of the standard Consequence argument for the incompatibility of freedom and determinism. We show how to repair the Consequence argument and argue that no similar improvement will revive the worry about the compatibility of indeterminism and freedom.

This interdisciplinary book brings together theoretical and empirical contributions from marketing and economic sociologists to analyse and develop novel ...

We lay out the fatalist’s argument, making sure to clarify which dialectical moves are available to the libertarian. We then offer a more robust presentation of Ockhamism, responding to obvious objections and teasing out the implications of the view. At this point, we discuss presentism and eternalism in more detail. We then present our argument for the claim that the libertarian cannot take Ockham’s way out of the fatalism argument unless she rejects presentism. Finally, we consider and dispense with objections (...) to our argument. In the end, it ought to be clear that the libertarian must make a choice between Ockham’s way out and presentism. (shrink)

Pain is one of the most frequent presenting symptoms for patients who come to a physician's office. Despite the frequency of this presentation, little consistent, systematic information is provided to medical students or physicians about the treatment of pain. In addition, relatively little information is given about the recognition and prevention of drug abuse and about how to prescribe analgesics rationally to minimize the chances for abuse. This lack of educational preparation for both pain and addiction contributes to significant fear (...) and inability on the part of health professionals to diagnose and treat both conditions. It creates a barrier of fear to prescribe adequate doses of pain medications for patients who present with both acute and chronic pain problems. Inadequate medicating can be caused by the physician's overriding worry about creating addiction in a patient. Morgan has called this problem “opiophobia.”. (shrink)

Pain is one of the most frequent presenting symptoms for patients who come to a physician's office. Despite the frequency of this presentation, little consistent, systematic information is provided to medical students or physicians about the treatment of pain. In addition, relatively little information is given about the recognition and prevention of drug abuse and about how to prescribe analgesics rationally to minimize the chances for abuse. This lack of educational preparation for both pain and addiction contributes to significant fear (...) and inability on the part of health professionals to diagnose and treat both conditions. It creates a barrier of fear to prescribe adequate doses of pain medications for patients who present with both acute and chronic pain problems. Inadequate medicating can be caused by the physician's overriding worry about creating addiction in a patient. Morgan has called this problem “opiophobia.”. (shrink)

Each year, millions of individuals in the United States are treated for a variety of serious medical conditions with prescription drugs whose therapeutic benefits are well known. The vast majority of these medications are used to treat medical and psychiatric illnesses. Generally, they are used as prescribed, and contribute to a better quality of life for persons suffering from debilitating or life-threatening disorders.The fact that a small portion of these medications is diverted by those who seek their psychoactive effects raises (...) the important policy issue: how to make drugs easily available for medical use while limiting access for purposes of abuse.Such a responsibility poses challenges very different from those of the so-called “war” on illicit drugs, because this control must be achieved without impeding patients’ access to medical care. A rational public policy would attempt to achieve a balance between the need to minimize abuse and the need to provide relief. (shrink)

Each year, millions of individuals in the United States are treated for a variety of serious medical conditions with prescription drugs whose therapeutic benefits are well known. The vast majority of these medications are used to treat medical and psychiatric illnesses. Generally, they are used as prescribed, and contribute to a better quality of life for persons suffering from debilitating or life-threatening disorders.The fact that a small portion of these medications is diverted by those who seek their psychoactive effects raises (...) the important policy issue: how to make drugs easily available for medical use while limiting access for purposes of abuse.Such a responsibility poses challenges very different from those of the so-called “war” on illicit drugs, because this control must be achieved without impeding patients’ access to medical care. A rational public policy would attempt to achieve a balance between the need to minimize abuse and the need to provide relief. (shrink)

The United Nations (UN) General Assembly High-Level Meeting (HLM) on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response (PPPR) was a missed opportunity to bring high-level commitment and momentum to the global governance of health emergencies. Intended to bring much-needed attention to a policy issue that is rapidly slipping down the international agenda, the fraught diplomacy among member states, lack of consensus on key issues, and weak UN Political Declaration in New York foreshadow a difficult road ahead for upcoming negotiations under the World (...) Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva. This column chronicles the evolving engagement of the UN in global health governance, examines the diplomatic process leading to the UN HLM on PPPR, and assesses the contributions and missed opportunities of its resulting Political Declaration. (shrink)

The consequence argument for the incompatibility of free action and determinism has long been under attack, but two important objections have only recently emerged: Warfield’s modal fallacy objection and Campbell’s no past objection. In this paper, I explain the significance of these objections and defend the consequence argument against them. First, I present a novel formulation of the argument that withstands their force. Next, I argue for the one controversial claim on which this formulation relies: the trans-temporality thesis. This thesis (...) implies that an agent acts freely only if there is one time at which she is able to perform an action and a distinct time at which she actually performs it. I then point out that determinism, too, is a thesis about trans-temporal relations. I conclude that it is precisely because my formulation of the consequence argument emphasizes trans-temporality that it prevails against the modal fallacy and no past objections. (shrink)

Experimental observations are often taken in order to assist in making a choice between relevant hypotheses ∼ H and H. The power of observations in this decision is here metrically defined by information-theoretic concepts and Bayes' theorem. The exact (or maximum power) of a new observation to increase or decrease Pr(H) the prior probability that H is true; the power of that observation to modify the total amount of uncertainty involved in the choice between ∼ H and H: the power (...) of a new observation to reduce uncertainty toward the ideal amount, zero; all these powers are systematically shown to be exact metrical functions of Pr(H) and Pr(o/H)/Pr(o)-1 where the numerator is the likelihood of the new observation given H, and the denominator is the "expectedness" of the observation. (shrink)

Experimental observations are often taken in order to assist in making a choice between relevant hypotheses ~H and H. The power of observations in this decision is here metrically defined by information-theoretic concepts and Bayes' theorem. The exact of a new observation to increase or decrease Pr the prior probability that H is true; the power of that observation to modify the total amount of uncertainty involved in the choice between ~H and H: the power of a new observation to (...) reduce uncertainty toward the ideal amount, zero; all these powers are systematically shown to be exact metrical functions ofwhere the numerator is the likelihood of the new observation given H, and the denominator is the “expectedness” of the observation. (shrink)

We view an individual’s legitimacy judgment as an attitude. It is influenced by a personal belief system composed of global values and domain-specific beliefs, consistent with the value–attitude system in marketing. Our context is the legitimacy of the Canadian oil sands industry. We hypothesize that an individual’s legitimacy judgment may be influenced by three domain-specific beliefs: the credibility of the industry, environmental non-government organizations, and the mass media. We also examine two global values associated with sustainable development: concern for the (...) environment and concern for economic development. These are expected to have negative and positive effects, respectively, on an individual’s legitimacy judgment and on industry credibility. We also examine if these relationships are influenced by proximity to the oil sands. We test our theory using a mixed methods research design and a structural equation analysis on a survey of 853 residents of Edmonton and Toronto, Canada. We find support for most of our hypotheses. (shrink)

In the axiomatic development of the logic of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics it is not difficult to set down certain plausible axioms which ensure that the quantum logic of propositions has the structure of an orthomodular poset. This can be done in a number of ways, for example, as in Gunson [2], Mackey [4], Piron [5], Varadarajan [7] and Zierler [8], and we summarise one of these ways in §2 below.

Have I made a mistake in my Anarchism, or has the editor of Liberty himself tripped? At any rate, I must challenge the Anarchism of one sentence in his otherwise masterful paper upon 'State Socialism and Anarchism.' If I am wrong, I stand open to conviction. It is this. 'They [Anarchists] look forward to a time...when the children born of these relations shall belong exclusively to the mothers until old enough to belong to themselves.'.

The so-called Mind argument aims at the conclusion that agents act freely only if determinism is true. The soundness of this argument entails the falsity of libertarianism, the two-part thesis that agents act freely, and free action and determinism are incompatible. In this paper, I offer a new formulation of the Mind argument. I argue that it is true by definition that if an agent acts freely, either (i) nothing nomologically grounds an agent’s acting freely, or (ii) the consequence argument (...) for incompatibilism is unsound. I define the notion of nomological grounding, and argue that unless an agent’s acting freely is nomologically grounded, unacceptable consequences follow. I then argue that if agents act freely and the consequence argument is sound, a vicious regress ensues. I conclude by considering the libertarian’s dialectical options. (shrink)

Since the time, about a century ago, when DeMorgan, Boole and Jevons, inaugurated the study of the logic of numerically definite reasoning, no one has been concerned to establish the validity rules for a very general type of numerically definite inference which is a strong analogue of the classical syllogism. The reader will readily agree that the traditional rules of syllogistic inference cannot even begin to decide whether the following proportionally quantified syllogism is a valid argument: at most 4/7 p (...) are at most 2/3 not-m and at least 3/5 s are precisely 7/8 m, hence, at most 1/3 s are p. Likely reasons, of broad methodological interest, why this readily definable type of formal inference has been neglected will presently be proposed. Among the masters of twentieth century logic, Hilbert and Bernays have, to be sure, meticulously shown how such numerically definite propositions as “at least 7 individuals have the property p” can be expressed in the predicate calculus with the use of the identity relation. They do not, since their concern with such propositions is indirect, proceed to establish a systematic calculus of classes whose “size” or extent is numerically definite. As we shall always notice, traditional logic and even ordinary Boolean algebra prefer to generalize about the laws governing the interrelationship of classes in inference systems without making any hypotheses concerning class “size” or extent except by the classical quantifier “some”, which quantifier admits the measure or extent of a class only in terms of the proposition that a given class contains or does not contain at least one member. Such a restricted admission of the relevance for inference of class size is among the fundamental reasons for the neglect of proportional quantifiers, i.e., quantifiers where numerical value is any rational number r such that 0/100 ≤ r ≤ 100/100. It can, of course, also be pointed out that the traditional syllogism and ordinary Boolean algebra do not i.e. measure, numerically define, the degree of inclusion of one class in another. Inclusion is taken either as total or partial, with no discrimination of the degree of partial inclusion. (shrink)

In 1964 radiographs of an Egyptian mummy displayed by the, then, Gulbenkian Museum of Art and Archaeology in Durham revealed an artificial upper limb attached to a deformed lower forearm. The limb was removed for further study. It concluded that the deformity was due to pre-mortem, amputation above the wrist, the ancient embalmers applying a crude restoration. In 2005 the author undertook a detailed reappraisal of this restored limb. These findings now suggest that this individual exhibits a congenital deformity to (...) the upper limb. Such a proposal prompts a discourse on how deformity was perceived, not only by ancient Egyptian society but by those across the ancient world. Textual sources have been selected to highlight how perfection of the physical body was prized by some cultures, contrasting this with how those who exhibited ‘otherness’,were either accepted or marginalized. (shrink)

For a generation increasingly fragmented by a glut of unassimilable information and unrelated "facts", "Wittgenstein" from The Element Masters of Philosophy series focuses on his groundbreaking perspective of understanding concepts.

We determine the bivariate probability densities with specified margins and show that the Cohen-Zaparovanny class of positive phase-space density functions, with the quantum mechanical marginal distributions of position and momentum, contains all such densities.

This paper discusses a possible test of Hume's ‘ missing shade of blue’ and whether it might be possible to make some empirical progress on the question. Towards this end seventy-two students were tested to see if they could determine the correct color ratios of missing black and white shades ranging from a consecutive gap of two out of 236 possible combinations, to a consecutive gap of ten of out of 236 possible combinations. On the most difficult test, four of (...) the seventy-two students correctly determined a missing shade, though these same four all claimed to have above-average experience with art. (shrink)

The trace formulation of quantum mechanical expectations is derived in a classical deterministic setting by averaging over an assembly of states. Interference of probabilities is discussed and its usual Hilbert space formulation is questioned. Nevertheless, it is shown that the observable predictions of quantum statics remain unchanged in the framework developed here.