The concept of precision medicine aims to tailor treatment based on data unique to the patient. An example is the use of genetic data from malignant tumours to select the most appropriate oncological treatment. The competing interests of utilitarianism and egoism create dilemmas for decisions regarding investment in precision medicine. The need to balance the perceived rights and needs of individuals against those of society as a whole is an on-going challenge in the distribution of limited health service resources. There (...) is need for proper planning, organisation and investment into precision medicine to cope with the consequences of both direct-to-consumer and healthcare-directed genetic testing for genetic counselling, therapeutics and diagnostic networks. Consideration needs to be given to providing adequate time and training to allow for meaningful shared decision-making with patients and there is a strong case in support of a hub-and-spoke model to provide rapid, solid tumour genetic mutational analysis to prevent patients missing out on beneficial treatments. (shrink)

La fenomenología ha sido atacada recientemente por los promotores del realismo especulativo. En este artículo presento y analizo estas críticas, y argumento que, o bien son superficiales y simplistas, o bien carecen de novedad.Key words: Phenomenology, speculative realism, correlationism, idealism, naturalism.

Explores the meaning of death, how people of different times, regions, and religions have coped with it, and the progress and effects of the war waged against it by researchers, physicians, and surgeons.

Are we now in a position to give a "final accounting" of Freud's work? Before answering, I should say what this means, or rather what I mean. If we mean a verdict that is certain, in the sense that it could not possibly be overturned by new  ...

His final set of lectures at the College de France, described here by Thomas Flynn, focused on the concept of truth-telling as a moral virtue in the ancient ...

Proponents of physical intentionality argue that the classic hallmarks of intentionality highlighted by Brentano are also found in purely physical powers. Critics worry that this idea is metaphysically obscure at best, and at worst leads to panpsychism or animism. I examine the debate in detail, finding both confusion and illumination in the physical intentionalist thesis. Analysing a number of the canonical features of intentionality, I show that they all point to one overarching phenomenon of which both the mental and the (...) physical are kinds, namely finality. This is the finality of ‘final causes’, the long-discarded idea of universal action for an end to which recent proponents of physical intentionality are in fact pointing whether or not they realise it. I explain finality in terms of the concept of specific indifference, arguing that in the case of the mental, specific indifference is realised by the process of abstraction, which has no correlate in the case of physical powers. This analysis, I conclude, reveals both the strength and weakness of rational creatures such as us, as well as demystifying the way in which powers work. (shrink)

Gerdessen, H. Die einwirkung der willensbetätigung auf die eigenschaften der bezugsvorstellungen.--Ach, N., und Margaritzky, S. Über die sensorische einstellung beim heben von gewichten.--Kohlhagen, F. Über die gefügigkeitsqualität und ihre bedeutung für die kategorie.--Ach, N. Finale qualität (gefügigkeitsqualität) und objektion.

This paper critically examines Michael Zimmerman’s account of basic final value in The Nature of Intrinsic Value. Zimmerman’s account has several positive features. Unfortunately, as I argue, given one plausible assumption about value his account derives a contradiction. I argue that rejecting that assumption has several implausible results and that we should instead reject Zimmerman’s account. I then sketch an alternative account of basic final value, showing how it retains some of the positive features of Zimmerman’s account while avoiding its (...) pitfalls. (shrink)

How does valuing something for its own sake differ from valuing an entity for the sake of other things? Although numerous answers come to mind, many of them rule out substantive views about what is valuable for its own sake. I therefore seek to provide a more neutral way to distinguish the two valuing attitudes. Drawing from existing accounts of valuing, I argue that the two can be distinguished in terms of a conative-volitional feature. Focusing first on “non-final valuing”—i.e. valuing_ (...) x_ for the sake of something else—I argue that it involves adopting certain reasons on account of a desire for _x_ to contribute to other things. I then show how this contrasts final valuing. The result, I argue, is a plausible account of how the two modes of valuing differ that leaves open substantive views about what all can be valued for its own sake. This is helpful because it develops a popular methodology used to explore the value of a wide range of things, including natural entities, family heirlooms, and artworks, as well as, more broadly, entities that might have “extrinsic final value.”. (shrink)

In this essay I argue that sports at their best qualify as final ends, that is, as ends whose value is such that they ground not only the practices whose ends they are, but everything else we do as human agents. The argument I provide to support my thesis is derived from Harry Frankfurt's provocative work on the importance of the things we care about, more specifically, on his claim that it is by virtue of caring about things and practices, (...) really caring about them ? even loving them ? we are able to regard and treat them as final ends. Sports, I claim, are paradigmatic examples of practices cared about and loved in these deep ways, and as such deserve to be considered, rather than dismissed because of their supposed triviality, as one of those ends around which a life most worth living can be legitimately forged. (shrink)

Kant's final conception of the relation of God and morality, and the fullest development of the metaphysical context of morality is to be found in the large collection of notes and jottings written down by Kant between about 1790‐1803, which have been collected as the Opus Postumum. There is a development in the Opus Postumum from the Critical doctrine that ‘God’ is a postulate which can have no direct influence on the moral life, an unknown, unexperiencable somewhat which makes the (...) summum bonum possible. The basic problem is that Kant has left a deeply religious ethics expressed in a radically humanistic terminology. He propounds a view of man as involved in an impersonal but purposive nature. In trying to replace speculative rationalism by a voluntaristic rationalism, Kant attempts to find a via media between the rationalism of Wolff and the stress on individual moral freedom of Pietism. (shrink)

Part of the draw of athletics is its straightforwardness. There are nuances to competitions to make them more sporting contests, but at the end of a long jump competition whomever records the longest jump should win. Unfortunately, a recent rule-change at the highest level of the sport – the “Final 3” format – undermined this simplicity for the horizontal jumps and the throws for some of the 2020 and much of the 2021 seasons. While fortunately this rule was largely reverted (...) within days of the initial submission of this paper, it’s still valuable to critically evaluate why such a rule is problematic so as to better understand of the value of sporting competitions and give guidance on future rule changes, be they in athletics or other sports. To that end, we will be drawing from the literature on the purpose and value of competitions and coupling that with simulations based on data from actual top-tier long jump competitions to show that the Final 3 format makes for significantly worse competitions than the standard format. (shrink)

Finality suggests an unchangeable conclusion. It also raises the idea of a goal towards which a reality is directed. This is the sense in which one finds the final cause in Aristotle and other philosophers. Nearly everyone feels helpless before finality. This is because it evokes the spectrum of finitude as it appears to occur in the dead. No one in the prime of life and at the peak of health, wealth, pleasure and hopeful optimism actively desires death. Yet like (...) a shadow, the awareness of a possible sudden end stalks at everyone. It is not the most comfortable feeling. This raises a situation where both the idea and the reality of death must be confronted in order to make sense of life. Has it meaning? Is it destined or free floating? How and when will life end or does it even have an absolute termination at all? Is death life’s last unassailable barrier or just a simple demarcation from other forms of conscious existence in some way? Though often never put into words, failure to engage these questions raises conundrum. Attempts to answer them form and inform cultures, nourish customs, create traditions, inspire inventions, and generally stimulate the human spirit. They keep religions alive, engage thinkers, inspire fidelity to cultural roots and symbols and fire up the spirit of research. It is the position of this paper that confronting human finality is at the service of valorizing human life further. It is like an unseen engine that keeps the vehicle alive. Thus, life approaches death while death serves life. It (death) forbids anyone at the level of the intellect, experience and knowledge from making any absolute positive claims regarding the termination of life. Confronting death psychologically, physically and spiritually requires specific perspectives since each man must face it inevitably in his person and each culture and religion must make sense of it in its own way. That is what this study examines. (shrink)

(Ak 10:74).[1] During the so-called ‘silent decade’ of the 1770s, when Kant was working on the Critique of Pure Reason, he promised repeatedly not only that he would soon finish that work but also that he would soon publish a “metaphysics of morals” (Ak 10:97, 132, 144).[2] Yet it was not until four years after the first Critique that Kant finally wrote a work on ethics, and even then he merely laid the ground for a metaphysics of morals by identifying (...) and establishing the supreme principle on which a system of duties would be based (G 4:392). Three years later, in the Critique of Practical Reason Kant once again dealt entirely with foundational questions in moral philosophy. Kantian ethics is primarily known, especially among English-speaking philosophers, through these two ethical works of the 1780s, neither of which contains anything like a ‘metaphysics of morals’. (shrink)

From the perspective of an African ethic, analytically interpreted as a philosophical principle of right action, what are the proper final ends of a publicly funded university and how should they be ranked? To answer this question, I first provide a brief but inclusive review of the literature on Africanising higher education from the past 50 years, and contend that the prominent final ends suggested in it can be reduced to five major categories. Then, I spell out an intuitively attractive (...) African moral theory and apply it to these five final ends, arguing that three of them are appropriate but that two of them are not. After that, I maintain that the African moral theory prescribes two additional final ends for a public university that are not salient in the literature. Next, I argue that employing the African moral theory as I do enables one to rebut several criticisms of Africanising higher education that have recently been made from a liberal perspective. I conclude by posing questions suitable for future research. (shrink)

In a series of works, Pablo Cobreros, Paul Égré, David Ripley and Robert van Rooij have proposed a nontransitive system (call it ‘_K__3__L__P_’) as a basis for a solution to the semantic paradoxes. I critically consider that proposal at three levels. At the level of the background logic, I present a conception of classical logic on which _K__3__L__P_ fails to vindicate classical logic not only in terms of structural principles, but also in terms of operational ones. At the level of (...) the theory of truth, I raise a cluster of philosophical difficulties for a _K__3__L__P_-based system of naive truth, all variously related to the fact that such a system proves things that would seem already by themselves repugnant, even in the absence of transitivity. At the level of the theory of validity, I consider an extension of the _K__3__L__P_-based system of naive validity that is supposed to certify that validity in that system does not fall short of naive validity, argue that such an extension is untenable in that its nontriviality depends on the inadmissibility of a certain irresistible instance of transitivity (whence the advertised “final cut”) and conclude on this basis that the _K__3__L__P_-based system of naive validity cannot coherently be adopted either. At all these levels, a crucial role is played by certain metaentailments and by the extra strength they afford over the corresponding entailments: on the one hand, such strength derives from considerations that would seem just as compelling in a general nontransitive framework, but, on the other hand, such strength wreaks havoc in the particular setting of _K__3__L__P_. (shrink)

Final value accrues to objects that are good for their own sakes, while instrumental value accrues to objects that are good for the sake of their effects. The following paper aims to show that this distinction cuts across some surprising areas of the evaluative domain. This means that there may be some unexpected types of value that can come in a final or instrumental form. The argument proceeds by looking at two prominent types of value, namely kind-value and personal value. (...) The former accrues to objects that are good as the kinds of things that they are, while the latter accrues to objects that are good for someone. Substantive examples are offered in support of the idea that these types of value can come in final or instrumental form. The substantive examples are then given additional support by considering the structure and behavior of fitting attitudes. (shrink)

Com base na crítica que Hume faz ao argumento do desígnio, especialmente nas partes 10 e 11 dos Diálogos sobre a Religião Natural, meu objetivo neste artigo é, a partir de uma análise da relação entre a existência do mal no mundo e a suposta existência de uma divindade possuidora dos atributos tradicionais do teísmo, defender a tese segundo a qual o tratamento que Hume dá ao problema do mal corresponde, digamos assim, à cartada final – o último e decisivo (...) recurso que Philo personagem que articula essa crítica) aciona para mostrar que o argumento do desígnio não fornece bases suficientemente sólidas e consistentes para dar suporte à crença na existência de um Deus maximamente poderoso, justo e benevolente; e que, portanto, a existência do mal no mundo tem uma força argumentativa tal que a improbabilidade da existência de Deus é maior do que com base nos argumentos apresentados nas partes 2 a 8 dos Diálogos. Isso significa que eu tomo aqui o problema do mal como o maior problema para o teísta experimental – cuja argumentação pretende provar a existência de Deus a partir da observação dos fenômenos do mundo. (shrink)

I remember being intrigued by the title of this book years ago, as it is a revised and updated version of an earlier work of Michael Grosso. The title seems to imply that we all have a choice as we are leaving the physical body, the option of expiring into nothingness or moving to a realm beyond the material world. I wondered why one would choose the former, and exactly who is making that choice? By the time one finishes the (...) logical sequence of evidence, history, and theory that unfolds in the book, it becomes clear that the title’s inference is not what some might expect. Grosso believes that there are no final choices. Accepting finality is not logical when one comes to believe that our consciousness survives bodily death, and he believes that physical death is not permanent extinction, but a gateway to more living. The underlying and not so subtle message in the book has not only stood the test of time, but has become more relevant in view of today’s state of affairs. Considering the increasing threat of nuclear obliteration, climatic shifts, world divisiveness and conflict, natural disasters, pollution, famine, mass shootings, drug epidemics, and refugees roaming the planet, are these potential calamities something that could jolt the collective mind into a greater spiritual reality? The author has an interesting theory based upon near death experience research. (shrink)

Aristotle maintains that every man has, or should have, a single end, a target at which he aims. The doctrine is stated in E.N. I 2. ‘If, then, there is some end of the things we do which we desire for its own sake, and if we do not choose everything for the sake of something else, clearly this must be the good and the chief good. Will not the knowledge of it, then, have a great influence on life? Shall (...) we not, like archers who have a mark to aim t, be more likely to hit upon what is right?’. Aristotle does not here prove, nor need we understand him as claiming to prove, that there is only one end which is desired for itself. He points out correctly that, if there are objects which are desired but not desired for themselves, there must be some object which is desired for itself. The passage further suggests that, if there were one such object and one only, this fact would be important and helpful for the conduct of life. (shrink)

At the beginning of the series, a dozen young women are introduced as potential mates for the eligible young bachelor. The audience accompanies the couples on their limo-escorted dates, meets the bachelor's family and friends, listens to their evaluation of the bride, and watches expectantly as the smiling Prince Charming singles out a few finalists for his attention. As the weeks pass by, one by one, tearful young women are dismissed from the show as the presentation of the final rose (...) that signifies singular devotion draws near. In the end, only two young women remain, and only one can receive…. (shrink)

I praise Metzinger's book _On Being No One_ by calling my essay "Finally Some One" meaning that I am pleased to see a first rate philosopher so carefully reading the neurobiological literature. Especially as it pertains to sleep and dreaming. Metzinger is comprehensive and comprehending. By studying the neurobiological substrates of normal dreaming, lucid dreaming and related altered states of consciousness (such as out of body experiences, hypnosis, and deja' vu), we may gain insight into the general rules governing brain (...) activity in relation to subjective experience. (shrink)

In the Phaedo, Socrates leads us to expect that his final argument will address the details of Cebes’ cloakmaker objection. Nonetheless, almost all commentators treat the final argument as unconnected to these details. This paper argues that close attention to Cebes’ objection, Socrates’ restatement of it, and Socrates’ final argument shows that the final argument does offer a detailed response. According to the objection, the soul suffers as it brings life to the body, which ultimately leads to its destruction. Socrates (...) argues that, on the contrary, bringing life to the body is precisely what ensures the soul’s immortality and indestructability. Cebes’ objection targets Socrates’ so-called ‘affinity argument’. In responding to Cebes’ objection, the final argument fills in the account of the soul that Socrates put forward in the affinity argument. In doing so, it identifies one precise way in which the soul is akin to the divine. (shrink)

What precisely does aristotle mean when he asserts that something is (or comes to be) "for" "the" "sake" "of" something? I suggest that the answer to this question may be found by examining aristotle's position on the problem of reduction in biology, As it arises within his own scientific "and" "philosophical" context. I discuss the role of the concepts of "nature" and "potential" in aristotelian scientific explanation, And reformulate the reduction problem in that light. I answer the main question by (...) establishing that aristotle holds an "irreducibility" thesis in regard to the generation and development of a living organism, And that this thesis is the core of his conception of final causality. I conclude by arguing that aristotle's teleology is fundamentally "empirical" in character, And not an a priori doctrine brought "to" the study of nature. (shrink)

Principles are central to physical reasoning, particularly in the search for a theory of quantum gravity (QG), where novel empirical data is lacking. One principle widely adopted in the search for QG is UV completion: the idea that a theory should (formally) hold up to all possible high energies. We argue---/contra/ standard scientific practice---that UV-completion is poorly-motivated as a guiding principle in theory-construction, and cannot be used as a criterion of theory-justification in the search for QG. For this, we explore (...) the reasons for expecting, or desiring, a UV-complete theory, as well as analyse how UV completion is used, and how it should be used, in various specific approaches to QG. (shrink)

The existence of a final coalgebra is equivalent to the existence of a formal logic with a set of formulas that has the Hennessy–Milner property of distinguishing coalgebraic states up to bisimilarity. This applies to coalgebras of any functor on the category of sets for which the bisimilarity relation is transitive. There are cases of functors that do have logics with the Hennessy–Milner property, but the only such logics have a proper class of formulas. The main theorem gives a representation (...) of states of the final coalgebra as certain satisfiable sets of formulas. The key technical fact used is that any function between coalgebras that is truth-preserving and has a simple codomain must be a coalgebraic morphism. (shrink)

Richard Rorty in Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity presents the character of the liberal ironist. An ironist is a person that has pressing and continuing doubts about her “final vocabulary.” A final vocabulary is a set of words that one uses to justify and narrate oneself. An interesting question is why words, and not beliefs, are used by Rorty to characterize someone’s identity. In this paper I take a step back from liberal ironism and focus on the notion of “final vocabulary” (...) and its role on a Rortian picture of moral identity. In order to do this, I explore it alongside concepts from the field of sociolinguistics and from other pragmatist theories of selfhood. I claim that Rorty presents important insights for a pragmatic naturalist conception of our moral identities. (shrink)

The Common Rule originally issued in 1991 and last amended in 2005 is scheduled to be replaced on January 19, 2018 by a revised Common Rule. The goal of the revisions is to modernize and improve applicability of the rule to a research landscape that has dramatically changed since 1991. Translating these changes into action will require comprehensive understanding of the final rule and detailed implementation planning by Human Research Protection Programs. This paper presents select changes that require substantial attention; (...) including for example: expansion of the exempt category, changes to continuing review requirements, changes to the informed consent form and the use of single IRBs for domestic multi-site research. In addition, myriad policies, procedures and workflows will have to be developed, drastically rewritten, or just mildly tweaked. (shrink)

DHHS's rule on the care of imperiled newborns has a symbolic significance for the groups that struggled for compromise, but it will have a minimal impact on medical and moral decision making.

The paper distinguishes between two rival views about the nature of final value (i.e. the value something has for its own sake) — intrinsicalism and conditionalism. The former view (which is the one adopted by G.E. Moore and several later writers) holds that the final value of any F supervenes solely on features intrinsic to F, while the latter view allows that the final value of F may supervene on features non-intrinsic to F. Conditionalism thus allows the final value of (...) F to vary according to the context in which F appears. Given the plausible assumption that there is an intimate tie between final values and appropriate attitudinal responses, it appears that conditionalism is the better approach for mainly the following three reasons: First, intrinsicalism is too indiscriminate, which makes it subject to what I call ‘location problems’ of final value. I illustrate this problem by discussing alleged examples of Moorean organic unities. Second, intrinsicalism evokes symptoms of ‘evaluative schizophrenia’. Third, considerations of theoretical economy tell in favour of conditionalism. Thereafter I respond to some recent challenges to conditionalism. An appendix surveys some meritorious implications that conditionalism offers for various substantial versions of such structurally different views about value as monism, pluralism, and particularism. (shrink)

We argued in our joint article that the facilitated consensus model of clinical ethics consultation is incomplete because it does not address the problem of what we have called “unsettled cases.” Sabrina Derrington and April Dworetz, Mark Aulisio, and Al Jonsen have each usefully challenged our claims and conclusions. In this brief article we respond to some of their arguments.