As scientific and engineering efforts become increasingly global in nature, the need to understand differences in perceptions of research ethics issues across countries and cultures is imperative. However, investigations into the connection between nationality and ethical decision-making in the sciences have largely generated mixed results. In Study 1 of this paper, a measure of biases and compensatory strategies that could influence ethical decisions was administered. Results from this study indicated that graduate students from the United States and international graduate students (...) studying in the US are prone to different biases. Based on these findings, recommendations are made for developing ethics education interventions to target these decision-making biases. In Study 2, we employed an ethics training intervention based on ethical sensemaking and used a well-established measure of ethical decision-making that more fully captures the content of ethical judgment. Similar to Study 1, the results obtained in this study suggest differences do exist between graduate students from the US and international graduate students in ethical decision-making prior to taking the research ethics training. However, similar effects were observed for both groups following the completion of the ethics training intervention. (shrink)

Spinoza speculated on how ethics could emerge from biology and psychology rather than disrupt them and recent evidence suggests he might have gotten it right. His radical deconstruction and reconstruction of ethics is supported by a number of avenues of research in the cognitive and neurosciences. This paper gathers together and presents a composite picture of recent research that supports Spinoza’s theory of the emotions and of the natural origins of ethics. It enumerates twelve naturalist claims of Spinoza that now (...) seem to be supported by substantial evidence from the neurosciences and recent cognitive science. I focus on the evidence provided by Lakoff and Johnson in their summary of recent cognitive science in Philosophy in the Flesh: The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought (1999); by Antonio Damasio in his assessment of the state of affective neuroscience in Descartes’ Error (1994) and in The Feeling of What Happens (1999) (with passing references to his recent Looking for Spinoza (2003); and by Giacomo Rizzolatti, Vittorio Gallese and their colleagues in the neural basis of emotional contagion and resonance, i.e., the neural basis of primitive sociality and intersubjectivity, that bear out Spinoza’s account of social psychology as rooted in the mechanism he called attention to and identified as affective imitation. (shrink)

In the Platonic work Alcibiades I, a divinely guided Socrates adopts the guise of a lover in order to divert Alcibiades from an unthinking political career. The contributors to this carefully focussed volume cover aspects of the background to the work; its arguments and the philosophical issues it raises; its relationship to other Platonic texts, and its subsequent history up to the time of the Neoplatonists. Despite its ancient prominence, the authorship of Alcibiades I is still unsettled; the essays and (...) two appendices, one historical and one stylometric, come together to suggest answers to this tantalising question. (shrink)

As scientific and engineering efforts become increasingly global in nature, the need to understand differences in perceptions of research ethics issues across countries and cultures is imperative. However, investigations into the connection between nationality and ethical decision-making in the sciences have largely generated mixed results. In Study 1 of this paper, a measure of biases and compensatory strategies that could influence ethical decisions was administered. Results from this study indicated that graduate students from the United States and international graduate students (...) studying in the US are prone to different biases. Based on these findings, recommendations are made for developing ethics education interventions to target these decision-making biases. In Study 2, we employed an ethics training intervention based on ethical sensemaking and used a well-established measure of ethical decision-making that more fully captures the content of ethical judgment. Similar to Study 1, the results obtained in this study suggest differences do exist between graduate students from the US and international graduate students in ethical decision-making prior to taking the research ethics training. However, similar effects were observed for both groups following the completion of the ethics training intervention. (shrink)

State Medical Boards (SMBs) can take severe disciplinary actions (e.g., license revocation or suspension) against physicians who commit egregious wrongdoing in order to protect the public. However, there is noteworthy variability in the extent to which SMBs impose severe disciplinary action. In this manuscript, we present and synthesize a subset of 11 recommendations based on findings from our team’s larger consensus-building project that identified a list of 56 policies and legal provisions SMBs can use to better protect patients from egregious (...) wrongdoing by physicians. (shrink)

The prospect of using cell-based interventions to treat neurological conditions raises several important ethical and policy questions. In this target article, we focus on issues related to the unique constellation of traits that characterize CBIs targeted at the central nervous system. In particular, there is at least a theoretical prospect that these cells will alter the recipients' cognition, mood, and behavior—brain functions that are central to our concept of the self. The potential for such changes, although perhaps remote, is cause (...) for concern and careful ethical analysis. Both to enable better informed consent in the future and as an end in itself, we argue that early human trials of CBIs for neurological conditions must monitor subjects for changes in cognition, mood, and behavior; further, we recommend concrete steps for that monitoring. Such steps will help better characterize the potential risks and benefits of CBIs as they are tested and potentially used for treatment. (shrink)

Morality can help guide behavior and facilitate relationships. Although moral judgments by autistic people are similar to neurotypical individuals, many researchers argue that subtle differences signify deficits in autistic individuals. Moral foundation theory describes moral judgments in terms of differences rather than deficits. The current research, aimed at assessing autistic individuals’ moral inclinations using Haidt’s framework, was co-designed with autistic community members. Our aim was to describe autistic moral thinking from a strengths-based perspective while acknowledging differences that may pose interpersonal (...) challenges among autistic youth. We assessed 25 autistic and 23 neurotypical children’s moral judgments using the Moral Foundations Questionnaire for Kids. We used semi-structured interviews and qualitative analysis with a subset of participants to describe children’s moral reasoning. Analyses suggested that autistic and neurotypical children make similar judgments about moral transgressions across all five moral foundations. General linear mixed modeling showed that the greatest predictor of recommending punishment was how bad children deemed moral transgressions to be. We also found a trend that autistic children were more likely to recommend punishment for harmless norms violations than were neurotypical children. Future research could use longitudinal methods to understand the development of moral judgments among autistic and neurotypical children. (shrink)

Population-based research is enhanced by biological measures, but biological sampling raises complex ethical issues. The third British National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (Natsal-3) will estimate the population prevalence of five sexually transmitted infections (STIs) (Chlamydia trachomatis, Neisseria gonorrhoeae, human papillomavirus (HPV), HIV and Mycoplasma genitalium) in a probability sample aged 16–44 years. The present work describes the development of an ethical approach to urine testing for STIs, including the process of reaching consensus on whether to return results. The (...) following issues were considered: (1) testing for some STIs that are treatable and for which appropriate settings to obtain free testing and advice are widely available (Natsal-3 provides all respondents with STI and healthcare access information), (2) limits on test accuracy and timeliness imposed by survey conditions and sample type, (3) testing for some STIs with unknown clinical and public health implications, (4) how a uniform approach is easier to explain and understand, (5) practical difficulties in returning results and cost efficiency, such as enabling wider STI testing by not returning results. The agreed approach, to perform voluntary anonymous testing with specific consent for five STIs without returning results, was approved by stakeholders and a research ethics committee. Overall, this was acceptable to respondents in developmental piloting; 61% (68 of 111) of respondents agreed to provide a sample. The experiences reported here may inform the ethical decision making of researchers, research ethics committees and funders considering population-based biological sampling. (shrink)

We report the identification of a recurrent, 520-kb 16p12.1 microdeletion associated with childhood developmental delay. The microdeletion was detected in 20 of 11,873 cases compared with 2 of 8,540 controls and replicated in a second series of 22 of 9,254 cases compared with 6 of 6,299 controls. Most deletions were inherited, with carrier parents likely to manifest neuropsychiatric phenotypes compared to non-carrier parents. Probands were more likely to carry an additional large copy-number variant when compared to matched controls. The clinical (...) features of individuals with two mutations were distinct from and/or more severe than those of individuals carrying only the co-occurring mutation. Our data support a two-hit model in which the 16p12.1 microdeletion both predisposes to neuropsychiatric phenotypes as a single event and exacerbates neurodevelopmental phenotypes in association with other large deletions or duplications. Analysis of other microdeletions with variable expressivity indicates that this two-hit model might be more generally applicable to neuropsychiatric disease. © 2010 Nature America, Inc. All rights reserved. (shrink)

© 2017. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.We present new observations of the low-mass companion to HD 984 taken with the Gemini Planet Imager as a part of the GPI Exoplanet Survey campaign. Images of HD 984 B were obtained in the J and H bands. Combined with archival epochs from 2012 and 2014, we fit the first orbit to the companion to find an 18 au orbit with a 68% confidence interval between 14 and 28 au, an eccentricity (...) of 0.18 with a 68% confidence interval between 0.05 and 0.47, and an inclination of 119°with a 68% confidence interval between 114°and 125°. To address the considerable spectral covariance in both spectra, we present a method of splitting the spectra into low and high frequencies to analyze the spectral structure at different spatial frequencies with the proper spectral noise correlation. Using the split spectra, we compare them to known spectral types using field brown dwarf and low-mass star spectra and find a best-fit match of a field gravity M6.5 ±1.5 spectral type with a corresponding temperature of K. Photometry of the companion yields a luminosity of log=2.88 ± 0.07 dex with DUSTY models. Mass estimates, again from DUSTY models, find an age-dependent mass of 34 ±1 to 95 ±4 M Jup. These results are consistent with previous measurements of the object. (shrink)

This note analyses a recent case of the English Court of Appeal in which the applicant, R.G., a gay, H.I.V. positive Colombian claimed asylum on grounds of persecution due to his sexuality. Both the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal and the Court of Appeal rejected R.G.’s claim for asylum. The Court of Appeal’s first and most significant reason was that the alleged persecution was not sufficiently serious or life threatening, since R.G. had not suffered actual physical violence throughout the 13 years (...) that he had lived as a closeted gay man in Colombia. Secondly, the court considered the real reason for R.G.’s seeking asylum was his desire to access free health care in order to manage his H.I.V. His allegations of persecution on the grounds of sexuality were viewed as a sham. This note is critical of the approach taken by the Court, which, it is argued, displays an insensitivity to the complexity of sexual identity and its performance and has the effect of perpetuating and legitimating discrimination against lesbians and gay men. (shrink)

This is the first book to offer the best essays, articles, and speeches on ethics and intelligence that demonstrate the complex moral dilemmas in intelligence collection, analysis, and operations. Some are recently declassified and never before published, and all are written by authors whose backgrounds are as varied as their insights, including Robert M. Gates, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; John P. Langan, the Joseph Cardinal Bernardin Professor of Catholic Social Thought at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Georgetown (...) University; and Loch K. Johnson, Regents Professor of Political Science at the University of Georgia and recipient of the Owens Award for contributions to the understanding of U.S. intelligence activities. Creating the foundation for the study of ethics and intelligence by filling in the gap between warfare and philosophy, this is a valuable collection of literature for building an ethical code that is not dependent on any specific agency, department, or country. (shrink)