Although an invasive medical intervention, Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) has been regarded as an efficient and safe treatment of Parkinson’s disease for the last 20 years. In terms of clinical ethics, it is worth asking whether the use of DBS may have unanticipated negative effects similar to those associated with other types of psychosurgery. Clinical studies of epileptic patients who have undergone an anterior temporal lobectomy have identified a range of side effects and complications in a number of domains: psychological, (...) behavioural, affective and social. In many cases, patients express difficulty adjusting from being chronically ill to their new status as ‘treated’ or ‘seizure free’. This postoperative response adjustment has been described in the literature on epilepsy as the ‘Burden of Normality’ (BoN) syndrome. Most of the discussion about DBS postoperative changes to self is focused on abnormal side effects caused by the intervention (ie, hypersexuality, hypomania, etc). By contrast, relatively little attention is paid to the idea that successfully ‘treated’ individuals might experience difficulties in adjusting to becoming ‘normal’. The purpose of this paper is (1) to articulate the postoperative DBS psychosocial adjustment process in terms of the BoN syndrome, (2) to address whether the BoN syndrome illustrates that DBS treatment poses a threat to the patient’s identity, and (3) to examine whether the current framework for rehabilitation after DBS procedures should be updated and take into account the BoN syndrome as a postoperative self-change response. (shrink)

Clinical investigators must engage in just subject recruitment and selection and avoid unduly influencing research participation. There may be tension between the practice of keeping payments to participants low to avoid undue influence and the requirements of justice when recruiting normal healthy volunteers for phase 1 drug studies. By intentionally keeping payments low to avoid unduly influenced participation, investigators, on the recommendation or insistence of institutional review boards, may be targeting or systematically recruiting healthy adult members of lower socio-economic groups (...) for participation in phase 1 studies. Investigators are at risk of routinely failing to fulfill the obligation of justice, which prohibits the systematic targeting and recruiting of subjects for reasons unrelated to the nature of the study. Insofar as we take seriously the obligation to engage in just subject recruitment and selection, I argue that we must acknowledge the implications low payments might have for subject recruitment and selection and examine the effect of low payments. If low payments de facto target the less well-off for phase 1 studies, we must defend the priority ranking of the obligation to avoid undue influence over the obligation of justice or adopt an alternative recruitment approach. This paper identifies a number of alternatives to the current system of low-value payments to research participants. (shrink)

Juristic argumentation must in normal cases lead to a positive conclusion. The adoption of the rules of the burden of argumentation is, therefore, necessary. It is the task of the normative theory of juristic argumentation to formulate and to justify these rules., The rules of the burden of argumentation are constitutive rules. They do not impose duties or obligations to justify, but they state under what conditions a thesis counts as justified. The basic problem lies in the second‐order (...) justification, that is, in the justification of the rules of the burden of argumentation. Their rational justification is a precondition for rational juristic discourse. (shrink)

The novel coronavirus of 2019 exposed, in an undeniable way, the severity of racial inequities in America’s healthcare system. As the urgency of the pandemic grew, administrators, clinicians, and ethicists became concerned with upholding the ethical principle of “most lives saved” by re-visiting crisis standards of care and triage protocols. Yet a colorblind, race-neutral approach to “most lives saved” is inherently inequitable because it reflects the normality and invisibility of ‘whiteness’ while simultaneously disregarding the burdens of ‘Blackness’. As written, (...) the crisis standards of care adopted by States are racist policies because they contribute to a history that treats Black Americans are inherently less than. This paper will unpack the idealized fairness and equity pursued by CSC, while also considering the use of modified Sequential Organ Failure Assessment as a measure of objective equality in the context of a healthcare system that is built on systemic racism and the potential dangers this can have on Black Americans with COVID-19. (shrink)

Critically examining popular ESL textbooks, this accessible and engaging book uncovers gender and ethnic representations that impact young English language learners in US public schools and provides equitable, egalitarian alternatives.

Donald M. MacKinnon has been one of the most important and influential of post-war British theologians and religious philosophers. Generally eclectic, frequently allusive, usually intellectually generous, persistently richly challenging and always astonishingly erudite, he had a significant impact on the development and subsequent theological work of the likes of Rowan Williams, Nicholas Lash, David Ford and John Milbank. A younger generation largely emerging from Cambridge, but with influence elsewhere, has more recently brought MacKinnon's normally occasionalist writing to a larger audience (...) worldwide where it is beginning to receive noteworthy attention. In this collection several of MacKinnon's most outstanding papers not yet published in book format is collected together with an Editorial Introduction by a former student of one of MacKinnon's own students. They range from his reflections on theology as educational, the nature of moral reasoning, considerations of ecclesial practice, dogmatics and hope. Here is another reminder of MacKinnon's intellectual brilliance. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Case for Restricting the Civil Liberties of the Cognitively Disabled Two Conceptions of Competence Further Topics Editor's Note.

The German invasion of the Soviet Union in June of 1941 has long been attributed to errors by Joseph Stalin, yet a revisionist position known as the Icebreaker hypothesis has also emerged alleging that Stalin is not to blame. This essay examines why the Icebreaker theory is erroneous based on its lack of concrete facts. The reasons why Operation Barbarossa was so effective are also examined, leading to the conclusion that Stalin should still shoulder most of the blame for Soviet (...) disorganization prior to the invasion. (shrink)

Philologus, founded in 1846, is one of the oldest and most respected periodicals in the field of Classics. It publishes articles on Greek and Latin literature, historiography, philosophy, history of religion, linguistics, reception, and the history of scholarship. The journal aims to contribute to our understanding of Greco-Roman culture and its lasting influence on European civilization. The journal Philologus, conceived as a forum for discussion among different methodological approaches to the study of ancient texts and their reception, publishes original scholarly (...) contributions with a strong international focus. Publications languages are: German, English, Italian, French. As of 2014 the publication of supplementary volumes will be resumed. The series Philologus. Supplemente / Philologus. Supplementary Volumes will publish monographs and edited volumes pertaining to all aspects of the study of ancient literature and its reception, with a special focus on topics concerning literary theory, philosophy and the history of scholarship from an interdisciplinary perspective. (shrink)

Objective Apeiron was founded in 1966 and has developed into one of the oldest and most distinguished journals dedicated to the study of ancient philosophy, ancient science, and, in particular, of problems that concern both fields. Apeiron is committed to publishing high-quality research papers in these areas of ancient Greco-Roman intellectual history; it also welcomes submission of articles dealing with the reception of ancient philosophical and scientific ideas in the later western tradition. The journal appears quarterly. Articles are peer-reviewed on (...) a double-blind basis. Topics ancient philosophy ancient science reception of ancient philosophical and scientific ideas in the later western tradition Article formats Original Articles. (shrink)

Caplan & Waters argue that the processing resources used for sentence comprehension are not drawn from an undifferentiated verbal working memory resource. This commentary cites data from normal aging to support this position. Still lacking in theory development is a specification of the transient memory representations necessary for interpretive and post-interpretive operations.

We show that in quantum logic of closed subspaces of Hilbert space one cannot substitute quantum operations for classical (standard Hilbert space) ones and treat them as primitive operations. We consider two possible ways of such a substitution and arrive at operation algebras that are not lattices what proves the claim. We devise algorithms and programs which write down any two-variable expression in an orthomodular lattice by means of classical and quantum operations in an identical form. Our results show that (...) lattice structure and classical operations uniquely determine quantum logic underlying Hilbert space. As a consequence of our result, recent proposals for a deduction theorem with quantum operations in an orthomodular lattice as well as a, substitution of quantum operations for the usual standard Hilbert space ones in quantum logic prove to be misleading. Quantum computer quantum logic is also discussed. (shrink)

Philologus, founded in 1846, is one of the oldest and most respected periodicals in the field of Classics. It publishes articles on Greek and Latin literature, historiography, philosophy, history of religion, linguistics, reception, and the history of scholarship. The journal aims to contribute to our understanding of Greco-Roman culture and its lasting influence on European civilization. The journal Philologus, conceived as a forum for discussion among different methodological approaches to the study of ancient texts and their reception, publishes original scholarly (...) contributions with a strong international focus. Publications languages are: German, English, Italian, French. As of 2014 the publication of supplementary volumes will be resumed. The series Philologus. Supplemente / Philologus. Supplementary Volumes will publish monographs and edited volumes pertaining to all aspects of the study of ancient literature and its reception, with a special focus on topics concerning literary theory, philosophy and the history of scholarship from an interdisciplinary perspective. (shrink)

According to human enhancement advocates, it is morally permissible (and sometimes obligatory) to use biomedical means to modulate or select certain biological traits in order to increase people’s welfare, even when there is no pathology to be treated or prevented. Some authors have recently proposed to extend the use of biomedical means to modulate lust, attraction, and attachment. I focus on some conceptual implications of this proposal, particularly with regard to bioconservatives’ understanding of the notions of therapy and enhancement I (...) first explain what makes the proposal of medicalizing love interesting and unique, compared to the other forms of bioenhancement usually advocated. I then discuss how the medicalization of love bears on the more general debate on human enhancement, particularly with regard to the key notion of “normality” that is commonly used to define the therapy–enhancement distinction. This analysis suggests that the medicalization of love, in virtue of its peculiarity, requires bioconservatives to reconsider their way of understanding and applying the notions of “therapy” and “enhancement.” More in particular, I show that, because a non-arbitrary and value-free notion of “therapy” cannot be applied to the case of love, bioconservatives have the burden of either providing some new criterion that could be used for drawing a line between permissible and impermissible medicalization, or demonstrating that under no circumstances—including the cases in which love is already acknowledged to require medical intervention—can love fall within the domain of medicine. (shrink)

In a text written during his stay in Paris, Leibniz, to deny ontological reality to relations, employs an argument well known to the medieval thinkers and which later would be revived by Francis H. Bradley. If one assumes that relations are real and that a relation links any property to a subject – so runs the argument – then one falls prey to an infinite regress. Leibniz seems to be well aware of the consequences that this argument has for his (...) own metaphysical views, where the relation of inherence (‘inesse’) plays such a central role. Thus, he attempts first to interpret the relation of inherence as something ‘metaphoric’, originating from our ‘spatial way’ of looking at the surrounding world; and then he tries to reduce it to the part-whole relation which clearly he considers weaker, from the ontological point of view, than that of ‘being in’. (shrink)

In a text written during his stay in Paris, Leibniz, to deny ontological reality to relations, employs an argument well known to the medieval thinkers and which later would be revived by Francis H. Bradley. If one assumes that relations are real and that a relation links any property to a subject – so runs the argument – then one falls prey to an infinite regress. Leibniz seems to be well aware of the consequences that this argument has for his (...) own metaphysical views, where the relation of inherence plays such a central role. Thus, he attempts first to interpret the relation of inherence as something ‘metaphoric’, originating from our ‘spatial way’ of looking at the surrounding world; and then he tries to reduce it to the part-whole relation which clearly he considers weaker, from the ontological point of view, than that of ‘being in’. (shrink)

One of the fundamental struggles in corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the uncertainty and inherent contradictions that stem from a company being an individual legal entity and a community of persons. The authors contend that CSR has departed from the essence of “social responsibility.” The paper is a commentary on CSR, presented as two frameworks rooted in individualism—The Merchant Trade (the strategic view of CSR) and The White Man’s Burden (self-righteous CSR heroism that assumes the shackles of responsibility normally (...) offered by others). Both, however, contradict the essence of “social responsibility” pitting individual against community, business against society, and economic needs and realities versus ethical reflection. The authors present a model that advocates a more moderate and realistic approach to CSR that goes back to the essence of social responsibility. (shrink)

We present a one per cent measurement of the cosmic distance scale from the detections of the baryon acoustic oscillations in the clustering of galaxies from the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey, which is part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III. Our results come from the Data Release 11 sample, containing nearly one million galaxies and covering approximately 8500 square degrees and the redshift range 0.2 < z < 0.7. We also compare these results with those from the publicly released (...) DR9 and DR10 samples. Assuming a concordance Λ cold dark matter cosmological model, the DR11 sample covers a volume of 13 Gpc3 and is the largest region of the Universe ever surveyed at this density. We measure the correlation function and power spectrum, including density-field reconstruction of the BAO feature. The acoustic features are detected at a significance of over 7σ in both the correlation function and power spectrum. Fitting for the position of the acoustic features measures the distance relative to the sound horizon at the drag epoch, rd, which has a value of rd,fid = 149.28 Mpc in our fiducial cosmology. We find DV = at z = 0.32 and DV = at z = 0.57. At 1.0 per cent, this latter measure is the most precise distance constraint ever obtained from a galaxy survey. Separating the clustering along and transverse to the line of sight yields measurements at z = 0.57 of DA = and H =. Our measurements of the distance scale are in good agreement with previous BAO measurements and with the predictions from cosmic microwave background data for a spatially flat CDM model with a cosmological constant. © 2014 The Author Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Martin Heidegger and OntologyEmmanuel Levinas (bio)The prestige of Martin Heidegger 1 and the influence of his thought on German philosophy marks both a new phase and one of the high points of the phenomenological movement. Caught unawares, the traditional establishment is obliged to clarify its position on this new teaching which casts a spell over youth and which, overstepping the bounds of permissibility, is already in vogue. For once, (...) Fame has picked one who deserves it and, for that matter, one who is still living. Anyone who has studied philosophy cannot, when confronted by Heidegger’s work, fail to recognize how the originality and force of his achievements, stemming from genius, are combined with an attentive, painstaking, and close working-out of the argument—with that craftsmanship of the patient artisan in which phenomenologists take such pride. In this study, it is important for us to understand, above all, the true intentions of our author, to illuminate what he thinks really needs to be said, and to surmise what is most critical for him.To get to the heart of Heidegger’s system, it seems fitting to begin with a problem that is generally familiar. We choose the problem of knowledge, a deeper understanding of which takes us to the very threshold of Heidegger’s thought. For this problem, central to modern philosophy, is one of the main obstacles of modern philosophy that Heidegger wishes to surmount. Neo-Kantianism, which takes knowledge as the philosophical problem of the first rank, is the movement against which Heidegger rebels with all his strength. We have, thus, every chance of gaining access to his thought by the main door, so to speak. Once inside the system we will try to trace its outlines, 2 reserving, for a second part of our work, the determination of Heidegger’s place in the history of ideas, especially in the phenomenological movement, as well as of his relations with the philosopher to whom he owes so much—Edmund Husserl. 31In its most general form, the problem of the theory of knowledge has a critical significance. It consists in delineating a domain where knowledge can be certain and in determining the criteria for the legitimate scope of knowledge. But this problem, as normal and as simple as it may appear, has deeper roots. That knowledge should need a criterion at all presupposes that truth is not identical to all that is known and that the course [End Page 11] of things can fail to correspond with the course of thought. “How does knowledge correspond to being?” is a more profound formulation of the problem of knowledge.But we are not going to touch anymore on the primordial phenomenon that generates the problem. The problem of correspondence between thing and thought presupposes a free activity of thought and its isolation in relation to the object. It is precisely this presupposition which renders their harmony and even their contact problematic. “How does the subject take leave of itself to attain the object?” is what the problem of knowledge, in the last analysis, boils down to. Its true source is thus the concept of “subject” as elaborated by modern philosophy. The cogito presided over the subject’s birth. The cogito was the affirmation of the privileged nature of the subject’s immanent sphere, of its unique place in existence; hence, the cogito was the specificity of the subject’s connection to the rest of reality, the sui generis nature which opens up the passage from immanence to transcendence, the passage from ideas contained in the thinking substance to 4 their “formal existence.”The concept of the subject, understood as a substance having a specific position in the entire domain of being, presents us with difficulties of two kinds. First, how do we understand this leave-taking from the self which the thinking substance brings about and which displays an entirely original aspect? Indeed, we could say that thought, in reaching out toward objects, does not actually take leave of itself, since its objects—considered as ideas and contents of thought—are, in a certain sense, already within it. In order to make sense of this paradox, Descartes... (shrink)

We prove that any left-ordered inp-minimal group is abelian and we provide an example of a non-abelian left-ordered group of dp-rank 2. Furthermore, we establish a necessary condition for a group to have finite burden involving normalizers of definable sets, reminiscent of other chain conditions for stable groups.

Belying the rhetoric of “We’re all in this together,” and “COVID as the great equalizer,” the pandemic has brought into focus the “pre-existing conditions” of inequality—poverty, racism, lack of health care, lack of child care, women’s double burden, and the vulnerability of the elderly, among others. The coronavirus reveals gaping inequities in the length and quality of life caused by social and economic “pre-existing conditions.” It is the great unequalizer, the promise and ruse of “We’re all in this together.” (...) The new normal for some, is the old normal for many others. (shrink)

Who carries the burden of proof in analytic philosophical debates, and how can this burden be satisfied? As it turns out, the answer to this joint question yields a fundamental challenge to the very conduct of metaphysics in analytic philosophy. Empirical research presented in this book indicates that the vastly predominant goal pursued in analytic philosophical dialogues lies not in discovering truths or generating knowledge, but merely in prevailing over one’s opponents. Given this goal, the book examines how (...) most effectively to allocate and discharge the burden of proof. It focuses on premises that must prudently be avoided because a burden of proof on them could never be satisfied, and in particular discusses unsupportable bridge premises across inference barriers, like Hume’s barrier between ‘is’ and ‘ought’, or the barrier between the content of our talk or thought, and the world beyond such content. Employing this content/world barrier for a critical assessment of mainstream analytic philosophical methods, this book argues that we must prudently avoid invoking intuitions or other content of thought or talk in support of claims about the world beyond content, that is, metaphysically significant claims. Yet as content-located evidence is practically indispensable to metaphysical debates throughout analytic philosophy, from ethics to the philosophy of mathematics, this book reaches the startling conclusion that all such metaphysical debates must, prudently, be terminated. (shrink)

The burden of proof (BOP) fallacy is an informal fallacy involving the failure to recognize or properly assign the BOP in a persuasive reasoned dialogue, that is, an interchange between two or more parties whose aim is to prove or defend a position and, in doing so, persuade the other side of its truth or plausibility. In some such dialogues, the amount or strength of evidence required in order to accomplish this goal reasonably may differ for one of the (...) parties involved. The BOP fallacy can occur in two ways. The first is when one side of the dialogue fails to recognize that its opponent incurs the BOP. The second way the BOP fallacy can occur is when one side of the dialogue assigns the BOP incorrectly. There are still some factors that play a role in determining which side of a dialogue incurs the BOP and this chapter discusses these factors. (shrink)

This paper considers the probative burdens of proposing action or policy options in deliberation dialogues. Do proposers bear a burden of proof? Building on pioneering work by Douglas Walton (2010), and following on a growing literature within computer science, the prevailing answer seems to be “No.” Instead, only recommenders—agents who put forward an option as the one to be taken—bear a burden of proof. Against this view, we contend that proposers have burdens of proof with respect to their (...) proposals. Specifically, we argue that, while recommenders that Φ bear a burden of proof to show that □Φ (We should / ought to / must Φ), proposers that Φ have a burden of proof to show that ◇Φ (We may / can Φ). A burden of proposing may be defined as, which reads: Those who propose that we might Φ are obliged, if called upon, to show that Φ is possible in any of four ways which we call worldly, deontic, instrumental, and practical. So understood, burdens of proposing satisfy the standard formal definition of burden of proof. (shrink)

How is the burden of proof to be distributed among individuals who are involved in resolving a particular issue? Under what conditions should the burden of proof be distributed unevenly? We distinguish attitudinal from dialectical burdens and argue that these questions should be answered differently, depending on which is in play. One has an attitudinal burden with respect to some proposition when one is required to possess sufficient evidence for it. One has a dialectical burden with (...) respect to some proposition when one is required to provide supporting arguments for it as part of a deliberative process. We show that the attitudinal burden with respect to certain propositions is unevenly distributed in some deliberative contexts, but in all of these contexts, establishing the degree of support for the proposition is merely a means to some other deliberative end, such as action guidance, or persuasion. By contrast, uneven distributions of the dialectical burden regularly further the aims of deliberation, even in contexts where the quest for truth is the sole deliberative aim, rather than merely a means to some different deliberative end. We argue that our distinction between these two burdens resolves puzzles about unevenness that have been raised in the literature. (shrink)

The paper calls for argumentation theory to learn from moral and political philosophy. Several thinkers in these fields help understand the occurrence of what we may call legitimate dissensus: enduring disagreement even between reasonable people arguing reasonably. It inevitably occurs over practical issues, e.g., issues of action rather than truth, because there will normally be legitimate arguments on both sides, and these will be incommensurable, i.e., they cannot be objectively weighed against each other. Accordingly, ‘inference,’ ‘validity,’ and ‘sufficiency’ are inapplicable (...) notions. Further distinctive features of pro and con arguments in practical argumentation are explored, and some corollaries are drawn regarding evaluative norms of legitimate dissensus. Examples from immigrationrelated public debates in Denmark are given. (shrink)

In order to perform certain actions – such as incarcerating a person or revoking parental rights – the state must establish certain facts to a particular standard of proof. These standards – such as preponderance of evidence and beyond reasonable doubt – are often interpreted as likelihoods or epistemic confidences. Many theorists construe them numerically; beyond reasonable doubt, for example, is often construed as 90 to 95% confidence in the guilt of the defendant. -/- A family of influential cases suggests (...) standards of proof should not be interpreted numerically. These ‘proof paradoxes’ illustrate that purely statistical evidence can warrant high credence in a disputed fact without satisfying the relevant legal standard. In this essay I evaluate three influential attempts to explain why merely statistical evidence cannot satisfy legal standards. (shrink)

An anthology of the most important historical sources, classical and modern, on the subjects of presumptions and burdens of proof In the last fifty years, the study of argumentation has become one of the most exciting intellectual crossroads in the modern academy. Two of the most central concepts of argumentation theory are presumptions and burdens of proof. Their functions have been explicitly recognized in legal theory since the middle ages, but their pervasive presence in all forms of argumentation and in (...) inquiries beyond the law--including politics, science, religion, philosophy, and interpersonal communication--have been the object of study since the nineteenth century. However, the documents and essays central to any discussion of presumptions and burdens of proof as devices of argumentation are scattered across a variety of remote sources in rhetoric, law, and philosophy. Presumptions and Burdens of Proof: An Anthology of Argumentation and the Law brings together for the first time key texts relating to the history of the theory of presumptions along with contemporary studies that identify and give insight into the issues facing students and scholars today. The collection's first half contains historical sources and begins with excerpts from Aristotle's Topics and goes on to include the locus classicus chapter from Bishop Whately's crucial Elements of Rhetoric as well as later reactions to Whately's views. The second half of the collection contains contemporary essays by contributors from the fields of law, philosophy, rhetoric, and argumentation and communication theory. These essays explore contemporary understandings of presumptions and burdens of proof and their role in numerous contexts today. This anthology is the definitive resource on the subject of these crucial rhetorical modes and will be a vital resource to all scholars of communication and rhetoric, as well as legal scholars and practicing jurists. (shrink)

There is a paucity of treatment options for cognitively normal individuals with drug resistant genetic generalized epilepsy. Centromedian nucleus of the thalamus deep brain stimulation may be a viable treatment for GGE. Here, we present the case of a 27-year-old cognitively normal woman with drug resistant GGE, with childhood onset. Seizure semiology are absence seizures and generalized onset tonic clonic seizures. At baseline she had 4–8 GTC seizures per month and weekly absence seizures despite three antiseizure medications and vagus nerve (...) stimulation. A multidisciplinary committee recommended off-label use of CM DBS in this patient. Over 12-months of CM DBS she had two GTC seizure days, which were in the setting of medication withdrawal and illness, and no GTC seizures in the last 6 months. There was no significant change in the burden of absence seizures. Presently, just two studies clearly document CM DBS in cognitively normal individuals with GGE or idiopathic generalized epilepsy [in contrast to studies of cognitively impaired individuals with developmental and epileptic encephalopathies ]. Our results suggest that CM DBS can be an effective treatment for cognitively normal individuals with GGE and underscore the need for prospective studies of CM DBS. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Misprision of IdentityHarold Merskey (bio)Misprision the deliberate concealment of one's knowledge of a crime...A misreading, misunderstanding, etc.A failure to appreciate the value of a thing...(Concise Oxford Dictionary)There are options in the forms of identity that Charland's subjects assume. There are options as well in the meaning of this title, which may apply severally or individually to the choices under consideration. Are those who change their identity with labels—or reject (...) labels—correctly assuming accurate descriptions, or incorrectly misleading themselves and some others? In which of these cases are observation and intervention ethical, and do they pose demands on medical ethicists, or should they simply be ignored?Types of AutonomyParticipants in chat rooms on the Internet may justifiably be considered to be individuals who are seeking a current method of communication to promote a view of themselves, or ideas that they possess, or projects that they endorse. In this they may resemble others who have used more traditional methods of presenting their ideas, their claims, their wares, hard merchandise, literary material, or political or philosophical propositions to the public at large. These others may be sales persons, advertisers, poets, singers, clowns, buskers, politicians, preachers, missionaries, learned public speakers, television presenters, news commentators (but not necessarily reporters), and anyone indeed who talks to other people in public about matters that she or he wishes to bring forward. They have a point they want to make. They may be grouping themselves as 'survivors' or pro-anorexia, or Multiple Personality Disorder victims, but they are not necessarily operating as patients who are looking for a fiduciary relationship with physicians or other health care practitioners. It is thus a long step to turn them into individuals who may have a claim on the doctor–patient relationship.Do we wish to undertake research on them? Research or study in the first instance for these circumstances must be in the field of social science. The rules of what it is ethical for a sociologist to do apply first. The rules of situations where one person has more power and the other depends on that individual for assistance without exploitation may differ considerably from case to case. In so far as there may be some special rules as to what is fair, reasonable, just, kind, merciful, or prudent to study individuals who expose themselves and their interests publicly, this is perhaps best done first by reference to standards for journalists.That criterion may be too lenient a standard for most health professionals because journalists seem to be quite willing to expose the subjects of their observations to public obloquy and to [End Page 351] present information about many individuals—information that the persons themselves do not consent to see in the public domain, but that the journalist, having acquired, feels entitled to make known. Still there are believed to be some standards that journalists observe and these tend to protect the weak and the more vulnerable, although that does not mean that they are regularly followed. They tend to emphasize not printing material that is salacious or very lewd and would have personal reference, but they do not withhold comparable information if they consider that it is accurate and describes the behavior of individuals who are of interest to the public which, in certain circumstances, may mean almost anybody.So up to this point it seems that our normal respect for the autonomy of the individual in chat rooms can be balanced against our interest in freedom of speech, which leads to open and very broadly based publication of information and observations.The Burden of the LabelOnce the medical label is affixed, a different level of stringency begins to apply to what may be studied or published. Because we feel that individuals' self-esteem is at risk and perhaps their lives, we hesitate to make cutting or pejorative comments about distressed people. Such diagnoses as cancer or depression may be held back from the patient (and, certainly, in the case of depression, even more may be kept from others around the patient). Likewise unspoken thoughts may be automatically acknowledged and, like radical material, may be carefully segregated and... (shrink)

In a certain sense, uncertainty andignorance have been recognized in science andphilosophy from the time of the Greeks.However, the mathematical sciences have beendominated by the pursuit of certainty.Therefore, experiments under simplified andidealized conditions have been regarded as themost reliable source of knowledge. Normally,uncertainty could be ignored or controlled byapplying probability theory and statistics.Today, however, the situation is different.Uncertainty and ignorance have moved intofocus. In particular, the global character ofsome environmental problems has shown that theproblems cannot be disregarded. Therefore,scientists and technologists (...) have in many wayscome into a new situation. The Chernobylaccident is a dramatic example, however,problems such as a possible greenhouse effect,a possible reduction of the ozone layer, and soon are all of the same type. These encompasstotally different problems than scientists andtechnologists are traditionally trained to dealwith. In these cases, the standard use ofstatistics has to change, the burden of proofshould be reversed, one should draw ondifferent kinds of expertise, and, in general,science should be ``democratized.''. (shrink)

The notion of “the burden of proof” plays an important role in real-world argumentation contexts, in particular in law. It has also been given a central role in normative accounts of argumentation, and has been used to explain a range of classic argumentation fallacies. We argue that in law the goal is to make practical decisions whereas in critical discussion the goal is frequently simply to increase or decrease degree of belief in a proposition. In the latter case, it (...) is not necessarily important whether that degree of belief exceeds a particular threshold (e.g., ‘reasonable doubt’). We explore the consequences of this distinction for the role that the “burden of proof” has played in argumentation and in theories of fallacy. (shrink)

In what circumstances, if any, are intimate relationships between faculty members and students at the same academic institution morally permissible? Relationships can be sexual without the involvement of any intimate romantic feelings, or romantic without any sexual intimacy. By "intimate relationships" I mean those involving either kind of intimacy. Since adult humans should normally be allowed to choose with whom they have intimate relationships, the burden of proof is on the person who would restrict faculty-student relationships to show why (...) they are morally wrong. Although none of my main arguments depend on the gender of the faculty member and student, we need to bear in mind that the vast majority of such relationships occur between male faculty and female students. Gender inequalities in our society are likely to exacerbate the concerns that I discuss in section 2a about female students' ability to give fully voluntary consent to intimate relationships with male professors, and these inequalities also create the danger, which I discuss in section 3, that such relationships may perpetuate negative stereotypes about women. (shrink)

The article discusses burden of proof rules in social criticism. By social criticism I mean an argumentative situation in which an opponent publicly argues against certain social practices; the examples I consider are discrimination on the basis of species and discrimination on the basis of one's nationality. I argue that burden of proof rules assumed by those who defend discrimination are somewhat dubious. In social criticism, there are no shared values which would uncontroversially determine what is the reasonable (...) presumption and who has the burden of proof, nor are there formal rules which would end the debate and determine the winner at a specific point. (shrink)

The notion of burden of proof and its companion notion of presumption are central to argumentation studies. This book argues that we can learn a lot from how the courts have developed procedures over the years for allocating and reasoning with presumptions and burdens of proof, and from how artificial intelligence has built precise formal and computational systems to represent this kind of reasoning. The book provides a model of reasoning with burden of proof and presumption, based on (...) analyses of many clearly explained legal and non-legal examples. The model is shown to fit cases of everyday conversational argumentation as well as argumentation in legal cases. Burden of proof determines under what conditions an arguer is obliged to support a claim with an argument that backs it up and how strong that argument needs to be to prove the claim in question. (shrink)