Introduction Stored human samples and the establishment of biobanks are increasing in the world. Along with this there are the questions of ethics that arise such as the correct method of obtaining informed consent for research on stored samples and the policies involved in collaborative research using collected samples. This study is an attempt to evaluate the researchers, academics and policy makers' views on these ethical aspects. Methods This was an anonymised study involving a Sri Lankan population of researchers, ethics (...) committee members, and policy makers. A self administered questionnaire was utilised as the study instrument. The questionnaire captured four major areas of interest: demographic characteristics of respondents, their attitudes on informed consent policy, their opinion on rights of collaborating researchers, their attitudes on dealing with international differences in regulatory frameworks. Results The study included 55 responders with 40/55 agreeing that donors should receive the option of giving informed consent for future research, with 31/55 considering multiple- type consent options most appropriate. Regarding the issue of shared samples in collaborative research majority agreed that source country ethics review committee approval was necessary 53/55. Conclusion The study concludes that sample donors should be given the option of giving advance consent to unspecified future research provided that future research is approved by an ethics committee. In collaborative research, it is necessary to involve ethics committees from donor countries in the research approval process. (shrink)

Engagement with genomic medicine and research has increased globally during the past few decades, including rapid developments in Sri Lanka. Genomic research is carried out in Sri Lanka on a variety of scales and with different aims and perspectives. However, there are concerns about participants' understanding of genomic research, including the validity of informed consent. This article reports a qualitative study aiming to explore the understanding, knowledge, and attitudes of the Sri Lankan public towards genomic medicine and to inform the (...) development of an effective and appropriate process for informed consent in that setting. Purposive sampling was employed. Participants were recruited from a sub-group of the public in Colombo, Sri Lanka who had either consented or refused to donate genetic material for a biobank. Data were collected using face-to-face semi-structured interviews. Interview data were transcribed verbatim and translated into English. Conventional content analysis was used. The analysis developed three key themes: a) ‘Scientific literacy’ describes an apparent lack of scientific knowledge that seems to affect a participant’s ability to understand the research, b) ‘Motivation’ describes narratives about why participants chose (not) to take part in the research, despite not understanding it, and c) ‘Trust’ describes how trust served to mitigate the apparent ethical deficit created by not being fully informed. In this article, we argue that informed trust is likely an acceptable basis for consent, particularly in settings where scientific literacy might be low. However, researchers must work to be worthy of that trust and ensure that misconceptions are actively addressed. (shrink)

BackgroundInternational guidelines on research have focused on protecting research participants. Ethical Research Committee (ERC) approval and informed consent are the cornerstones. Externally sponsored research requires approval through ethical review in both the host and the sponsoring country. This study aimed to determine to what extent ERC approval and informed consent procedures are documented in locally and internationally published human subject research carried out in Sri Lanka.MethodsWe obtained ERC approval in Sri Lanka and the United Kingdom. Theses from 1985 to 2005 (...) available at the Postgraduate Institute of Medicine (PGIM) library affiliated to the University of Colombo were scrutinised using checklists agreed in consultation with senior research collaborators. A Medline search was carried out with MeSH major and minor heading 'Sri Lanka' as the search term for international publications originating in Sri Lanka during 1999 to 2004. All research publications from CMJ during 1999 to 2005 were also scrutinized.ResultsOf 291 theses, 34% documented ERC approvals and 61% documented obtaining consent. From the international journal survey, 250 publications originated from Sri Lanka of which only 79 full text original research publications could be accessed electronically. Of these 38% documented ERC approval and 39% documented obtaining consent. In the Ceylon Medical Journal 36% documented ERC approval and 37% documented obtaining consent.ConclusionOnly one third of the publications scrutinized recorded ERC approval and procurement of informed consent. However, there is a positive trend in documenting these ethical requirements in local postgraduate research and in the local medical journal. (shrink)

BackgroundApproval of the research proposal by an ethical review committee from both sponsoring and host countries is a generally agreed requirement in externally sponsored research.However, capacity for ethics review is not universal. Aim of this study was to identify opinions and views of the members serving in ethical review and ethics committees in Sri Lanka on informed consent, essential components in the information leaflet and the consent form.MethodsWe obtained ethical approval from UK and Sri Lanka. A series of consensus generation (...) meetings on the protocol were conducted. A task oriented interview guide was developed. The interview was based on open-ended questionnaire. Then the participants were given a WHO checklist on informed consent and requested to rate the items on a three point scale ranging from extremely important to not important.ResultsTwenty-nine members from ethics committees participated. Majority of participants (23), believed a copy of the information leaflet and consent form, should accompany research proposal. Opinions about the items that should be included in the information leaflets varied. Participants identified 18 criteria as requirements in the information leaflet and 19 for the consent form.The majority, 20 (69%), believed that all research need ethical approval but identified limited human resource, time and inadequate capacity as constraints. Fifteen (52%) believed that written consent is not required for all research. Verbal consent emerged as an alternative to written consent. The majority of participants rated all components of the WHO checklist as important.ConclusionThe number of themes generated for the consent form (N = 18) is as many as for the information leaflet (N = 19) and had several overlaps. This suggests that the consent form should be itemized to reflect the contents covered in the information leaflet. The participants' opinion on components of the information leaflets and consent forms proved to be similar with WHO checklist on informed consent. (shrink)

BackgroundLack of proper understanding on the part of researchers about public understanding of research and informed consent will increase the potential for malpractice. As a part of a larger study on ethics and informed consent in Sri Lanka, this study aimed to ascertain the level of understanding of 'research' by exploring the views of the public and professionals.MethodsConvenience sampling and snow ball technique were used for recruitment with an emphasis on balanced age and gender representation, diverse educational, socio-cultural and professional (...) backgrounds, and previous research experience, either as researchers or participants. Content analysis of the data was carried out.Results66 persons (37 males, 29 females) participated. Although fundamentally a qualitative study, themes were also quantitatively analysed for informative results. Most participants thought that the word 'research' meant searching, looking, inquiring while some others thought it meant gathering information, gaining knowledge and learning.A third of participants did not offer an alternative word for research. Others suggested the words survey, exploration, search, experiment, discovery, invention and study as being synonymous. Doctors, health professionals, health institutions, scientists, professionals, businessmen, pharmaceutical companies, students, teachers were identified as people who conduct research.Participants indicated that crucial information on deciding to participate in research included objectives of the research, project importance and relevance, potential benefits to individuals and society, credibility & legitimacy of researchers, what is expected of participant, reason for selection, expected outcome, confidentiality and ability to withdraw at any time. A majority (89%) expressed their willingness to participate in future research.ConclusionsThe results show that with or without prior experience in research, participants in this study had a reasonable understanding of research. The findings show that a decision about taking part in research is dependent on knowledge, education and also on social networks.The results demonstrate that the majority were supportive of health research and believe that research is beneficial to the welfare of society. (shrink)

BackgroundIt is widely acknowledged that there is a global divide on health care and health research known as the 10/90 divide.MethodsA retrospective survey of articles published in the BMJ, Lancet, NEJM, Annals of Internal Medicine & JAMA in a calendar year to examine the contribution of the developing world to medical literature. We categorized countries into four regions: UK, USA, Other Euro-American countries (OEAC) and (RoW). OEAC were European countries other than the UK but including Australia, New Zealand and Canada. (...) RoW comprised all other countries.ResultsThe average contribution of the RoW to the research literature in the five journals was 6.5%. In the two British journals 7.6% of the articles were from the RoW; in the three American journals 4.8% of articles were from RoW. The highest proportion of papers from the RoW was in the Lancet (12%). An analysis of the authorship of 151 articles from RoW showed that 104 (68.9%) involved authorship with developed countries in Europe or North America. There were 15 original papers in these journals with data from RoW but without any authors from RoW.ConclusionsThere is a marked under-representation of countries in high-impact general medical journals. The ethical implications of this inequity and ways of reducing it are discussed. (shrink)

Background: Establishment of Sri Lankan Twin Registry demanded development of ethical guidelines, as an effective ethical framework was not available in Sri Lanka. Design: Objectives were to find out whether the ombudsman concept exists in current informed consent practices and to investigate opinion about ombudsmen. We searched Pub Med, conducted a postal survey, and monitored Internet discussion. Results: The responses were categorized into current practices and existing models in informed consent process, reservations expressed about current practices, arguments supporting the concept, (...) concerns and issues, alternatives, and how to implement the proposal. The concept of a third person is not entirely novel. How to find a truly independent person, the financial implication, confidentiality, obligations, and liabilities of ombudsmen, also emerged. Conclusions: The concept of an ombudsman is conceptually and ethically sound and acceptable but the challenges posed by this very same solution to creating a better process of informed consent will have to be faced. (shrink)

This volume gathers together for the first time are all the key texts in a crucial debate in modern philosophy, centered on Leibniz's famous 1695 essay, the "New System of the Nature of Substances and their Communication," in which he introduced his strikingly original theory of metaphysics. His "system" became increasingly famous and drew him into discussion and development of these ideas, both in public and in private, with a variety of thinkers, most notably the great French philosopher Pierre Bayle. (...) Woolhouse's and Francks's new English edition gives the only full representation of this debate, and will therefore be essential reading for anyone who wishes to gain a proper understanding of Leibniz's philosophy and its intelletual context. All the texts are newly translated and extensively annotated; many appear in English for the first time. (shrink)

Background Medical ethics deals with the ethical obligations of doctors to their patients, colleagues and society. The annual reports of Sri Lanka Medical Council indicate that the number of complaints against doctors has increased over the years. We aimed to assess the level of knowledge, attitude and practice regarding medical ethics among doctors in three teaching hospitals in Sri Lanka. Methods A hospital-based cross-sectional study was conducted among doctors using a pre-tested self-administered, anonymous questionnaire. Chi Squared test, and ANOVA test (...) were used to identify the significance of association between level of knowledge and selected factors. Results Most doctors had a poor level of knowledge on medical ethics, with postgraduate trainees showing significantly higher level of knowledge. The average knowledge on medical ethics among doctors was significantly different between the three hospitals. Over 95% had a favourable attitude towards gaining knowledge and advocated the need for training. The majority indicated awareness of unethical practices. 24.6% of respondents stated that they get a chaperone ‘sometimes’ during patient examination while 3.5% never do. The majority responded that they never accept gifts from pharmaceutical companies in recognition of their prescribing pattern. 12–41% of doctors participated in the study acknowledged that they ‘sometime’ engaged in unethical practices related to prescribing drugs, accepting gifts from pharmaceutical companies and when obtaining leave. Conclusion Most doctors had a poor level of knowledge of medical ethics. Postgraduate trainees had a higher level of knowledge than other doctors. The majority showed a favourable attitude towards gaining knowledge and the need of training. Regular in-service training on medical ethics for doctors would help to improve their knowledge on medical ethics, as well as attitudes and ethical conduct. (shrink)

t. 1. Apo ton prōto skeptomeno anthrōpo mechri ton 6. aiōna M.Ch. -- t. 2. Apo ton 7. aiōna M.Ch. mechri to sēmera.

This article is the guest editors’ introduction to the special issue in Business & Society on “SMEs and CSR in Developing Countries.” The special issue includes four original research articles by Hamann, Smith, Tashman, and Marshall; Allet; Egels-Zandén; and Puppim de Oliveira and Jabbour on various aspects of the relationship of small and medium enterprises to corporate social responsibility in developing countries.

Since the launch of applications such as DALL-E, Midjourney, and Stable Diffusion, generative artificial intelligence has been controversial as a tool for creating artwork. While some have presented longtermist worries about these technologies as harbingers of fully automated futures to come, more pressing is the impact of generative AI on creative labour in the present. Already, business leaders have begun replacing human artistic labour with AI-generated images. In response, the artistic community has launched a protest movement, which argues that AI (...) image generation is a kind of theft. This paper analyzes, substantiates, and critiques these arguments, concluding that AI image generators involve an unethical kind of labour theft. If correct, many other AI applications also rely upon theft. (shrink)

We propose a formal framework for interpretable machine learning. Combining elements from statistical learning, causal interventionism, and decision theory, we design an idealised explanation game in which players collaborate to find the best explanation for a given algorithmic prediction. Through an iterative procedure of questions and answers, the players establish a three-dimensional Pareto frontier that describes the optimal trade-offs between explanatory accuracy, simplicity, and relevance. Multiple rounds are played at different levels of abstraction, allowing the players to explore overlapping causal (...) patterns of variable granularity and scope. We characterise the conditions under which such a game is almost surely guaranteed to converge on a optimal explanation surface in polynomial time, and highlight obstacles that will tend to prevent the players from advancing beyond certain explanatory thresholds. The game serves a descriptive and a normative function, establishing a conceptual space in which to analyse and compare existing proposals, as well as design new and improved solutions. (shrink)

Plato's dialogues frequently criticize traditional Greek myth, yet Plato also integrates myth with his writing. Daniel S. Werner confronts this paradox through an in-depth analysis of the Phaedrus, Plato's most mythical dialogue. Werner argues that the myths of the Phaedrus serve several complex functions: they bring nonphilosophers into the philosophical life; they offer a starting point for philosophical inquiry; they unify the dialogue as a literary and dramatic whole; they draw attention to the limits of language and the limits of (...) knowledge; and they allow Plato to co-opt cultural authority as a way of defining and legitimating the practice of philosophy. Platonic myth, as a species of traditional tale, is thus both distinct from philosophical dialectic and similar to it. Ultimately, the most powerful effect of Platonic myth is the way in which it leads readers to participate in Plato's dialogues and to engage in a process of self-examination. (shrink)

In Seeing Things as They Are (Searle 2015), Searle developed a direct realist’s theory of perception. According to direct realism, physical objects are directly and immediately perceived. Searle claims that Berkeley’s theory of perception goes against direct realism. For Searle, Berkeley’s theory suggests that only subjective experiences (ideas) are directly and immediately perceived, not physical objects. Contrary to Searle, G. S. Pappas claims that Berkeley’s theory of perception is consistent with the view that physical objects are immediately perceivable (Pappas 1982; (...) Pappas 1987). Given the conflicting interpretations of Berkeley’s theory of perception, this paper attempts to defend Searle’s position on Berkeley’s theory of perception. It refutes Pappas’ interpretation by arguing that he is inconsistent with Berkeley’s theses of ontological phenomenalism and heterogeneity thesis. (shrink)

Millions of people undergo displacement in the world. Internally displaced people (IDP) are especially vulnerable as they are not protected by special legislation in contrast to other migrants. Research conducted among IDPs must be correspondingly sensitive in dealing with ethical issues that may arise. Muslim IDPs in Puttalam district in the North-Western province of Sri Lanka were initially displaced from Northern Sri Lanka due to the conflict in 1991. In the backdrop of a study exploring the prevalence of common mental (...) disorders among the IDPs, researchers encountered various ethical challenges. These included inter-related issues of autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence, confidentiality and informed consent, and how these were tailored in a culture-specific way to a population that has increased vulnerability. This paper analyses how these ethical issues were perceived, detected and managed by the researchers, and the role of ethics review committees in mental health research concerning IDPs. The relevance of guidelines and methodologies in the context of an atypical study population and the benefit versus risk potential of research for IDPs are also discussed. The limitations that were encountered while dealing with ethical challenges during the study are discussed. The concept of post-research ethical conduct audit is suggested to be considered as a potential step to minimize the exploitation of vulnerable populations such as IDPs in mental health research. (shrink)

Capital punishment—the legally authorized killing of a criminal offender by an agent of the state for the commission of a crime—stands in special need of moral justification. This is because execution is a particularly severe punishment. Execution is different in kind from monetary and custodial penalties in an obvious way: execution causes the death of an offender. While fines and incarceration set back some of one’s interests, death eliminates the possibility of setting and pursuing ends. While fines and incarceration narrow (...) one’s routes to happiness, death eliminates its possibility. Not surprisingly, there is much debate about the moral permissibility of capital punishment. This entry maps the terrain of this debate. The first section discusses justifications of the death penalty as they appear in major theories of punishment. The second section surveys moral objections to execution that apply to most justifications. The third addresses procedural criticisms, which do not target the morality of execution so much as the justice of its implementation. (shrink)

Many people are worried about the harmful effects of climate change but nevertheless enjoy some activities that contribute to the emission of greenhouse gas (driving, flying, eating meat, etc.), the main cause of climate change. How should such people make choices between engaging in and refraining from enjoyable greenhouse-gas-emitting activities? In this chapter, we look at the answer provided by decision theory. Some scholars think that the right answer is given by interactive decision theory, or game theory; and moreover think (...) that since private climate decisions are instances of the prisoner’s dilemma, one rationally should engage in these activities provided that one enjoys them. Others think that the right answer is given by expected utility theory, the best-known version of individual decision theory under risk and uncertainty. In this chapter, we review these different answers, with a special focus on the latter answer and the debate it has generated. (shrink)

Critics of the computational connectionism of the last decade suggest that it shares undesirable features with earlier empiricist or associationist approaches, and with behaviourist theories of learning. To assess the accuracy of this charge the works of earlier writers are examined for the presence of such features, and brief accounts of those found are given for Herbert Spencer, William James and the learning theorists Thorndike, Pavlov and Hull. The idea that cognition depends on associative connections among large networks of neurons (...) is indeed one with precedents, although the implications of this for psychological issues have been interpreted variously — not all versions of connectionism are alike. (shrink)

The practical goal of preventing premature death seems uncontroversial. But the term ‘premature death’ is vague with several, sometimes conflicting definitions. This ambiguity results in several conceptions with which not all will agree. Moreover, the normative rationale behind the goal of preventing premature deaths is masked by the operational definition of existing measures. In this article, we argue that ‘premature death’ should be recognized as a normative concept. We propose that normative theories should be used to justify measures of premature (...) death to provide them with normative validity and public legitimacy. (shrink)

By transcendental aesthetic, Kant means “the science of all principles of a priori sensibility” (A 21/B 35). These, he argues, are the laws that properly direct our judgments of taste (B 35 – 36 fn.), i.e. our aesthetic judgments as we ordinarily understand that notion in the context of contemporary art. Thus the first part of the Critique of Pure Reason, entitled the Transcendental Aesthetic, enumerates the necessary presuppositions of, among other things, our ability to make empirical judgments about particular (...) works of art. These presuppositions are sensible rather than intellectual because on Kant's view, all intellection that considers objects of any kind, whether abstract or concrete, must at base connect to actual, material objects with which we come into direct contact; and this we can do only through sensibility (A 19/B 33). Thus the following discussion explores what Kant claims must be true of us in order to make the sorts of aesthetic judgments we make, rather than any particular class or quality of aesthetic judgments itself. On Kant's view, what must be true of us in order to make aesthetic judgments is not different from what must be true of us in order to make any other kind of judgment about empirical objects. This last point is worth emphasizing, in order to correct an interpretation of Kant's account of aesthetic judgment in the Critique of Judgment that wrongly reads Kant as claiming that aesthetic judgments do not have to satisfy the same basic requirements of judgment that any other kind of judgment also must satisfy, such as the synthetic subsumption of such objects under certain necessary and hard-wired concepts of understanding, the internal coherence of such judgments with other, non-aesthetic ones of a more abstract and comprehensive character, the unified consciousness within which such judgments are intelligibly made, and the like. Of course Kant recognizes the special character of aesthetic judgments and unpacks it in the... (shrink)

Ptolemy reports three dated lunar eclipses observed by Hipparchus, and also refers to two more, without identifying them, which Hipparchus compared with two earlier counterparts (apparently, observed in Mesopotamia) to assess the validity of the Babylonian period relations of the lunar motion. Also, in Pliny the Elder’s Historia naturalis, we are told that a horizontal lunar eclipse (selenelion) at sunrise and moonset was reported (observed?) by Hipparchus. Reviewing a paper by G.J. Toomer in 1980, it is shown that the pairs (...) of the eclipses were, almost certainly, the ones occurring on “31 January 486 b.c. and 27 January 141 b.c.” and “19 November 502 b.c. and 14 November 157 b.c.”; and if Hipparchus observed from St. Stephen’s Hill in Rhodes, the most probable candidate for the selenelion at moonset was the lunar eclipse of 7 February 142 b.c., although he also had the chance to observe any of the four others, occurring on 3 July 150 b.c., 10 April 145 b.c., 26 November 139 b.c., and 15 November 138 b.c., on a sufficiently elevated mountain on the island. (shrink)

The Nature of This Work Out Philosophy is a collection of our basic notions concerning the world and our way of considering it. For this reason, the book, ...

In this original work of cultural criticism, Allen S. Weiss explores the meaning of radio to the modern imagination.

Protagoras, of all the ancient philosophers, has perhaps attracted the most interest in modern times. His saying ‘Man is the measure of all things’ caused Schiller to adopt him as the patron of the Oxford pragmatists, and has generally earned him the title of the first humanist. Yet the exact delineation of his philosophcal position remains a baffling task. Neumann, writing on Die Problematik des ‘Homo-mensura’ Satzes in 1938,2 concludes that no certainty whatever can be reached on the meaning of (...) the dictum, since ‘man’, ‘measure’, and ‘things’ are all ambiguous, nor can we tell which of the three is the predicate. The time is past when it was believed that a man's philosophy could be understood apart from the events of his life and the circumstances of his age: yet in the case of Protagoras the historical method of approach has hardly been attempted, although the impact of environment was perhaps more decisive in the formation of philosophical concepts in the Greek world than anywhere else. The reality about which the Greek philosopher spoke had three aspects: it was either the one universe of physics, or the political unity, or God. For example, the book of Heracleitus Περ φσεως was divided into three chapters or logoi, About the Whole, a political, and a theological. Neither physics nor theology supplies from its own subject-matter the form in which this reality was described. (shrink)