Upon doing something generous for someone with whom you are close, some kind of reciprocity may be appropriate. But it often seems wrong to actually request reciprocity. This chapter explores the wrongness in making these requests, and why they can nevertheless appear appropriate. After considering several explanations for the wrongness at issue (involving, e.g. distinguishing oughts from obligation, the suberogatory, imperfect duties, and gift-giving norms), a novel proposal is advanced. The requests are disrespectful; they express that their agent insufficiently trusts (...) the hearer to recognize their own reasons to reciprocate, and the close relationship between them morally requires this kind of trust. This proposal is articulated and situated in the recent discussion of the normativity of requests. The chapter concludes by explaining how these requests may appear appropriate. Agents in these relationships often have standing to make requests, though the standing is lacking in these particular cases. (shrink)

First published in 2000. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The COVID-19 pandemic revealed numerous weaknesses in pandemic preparedness and response, including underfunding, inadequate surveillance, and inequitable distribution of countermeasures. To overcome these weaknesses for future pandemics, WHO released a zero draft of a pandemic treaty in February, 2023, and subsequently a revised bureau's text in May, 2023. COVID-19 made clear that pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response reflect choices and value judgements. These decisions are therefore not a purely scientific or technical exercise, but are fundamentally grounded in ethics. The latest (...) treaty draft reflects these ethical considerations by including a section entitled Guiding Principles and Approaches. Most of these principles are ethical—they establish core values that undergird the treaty. Unfortunately, the treaty draft's set of principles are numerous, overlapping, and show inadequate coherence and consistency. We propose two improvements to this section of the draft pandemic treaty. First, key guiding ethical principles should be clearer and more precise than they currently are. Second, the link between ethical principles and policy implementation should be clearly established and define boundaries on acceptable interpretation, ensuring that signatories abide by these principles. (shrink)

Many defenders of the possibility of time travel into the past also hold that such time travel places no restrictions on what said time travelers can do. Some hold that it places at least a few restrictions on what time travelers can do. In attempting to resolve this dispute, I reached a contrary conclusion. Time travelers to the past cannot do other than what they in fact do. Using a very weak notion of can, I shall argue that the correspondingly (...) strong cannot do otherwise applies in the case of backwards time travel. I defend this result from objections. (shrink)

According to the ‘conceivability argument’ [1] it’s conceivable that a conscious human being H may have a perfect physical duplicate H* who isn’t conscious, [2] whatever is conceivable is possible, therefore [3] H* may possibly exist. This paper argues that the conceivability argument can’t help in discussion of the ‘mind–body problem’ even if [2] is allowed to be true. This is not because [1] is false, but because we don’t and can’t know enough about the nature of the physical to (...) know whether or not [1] is true. This follows from ‘the silence of physics’—the fact that physics neither does nor can tell us about the intrinsic non-structural nature of the physical, and the consequences of this fact for any adequate account of the meaning of the word ‘physical’. (shrink)

El informe sobre el estado de la democracia liberal de 2022 elaborado por el Instituto de investigación V-Dem de la Universidad de Gothenburg constata la existencia de un claro declive global en el apoyo a este sistema de gobierno que baja a los niveles de 1989.

This compilation of student research papers and analysis of important historical legal papers attempts to compare the experience of the past political-legal issues with the present.

La noticia de la inauguración en mayo de este año del Global Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence en Berlín pasó un tanto desapercibida. Esta fue una de las últimas jugadas maestras de estrategia política de la fulgurante carrera ciertamente no académica de la canciller alemana Angela Merkel, quien anunció que Alemania aportará una financiación anual de treinta millones de euros.

La imagen de cualquier país tiene dos vertientes, la formada por los nativos y la creada y cultivada por los extranjeros. En este ensayo se estudian las diferentes visiones que han existido de España desde la Edad Media a la actualidad.

This book explores the relationship between schizophrenia and common sense. It approaches this theme from a multidisciplinary perspective. Coverage features contributions from phenomenology, cognitive neuroscience, philosophy of mind, psychology, and social cognition. The contributors address the following questions: How relevant is the loss of common sense in schizophrenia? How can the study of schizophrenia contribute to the study of common sense? How to understand and explain this loss of common sense? They also consider: What is the relationship of practical reasoning (...) and logical formal reasoning with schizophrenia? What is the relationship between the person with a diagnosis of schizophrenia and social values? Chapters examine such issues as rationality, emotions, self, and delusion. In addition, one looks at brain structure and neurotransmission. Others explore phenomenological and Wittgensteinian theories. The book features papers from the Schizophrenia and Common Sense International Workshop, held at New University of Lisbon, November 2015. It offers new insights into this topic and will appeal to researchers, students, as well as interested general readers. (shrink)

A gas in a box is perhaps the most important model system studied in thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. Usually, studies focus on the gas, whereas the box merely serves as an idealized confinement. The present article focuses on the box as the central object and develops a thermodynamic theory by treating the geometric degrees of freedom of the box as the degrees of freedom of a thermodynamic system. Applying standard mathematical methods to the thermody- namics of an empty box allows (...) equations with the same structure as those of cosmology and classical and quantum mechanics to be derived. The simple model system of an empty box is shown to have interesting connections to classical mechanics, special relativity, and quantum field theory. (shrink)

According to Thomas Aquinas, a sovereign government may legitimately execute sinners in pursuance of the common good. Aquinas outlines his defence of Capital Punishment in the Summa Theologica 2–2, q.64, a.2 and the Summa Contra Gentiles, Book 3, Chapter 146. Aquinas's stance on this issue is well known and his argument in favour of CP has been extensively discussed. This article will focus instead on the objections Aquinas raises to the institution of CP in the ST and SCG, along with (...) his responses to these objections. After providing a brief sketch of Aquinas's account of legal punishment, Aquinas's argument for the legitimacy of CP will then be outlined. The objections which Aquinas raises to CP will then be individually examined, along with his reply to each. After examining the underpinnings of Aquinas's objections and responses, the outline of a critique will be offered which draws upon the thought of Augustine and Karl Barth. (shrink)

Graeme Laurie stepped down from the Chair in Medical Jurisprudence at the University of Edinburgh in 2019. This edited collection pays tribute to his extraordinary contributions to the field. Graeme has often spoken about the importance of 'legacy' in academic work and has forged a remarkable intellectual legacy of his own, notably through his work on genetic privacy, human tissue and information governance, and on the regulatory salience of the concept of liminality. The essays in this volume animate the concept (...) of legacy as lens of analysis for the study and practice of medical jurisprudence. In this light, legacy reveals characteristics of both benefit and burden, as both an encumbrance to and facilitator of the development of law, policy and regulation. Overall, the contributions reconcile the ideas of legacy and responsiveness and show that both dimensions are critical to achieve and sustain the health of medical jurisprudence itself as a dynamic, interdisciplinary and policy-engaged field of thinking. (shrink)

This classic textbook focuses on medical law and its relationship with medical practice and modern ethics. It provides thorough coverage of all of the topics found on medical law courses, and in depth analysis of recent court decisions, encouraging students to think analytically about the subject.

O texto busca refletir criticamente sobre alguns fenômenos sociais contemporâneos, fortemente imbricados, notadamente as tendências contemporâneas de entrincheiramento e achatamento do eu; o reforço da iconomania e da compulsiva produção de avatares de si, em meio a bolhas narcísicas digitais, franqueadas pelas recentes tecnologias de informação e comunicação; e a virtual destruição da intimidade e da privacidade, diante da emergência de panópticos digitais e da vigilância algorítmica. Para tanto, toma-se como ponto de partida proposições apresentadas por Christopher Lasch em sua (...) obra _The Minimal Self: Psychic Survival in Troubled Times_, publicada originalmente em 1984, em particular a própria noção de mínimo eu, as quais são, então, entretecidas com argumentos de Christophe Dejours, Günther Anders, Theodor Adorno, Hebert Marcuse, Jonathan Crary, entre outros. Em acréscimo, busca-se salientar a ancoragem desses processos à hodierna dinâmica de acumulação de capital, a partir da crítica da economia política, perspectiva que atravessa todo o texto, bem como assinalar a atualidade do pensamento de Lasch. (shrink)