This article is a review of the literature on the subject of how nurses who provide palliative care are affected by ethical issues. Few publications focus directly on the moral experience of palliative care nurses, so the review was expanded to include the moral problems experienced by nurses in the care of the terminally ill patients. The concepts are first defined, and then the moral attitudes of nurses, the threats to their moral integrity, the moral problems that are perceived by (...) nurses, and the emotional consequences of these moral problems are considered in turn. The results show that the moral behaviour of nurses, which is theoretically grounded in commitment to care and to the patient, appears to be shaped by specific processes that lead to engagement or to mental and behavioural disengagement in morally difficult situations. Nurses often appear to fail to recognize the moral dimensions of the problems they experience and also to lack the skills they need to resolve moral problems adequately. Although the findings show that several elements that are beyond the control of nurses, owing to their lack of autonomy and authority, influence their moral experience, intrinsic factors such as feelings of insecurity and powerlessness have a profound effect on nurses’ perceptions and attitudes in the face of moral problems. The moral problems perceived by these nurses are related to end-of-life issues, communication with patients, the suffering of patients, and the appropriateness of the medical treatment. (shrink)

This book presents the first English translation of the original French treatise “La Physique d’Einstein” written by the young Georges Lemaître in 1922, only six years after the publication of Albert Einstein’s theory of General Relativity. It includes an historical introduction and a critical edition of the original treatise in French supplemented by the author’s own later additions and corrections. -/- Monsignor Georges Lemaître can be considered the founder of the “Big Bang Theory” and a visionary architect of (...) modern Cosmology. The scientific community is only beginning to grasp the full extent of the legacy of this towering figure of 20th century physics. Against the best advice of the greatest names of his time, the young Lemaître was convinced, solely through the study of Einstein’s theory of General Relativity, that space and time must have had a beginning with a tremendous “Big Bang” from a “quantum primeval atom” resulting in an ever-expanding Universe with a positive cosmological constant. -/- But how did the young Lemaître, essentially on his own, come to grips with the physics of Einstein? A year before his ordination as a diocesan priest, he submitted the audacious treatise, published in this book, that was to earn him Fellowships to study at Cambridge, MIT and Harvard, and launched him on a scientific path of ground-breaking discoveries. Almost a century after Lemaître’s seminal publications of 1927 and 1931, this highly pedagogical treatise is still of timely interest to young minds and remains of great value from a history of science perspective. (shrink)

When philosophers participate in the interdisciplinary ethical, environmental, economic, legal, and social analysis of nanotechnologies, what is their specific contribution? At first glance, the contribution of philosophy appears to be a clarification of the various moral and ethical arguments that are commonly presented in philosophical discussion. But if this is the only contribution of philosophy, then it can offer no more than a stalemate position, in which each moral and ethical argument nullifies all the others. To provide an alternative, we (...) must analyze the reasons behind the prevailing individual and cultural relativism in ethics. The epistemological investigation of this stalemate position will guide us to the core problem of the relation between theory and action . The stalemate can be overcome from a pragmatic philosophical standpoint, which combines epistemology, philosophy of language—that is, the philosophy of speech acts—and practical reasoning—that is, reasoning about decision-making . From this philosophical standpoint, it will be possible to show how philosophy can accompany and support the development of nanotechnologies. (shrink)

This book, which was completed just before Jean Hampton’s untimely death in April 1996, is an admirable hybrid. Although it successfully achieves its stated purpose of “acquaint[ing] the student of political philosophy both with [its] questions and with the various answers to them proposed by philosophers since the ancient Greeks”, it is, at the same time, quite an original work—one that can be read with real profit by professional philosophers as well as students.

We investigate risk attitudes when the underlying domain of payoffs is finite and the payoffs are, in general, not numerical. In such cases, the traditional notions of absolute risk attitudes, that are designed for convex domains of numerical payoffs, are not applicable. We introduce comparative notions of weak and strong risk attitudes that remain applicable. We examine how they are characterized within the rank-dependent utility model, thus including expected utility as a special case. In particular, we characterize strong comparative risk (...) aversion under rank-dependent utility. This is our main result. From this and other findings, we draw two novel conclusions. First, under expected utility, weak and strong comparative risk aversion are characterized by the same condition over finite domains. By contrast, such is not the case under non-expected utility. Second, under expected utility, weak comparative risk aversion is characterized by the same condition when the utility functions have finite range and when they have convex range. By contrast, such is not the case under non-expected utility. Thus, considering comparative risk aversion over finite domains leads to a better understanding of the divide between expected and non-expected utility, more generally, the structural properties of the main models of decision-making under risk. (shrink)

Cette statuette, très exactement datée tant par son contexte archéologique que par son style, nous fournit l'inscription en linéaire A la plus récente connue à ce jour (PO Zg 1). Six des huit signes peints qu'elle présente se retrouvent dans le même ordre sur l'épingle en argent de Platanos qui porte une inscription en linéaire A (PL Zf 1). Il est possible qu'il s'agisse d'un nom de divinité suivi de la «formule» A-SA-SA-RA-·. Le document démontre en tout cas la survivance (...) de certains aspects tant de la religion que de l'écriture minoenne jusqu'à une période avancée de l'époque mycénienne. (shrink)

The worldwide COVID-19 pandemic has shed more light on the difficulty of making health care decisions integrating scientific knowledge and values associated to life and death issues, human suffering, quality of life, economic losses, liberty of movement, etc. But the difficulties related to health care decisions and the use of innovative drugs or technologies are not new, and many countries have created agencies that have the mandate to evaluate new technologies in health care. Health Technological Assessment (HTA) reports’ aim is (...) to guide the decision makers in these difficult matters. There are two ethical components in HTA. The first is the report’s presentation of an ethical evaluation of the technology. The second is the value-ladenness of the HTA decision-making process itself. When implicit value judgments are not elicited, the justification of the final decision cannot be transparent. The present paper aims to identify and elicit the implicit value-judgments related to each step of the HTA process. This research is grounded on an applied ethics decision-making paradigm based on the role of value judgments in the decision-making process. The first part discusses two different approaches to values and value judgments in HTA. In the second part, citations mentioning value judgments extracted from a systematic review on the integration of ethics into HTA were categorized to elicit the value judgments and their criteria for each different HTA decision-making steps. The results show that there are 18 decision-making steps in the HTA process where 23 implicit value-judgments can be recognized. The range of these value judgments encompasses the whole HTA process: from the initial request, the presenting of the principal issues, to the final report’s dissemination. Since stakeholders need to understand which value judgments the conclusion of a report relies on, eliciting the implicit value judgments in the HTA decision-making process should yield more transparency. (shrink)

Les thérapies psychanalytiques auprès des couples apportent un bénéfice thérapeutique personnel à chacun des patients et, souvent, à leur lien douloureux ambivalent, comme en témoigne une méta-analyse comparative des approches thérapeutiques anciennes ou contemporaines. Une compréhension psychanalytique plus groupale s’impose aujourd’hui pour mieux saisir les problématiques identitaires mises en jeu par les processus inconscients qui structurent tout groupe humain, mais aussi la spécificité groupale transgénérationnelle des familles et des couples, laquelle donne à leur vie émotionnelle et affective une si grande (...) intensité. (shrink)

Les figures du rien. Leyenberger. Georges4070.

L'oeuvre de Gaston Bachelard apparaît aujourd'hui comme une oeuvre prophétique. Dans la mesure où elle concerne aussi bien les domaines de l'imagination et de la poésie que les démarches rationnelles de la recherche scientifique la plus avancée. Et l'homme contemporain est effectivement en proie aux exigences contradictoires de l'intelligence spéculative et des dérives créatrices de l'imaginaire. (4e de couverture).

L’analyse des relations d’argent dans les cures psychanalytiques en couple reste souvent trop superficielle. La double fonction à la fois réelle et symbolique de l’argent suscite de faciles résistances coalisées entre les deux partenaires avec parfois une complicité du thérapeute. L’usage nécessaire de l’argent dans la réalité sert à masquer son rôle prépondérant dans les jeux de relation et notamment de pouvoir. Dépasser ces résistances implique d’analyser l’argent dans sa fonction de signifiant fondamental du lien de couple et en particulier (...) le croisement inconscient des représentations que s’en font les deux partenaires, quitte à exploiter des dispositifs adaptés. (shrink)

La séduction est un phénomène universel, présent en toute relation, notamment en toute action thérapeutique, où son analyse s’impose. La séduction narcissique et son emprise entraînent diverses réactions défensives, crises et ruptures, notamment annulation du désir sexuel chez l’un ou l’autre partenaire, du fait de la menace d’assujettissement et d’atteinte identitaire. C’est à ce niveau profond, d’accès difficile, que doit se situer l’analyse de l’intervention thérapeutique.

Qu'y a-t-il de commun entre l'Univers, l'animal, la machine et la ville? A priori pas grand-chose si l'on prend en considération les différences d'échelle ou encore le fait que l'on cherche à rapprocher deux concepts "naturels", l'Univers et l'animal, à deux types de "constructions" humaines, la machine et la ville. Le propos de cet ouvrage est précisément de démontrer le contraire : des constatations identiques ou analogues peuvent s'appliquer à chacun d'eux. Notre appréhension de ces différentes entités a progressé de (...) façon considérable au cours du temps et notoirement au cours des dernières années. Les quatre termes deviennent de plus en plus complexes en même temps que nos analyses deviennent plus performantes. Chacun d'eux est constitué de structures emboîtées : ils sont en mosaïques, ensembles faits d'éléments distincts qui se juxtaposent, mais qui sont toujours plus que la simple somme de leurs éléments. Ils évoluent au cours du temps, et cette évolution est darwinienne : ils s'adaptent, cherchent l'équilibre, et seules subsistent les structures les plus robustes. Et ce qui est le plus réussi, le plus adapté, est aussi bien souvent ce que nous trouvons le plus beau... Mettre en parallèle les regards d'un astrophysicien, d'un biologiste, d'un architecte et d'un roboticien permet à chacune de ses disciplines d'apporter un éclairage nouveau sur les trois autres : un bel exercice de dialogue. (shrink)

When building causal knowledge in behavioural genetics, the natural randomisation of genotypes at conception (approximately analogous to the artificial randomisation occurring in randomised controlled trials) facilitates the discovery of genetic causes. More importantly, the randomisation of genetic material within families also enables a better identification of (environmental) risk factors and aetiological pathways to diseases and behaviours.

Le prophète Balaam.--M. Hauriou collectiviste malgré lui.--Sombart contre Marx.--La méthode de M. Hauriou et ses mérites.--Le cas de M. Duguit --La sirene évolutionniste.--La nécessité du droit naturel.

Cet article s’intéresse à l’évolution non seulement quantitative mais aussi qualitative du phénomène du divorce. Dans le divorce, d’un cas à l’autre, on observe de grandes différences suivant le degré d’accomplissement du travail psychique de deuil des ex-partenaires. Mais son extrême banalisation entraîne aussi un important changement d’état d’esprit général, avec des problèmes nouveaux, voire des mutations d’ordre psycho-culturel concernant la vie de couple. La puissante médiatisation contemporaine contribue à amplifier les transformations en cours, modifiant considérablement non seulement les comportements (...) et les mœurs, mais aussi certaines représentations, y compris dans leurs dimensions inconscientes. On voit poindre, entre autres, la représentation d’un « destin » inéluctable qui condamnerait à l’avance tout projet de vie amoureuse durable. Certaines conséquences cliniques en sont perceptibles dans le choix amoureux des couples actuels, où s’atténue parfois la distinction entre couple projeté à long terme et aventure passagère. (shrink)

We publish here the letters between Gadamer and Ricoeur, as they are found in the Archives of the two philosophers (Gadamer-Archiv in Marbach and Fonds Ricoeur in Paris). Starting from February 1964 and ending on October 2000, the thirty-five letters reproduced here cannot give a complete picture of their much richer correspondence and relations, because it seems that neither Ricoeur, nor Gadamer kept all the letters they received from one another. But altogether, they document their common concerns, their mutual respect, (...) even their intellectual solidarity and finally the particular context that brought them to write to one another, i.e. Ricoeur’s intention to publish a translation of Gadamer’s book, Truth and Method, in a new series he edited for the Seuil Publisher. This publishing and translation project will mark their entire correspondence. (shrink)

Contemporary African American and Black British Women Writers: Narrative, Race, Ethics brings together British and American scholars to explore how, in texts by contemporary black women writers in the U. S. and Britain, formal narrative techniques express new understandings of race or stimulate ethical thinking about race in a reader. Taken together, the essays also demonstrate that black women writers from both sides of the Atlantic borrow formal structures and literary techniques from one another to describe the workings of structural (...) racism in the daily lives of black subjects and to provoke readers to think anew about race. Narratology has only recently begun to use race as a category of narrative theory. This collection seeks both to show the ethical effects of narrative form on individual readers and to foster reconceptualizations of narrative theory that account for the workings of race within literature and culture. (shrink)

Although, in one respect, the role of popular movements in the collapse of the Soviet system was clear and fundamental, nevertheless that played by the former Communist elites was equally important.