Despite the increased prevalence of bioethics research that seeks to use empirical data to answer normative research questions, there is no consensus as to what an appropriate methodology for this would be. This review aims to search the literature, present and critically discuss published Empirical Bioethics methodologies.

In our seventh and final piece on the theme “Good without God”, Jonathan Ives argues that reliance on God as an external source of moral authority leads to a kind of moral cowardice.

Cycles of Personal Belief by Waldo Emerson Forbes.

This paper responds to the commentaries from Stacy Carter and Alan Cribb. We pick up on two main themes in our response. First, we reflect on how the process of setting standards for empirical bioethics research entails drawing boundaries around what research counts as empirical bioethics research, and we discuss whether the standards agreed in the consensus process draw these boundaries correctly. Second, we expand on the discussion in the original paper of the role and significance of the concept of (...) ‘integrating’ empirical methods and ethical argument as a standard for research practice within empirical bioethics. (shrink)

Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe have attempted to save the concept of ?hegemony? from its economistic and essentialist Marxist roots by incorporating the linguistic influences of post?structuralist theory. Their major Marxist detractors criticise their trajectory as a ?descent into discourse? ? a decay from well?grounded, material reality into the idealistic and problematic realm of language and discourse. Both sides of the debate seem to agree on one thing: the line from Marxism to post?Marxism is the line from the economy to (...) language, from ?reality? to discourse. This article focuses on Gramsci?s writings on language to argue against both sides of this debate. It illustrates how language is central to Gramsci?s historical materialism and that he does not oppose it to materiality. It argues that Gramsci adopted the very term hegemony substantially from his university studies in linguistics ? the debates from which Ferdinand de Saussure also developed structuralism. For Gramsci, such linguistic issues were directly related to the ?questione della lingua? and Italian unification. Moreover, language lies at the centre of Gramsci?s understanding of the relationship between coercion and consent. This not only troubles Laclau & Mouffe?s reading of Gramsci, but it illuminates a more productive conception of hegemony that can address recent debates around post?structuralism and the use of ?hegemony? to analyse globalisation and an increasingly technological and electronic world. (shrink)

O autor, na multiplicidade de seus aspectos, detém-se em considerações sobre o Estado, mas não se limita à perspectiva dos escritos tradicionais de Teoria Geral. Recolhe momentos de sua configuração histórica, de partes relevantes de sua fisionomia jurídica e, de modo particular, emite reflexões filosóficas sobre a morfologia estrutural e o sentido ético dessa entidade. O enfoque, porém, dista de ser mero tangenciar o assunto, porquanto insere, a cada passo, proposições que exprimem sua opinião pessoal e a ideologia de quem (...) anuncia mas, sobretudo, realiza com coerência e determinação, uma pauta de condutas orientada por valores definidos e estáveis. (shrink)

Aims:The aim of this narrative synthesis was to explore the necessary and sufficient conditions required to define moral distress.Background:Moral distress is said to occur when one has made a moral judgement but is unable to act upon it. However, problems with this narrow conception have led to multiple redefinitions in the empirical and conceptual literature. As a consequence, much of the research exploring moral distress has lacked conceptual clarity, complicating attempts to study the phenomenon.Design:Systematic literature review and narrative synthesis (November (...) 2015–March 2016).Data sources:Ovid MEDLINE®In-Process & Other Non-Indexed Citations 1946–Present, PsycINFO®1967–Present, CINAHL®Plus 1937–Present, EMBASE 1974–24 February 2016, British Nursing Index 1994–Present, Social Care Online, Social Policy and Practice Database (1890–Present), ERIC (EBSCO) 1966–Present and Education Abstracts.Review methods:Literature relating to moral distress was systematically retrieved and subjected to relevance assessment. Narrative synthesis was the overarching framework that guided quality assessment, data analysis and synthesis.Results:In all, 152 papers underwent initial data extraction and 34 were chosen for inclusion in the narrative synthesis based on both quality and relevance. Analysis revealed different proposed conditions for the occurrence of moral distress: moral judgement, psychological and physical effects, moral dilemmas, moral uncertainty, external and internal constraints and threats to moral integrity.Conclusion:We suggest the combination of (1) the experience of a moral event, (2) the experience of ‘psychological distress’ and (3) a direct causal relation between (1) and (2) together are necessary and sufficient conditions for moral distress. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in (...) the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

In this article we distinguish between philosophical bioethics (PB), descriptive policy orientated bioethics (DPOB) and normative policy oriented bioethics (NPOB). We argue that finding an appropriate methodology for combining empirical data and moral theory depends on what the aims of the research endeavour are, and that, for the most part, this combination is only required for NPOB. After briefly discussing the debate around the is/ought problem, and suggesting that both sides of this debate are misunderstanding one another (i.e. one side (...) treats it as a conceptual problem, whilst the other treats it as an empirical claim), we outline and defend a methodological approach to NPOB based on work we have carried out on a project exploring the normative foundations of paternal rights and responsibilities. We suggest that given the prominent role already played by moral intuition in moral theory, one appropriate way to integrate empirical data and philosophical bioethics is to utilize empirically gathered lay intuition as the foundation for ethical reasoning in NPOB. The method we propose involves a modification of a long-established tradition on non-intervention in qualitative data gathering, combined with a form of reflective equilibrium where the demands of theory and data are given equal weight and a pragmatic compromise reached. (shrink)

This book is Emerson's portrait of the England and the English.

La tâche assignée par Friedrich Schlegel à la faction romantique est d ' achever l ' entreprise transcendantale, entamée avec succès par Fichte dans le domaine de la philosophie, en élargissant notamment au domaine de l ' art le cadre jugé trop étroit de la Doctrine de la Science. Dans la réalisation de cette tâche, Schlegel reste de part en part tributaire du système fichtéen. D ' un côté, il n ' aborde la construction de son esthétique que par le (...) biais d ' une histoire du Beau construite sur une philosophie de l ' histoire dont il trouve le modèle théorique chez Fichte. D ' un autre côté, c ' est sur le modèle de la philosophie transcendantale de Fichte qu ' il développe son concept de poésie transcendantale. Si, pour l ' essentiel, l ' originalité de Schlegel a consisté dans la tentative d ' exporter le modèle transcendantal hors du domaine de la philosophie, la légitimité de son entreprise reste toutefois suspendue à la question du statut d ' une telle exportation. Die von F. Schlegel der « romantischen Faktion » zugeschriebene Aufgabe ist, das von Fichte im Gebiet der Philosophie erfolgreich begonnene transzendentale Unternehmen durch die Erweiterung des ihm zu eng scheinenden Rahmens der Wissenschaftslehre auf das Gebiet der Kunst zu vollenden. Bei der Ausführung dieser Aufgabe bleibt Schlegel durchgängig von Fichte abhängig. Einerseits geht er an den Aufbau seiner Ästhetik nur über eine Geschichte des Schönen heran, die sich auf eine Geschichtsphilosophie gründet, dessen theoretisches Modell er bei Fichte findet. Andererseits entwickelt er seinen Begriff der Transzendentalpoesie nach dem Vorbild von Fichtes Transzendentalphilosophie. Wenn Schlegels Originalität hauptsächlich in dem Versuch besteht, das transzendentale Modell außerhalb des Gebiets der Philosophie zu übertragen, bleibt die Legitimität seines Unternehmens von der Frage nach der Berechtigung einer solchen Übertragung abhängig. (shrink)

In recent years there has been a wealth of literature arguing the need for empirical and interdisciplinary approaches to bioethics, based on the premise that an empirically informed ethical analysis is more grounded, contextually sensitive and therefore more relevant to clinical practice than an ‘abstract’ philosophical analysis. Bioethics has (arguably) always been an interdisciplinary field, and the rise of ‘empirical’ (bio)ethics need not be seen as an attempt to give a new name to the longstanding practice of interdisciplinary collaboration, but (...) can perhaps best be understood as a substantive attempt to engage with the nature of that interdisciplinarity and to articulate the relationship between the many different disciplines (some of them empirical) that contribute to the field. It can also be described as an endeavour to explain how different disciplinary approaches can be integrated to effectively answer normative questions in bioethics, and fundamental to that endeavour is the need to think about how a robust methodology can be articulated that successfully marries apparently divergent epistemological and metaethical perspectives with method. This paper proposes ‘Reflexive Bioethics’ (RB) as a methodology for interdisciplinary and empirical bioethics, which utilizes a method of ‘Reflexive Balancing’ (RBL). RBL has been developed in response to criticisms of various forms of reflective equilibrium, and is built upon a pragmatic characterization of Bioethics and a ‘quasi-moral foundationalism’, which allows RBL to avoid some of the difficulties associated with RE and yet retain the flexible egalitarianism that makes it intuitively appealing to many. (shrink)

El artículo ofrece algunas grandes líneas para explicar, desde una perspectiva sociológico-histórica, las dificultades experimentadas por las sociedades latinoamericanas para definir regímenes políticos democráticos y encontrar, en segundo lugar, alguna respuesta a la pregunta ¿por qué clases dominantes que levantan la democracia como principio de legitimidad de la construcción de su poder institucionalizado, terminan generando regímenes escasamente democráticos, cuando no francamente dictatoriales? El punto de partida es la hipótesis de la constitución histórica de los países latinoamericanos desde tres matrices societales: (...) la plantación con trabajo esclavista, la hacienda con trabajo semiservil y la estancia con trabajo asalariado. Las tres generan coincidencias y diferencias en los planos sociales y culturales que no dejan de expresarse, con matices, en las formas con las cuales se procesan, tras la ruptura del nexo colonial, los proyectos y los fundamentos del nuevo orden político. La historia generada por tales matrices permite comprender por qué la lucha por la democracia no cuenta con actores democráticos genuinos, capaces de, y/o con la fuerza suficiente para, impulsar luchas por la construcción de regímenes políticos democráticos. En ese sentido, es particularmente notable el carácter no democrático de las burguesías latinoamericanas, el cual pone en duda la sinceridad de su proclamada adhesión actual a la democracia liberal. Su formidable capacidad camaleónica le impele hoy a jugar el juego impuesto por la coyuntura política mundial: la democracia política es una condición necesaria para hacer buenos negocios. (shrink)

First Published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This is Emerson's Second Series of Essays, including: The Poet, Experience, Character, Manners, Gifts, Nature, Politics, Nominalist and Realist, and New England Reformers.