This article examines changes in employed African American mothers' use of relatives for child care. Data from nationally representative pooled cross sections show that the proportion of Black mothers relying on extended kin for care of their preschool-age children declined significantly between 1977 and 1994. Multivariate analyses reveal that the decline characterized all subgroups of employed African American mothers but was less pronounced for young, single, mothers living outside the South. Thus, by 1994, employed Black mothers who most needed relatives' (...) child care support received it, while those who could manage without such help did so. This change suggests that African Americans' use of kin-provided support responds to shifts in broader social and economic conditions that affect the balance of resources and needs within extended families. (shrink)

In Buddhism, Meditation and Free Will: A Theory of Mental Freedom , Rick Repetti explains how the dynamics of Buddhist meditation can result in a kind of metacognition and metavolitional control that exceeds what is required for free will and defeats the most powerful forms of free will skepticism. This article argues that although the Buddhist path requires and enhances the kind of mental and volitional control Repetti describes, the central dynamic of the path and meditation is better understood as (...) a process of habituation. This not only involves the dis‐identification from mental and emotional content that Repetti discusses—and is commonly emphasized in modern presentations of mindfulness or insight (vipassanā ) meditation—but also a transformation of the heart that is effected through the complementary psychological and somatic qualities associated with calm abiding (samatha ) and concentration (samādhi ) and emphasized in the Pali Nikāyas and commentaries. (shrink)

BackgroundOur human societies and certainly also (bio) medicine are more and more permeated with technology. There seems to be an increasing awareness among bioethicists that an effective and comprehensive approach to ethically guide these emerging biomedical innovations into society is needed. Such an approach has not been spelled out yet for bioethics, while there are frequent calls for ethical guidance of biomedical innovation, also by biomedical researchers themselves. New and emerging biotechnologies require anticipation of possible effects and implications, meaning the (...) scope is not evaluative after a technology has been fully developed or about hypothetical technologies, but real-time for a real biotechnology.Main textIn this paper we aim to substantiate and discuss six ingredients that we increasingly see adopted by ethicists and that together constitute “ethics parallel research”. This approach allows to fulfil two aims: guiding the development process of technologies in biomedicine and providing input for the normative evaluation of such technologies. The six ingredients of ethics parallel research are: (1) disentangling wicked problems, (2) upstream or midstream ethical analysis, (3) ethics from within, (4) inclusion of empirical research, (5) public participation and (6) mapping societal impacts, including hard and soft impacts. We will draw on gene editing, organoid technology and artificial intelligence as examples to illustrate these six ingredients.ConclusionEthics parallel research brings together these ingredients to ethically analyse and proactively or parallel guide technological development. It widens the roles and judgements from the ethicist to a more anticipatory and constructively guiding role. Ethics parallel research is characterised by a constructive, rather than a purely critical perspective, it focusses on developing best-practices rather than outlining worst practice, and draws on insights from social sciences and philosophy of technology. (shrink)

Little is known on the appraisal of ethically questionable not- for-profit actions such as social marketing advertising campaigns. The present study evaluates the ethical acceptance by adults of anti-obesity threat appeals targeting children, depending on the claimed effectiveness of the campaign. An experiment conducted among 176 Belgian participants by means of an online survey shows that individuals’ acceptance of social marketing practices increases along with the claimed effectiveness of the campaign. As such it demonstrates that the audience adopts a pragmatic (...) perspective, challenging the non-consequentialist stance of social marketers who refrain themselves from using these ‘questionable’ techniques although highly effective. The trade-off between ethical judgment and claimed effectiveness varies depending on whether the threats focus on the child’s physical integrity or social life. Individual characteristics such as parenthood and age also influence the relationship. All in all, it seems that people with stronger connections to the issue such as parents are more ready to compromise. These findings enrich our insights into consequentialism in social marketing campaigns, how people respond to controversial messages targeted at vulnerable group, and open new venues to social managers and public policy makers. Managerial implications and concrete advice on how to communicate with the various audiences are proposed, as well as suggestions for future studies. (shrink)

Introduction.--Biographical notes.--General analysis of knowledge and the act.--Perceptual and manipulatory phases of the act.--Cosmology.--Value and the act.--Supplementary essays.

It may soon become possible not just to replace, but to re-grow healthy tissues after injury or disease, because of innovations in the field of Regenerative Medicine. One particularly promising innovation is a regenerative valve implant to treat people with heart valve disease. These implants are fabricated from so-called ‘smart’, ‘lifelike’ materials. Implanted inside a heart, these implants stimulate re-growth of a healthy, living heart valve. While the technological development advances, the ethical implications of this new technology are still unclear (...) and a clear conceptual understanding of the notions ‘smart' and ‘lifelike' is currently lacking. In this paper, we explore the conceptual and ethical implications of the development of smart lifelike materials for the design of regenerative implants, by analysing heart valve implants as a showcase. In our conceptual analysis, we show that the materials are considered ‘smart’ because they can communicate with human tissues, and ‘lifelike’ because they are structurally similar to these tissues. This shows that regenerative valve implants become intimately integrated in the living tissues of the human body. As such, they manifest the ontological entanglement of body and technology. In our ethical analysis, we argue this is ethically significant in at least two ways: It exacerbates the irreversibility of the implantation procedure, and it might affect the embodied experience of the implant recipient. With our conceptual and ethical analysis, we aim to contribute to responsible development of smart lifelike materials and regenerative implants. (shrink)

BackgroundGene drive technologies (GDTs) promote the rapid spread of a particular genetic element within a population of non-human organisms. Potential applications of GDTs include the control of insect vectors, invasive species and agricultural pests. Whether, and if so, under what conditions, GDTs should be deployed is hotly debated. Although broad stances in this debate have been described, the convictions that inform the moral views of the experts shaping these technologies and related policies have not been examined in depth in the (...) academic literature.MethodsIn this qualitative study, we interviewed GDT experts (n = 33) from different disciplines to identify and better understand their moral views regarding these technologies. The pseudonymized transcripts were analyzed thematically.ResultsThe respondents’ moral views were principally influenced by their attitudes towards (1) the uncertainty related to GDTs; (2) the alternatives to which they should be compared; and (3) the role humans should have in nature. Respondents agreed there is epistemic uncertainty related to GDTs, identified similar knowledge gaps, and stressed the importance of realistic expectations in discussions on GDTs. They disagreed about whether uncertainty provides a rationale to refrain from field trials (‘risks of intervention’ stance) or to proceed with phased testing to obtain more knowledge given the harms of the status quo (‘risks of non-intervention’ stance). With regards to alternatives to tackle vector-borne diseases, invasive species and agricultural pests, respondents disagreed about which alternatives should be considered (un)feasible and (in)sufficiently explored: conventional strategies (‘downstream solutions’ stance) or systematic changes to health care, political and agricultural systems (‘upstream solutions’ stance). Finally, respondents held different views on nature and whether the use of GDTs is compatible with humans’ role in nature (‘interference’ stance) or not (‘non-interference stance’).ConclusionsThis interview study helps to disentangle the debate on GDTs by providing a better understanding of the moral views of GDT experts. The obtained insights provide valuable stepping-stones for a constructive debate about underlying value conflicts and call attention to topics that deserve further (normative) reflection. Further evaluation of these issues can facilitate the debate on and responsible development of GDTs. (shrink)

Precision medicine research involving human biological material is becoming an increasingly central component of healthcare, and its potential is quickly growing due to rapid technological progress...

In recent years, exposome research has been put forward as the next frontier for the study of human health and disease. Exposome research entails the analysis of the totality of environmental exposures and their corresponding biological responses within the human body. Increasingly, this is operationalized by big-data approaches to map the effects of internal as well as external exposures using smart sensors and multiomics technologies. However, the ethical implications of exposome research are still only rarely discussed in the literature. Therefore, (...) we conducted a systematic review of the academic literature regarding both the exposome and underlying research fields and approaches, to map the ethical aspects that are relevant to exposome research. We identify five ethical themes that are prominent in ethics discussions: the goals of exposome research, its standards, its tools, how it relates to study participants, and the consequences of its products. Furthermore, we provide a number of general principles for how future ethics research can best make use of our comprehensive overview of the ethical aspects of exposome research. Lastly, we highlight three aspects of exposome research that are most in need of ethical reflection: the actionability of its findings, the epidemiological or clinical norms applicable to exposome research, and the meaning and action–implications of bias. (shrink)

Heidegger's Being and Time: Critical Essays provides a variety of recent studies of Heidegger's most important work. Twelve prominent scholars, representing diverse nationalities, generations, and interpretive approaches deal with general methodological and ontological questions, particular issues in Heidegger's text, and the relation between Being and Time and Heidegger's later thought. All of the essays presented in this volume were never before available in an English-language anthology. Two of the essays have never before been published in any language ; three of (...) the essays have never been published in English before , and two of the essays provide previews of works in progress by major scholars. (shrink)

The rise of precision medicine has led to an unprecedented focus on human biological material in biomedical research. In addition, rapid advances in stem cell technology, regenerative medicine and synthetic biology are leading to more complex human tissue structures and new applications with tremendous potential for medicine. While promising, these developments also raise several ethical and practical challenges which have been the subject of extensive academic debate. These debates have led to increasing calls for longitudinal governance arrangements between tissue providers (...) and biobanks that go beyond the initial moment of obtaining consent, such as closer involvement of tissue providers in what happens to their tissue, and more active participatory approaches to the governance of biobanks. However, in spite of these calls, such measures are being adopted slowly in practice, and there remains a strong tendency to focus on the consent procedure as the tool for addressing the ethical challenges of contemporary biobanking. In this paper, we argue that one of the barriers to this transition is the dominant language pervading the field of human tissue research, in which the provision of tissue is phrased as a ‘donation’ or ‘gift’, and tissue providers are referred to as ‘donors’. Because of the performative qualities of language, the effect of using ‘donation’ and ‘donor’ shapes a professional culture in which biobank participants are perceived as passive providers of tissue free from further considerations or entitlements. This hampers the kind of participatory approaches to governance that are deemed necessary to adequately address the ethical challenges currently faced in human tissue research. Rather than reinforcing this idea through language, we need to pave the way for the kind of participatory approaches to governance that are being extensively argued for by starting with the appropriate terminology. (shrink)

Objective: The aim of the current study was to investigate associations, unique and interactive, between mothers’ and children’s histories of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) and children’s psychiatric outcomes using an intergenerational perspective. Further, we were particularly interested in examining whether maternal reflective functioning about their own trauma (T-RF) was associated with lower likelihood of children’s abuse exposure (among children of CSA-exposed mothers). Method: One hundred and eleven children (Mage= 9.53 years; 43 sexual abuse victims) and their mothers (Mage= 37.99; 63 (...) sexual abuse victims) participated in this study. Mothers completed the Parent Development Interview (PDI), which yielded assessments of RF regarding their own experiences of abuse, and also reported on their children’s internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Results: Children of CSA-exposed mothers were more likely to have experienced CSA. A key result was that among CSA-exposed mothers, higher maternal T-RF regarding their own abuse was associated with lower likelihood of child CSA-exposure. Mothers’ and children’s CSA histories predicted children’s internalizing and externalizing symptoms, such that CSA exposure for mother or child was associated with greater symptomatology in children. Conclusions: The findings show that the presence of either maternal or child CSA is associated with more child psychological difficulties. Importantly in terms of identifying potential protective factors, maternal T-RF is associated with lower likelihood of CSA exposure in children of CSA-exposed mothers. We discuss these findings in the context of the need for treatments focusing on increasing Trauma - RF in mothers and children in the context of abuse to facilitate adaptation and reduce the intergenerational risk. (shrink)

Gene drive technologies (GDTs) have been proposed as a potential new way to alleviate the burden of malaria, yet have also raised ethical questions. A central ethical question regarding GDTs relates to whether it is morally permissible to intentionally modify or eradicate mosquitoes in this way and how the inherent worth of humans and non-human organisms should be factored into determining this. Existing analyses of this matter have thus far generally relied on anthropocentric and zoocentric perspectives and rejected an individualist (...) biocentric outlook in which all living organisms are taken to matter morally for their own sake. In this paper, we reconsider the implications of taking a biocentric approach and highlight nuances that may not be evident at first glance. First, we shortly discuss biocentric perspectives in general, and then outline Paul Taylor’s biocentric theory of respect for nature. Second, we explore how conflicting claims towards different organisms should be prioritised from this perspective and subsequently apply this to the context of malaria control using GDTs. Our ethical analysis shows that this context invokes the principle of self-defence, which could override the pro tanto concerns that a biocentrist would have against modifying malaria mosquitoes in this way if certain conditions are met. At the same time, the case study of GDTs underlines the relevance of previously posed questions and criticism regarding the internal consistency of Taylor’s egalitarian biocentrism. (shrink)

The co-occurrence of stress-induced posttraumatic stress disorder and obesity is common, particularly among military personnel but the link between these conditions is unclear. Individuals with comorbid PTSD and obesity manifest other physical and psychological problems, which significantly diminish their quality of life. Current understanding of the pathways connecting stress to PTSD and obesity is focused largely on behavioral mediators alone with little consideration of the biological regulatory mechanisms that underlie their co-occurrence. In this work, we leverage prior knowledge to systematically (...) highlight such bio-behavioral mechanisms and inform on the design of confirmatory pilot studies. We use natural language processing to extract documented regulatory interactions involved in the metabolic response to stress and its impact on obesity and PTSD from over 8 million peer-reviewed papers. The resulting network describes the propagation of stress to PTSD and obesity through 34 metabolic mediators using 302 documented regulatory interactions supported by over 10,000 citations. Stress jointly affected both conditions through 21 distinct pathways involving only two intermediate metabolic mediators out of a total of 76 available paths through this network. Moreover, oxytocin, Neuropeptide-Y, and cortisol supported an almost direct propagation of stress to PTSD and obesity with different net effects. Although stress upregulated both NPY and cortisol, the downstream effects of both markers are reported to relieve PTSD severity but exacerbate obesity. The stress-mediated release of oxytocin, however, was found to concurrently downregulate the severity of both conditions. These findings highlight how a network-informed approach that leverages prior knowledge might be used effectively in identifying key mediators like OXT though experimental verification of signal transmission dynamics through each path will be needed to determine the actual likelihood and extent of each marker’s participation. (shrink)

L'oeuvre de Pic de la Mirandole offre un terrain d'expansion très large à la notion de métamorphose en même temps qu'elle l'investit au profit de la notion de dignité humaine cristallisée autour d'une liberté créatrice qui est tout d'abord libération de la pensée.

L’admission des femmes à l’ordination presbytérale ou au pastorat dans les Églises issues de la Réforme est liée à la situation historique particulière des États-Unis. Actuellement, aucun argument biblique ou théologique n’est jugé insurmontable pour l’ordination des femmes. Il existe certes de vives tensions, mais des ruptures effectives interviennent plutôt à la suite de l’ordination d’hommes et de femmes homosexuels. L’admission des femmes au ministère ordonné semble reposer sur l’hypothèse qu’un clergé mixte à tous les degrés du sacrement de l’ordre (...) assure à une Église la stabilité et la paix interne. Les débats au sein de ces Églises ont montré la faiblesse d’une interprétation de l’Écriture en termes de complémentarité entre l’homme et la femme. Ils les ont aussi conduites à une redécouverte de la grande variété de la tradition ecclésiale en la matière. L’article pose la question des enseignements que l’Église catholique romaine devrait à l’avenir tirer de l’expérience des Églises chrétiennes des États-Unis. (shrink)

Late in 1990, the Center for the Study of Ethics in the Professions at Illinois Institute of Technology (lIT) received a grant of more than $200,000 from the National Science Foundation to try a campus-wide approach to integrating professional ethics into its technical curriculum.! Enough has now been accomplished to draw some tentative conclusions. I am the grant's principal investigator. In this paper, I shall describe what we at lIT did, what we learned, and what others, especially philosophers, can learn (...) from us. We set out to develop an approach that others could profitably adopt. I believe that we succeeded. (shrink)

Exposome research is put forward as a major tool for solving the nature-versus-nurture debate because the exposome is said to represent “the nature of nurture.” Against this influential idea, we argue that the adoption of the nature-versus-nurture debate into the exposome research program is a mistake that needs to be undone to allow for a proper bioethical assessment of exposome research. We first argue that this adoption is originally based on an equivocation between the traditional nature-versus-nurture debate and a debate (...) about disease prediction/etiology. Second, due to this mistake, exposome research is pushed to adopt a limited conception of agential control that is harmful to one's thinking about the good that exposome research can do for human health and wellbeing. To fully excise the nature-versus-nurture debate from exposome research, we argue that exposome researchers and bioethicists need to think about the exposome afresh from the perspective of actionability. We define the concept of actionability and related concepts and show how these can be used to analyze the ethical aspects of the exposome. In particular, we focus on refuting the popular “gun analogy” in exposome research, returning results to study participants and risk-taking in the context of a well-lived life. (shrink)

Regenerative Medicine promises to develop treatments to regrow healthy tissues and cure the physical body. One of the emerging developments within this field is regenerative implants, such as jawbone or heart valve implants, that can be broken down by the body and are gradually replaced with living tissue. Yet challenges for embodiment are to be expected, given that the implants are designed to integrate deeply into the tissue of the living body, so that implant and body become one. In this (...) paper, we explore how regenerative implants may affect the embodied experience of implant recipients. To this end, we take a phenomenological approach. First, we explore what insights the existing phenomenological and empirical literature on embodiment offers regarding the experience of illness and of living with regular (non-regenerative) implants and organ transplants. Second, we apply these insights to better understand how future implant recipients might experience living with regenerative implants. Third, we conclude that concepts and considerations from the existing phenomenological literature do not sufficiently address what it might be like to live with an implantable technology that, over time, becomes one with the living body. We argue that the interwovenness and intimate relationship of people living with regenerative implants should be understood in terms of ‘entanglement’. Entanglement allows us to explore the complexities of human-technology relations, acknowledging the inseparability of humans and implantable technologies. Our theoretical foundations regarding the role of embodiment may be tested empirically once more people will be living with regenerative implants. (shrink)

One of the most influential scientific treatises in Cauchy's era was J.-L. Lagrange's Mécanique Analytique, the second edition of which came out in 1811, when Cauchy was barely out of his teens. Lagrange opens his treatise with an unequivocal endorsement of infinitesimals. Referring to the system of infinitesimal calculus, Lagrange writes:Lorsqu'on a bien conçu l'esprit de ce système, et qu'on s'est convaincu de l'exactitude de ses résultats par la méthode géométrique des premières et dernières raisons, ou par la méthode analytique (...) des fonctions dérivées, on peut employer les infiniment petits comme un instrument sûr et commode pour abréger et simplifier les demonstrations.Lagrange's renewed enthusiasm for .. (shrink)

Book review: Emmanuel Todd, "Où en sommes-nous? Une esquisse de l'histoire humaine" (Seuil, 2017).

L’intérêt majeur de la thèse de Cindy Coignard dont cet ouvrage est issu est de combler un vide historiographique sur le militantisme des femmes marxistes au cours de la guerre civile espagnole (1936-1939). Hormis l’ouvrage pionnier de l’espagnole Mary Nash sur les femmes républicaines, publié en 1999 (Rojas: las mujeres republicanas en la guerra civil), il n’existait pas à ce jour de monographie sur l’histoire sociale et politique des femmes au sein du POUM (Parti ouvrier d’unification marxi...

Volume 19, Issue 5, May 2019, Page 43-45.

In recent decades the improved treatment of childhood cancer has increased the proportion of children being cured. However, the intensive treatment required also implies a heavy burden for the children and their families. The purpose of this article is to judge the ethical aspects of different treatment regimens used for children with cancer by means of a case study. The analysis is based on the ethical model by Beauchamp and Childress. The assessment is based on every person, or group of (...) persons, involved and is on the principles of autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence and justice. The analysis shows that intensification of treatment of children with cancer is ethically justified from a deontological point of view. The consequences are more difficult to anticipate from a utilitarian perspective. Au cours de plusiurs décennies les traitements plus efficaces des cancers des enfants ont augmentés la proportion des enfants guéris. Pourtant, le traitement intensif pose aussi un lourd fardeau aux enfants et leurs familles. Le but de cet article est d'évaluer les implications éthiques des différents traitements utilisés pour enfants souffrants de cancer, à l'aide d'une étude particulière. L'analyse éthique est basée sur le modèle de Beauchamp et Childress. L'évaluation est basée sur chaque personne ou sur les groupes de personnes impliqués, et sur les principes d'autonomie, nonmaléficence, bénéficence et justice. L'analyse montre que l'intensification du traitement des enfants souffrant de cancer est justifié éthiquement du point de vue déontologique. Les conséquences de ces actions sont plus difficiles à prévoir vue d'une perspective utilitaire. Die verbesserte Behandlung von Kinderkrebs in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten hat die Proportion der geheilten Kinder ansteigen lassen. Die intensive Behandlung bedeutet aber auch eine schwere Belastung für die Kinder und ihre Familien. Der Zweck dieses Artikels ist es, die ethischen Aspekte der verschiedenen Behandlungsmethoden bei Kinderkrebs durch eine Fallstudie abzuwägen. Die ethische Analyse basiert auf dem ethischen Modell von Beauchamp und Childress. Die Beurteilung berücksichtigt jede betroffene Person oder Personengruppe und beruht auf den Prinzipien der Selbstbestimmung, Schädlichkeit bzw. Unschädlichkeit, Nutzen und Verträglichkeit und Gerechtigkeit. Diese Analyse zeigt, dass die Intensivierung der Behandlung von krebskranken Kindem von einem deontologischen Standpunkt aus ethisch vertretbar ist. Die Folgen der Behandlung sind jedoch vom Nützlichkeitsgesichtspunkt her schwieriger vorauszusehen. (shrink)

Despite widespread and worldwide efforts to eradicate vector-borne diseases such as malaria, these diseases continue to have an enormous negative impact on public health. For this reason, scientists are working on novel control strategies, such as gene drive technologies (GDTs). As GDT research advances, researchers are contemplating the potential next step of conducting field trials. An important point of discussion regarding these field trials relates to who should be informed, consulted, and involved in decision-making about their design and launch. It (...) is generally argued that community members have a particularly strong claim to be engaged, and yet, disagreement and lack of clarity exist about how this “community” should be defined and delineated. In this paper, we shed light on this “boundary problem”: the problem of determining how boundaries of inclusion and exclusion in (GDT) community engagement should be drawn. As our analysis demonstrates, the process of defining and delineating a community is itself normative. First, we explicate why it is important to define and delineate the community. Second, we demonstrate that different definitions of community are used and intermingled in the debate on GDTs, and argue in favor of distinguishing geographical, affected, cultural, and political communities. Finally, we propose initial guidance for deciding who should (not) be engaged in decision-making about GDT field trials, by arguing that the definition and delineation of the community should depend on the rationale for engagement and that the characteristics of the community itself can guide the effective design of community engagement strategies. (shrink)