It is increasingly argued that there is a single unified constitutive norm of both assertion and practical reasoning. The most common suggestion is that knowledge is this norm. If this is correct, then we would expect that a diagnosis of problematic assertions should manifest as problematic reasons for acting. Jennifer Lackey has recently argued that assertions epistemically grounded in isolated second-hand knowledge (ISHK) are unwarranted. I argue that decisions epistemically grounded in premises based on ISHK also seem inappropriate. I finish (...) by suggesting that this finding has important implications for the debates regarding the norms of assertion and practical reasoning. (shrink)

Conceptual generalisation occurs when conditional responses generalise to novel stimuli from the same category. Past research demonstrates that physiological fear responses generalise across categories, however, conceptual generalisation of stimulus valence evaluations during fear conditioning has not been examined. We investigated whether conceptual generalisation, as indexed by electrodermal responses and stimulus evaluations, would occur, and differ after training with single or multiple conditional stimuli (CSs). Stimuli from two of four categories (vegetables, farm animals, clothing, and office supplies) were used as the (...) CS+ (followed by an electric stimulus) or CS- (presented alone). Generalisation was assessed by presenting novel stimuli from the CS categories after acquisition, extinction, and reinstatement. One category exemplar was used as the CS+ and CS- in the single group, whereas three exemplars were used as the CS+ and CS- in the multiple group. Electrodermal responses generalised in acquisition and extinction but did not differ between groups. In the multiple group, CS evaluations generalised in acquisition and extinction, whereas generalisation was not evident in the single group. Training with multiple CSs also resulted in the extinction of stimulus valence. The current findings have implications for future research examining the generalisation of valence and for exposure-based treatments of anxiety. (shrink)

Generalisation in evaluative conditioning occurs when the valence acquired by a conditional stimulus (CS), after repeated pairing with an unconditional stimulus (US), spreads to stimuli that are similar to the CS (generalisation stimuli, GS). CS evaluations can be updated via CS instructions that conflict with prior conditioning (negative conditioning + positive instruction). We examined whether CS instructions can update GS evaluations after conditioning. We used alien stimuli where one alien (CSp) from a fictional group was paired with pleasant US images (...) and another alien (CSu) from a different group was paired with unpleasant US images. The other members from the two groups were used as GSs. After conditioning, participants received negative CSp instructions and positive CSu instructions. In Experiment 1, explicit and implicit GS evaluations were measured before and after the instructions. In Experiment 2, we used a between-participants design where one group received positive/negative CS instructions while a control group received neutral instructions. In both experiments, the positive/negative CS instructions caused a reversal of explicit GS evaluations and an elimination of implicit GS evaluations. The findings suggest that generalised evaluations can change after CS instructions which may have implications for interventions aimed at reducing negative group attitudes. (shrink)

A medical student's ability to present a case history is a critical skill that is difficult to teach. Case histories presented without theatrical engagement may fail to catch the attention of their intended recipients. More engaging presentations incorporate ‘stage presence’, eye contact, vocal inflection, interesting detail and succinct, well organised performances. They convey stories effectively without wasting time. To address the didactic challenge for instructing future doctors in how to ‘act’, the Mayo Medical School and The Mayo Clinic Center for (...) Humanities in Medicine partnered with the Guthrie Theater to pilot the programme ‘Telling the Patient's Story’. Guthrie teaching artists taught storytelling skills to medical students through improvisation, writing, movement and acting exercises. Mayo Clinic doctors participated and provided students with feedback on presentations and stories from their own experiences in patient care. The course's primary objective was to build students' confidence and expertise in storytelling. These skills were then applied to presenting cases and communicating with patients in a fresher, more engaging way. This paper outlines the instructional activities as aligned with course objectives. Progress was tracked by comparing pre-course and post-course surveys from the seven participating students. All agreed that the theatrical techniques were effective teaching methods. Moreover, this project can serve as an innovative model for how arts and humanities professionals can be incorporated for teaching and professional development initiatives at all levels of medical education. (shrink)

Until recently, the ocular surface is thought by many to be sterile and devoid of living microbes. It is now becoming clear that this may not be the case. Recent and sophisticated PCR analyses have shown that microbial DNA‐based “signatures” are present within various ethnic, geographic, and contact lens wearing communities. Furthermore, using a mouse model of ocular surface disease, we have shown that the microbe, Corynebacterium mastitidis (C. mast), can stably colonize the ocular mucosa and that a causal relationship (...) exists between ocular C. mast colonization and beneficial local immunity. While this constitutes proof‐of‐concept that a bona fide ocular microbiome that tunes immunity can exist at the ocular surface, there remain numerous unanswered questions to be addressed before microbiome‐modulating therapies may be successfully developed. Here, the authors will briefly outline what is currently known about the local ocular microbiome as well as microbiomes associated with other sites, and how those sites may play a role in ocular surface immunity. Understanding how commensal microbes affect the ocular surface immune homeostasis has the potential revolutionize how we think about treating ocular surface disease. (shrink)

We implemented a user-centered approach to the design of an artificial intelligence (AI) system that provides users with access to information about the workings of the United States federal court system regardless of their technical background. Presently, most of the records associated with the federal judiciary are provided through a federal system that does not support exploration aimed at discovering systematic patterns about court activities. In addition, many users lack the data analytical skills necessary to conduct their own analyses and (...) convert data into information. We conducted interviews, observations, and surveys to uncover the needs of our users and discuss the development of an intuitive platform informed from these needs that makes it possible for legal scholars, lawyers, and journalists to discover answers to more advanced questions about the federal court system. We report on results from usability testing and discuss design implications for AI and law practitioners and researchers. (shrink)

The evidence of high cognitive abilities in cetaceans does not stand up to close scrutiny under the standards established by laboratory researchers. This is likely to lead to a sterile debate between laboratory and field researchers unless fresh ways of taking the debate forward are found. A few suggestions as to how to do this are proposed.

The comorbidity of chronic pain and opioid addiction is a serious problem that has been growing with the practice of prescribing opioids for chronic pain. Neuroimaging research has shown that chronic pain and opioid dependence both affect brain structure and function, but this is the first study to evaluate the neurophysiological alterations in patients with comorbid chronic pain and addiction. Eighteen participants with chronic low back pain and opioid addiction were compared with eighteen age- and sex-matched healthy individuals in a (...) pain-induction fMRI task. Unified structural equation modeling (SEM) with Lagrange multiplier (LM) testing yielded a network model of pain processing for patient and control groups based on 19 a priori defined regions. Tests of differences between groups on specific regression parameters were determined on a path-by-path basis using z-tests corrected for the number of comparisons. Patients with the chronic pain and addiction comorbidity had increased connection strengths; many of these connections were interhemispheric and spanned regions involved in sensory, affective, and cognitive processes. The affected regions included those that are commonly altered in chronic pain or addiction alone, indicating that this comorbidity manifests with neurological symptoms of both disorders. Understanding the neural mechanisms involved in the comorbidity is crucial to finding a comprehensive treatment, rather than treating the symptoms individually. (shrink)

Scientists of the Human Genome Project tend to rely on three metaphors to describe their work, each of which implicitly tells much the same story. Whether they claim to interpret the ultimate "book," to fix a flawed "machine," or to map a mysterious "wilderness," they invariably cast the researcher as one who dominates and exploits the Other. This essay, which explores the ways such a story conflicts with feminist values, proposes an alternative.

Bioethics, Volume 36, Issue 6, Page 687-698, July 2022.

The following views were presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Seminar “Teaching Ethics in Science and Engineering”, 10–11 February 1993 organized by Stephanie J. Bird , Penny J. Gilmer and Terrell W. Bynum . Opragen Publications thanks the AAAS, seminar organizers and authors for permission to publish extracts from the conference. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions of AAAS or its Board of Directors.

BackgroundThe Pacific Islander population is the second fasting growing population in the United States and Arkansas is home to the largest Marshallese population in the continental US. The Marshal...

Robert Pippin has recently raised what he calls ‘the Montaigne problem’ for Nietzsche's philosophy: although Nietzsche advocates a ‘cheerful’ mode of philosophizing for which Montaigne is an exemplar, he signally fails to write with the obvious cheerfulness attained by Montaigne. We explore the moral psychological structure of the cheerfulness Nietzsche values, revealing unexpected complexity in his conception of the attitude. For him, the right kind of cheerfulness is radically non-naïve; it expresses the overcoming of justified revulsion at calamitous aspects of (...) life through a reflective, higher-order affirmative attitude. This complex notion of cheerfulness turns out to have roots in Montaigne himself, and it must be thought of as a kind of second nature cultivated through practice, as a kind of second nature. Understanding the meaning of cheerfulness thereby sheds light on the conception of philosophy as a way of life in both Nietzsche and Montaigne. (shrink)

Should people get vaccinated for the sake of others? What could ground—and limit—the normative claim that people ought to do so? In this paper, we propose a reasons-based consequentialist account of vaccination for the benefit of others. We outline eight harm-based and probabilistic factors that, we argue, give people moral reasons to get vaccinated. Instead of understanding other-directed vaccination in terms of binary moral duties (i.e., where people either have or do not have a moral duty to get vaccinated), we (...) develop a scalar approach according to which people can have stronger or weaker moral reasons to get vaccinated in view of the moral good of vaccination. One advantage of our approach is that it can capture why a person might have strong moral reasons to get vaccinated with Vaccine A, but only weak moral reasons to get vaccinated with Vaccine B. We discuss theoretical strengths of our approach and provide a case study of vaccination against COVID-19 to demonstrate its practical significance. (shrink)

Many biologists appeal to the so-called Krogh principle when justifying their choice of experimental organisms. The principle states that “for a large number of problems there will be some animal of choice, or a few such animals, on which it can be most conveniently studied”. Despite its popularity, the principle is often critiqued for implying unwarranted generalizations from optimal models. We argue that the Krogh principle should be interpreted in relation to the historical and scientific contexts in which it has (...) been developed and used. We interpret the Krogh Principle as a heuristic, i.e., as a recommendation to approach biological problems through organisms where a specific trait or physiological mechanism is expected to be most distinctively displayed or most experimentally accessible. We designate these organisms “Krogh organisms.” We clarify the differences between uses of model organisms and non-standard Krogh organisms. Among these is the use of Krogh organisms as “negative models” in biomedical research, where organisms are chosen for their dissimilarity to human physiology. Importantly, the representational scope of Krogh organisms and the generalizability of their characteristics are not fixed or assumed but explored through experimental studies. Research on Krogh organisms is steeped in the comparative method characteristic of zoology and comparative physiology, in which studies of biological variation produce insights into general physiological constraints. Accordingly, we conclude that the Krogh principle exemplifies the advantages of studying biological variation as a strategy to produce generalizable insights. (shrink)

Learning social studies content is important for all students, including those with severe disabilities. However, there is a limited amount of research that specifically examines teaching social studies to this population of students. Therefore, educators must look to research-based practices in other academic areas (e.g., English language arts) to determine new strategies to teach this important content. Using a multiple probe across participants design, three fifth-grade students with severe disabilities were taught to answer comprehension questions during read-alouds of social studies (...) text using a modified system of least prompts and graphic organizer. Findings indicate all students improved on the correct number of comprehension questions answered independently. Implications for practice and ideas for future research to teach social studies to students with severe disabilities are discussed. (shrink)

The increasing use of pharmacotherapy raises specific ethical concerns for psychologists working with vulnerable populations. Due to a shortage of trained specialists, professionals without training in mental health, such as primary care providers, are increasingly prescribing and monitoring psychotropic medications. Vulnerable populations face additional barriers to mental health treatment and are at heightened risk when these factors intersect. Hence, these patients experience unique barriers to receiving optimal psychopharmacological care and are differentially vulnerable to deleterious outcomes associated with misdiagnosis and overmedication. (...) Taken together, these factors fuel inequities in the access, quality, and utilization of mental health care. Psychologists working with these patients are ethically mandated to protect patients from harm and ensure equitable care across patient populations. Specifically, psychologists must respond to the dilemma of how to effectively treat patients within these vulnerable populations who have been misdiagnosed or poorly medicated while remaining within the bounds of their competence. This article recommends pathways to address these dilemmas through education, training, research, and advocacy. (shrink)

Abstract. Over time scientists have developed an effective investigative process that includes the acceptance of particular basic presuppositions, methods, content, and theories. T he deeply held presuppositions are the philosophical foundation of scientific thought and do much to define the field’s worldview. These fundamental assumptions can be esoteric for many and can become a source of conflict when they are not commonly shared with other points of view. Such presuppositions affect the observations, the conclusions drawn, and the positions taken. Furthermore, (...) in some cases presuppositions in science have undergone important shifts in meaning, causing an increasing dissonance. We argue that disputes in religion and science often are due to these very basic differences in philosophy that are held by members in the different communities. To better understand the nature of science and its differences with religious views, presuppositions rather than conclusions should be articulated and examined for validity and scope of application. (shrink)

Approximately one in 10 children in foster care are medically complex and require intensive medical supervision, frequent hospitalization, and difficult medical decision making. Some of these children are in foster care because their parents cannot care for their medical needs; other parents are responsible for their child’s medical needs due to abuse or neglect. In either case, there can be uncertainty about the role that a child’s biological parents should play in making serious medical decisions. Here we highlight some of (...) the ethical challenges inherent in making these decisions for children in foster care, as seen through the lenses of a child welfare provider, an inpatient care physician, and a primary care pediatrician. (shrink)

This study adds to a small but growing literature that situates sleep within gendered work— family responsibilities. We conducted interviews with 25 heterosexual dual-earner working-class couples with children, most of whom had one partner who worked at night. A few men suffered disrupted sleep because of their commitment to being a coparent to their children, but for most their provider status gave them rights to longer and more continuous sleep. By contrast, as they were the primary caregiver during sentient hours, (...) women’s sleep was curtailed and interrupted by responding to the needs of family members at night and at the beginning of each day, and this was true for women who worked nights as well as days. Furthermore, in struggling to meet their daily employment and familial obligations while tired and sleepy, women further stressed their bodies in ways that can cause cumulative sleep debt. This article demonstrates that sleep deficits are another manifestation of gender inequality, with important implications for long-term health and well-being. (shrink)

Logopenic variant primary progressive aphasia is a neurodegenerative language disorder primarily characterized by impaired phonological processing. Sentence repetition and comprehension deficits are observed in lvPPA and linked to impaired phonological working memory, but recent evidence also implicates impaired speech perception. Currently, neural encoding of the speech envelope, which forms the scaffolding for perception, is not clearly understood in lvPPA. We leveraged recent analytical advances in electrophysiology to examine speech envelope encoding in lvPPA. We assessed cortical tracking of the speech envelope (...) and in-task comprehension of two spoken narratives in individuals with lvPPA and age-matched controls. Despite markedly reduced narrative comprehension relative to controls, individuals with lvPPA had increased cortical tracking of the speech envelope in theta oscillations, which track low-level features, but not delta oscillations, which track speech units that unfold across a longer time scale. This neural signature was highly correlated across narratives. Results indicate an increased reliance on acoustic cues during speech encoding. This may reflect inefficient encoding of bottom-up speech cues, likely as a consequence of dysfunctional temporoparietal cortex. (shrink)

COVID-19 vaccination of children has begun in various high-income countries with regulatory approval and general public support, but largely without careful ethical consideration. This trend is expected to extend to other COVID-19 vaccines and lower ages as clinical trials progress. This paper provides an ethical analysis of COVID-19 vaccination of healthy children. Specifically, we argue that it is currently unclear whether routine COVID-19 vaccination of healthy children is ethically justified in most contexts, given the minimal direct benefit that COVID-19 vaccination (...) provides to children, the potential for rare risks to outweigh these benefits and undermine vaccine confidence, and substantial evidence that COVID-19 vaccination confers adequate protection to risk groups, such as older adults, without the need to vaccinate healthy children. We conclude that child COVID-19 vaccination in wealthy communities before adults in poor communities worldwide is ethically unacceptable and consider how policy deliberations might evolve in light of future developments. (shrink)

Racial inequities in medicine are the consequence of intersecting, multidimensional factors. As detailed in the articles by Braddock, Mithani, Cooper, and Boyd, and Yearby, the...

This paper is aimed at assessing how power, control, and resistance come into play and how resistance counteracts power and control in police investigative interviewing. Considering that the Philippines was once a colony of the United States, it is essential to compare the two samples as the Philippine legal system is highly patterned after the American jurisprudence (Mercullo in JForensicRes 11:1–4, 2020). Highlighting the existing and emerging power relations between the police interviewer and the interviewee, the study employed Sacks, Schegloff, (...) and Jefferson’s ( Recuenco, A. (2022). Cops to undergo investigation retraining to improve conviction rate. Manila Bulletin. https://mb.com.ph/2022/07/21/cops-to-undergo-investigation-retraining-to-improve-conviction-rate/ ) Conversation Analysis (CA) and Fairclough’s (Ehrlich in Coulthard and Johnson (eds), The Routledge Handbook of Forensic Linguistics, Routledge, 2010) Critical Language Studies (CLS) as general frameworks. A total of 10 Philippine and American police interviews were examined. While the Philippine corpus was obtained from the Pasay City Police Station, Metro Manila, the American corpus was culled from forensicling.com, an open-access website containing forensic linguistic data. Findings revealed that power and control were employed by the police in both contexts with 109 evidential markers (50.7%) and 2,443 representative speech acts (63.3%) having the highest frequency of occurrence. What is striking is the fact that police officers in both Philippine and American contexts show power and control in their utterances to be able to achieve the goal of police interviewing, that is, to gather information and elicit voluntary responses from the interviewees. Through this study, it is hoped that interviewers will be able to explore a better system of the questioning process that may lead the interviewees to cooperate more with them and arrive at a more accurate information. (shrink)

Social technology can improve the quality of older adults' social lives and mitigate negative mental and physical health outcomes associated with loneliness, but it should be designed collaboratively with this population. In this paper, we used participatory design methods to investigate how robots might be used as social facilitators for middle-aged and older adults in both the US and Japan. We conducted PD workshops in the US and Japan because both countries are concerned about the social isolation of these older (...) adults due to their rapidly aging populations. We developed a novel approach to participatory design of future technologies that spends 2/3 of the PD session asking participants about their own life experiences as a foundation. This grounds the conversation in reality, creates rapport among the participants, and engages them in creative critical thinking. Then, we build upon this foundation, pose an abstract topic, and ask participants to brainstorm on the topic based on their previous discussion. In both countries, participants were eager to actively discuss design ideas for socially facilitative robots and imagine how they might improve their social lives. US participants suggested design ideas for telepresence robots, social distancing robots, and social skills artificial intelligence programs, while Japanese participants suggested ideas for pet robots, robots for sharing experiences, and easy-to-operate instructor robots. Comparing these two countries, we found that US participants saw robots as tools to help facilitate their social connections, while Japanese participants envisioned robots to function as surrogate companions for their parents and distract them from loneliness when they were unavailable. With this paper, we contribute to the literature in two main ways, presenting: A novel approach to participatory design of future technologies that grounds participants in their everyday experience, and Results of the study indicating how middle-aged and older adults from the US and Japan wanted technologies to improve their social lives. Although we conducted the workshops during the COVID-19 pandemic, many findings generalized to other situations related to social isolation, such as older adults living alone. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:LettersMaxwell J. Mehlman, Susan R. Massey, Ronald M. Green, and Fred RosnerPhysicians and the Allocation of Scarce ResourcesMadam: We read with interest Dr. Pellegrino's commentary on our article in the December 1994 issue of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, and commend him for pointing out so well the different ways that law and ethics approach the issue of physician allocation of scarce resources.We wish to make one clarification. (...) Dr. Pellegrino states that we propose that fiduciary duties be abolished. Quite the contrary, our position is that fiduciary obligations are essential to the maintenance of trust—which we believe to be an efficient as well as an ethical element of the patient-provider relationship. If fiduciary duties are undercut, as we pointed out they are by the Oregon Medicaid legislation, then some other method of promoting trust must be established, and, as we point out in the article, it is difficult to identify what that method could be.Maxwell J. MehlmanandSusan R. MasseyThe Law Medicine CenterArter & HaddenCase Western Reserve UniversityCleveland, OHSchool of LawCleveland, OHReport of the Human Embryo Research PanelMadam: In the December 1994 issue of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, I reported on the controversy surrounding the work of the NIH Human Embryo Research Panel and the conclusions reached in its report, which was formally presented to NIH Director Harold Varmus on September 27, 1994. At that time, the report was to be reviewed by the Advisory Committee to the Director (ACD) until its next meeting in early December. I am writing to update your readers on the fate of the Panel's report.On the morning of December 2, 1994, following a previous afternoon of animated discussion, the ACD unanimously accepted the Report of the Human Embryo Research Panel. Panel members and members of the NIH staff who were present and had worked for nearly a year on the Report were gratified by this vote of confidence and by the strong support of NIH Director Harold Varmus.We had little time to enjoy this success. Within a matter of hours, the White House issued a press release in which President Clinton thanked the committee for its work and then, in a remark overruling one of the key recommendations in our report, stated: "I do not believe that federal funds should be used to support the creation of human embryos for research purposes, and I have directed that NIH not allocate any resources for such research." [End Page 83]As a Panel member and active participant in that day's events, my initial response was one of shock. I was particularly distressed that the President and his advisors chose a moment so late in the process to make their views known. Why had we worked for months, I asked, without a word of concern from the White House? Although Panel members were guided primarily by our perceptions of the ethical and scientific issues involved, some were close to the political realities of Washington and would have introduced these concerns into the Panel's deliberations.Within a matter of days, my own sense of outrage had diminished. First of all, it was clear that whatever the personal sources of the President's objections to the Panel's recommendations, this high level political intervention was inevitable. Less than a month before, on November 8, with the election of a majority House and Senate, the political environment for embryo research had changed dramatically. The previous June, 32 congressmen, most of them members of a minority Republican party, had signed a letter protesting the Panel's work. Now, one of the signers of that letter, Newt Gingrich, was destined to be Speaker of the House.Second, it became clear that the damage was not total. The President has forbidden NIH to support work involving the deliberate creation of embryos for research. Without exception, members of the Panel had come to the conclusion that some development of "research embryos" must be permitted to reduce the risks of new assisted reproductive technologies, to enhance scientific knowledge, and to develop new therapies for a range of serious diseases. All these... (shrink)