Work on farms and in restaurants is characterized by highly gendered and racialized divisions of labor, low wages, and persistent inequalities. Gender, race, and ethnicity often determine the spaces where people work in the food system. Although some research focuses on gendered divisions of labor in restaurants and on farms, few efforts look more broadly at intersectional inequalities in food work. Our study examines how inequality is perpetuated through restaurant and farm work in the United States and, specifically, how gender (...) and race/ethnicity influence where people work, their tasks and responsibilities, and their work experiences. In describing restaurant work, people in the restaurant industry typically refer to the front and back of the house to distinguish between different working spaces, jobs, and workers. We use this spatial metaphor of front and back of the house to analyze intersectional inequalities of food work in restaurants and on farms. The data derive from conversations with 63 restaurant and farm owners, managers, and workers in California and Pennsylvania. Our findings suggest that gendered and racialized bodies often define who works in the front and back of the “house,” and that owners and workers often naturalize gender and racial divisions of labor in food work. Despite these patterns, we found evidence of attempts to reduce these inequalities on farms and in restaurants. (shrink)

Identity Economics provides an important and compelling new way to understand human behavior, revealing how our identities--and not just economic incentives--influence our decisions. In 1995, economist Rachel Kranton wrote future Nobel Prize-winner George Akerlof a letter insisting that his most recent paper was wrong. Identity, she argued, was the missing element that would help to explain why people--facing the same economic circumstances--would make different choices. This was the beginning of a fourteen-year collaboration--and of Identity Economics. The authors explain how (...) our conception of who we are and who we want to be may shape our economic lives more than any other factor, affecting how hard we work, and how we learn, spend, and save. Identity economics is a new way to understand people's decisions--at work, at school, and at home. With it, we can better appreciate why incentives like stock options work or don't; why some schools succeed and others don't; why some cities and towns don't invest in their futures--and much, much more. Identity Economics bridges a critical gap in the social sciences. It brings identity and norms to economics. People's notions of what is proper, and what is forbidden, and for whom, are fundamental to how hard they work, and how they learn, spend, and save. Thus people's identity--their conception of who they are, and of who they choose to be--may be the most important factor affecting their economic lives. And the limits placed by society on people's identity can also be crucial determinants of their economic well-being. (shrink)

If funding allocation is an indicator of a field’s priorities, then the priorities of the field of bioethics are misaligned because they perpetuate injustice. Social justice mandates priority for the factors that drive systematic disadvantage, which tend not to be the areas supported by funding within academic bioethics. Current funding priorities violate social justice by overemphasizing technologies that aim to enhance the human condition without addressing underlying structural inequalities grounded in racism, and by deemphasizing areas of inquiry most frequently pursued (...) by Scholars of Color. This lack of attention to upstream determinants of health in bioethics research perpetuates a gap in the resources needed to understand the experiences of communities disproportionately experiencing poor health, which is itself a form of epistemic injustice. Both social and epistemic injustices are apparent in the impact of these funding priorities on people of color, both in the public and in the bioethics community. (shrink)

Increasingly, metaphors are the target of political critique: Jewish groups condemn Holocaust imagery; mental health organizations, the metaphorical exploitation of psychosis; and feminists, “rape metaphors.” I develop a novel model for making sense of such critiques of metaphor.

Epistemologists of testimony have focused almost exclusively on the epistemic dynamics of simple testimony. We do sometimes testify by ways of simple, single sentence assertions. But much of our testimony is narratively structured. I argue that narrative testimony gives rise to a form of epistemic dependence that is far richer and more far reaching than the epistemic dependence characteristic of simple testimony.

Hate speech and misinformation are rife. How to respond? Counterspeech proposals say: with more and better speech. This paper considers the treatment of counterspeech in Maxime Lepoutre’s Democratic Speech In Divided Times. Lepoutre provides a nuanced defence of counterspeech. Some counterspeech, he grants, is flawed. But, he says: counterspeech can be debugged. Once we understand why counterspeech fails – when fail it does – we can engineer more effective counterspeech strategies. Lepoutre argues that the failures of counterspeech can be theorised (...) using the ideology of salience. Negative counterspeech fails because it reinforces the salience of the very ideas or associations that it contests. His solution? Positive counterspeech – a form of counterspeech which avoids the salience trap. I argue that the salience paradigm is ill-suited to theorise the failures of counterspeech. I suggest some alternatives. Further, I show that these alternative paradigms make importantly different practical recommendations – recommendations concerning how we ought to engineer our counterspeech – from those issued by the salience paradigm. (shrink)

This article discusses recent theories of the meaning of generics. The discussion is centred on how the theories differ in their approach to addressing the primary difficulty in providing a theory of generic meaning: The notoriously complex ways in which the truth conditions of generics seem to vary. In addition, the article summarizes considerations for and against each theory.

An assortment of different points of view on conspiracy thinking and conspiracy theories, pro and con.

The standard view amongst philosophers of language and linguists is that the logical form of generics is quantificational and contains a covert, unpronounced quantifier expression Gen. Recently, some theorists have begun to question the standard view and rekindle the competing proposal, that generics are a species of kind-predication. These theorists offer some forceful objections to the standard view, and new strategies for dealing with the abundance of linguistic evidence in favour of the standard view. I respond to these objections and (...) show that their strategies fail. I offer a novel argument in favour of the standard view that I call the binder argument. The upshot of this argument is that if one rejects the existence of Gen, then one is committed to rejecting the existence of covert structure in general. (shrink)

In theoretical work about the language of personal taste, the canonical example is the simple predicate of personal taste, 'tasty'. We can also express the same positive gustatory evaluation with the complex expression, 'taste good'. But there is a challenge for an analysis of 'taste good': While it can be used equivalently with 'tasty', it need not be (for instance, imagine it used by someone who can identify good wines by taste but doesn't enjoy them). This kind of two-faced behavior (...) systematically arises with complex sensory-evaluative predicates, including those with other appearance verbs, such as 'look splendid' and 'sound nice'. I examine two strategies for capturing these different uses: one that posits an ambiguity in appearance verbs, and one that does not. The former is in line with an approach to 'look'-statements prominent in work in philosophy of perception, and I consider how the motivation given in that tradition carries over to the present context. I then show how the data used to support the verbal ambiguity approach can equally be captured on the second strategy, which appeals only to independently-motivated flexibility in adjective meaning. I close by discussing some considerations that are relevant for choosing between the two options. (shrink)

I argue that we are sometimes morally responsible for having and using (or not using) our concepts, despite the fact that we generally do not choose to have them or have full or direct voluntary control over how we use them. I do so by extending an argument of Angela Smith's; the same features that she says make us morally responsible for some of our attitudes also make us morally responsible for some of our concepts. Specifically, like attitudes, concepts can (...) be (a) conceptually and rationally connected to our evaluative judgments, (b) in principle subject to rational revision (reasons‐responsive), and (c) the basis for actual and potential moral assessments of people that we have good reasons to endorse. Thus, we are open to moral appraisal on the basis of having and using (or not using) our concepts when they reflect our evaluative judgments, though even then it is not always appropriate to praise or blame us on that basis. (shrink)

Jealousy is an emotion that arises in diverse circumstances and is experienced in phenomenologically diverse ways. In part because of this diversity, evaluations of jealous subjects tend to be conflicting and ambiguous. Thus philosophers who are interested in the moral status of jealousy face a challenge: to explain how, despite the diversity of jealous subjects and experiences of jealousy, our moral evaluations of those subjects in light of those experiences might be unified. In this project, I confront and respond to (...) this challenge, which I call the challenge of heterogeneity. -/- In Part I, I refine and expand on existing descriptive accounts of jealousy, defending an account with three necessary but not sufficient conditions. On my view, if one is jealous: -/- A. One desires that oneself stand in some relation to a specific, non-replicable good. B. One has in mind a (possibly imagined) rival and regards the rival’s having the good as logically or causally inconsistent with the satisfaction of this desire C. One has in mind some (possibly imagined) set of circumstances in which this desire would be satisfied. -/- In discussing this view I emphasize the role that relationships play in giving rise to jealousy, since its connections to relationships make jealousy descriptively and normatively unique. -/- In Part II, I develop an account of jealousy’s moral significance. To do so, I divide cases of jealousy into three types: those involving jealous desires relating to (1) caring relationships, (2) non-caring relationships, and (3) material goods or personal qualities. I argue that in all three types of cases, jealousy undermines the actual or potential moral value of the jealous subjects’ relationships, and that this undermining provides the paradigmatic moral reason to criticize jealous subjects. Thus I respond to the challenge of heterogeneity without simply portraying jealous subjects as selfish or insecure. -/- After doing so, I consider multiple arguments for the claim that a person’s being jealous sometimes constitutes a moral reason to praise that person. I critique each of those arguments and conclude that we have good reasons to see jealous subjects as worthy of moral criticism but not moral praise. (shrink)

Autonomy and the Situated Self offers a critique of contemporary mainstream bioethics and proposes an alternative framework for the exploration of bioethical issues. It also contrasts two conceptions of autonomy, one based on a liberal model but detached from its political foundation and one that is responsive to the concerns of virtue ethics and connected to the concept of human flourishing.

A new reading of Plato's account of conventionalism about names in the Cratylus. It argues that Hermogenes' position, according to which a name is whatever anybody 'sets down' as one, does not have the counterintuitive consequences usually claimed. At the same time, Plato's treatment of conventionalism needs to be related to his treatment of formally similar positions in ethics and politics. Plato is committed to standards of objective natural correctness in all such areas, despite the problematic consequences which, as he (...) himself shows, arise in the case of language. (shrink)

Mounting evidence suggests that endorsement of psychological continuity and the afterlife increases with age. This developmental change raises questions about the cognitive biases, social representations, and cultural input that may support afterlife beliefs. To what extent is there similarity versus diversity across cultures in how people reason about what happens after death? The objective of this study was to compare beliefs about the continuation of biological and psychological functions after death in Tanna, Vanuatu, and the United States. Children, adolescents, and (...) adults were primed with a story that contained either natural or supernatural cues. Participants were then asked whether or not different biological and psychological processes continue to function after death. We predicted that across cultures individuals would be more likely to endorse the continuation of psychological processes over biological processes and that a theistic prime would increase continuation responses regarding both types of process. Results largely supported predictions; U.S. participants provided more continuation responses for psychological than biological processes following both the theistic and non-theistic primes. Participants in Vanuatu, however, provided more continuation responses for biological than psychological processes following the theistic prime. The data provide evidence for both cultural similarity and variability in afterlife beliefs and demonstrate that individuals use both natural and supernatural explanations to interpret the same events. (shrink)

Ambiguity in our experience of embodiment online has prevented us from confidently extending existing scholarship to the domain of online sociality. In recent decades, research across the disciplines has been undergirded by themes related to embodiment, restoring to prominence a theme previously neglected in part thanks to the rise of feminist scholars within the academy. We have not, however, adequately appealed to this corpus when theorizing forms of life happening online. In this paper I hope to bridge this gap by (...) bringing forward phenomenological evidence about the nature of online embodiment. This paper presents the findings from a research project that used phenomenological interviews to elicit descriptions of lived embodiment from participants singing in online choirs during the COVID-19 pandemic. I argue that these descriptions reveal anchoring and discounting as central features of their experience, two dynamics of the body schema as described by Merleau-Ponty in the Phenomenology of Perception that underpin participant experiences of sensory disjunction. I furthermore take pains to show how the form of embodiment operative in the online choirs has the characteristics of intercorporeality, a reciprocal two-sided form of embodied subjectivity. After explaining how Husserl and Merleau-Ponty each define intercorporeality, I suggest that what I am calling an auditory intercorporeality underlies reported features of participant experience in the choirs, such as we-experience and coordination. (shrink)

The coronavirus pandemic has necessitated extraordinary human resilience in order to preserve and prolong life and social order. Risks to health and even life are being confronted by workers in health and social care, as well as those in roles previously never defined as “frontline,” such as individuals working in community supply chain sectors. The strategy adopted by the United Kingdom government in facing the challenges of the pandemic was markedly different from other countries. The present study set out to (...) examine what variables were associated with resilience, burnout, and wellbeing in all sectors of frontline workers, and whether or not these differed between the UK and Republic of Ireland. Individuals were eligible if they were a frontline worker in the UK or RoI during the pandemic. Part of a larger, longitudinal study, the participants completed an online survey to assess various aspects of their daily and working lives, along with their attitudes toward their government’s handling of the crisis, and measurement of psychological variables associated with heroism. A total of 1,305 participants provided sufficient data for analysis. UK-based workers reported lower wellbeing than the RoI-based participants. In multivariate models, both psychological and pandemic-related variables were associated with levels of resilience, burnout, and wellbeing in these workers, but which pandemic-related variables were associated with outcomes differed depending on the country. The judgment of lower timeliness in their government’s response to the pandemic appeared to be a key driver of each outcome for the UK-based frontline workers. These findings provide initial evidence that the different strategies adopted by each country may be associated with the overall wellbeing of frontline workers, with higher detriment observed in the UK. The judgment of the relatively slow response of the UK government to instigate their pandemic measures appears to be associated with lower resilience, higher burnout, and lower wellbeing in frontline workers in the UK. (shrink)

It is widely held by commentators that in the Protagoras, Socrates attempts to explain the experience of mental conflict and weakness of the will without positing the existence of irrational desires, or desires that arise independently of, and so can conflict with, our reasoned conception of the good. In this essay, I challenge this commonly held line of thought. I argue that Socrates has a unique conception of an irrational desire, one which allows him to explain the experience of mental (...) conflict and weakness of the will, while still holding the Socratic thesis that we always do what we think is good. The resulting picture is both psychologically plausible and philosophically distinctive. (shrink)

Organizational culture and employee conduct in financial institutions are coming under increasing scrutiny by regulators who seek to identify the underlying sources of unethical behavior. The literature on ethics in the workplace has often emphasized the importance of the alignment of systems and processes with organizational values and the role of the leader in creating an ethical culture. Less is known about how individual employees experience the ethical decision-making process, especially in complex and high-risk business environments where there are discrepancies (...) between an organization’s formal ethical standards and its informal practices. This article combines ethical decision-making models with key concepts from organization and adult learning theories to develop a deeper and more nuanced view of how individuals in financial institutions deal with ethical issues that arise in their daily work. Eight practical ideas are formulated to help financial institutions narrow the gap between formal ethical standards and actual practices and develop a culture that promotes ethical behavior: challenging authority, creating opportunities for discourse, valuing positive emotion, making time for reflection, rewarding ethical behavior, strengthening escalation processes, eliciting feedback, and establishing a learning culture. (shrink)

Despite their substantial appeal, closure principles have fallen on hard times. Both anti-luck conditions on knowledge and the defeasibility of knowledge look to be in tension with natural ways of articulating single-premise closure principles. The project of this paper is to show that plausible theses in the epistemology of testimony face problems structurally identical to those faced by closure principles. First I show how Lasonen-Aarnio’s claim that there is a tension between single premise closure and anti-luck constraints on knowledge can (...) be extended to make trouble for transmission theses. Second, I show how Schechter’s claim that there is a tension between single premise closure and the thought that knowledge is defeasible can be extended to make trouble for transmission theses. I end the paper by sketching the consequences of this trouble for the dialectic in the epistemology of testimony. (shrink)

This paper argues that Hegel’s account of subjectivity and agency as historically coined is essential to an accurate understanding of his theory of tragedy. Focusing on Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, I argue that Hegel’s historical account of agency is necessary for understanding his theory of the ancient tragic hero. Although Hegel’s theory of ancient tragedy is often described in terms of a conflict between ethical spheres embodied in two individuals, the conflict in Oedipus is between Oedipus’ deeds and his later (...) knowledge of what has actually occurred. I show how this seemingly subjective conflict is in keeping with Hegel’s theory. Further, while Hegel sees Oedipus as wrong to take full moral accountability for the consequences of his deeds, at the same time, for Hegel, this is the right action for a tragic hero, and the very thing that renders Oedipus timelessly and tragically heroic, rather than a mere victim of fate. (shrink)

The context of Covid-19 has offered an unusual cultural landscape for examining how workers view their own position relative to others, and how individuals respond to prolonged exposure to workplace stress across different sectors and cultures. Through our recent work tracking the well-being of frontline workers in the UK and Ireland, we have uncovered additional psychological factors that have not been accounted for in previous models of occupational stress or burnout. In recent months, frontline workers have worked to protect the (...) community from the threat of SARS-CoV-2 and, simultaneously, have evaluated their perceptions of collective efforts of others as either congruent or incongruent with collective goals : we call this novel aspect solidarity appraisal. These frontline workers have been hailed as heroes, which we argue has led to the creation of an implicit psychological contract between frontline workers and the public. Here, the heroes are willing to “go above and beyond” for the greater good, with the expectation that we do our part by adhering to public health guidelines. Where frontline workers perceive incongruence between the words and actions of others in working toward collective goals this drives negative affect and subsequent burnout. In this perspective article, we evaluate the cultural context of the pandemic in the UK and Ireland and suggest important socio-cultural factors that contribute to perceptions of solidarity, and how this may relate to burnout and worker welfare during and beyond the pandemic context. (shrink)

A major goal of this work is to specify some steps of the process by which participants maintain coherency in their conversations.The underlying element of the analysis is a construct called a “context space.” Roughly, a group of utterances that refers to a single issue or episode forms the basis for a context space. Superficially, a conversation is a sequence of utterances; at a deeper level it is a structured entity whose utterances can be parsed into hierarchically related context spaces.As (...) a conversation proceeds, each conversant builds a discourse model that includes the conversation's context space structure, a notion of the present discourse topic, and a list of items being focused upon. Conversational coherency depends upon a lack of conflict between the respective models of the participants. Conflicts are prevented by speakers following high level syntactic and semantic relational rules that enable listeners to identify their discourse models. These rules, given in the study, are highly integrated with the view of conversation presented here—a hierarchy of related context spaces. (shrink)

Bioethics has entered a new era: as many commentators have noted, the familiar mantra of autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence, and justice has proven to be an overly simplistic framework for understanding problems that arise in modern medicine, particularly at the intersection of public policy and individual preferences. A tradition of liberal pluralism grounds respect for individual preferences and affirmation of competing conceptions of the good. But we struggle to maintain (or at times explicitly reject) this tradition in the face of individual (...) preferences that we find distasteful, suspect, or even repugnant, especially where the broader social good or respect for equality is at stake. Directed donation presents us with such a dilemma: can we uphold the right of self-determination through respect of individual preferences regarding disposition of transplantable organs while at the same time maintaining an allocation system that reflects values of equity and justice claimed to underlie the socially negotiated practice of transplantation? Or are some preferences simply to be deemed unethical and not respected, even if that leads to a reduction in the number of transplantable organs available and to an apparent disregard for the autonomous decisions of the recently deceased? (shrink)

Because organic certification standards institutionalized a product-based rather than process-based definition, certified organic produce can be grown on large-scale industrial monocrop farms. Besides toxicity of inputs, these farms operate in much the same way as conventional production. Scholars emphasize the fact that labor rights have been left out of certification criteria, and because of that, organic farms reproduce the same labor relations as conventional. Empirical studies of organic farm labor, however, rely primarily on the perspective of farmers. In this study, (...) I ask the farmworkers themselves how harvesting on organic farms compares to conventional, and found that working in organic negatively impacts farmworker livelihoods. Qualitative interviews with 36 strawberry harvesters in Oxnard, California reveal that farmworkers make more money in conventional strawberry production because of the interaction between wage structure and size of the berry. Conventional strawberries are larger and therefore fewer of them fill up a box. Farmworkers routinely pick more boxes in conventional than in organic, thus earning more, since under the piece rate system, farmworkers are paid per box. With short-term economic survival rather than long-term occupational health concerns in mind, strawberry harvesters would rather work on conventional farms because “la fresa orgánica es más chiquita”. (shrink)

The food sovereignty movement calls for a reversal of the neoliberal globalization of food, toward an alternative development model that supports peasant production for local consumption. The movement holds an ambiguous stance on peasant production for export markets, and clearly prioritizes localized trade. Food sovereignty discourse often simplifies and romanticizes the peasantry—overlooking agrarian class categories and ignoring the interests of export-oriented peasants. Drawing on 8 months of participant observation in the Andean countryside and 85 interviews with indigenous peasant farmers, this (...) paper finds that export markets are viewed as more fair than local markets. The indigenous peasants in this study prefer export trade because it offers a more stable and viable livelihood. Feeding the national population through local market intermediaries, by contrast, is perceived as unfair because of oversupply and low, fluctuating prices. This perspective, from the ground, offers important insight to movement actors and scholars who risk oversimplifying peasant values, interests, and actions. (shrink)

Schütz’ tuning-in relationship designates sharing time as the ground of we-experiences, but the Husserlian account of time that he relies upon for this argument seems to undermine the very possibility of doing so. I argue that Merleau-Ponty’s conception of temporality offers a more plausible account of shared time via the ‘transferability’ of the body schema. Disability theorists and critical phenomenologists, however, would remind us that any account of we-experiences must recognize bodily difference. I argue that bodies of diverse motilities can (...) come to share a body schema without risk of ‘forced time compliance’ if we jettison synchronization and embrace improvisation as a paradigm for schematic sharing: I use the example of collective free improvisation to illustrate flexible, emergent, and bidirectional body schemas that, I claim, circumvent the assimilationist tendencies looming in any account of we-experiences premised upon bodily sameness. (shrink)

Animal rights organizations in the United States are predominantly female and middle class. What are the implications of the composition of these groups for animal rights activists' abilities to achieve their goals? In this article, the author examines the role of class and gender in the outcomes of an anti-hunting campaign and an anti-circus campaign waged by one animal rights organization in the Seattle area. The article shows that hunters make classed and gendered attributions about the activists, whereas circus patrons (...) do not view activists in terms of these statuses and end up taking their demands more seriously. It is suggested that an “identity interaction” between the activists' class and gender identity and that of their targets helps to explain these different reactions. The analysis also highlights the role of emotion in social movements, especially the ways in which targets perceive and react to activists' emotional displays. (shrink)

The “public charge” rule is a long-standing immigration policy that seeks to determine the likelihood that a prospective immigrant will become dependent on the government for subsistence. When the Trump administration sought to expand the criteria that would count against an applicant for permanent residency to include public benefits historically excluded from the calculation, thousands of commenters wrote to oppose or support the proposed changes. This paper explores the moral and practical reasons commenters provided for their position on the public (...) charge rule and considers the value of the public comment process for immigration, health, and social policy. (shrink)

Motivation has been the subject of much research in the sport psychology literature, whereas athlete mental health has received limited attention. Motivational complexities in elite sport are somewhat reflected in the mental health literature, where there is evidence for both protective and risk factors for athletes. Notably, few studies have linked motivation to mental health. Therefore, the key objective of this study was to test four mental health outcomes in the motivational sequence posited by the Hierarchical Model of Intrinsic and (...) Extrinsic Motivation: motivational climate  basic psychological needs  motivation  mental health outcomes. Elite team-sport athletes (140 females, 75 males) completed seven psychometric inventories of motivation-related and mental health variables. Overall, the athletes reported positive motivational patterns, with autonomous motivation and task climate being more prevalent than their less adaptive counterparts. Elevated depressive symptoms and poor sleep quality affected nearly half of the cohort. Structural equation modelling supported pathways between motivational climate, basic needs, motivation, and mood, depressive symptoms, sleep quality, and trait anxiety. Specifically, a task climate was positively associated with the three basic psychological needs, and an ego climate was positively associated with competence. Autonomy and relatedness had positive and negative associations with autonomous and controlled forms of motivation, respectively. Controlled motivation regulations were positively associated with the four mental health outcomes. Integrated regulation had a negative association with anxiety, and intrinsic regulation had a positive association with depressive symptoms. These findings highlight the complexities of and interrelations between motivation and mental health among athletes, and support the importance of considering mental health as an outcome of motivation. (shrink)

The 1981 Uniform Determination of Death Act (UDDA) established the validity of both cardio-respiratory and neurological criteria of death. However, many religious traditions including most forms of Haredi Judaism (ultra-orthodox) and many varieties of Buddhism strongly disagree with death by neurological criteria (DNC). Only one state in the U.S., New Jersey, allows for both religious exemptions to DNC and provides continuation of health insurance coverage when an exception is invoked in its 1991 Declaration of Death Act (NJDDA). There is yet (...) no quantitative or qualitative data on the frequencies of religious exemptions in New Jersey. This study gathered information about the frequency of religious exemptions and policy in New Jersey that was created out of respect for religious beliefs. Literature and internet searches on topics related to religious objections to DNC were conducted. Fifty-three chaplains and heads of bioethics committees in New Jersey hospitals were contacted by phone or email requesting a research interview. Respondents answered a set of questions about religious exemptions to DNC at the hospital where they worked that explored the frequency of such religious exemptions in the past five years, the religious tradition indicated, and whether any request for a religious exemption had been denied. This study was approved by the Northeastern University Institutional Review Board (IRB #: 16–03-15). Eighteen chaplains and bioethics committee members participated in a full research interview. Of these, five reported instances of religious exemptions to DNC occurring at the hospital at which they worked for a total of approximately 30–36 known exemptions in the past five years. Families sought religious exemptions because of faith in an Orthodox Judaism tradition and nonreligious reasons. No failed attempts to obtain an exemption were reported. Religious exemptions to DNC in New Jersey do occur, although very infrequently. Prior to this study, there was no information on their frequency. Considering religious exemptions do occur, there is a need for national or state policies that addresses both religious objections to DNC and hospital resources. More information is needed to better understand the impact of granting religious exemptions before new policy can be established. (shrink)

Truth, the pragmatist claims, is something we make, not something which corresponds to reality. If this view of truth is accepted, Rorty notes, two problems arise: the pragmatist will have little to say to those who abuse others, because he or she will not be able to point to some universal standards that the abusers are vio lating ; and the torturers may be able to quote pragmatic principles in their own defence. Rorty argues that the pragmatist can reduce cruelty (...) by splitting himself or herself into public and private parts. I examine this problem and Rorty's solution. I argue that his solution fails for two reasons: first, keeping our public and private selves apart is unlikely to reduce cruelty; and, second, he cannot maintain the public/private split. Consequently, Rorty is unable to deal with the anti-pragmatic criticism that his theory of truth could lead to an increase in cruelty. Key Words: democracy • liberalism • political theory • pragmatism • Richard Rorty. (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)

The postwar welfare state provides social insurance against economic, health, and related risks in an uncertain world. Because everyone can envision themselves to be among the unfortunate, social insurance fuses self-interest and solidarism in a normative principle Friedman (2020) calls probabilistic justice. But there is a competing principle of status defense, where the aim is to erect boundaries between socioeconomic strata and discourage cross-class mobility. We argue that this principle dominates when inequality is high and uncertainty low. The current moment (...) is one of high inequality and high uncertainty, which results in intense status anxiety, yet does not rule out solidaristic solutions. Our contributions are to diagnose the causes of our current malaise, and to theorize the normative bases for the political choice facing contemporary western democracies. (shrink)

: This essay provides a critical analysis of rape prevention since the 1980s. I argue that we must challenge rape prevention's habitual reinforcement of the notion that fear is a woman's best line of defense. I suggest changes that must be made in the anti-rape movement if we are to move past fear. Ultimately, I raise the question of what, if not vague threats and scare tactics, constitutes prevention.

The past decades have seen a rise in religious and secular responses to inequality that seek to offer those who are relatively wealthy an opportunity to personally engage with impoverished people and places. This article examines three cases of elite white South Africans who intentionally immersed themselves in poor urban environments. In dialogue with the anthropology of ethics, I argue that immersion was seen as an experimental tool for transforming the self and cultivating virtues of empathy and responsibility towards others. (...) In this way, immersion acted as a technology of the self, linking care of the self to care of others. Yet such experimentation was not without risk. Though imagined as a tool that could promote care of the self and care of others, immersion carries with it the potential to reinforce power divides and/or solicit negative moral judgment. (shrink)

Here I call attention to a class of desires that I call exclusionary desires. To have an exclusionary desire is to desire something under a description such that, were the desire satisfied, it would be logically impossible for people other than the desiring subject to possess the desired object. Assuming that we are morally responsible for our desires insofar as and because they reflect our evaluative judgments and are in principle subject to rational revision, I argue that we should, morally (...) speaking, alter both social structures and our individual psychologies to minimize, or at least substantially reduce, exclusionary desires. (shrink)