UNDERSTANDING SCIENTIFIC REASONING develops critical reasoning skills and guides students in the improvement of their scientific and technological literacy. The authors teach students how to understand and critically evaluate the scientific information they encounter in both textbooks and the popular media. With its focus on scientific pedagogy, UNDERSTANDING SCIENTIFIC REASONING helps students learn how to examine scientific reports with a reasonable degree of sophistication. The book also explains how to reason through case studies using the same informal logic skills employed (...) by scientists and to analyze a complex series of propositions and hypotheses using sound scientific reasoning. (shrink)

Sixteen essays on epistemology, metaphysics, & history & politics, treating aspects of the writings of Descartes, Locke, Hume, Kant, Leibniz, & Hobbes.

(1997). Considering moral sensitivity in media ethics courses and research: An essay review by Robert F. Potter. Journal of Mass Media Ethics: Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 51-57. doi: 10.1207/s15327728jmme1201_4.

This book offers an in-depth analysis of the wide range of issues surrounding "passive euthanasia" and "allow-to-die" decisions. The author develops a comprehensive conceptual model that is highly useful for assessing and dealing with real-life situations. He presents an informative historical overview, an evaluation of the clinical settings in which treatment abatement takes place, and an insightful discussion of relevant legal aspects. The result is a clearly articulated ethical analysis that is medically realistic, philosophically sound, and legally viable.

The first edition of this book was published in 1977. At that time the field of thanatology, the study of death and dying, was still reasonably new and was dominated by research done by psychiatrists and social scientists. The most notable person in the field at the time was Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, who was widely credited with having brought thanatology into public view with the 1969 publication of her book On Death and Dying. Two research centers on death and dying were (...) gaining national reputations: The Foundation of Thanatology in New York (Austin Kutscher, director), and the Center for Death Education and Research (Robert Fulton, director) at the University of Minnesota. (shrink)

Clinical psychologists, cognitive psychologists, neuropsychologists, social psychologists and developmental psychologists have all become increasingly interested in studying unconscious mental processes empirically. In the words of the editors, The study of the unconscious has the potential to become the unifying force in psychology, linking cognition and emotion, infancy and old age, normal and pathological development, brain and psyche.

Hegel's interpretation of the history of philosophy played a central role in the shaping of his own thought, and brought about one of the determining events of modern intellectual history: the rise of a new historical consciousness of human life, culture, and intellect. This third volume of the lectures covers the medieval and modern periods.

If classical Western theism is correct that God's timeless omniscience is compatible with human free will, then it is incoherent to hold that this God can in any strict sense be immutable and a se as well as omniscient. That is my thesis. ‘Classical theism’ shall refer here to the tradition of philosophical theology centring on such mainstream authors as Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas. ‘Divine omniscience’ shall mean that the eternal God knows all events as a timeless observer of them. (...) ‘Human free will’ shall mean that human beings are, at least sometimes, self-determining agents who make choices not decisively caused to be what they are by external or internal factors other than the free willing itself – choices that these agents have the capacity and the freedom to make differently than they do. Except where stipulated otherwise, ‘divine immutability’ shall ‘mean that God is neither subject to, nor capable of, change in being, knowing, or willing, since God is immune to external influences, and without internal needs, of the sorts that might give rise to such change. Finally, ‘aseity’ shall be used to underline the divine immunity to external influences, since a being that is wholly a se or self-caused , cannot be open to such influences, cannot be made to be what or how it is by anything other than itself. (shrink)

Berkhofer ranges through a vast archive of recent writings by a broad range of authors. He explicates the opposing paradigms and their corresponding dilemmas by presenting in dialogue form the positions of modernists and postmodernists, formalists and deconstructionists, textualists and contextualists.

The situationist challenge to global character traits claims that on the basis of findings in social psychology, we should only accept at most the existence of local or context-sensitive traits. In this article I explore a neglected area of J. S. Mill's work to outline an account of context-sensitive traits. This account of traits, coupled with a sophisticated consequentialist ethical framework, suggests an interesting view on which persons govern the circumstances of their actions in order to best promote overall well-being.

Recent survey data gathered from British medical students reveal widespread acceptance of conscientious objection in medicine, despite the existence of strict policies in the UK that discourage conscientious refusals by students to aspects of their medical training. This disconnect demonstrates a pressing need to thoughtfully examine policies that allow conscience objections by medical students; as it so happens, the USA is one country that has examples of such policies. After presenting some background on promulgated US conscience protections and reflecting on (...) their significance for conscience objections by medical students, this paper observes that the dominant approach (following the American Medical Association's conscience clause) is to allow exempted students to instead be evaluated on the basis of alternative curricular activities to learn the associated underlying content. This paper then introduces and discusses an example in which male Muslim students who believe it is wrong to touch members of the opposite sex object to performing physical examinations on female subjects in their medical training. This sort of case, it is argued, causes difficulty for a conscience clause that resolves the dilemma by granting reasonable exemptions in the form of participation in alternative curricular activities: there are cases where one must perform the ‘objectionable’ activity itself in order to learn the necessary content and underlying principles. (shrink)

In Human Happiness and Morality, noted philosopher Robert Almeder provides lucid introductory explanations of the major ethical theories and traditions, as well as a clear and comprehensive discussion of the proposed answers to three basic questions in ethics: What makes a right act right? Why should I be moral? What is human happiness and how can I attain it? He then ventures beyond the basic questions, describing the relationship between morality and happiness; clearly defining human happiness; and raising the (...) question of whether happiness, so defined, is the likely product of a life lived morally. In the final chapter, Almeder details simple Stoic rules for happy living and shows how it is possible to live the good life despite the existence of unhappiness and failure in others. (shrink)

Blind Realism originated in the deeply felt conviction that the widespread acceptance of Gettier-type counterexamples to the classical definition of knowledge rests in a demonstrably erroneous understanding of the nature of human knowledge. In seeking to defend that conviction, Robert F. Almeder offers a fairly detailed and systematic picture of the nature and limits of human factual knowledge.

This article argues that practitioners have a professional ethical obligation to dispense emergency contraception, even given conscientious objection to this treatment. This recent controversy affects all medical professionals, including physicians as well as pharmacists. This article begins by analyzing the option of referring the patient to another willing provider. Objecting professionals may conscientiously refuse because they consider emergency contraception to be equivalent to abortion or because they believe contraception itself is immoral. This article critically evaluates these reasons and concludes that (...) they do not successfully support conscientious objection in this context. Contrary to the views of other thinkers, it is not possible to easily strike a respectful balance between the interests of objecting providers and patients in this case. As medical professionals, providers have an ethical duty to inform women of this option and provide emergency contraception when this treatment is requested. (shrink)

Blind Realism originated in the deeply felt conviction that the widespread acceptance of Gettier-type counterexamples to the classical definition of knowledge rests in a demonstrably erroneous understanding of the nature of human knowledge. In seeking to defend that conviction, Robert F. Almeder offers a fairly detailed and systematic picture of the nature and limits of human factual knowledge.

This book argues that a conscientiously objecting medical professional should receive an exemption only if the grounds of an objector's refusal are reasonable. It defends a detailed, contextual account of public reasonability suited for healthcare, which builds from the overarching concept of Rawlsian public reason. The author analyzes the main competing positions and maintains that these other views fail precisely due to their systematic inattention to the grounding reasons behind a conscientious objection; he argues that any such view is plausible (...) to the extent that it mimics the 'reason-giving requirement' for conscience objections defended in this work. Only reasonable objections can defeat the prior professional obligation to assign primacy to patient well-being, therefore one who refuses a patient's request for a legally available, medically indicated, and safe service must be able to explain the grounds of their objection in terms understandable to other citizens within the public institutional structure of medicine. The book further offers a novel policy proposal to deploy the Reasonability View: establishing conscientious objector status in medicine. It concludes that the Reasonability View is a viable and attractive position in this debate. A New Theory of Conscientious Objection in Medicine: Justification and Reasonability will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in bioethics, medical ethics, and philosophy of medicine, as well as thinkers interested in the intersections between law, medical humanities, and philosophy. (shrink)

This is a book about the role that psychological impairment should play in a theory of criminal liability. Criminal guilt in the Anglo-American legal tradition requires both that the defendant committed some proscribed act and did so with intent, knowledge, or recklessness. The second requirement corresponds to the intuitive idea that people should not be punished for something they did not do 'on purpose' or if they 'did not realize what they were doing'. Unlike many works in this area, this (...) book addresses the automatism and insanity defences by examining the types of functional impairment that typical candidates for these defences actually suffer. What emerges is a much wider conceptual framework that allows us to understand the significance of psychological states and processes for the attribution of criminal responsibility in a manner that is logically coherent, morally defensible, and consistent with research in psychopathology. (shrink)

The subject of the passions has always haunted Western philosophy and, more often than not, aroused harsh judgments. For the passions represent a force of excess and lawlessness in humanity that produces troubling, confusing paradoxes. Michel Meyer provides new insight into an age-old dilemma: Does passion torture people because it blinds them, or, on the contrary, does it permit them to apprehend who and what we really are?

Hegel gave various lecture series on aesthetics or the philosophy of art, but never published a book of his own on this topic. His famous works on aesthetics were compiled from transcripts of lectures. This volume now presents one transcript complete in English for the first time, with extensive introductory material.

Bernard Williams has argued that on a consequentialist moral theory, individuals cannot possess what he calls "integrity." I argue that one central strand of this criticism concerns how persons must think about life-shaping decisions. I interpret "integrity" as a pattern of continuity in an agent's moral decision-making. In order to have integrity an agent must possess a stable character which unifies one's choices. Since a sophisticated consequentialist moral structure can properly value the having of a character on the basis of (...) which agents guide their lives, it can successfully address this criticism. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine Emest Sosa’s defense of Conceptual Relativism: the view that what exists is a function of human thought. My examination reveals that his defense entails an ontology that is indistinguishable from that of the altemative he labels less “sensible,” viz., Absolutism: the view that reality exists independently of our thinking. I conclude by defending Absolutism against Sosa’s objections.

This landmark volume brings together the work of the world's leading researchers in sublimated perception. This compilation marks a fundamental shift in the current study of subliminal effects: No longer in question is the notion that perception without awareness occurs. Now, the emphasis is on elucidating the parameters of subliminal effects and understanding the conditions under which stimuli perceived without awareness significantly influence affect, cognition, and behavior. PERCEPTION WITHOUT AWARENESS firmly establishes subliminal perception within the mainstream of psychological science. Well (...) represented here are the two main research branches that have emerged: One directly investigates the nature of subliminal effects; the other uses subliminal techniques as tools for investigating psychological phenomena such as hypnosis, dreaming, repression, social judgment and inference, psychopathology, and symptom formation. Broadly grouped into three main sections, the contributed chapters explore * The cognitive perspective--including implicit memory and implicit perception, the measurement of unconscious perceptual processes, and methods for revealing unconscious processes * The clinical perspective--exploring the cognitive and dynamic aspects of subliminal perception, memory, and consciousness; direct recovery of subliminal stimuli; and validation of subliminal psychodynamic activation * The social perspective--discussing subliminal mere-exposure effects, affect and social perception, and the role of subliminality in social psychology Timely and thought-provoking, PERCEPTION WITHOUT AWARENESS is sure to be of enormous interest to all psychoanalytic clinicians and scholars, as well as cognitive, clinical, and social psychologists whose work touches upon issues relating to psychopathology, perception, cognition, and memory. (shrink)

This is a book about the role that psychological impairment should play in a theory of criminal liability. Criminal guilt in the Anglo-American legal tradition requires both that the defendant committed some proscribed act and did so with intent, knowledge, or recklessness. The second requirement corresponds to the intuitive idea that people should not be punished for something they did not do 'on purpose' or if they 'did not realize what they were doing'. Unlike many works in this area, this (...) book addresses the automatism and insanity defences by examining the types of functional impairment that typical candidates for these defences actually suffer. What emerges is a much wider conceptual framework that allows us to understand the significance of psychological states and processes for the attribution of criminal responsibility in a manner that is logically coherent, morally defensible, and consistent with research in psychopathology. (shrink)

In this paper I defend the Reasonability View: the position that medical professionals seeking a conscientious exemption must state reasons in support of their objection and allow those reasons to be subject to evaluation. Recently, this view has been criticized by Jason Marsh as proposing a standard that is either too difficult to meet or too easy to satisfy. First, I defend the Reasonability View from this proposed dilemma. Then, I develop this view by presenting and explaining some of the (...) central criteria it uses to assess whether a conscientious objection is proper grounds for extending an exemption to a medical practitioner. (shrink)

In this paper I examine the claim that no theory of\nepistemic justification is possible because whatever\ndefinition one gives admits of the question "Are you\njustified in accepting your definition of justification?"\nwhich cannot be answered without begging the question in\nfavor of the original definition offered. I examine various\nreplies to the argument and then argue that the question\nneed not be answered.

Things strike me in a variety ways. F and F# sound slightly different, ripe and unripe tomatoes neither look nor taste nor smell the same, and silk feels smoother than corduroy. In each case, I distinguish an experience of something on the basis of what it is like to be its subject. That is to say, in philosophical parlance, if not quite the vernacular, its “quale,” leads me to categorize it and, thus, respond appropriately to its stimulus. The function of (...) a quale being established, we must define it along with its subject and, as Sartre maintained, their relation. How should we understand the subject and predicate terms and the copula in sentences such as ‘He is listening to Chopin’ or ‘She is seeing the sights of Paris’? Elaborating upon adverbialism, I shall argue that the subject of experiencing is a hylomorphic compound that is temporarily identical to the 'accidental compound' that it forms along with a qualified passion. I begin by explicating the adverbialist’s treatment of qualitative consciousness and defending it against the charge of circularity. (shrink)