In this contribution to the Common Knowledge symposium “Fuzzy Studies,” the authors, all of whom work in the field of science, technology, and society, begin from the assumption that, as Bruno Latour has put it, “we have never been modern.” They accept the STS thesis that, while modern practices purport to be entirely rational and coherent, on closer inspection they turn out to be as much noncoherent as coherent. This article poses the question of what forms “noncoherences” take and how (...) they are managed. The basic argument is that there is a range of styles of noncoherence or “modes of syncretism.” In small case studies, the authors identify six such modes or styles, which they term denial, domestication, separation, care, conflict, and collapse. Given that consistency and coherence seem less important now than they were once taken to be — and given that the conditions of possibility for purity are, in any case, in decline — this list and its supporting case studies, while not meant to be definitive, are offered as a way of understanding how practices that do not cohere may still function and fit together admirably. (shrink)

The article discusses three versions of context. First, UK Government legislation, the British Cattle Tracing System, as a context that frames and guides good farming practices to promote accountability for cattle movements and to control disease. It describes how the legislative context creates particular constructions of farmers, cows, and good and bad farming practices. Second, the article creates context as the local farm-based practices of cattle movement and monitoring. Differences and similarities between the legislative requirements and the farm-based practices are (...) discussed. The farming practices are primarily practices of responsibility and care that are embodied, relational, collective, and responsive. The article draws upon feminist insights into responsibility and accountability that accountability is mundane practices of touch, regard, looking back, and becoming with. Thereby, the article creates a third context in which local farming practices, legislation, and feminism meet and interact with one another. Within this “meta-context” of interferences between contexts, accountability is revisioned as the very condition of farm-based practices of care and responsibility. At the same time, the article revisions context as emergent in interferences and enacts alternative versions of farmers, cows, and good and bad practices. (shrink)

This paper examines the connection between politics and public space at a time when photography and the new media have put the classical distinction between the public and the private into question. My focus is on the body which, according to Hannah Arendt and the classical philosophers, is the most private thing there is. Drawing on the work of Weimar photojournalist Erich Salomon – who was among the first to infiltrate the spaces where political talks were held and decisions taken (...) – I argue for an understanding of the body as an aesthetic object and a site where public and private criss-cross and intersect. The body in photography leads me to the final part of the paper where I trace the figuring of the body in the texts of Plato, Aristotle and the Stoics, and argue that far from being a recent phenomenon, the aestheticisation of politics is already at work in the tradition that celebrates deliberation and the public use of reason. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has both exposed and created deep rifts in society. It has thrust us into deep ethical thinking to help justify the difficult decisions many will be called upon to make and to protect from decisions that lack ethical underpinnings. This paper aims to highlight ethical issues in six different areas of life highlighting the enormity of the task we are faced with globally. In the context of COVID-19, we consider health inequity, dilemmas in triage and allocation of (...) scarce resources, ethical issues associated with research, ethical considerations relating to tracing apps, and exit strategies such as immunity passports and COVID-19 vaccines. Finally, we consider environmental issues in light of COVID-19. The paper also offers some ethical reflection on these areas as many parts of the world contemplate the recovery phase. (shrink)

Ethical decision-making frameworks assist in identifying the issues at stake in a particular setting and thinking through, in a methodical manner, the ethical issues that require consideration as well as the values that need to be considered and promoted. Decisions made about the use, sharing, and re-use of big data are complex and laden with values. This paper sets out an Ethics Framework for Big Data in Health and Research developed by a working group convened by the Science, Health and (...) Policy-relevant Ethics in Singapore Initiative. It presents the aim and rationale for this framework supported by the underlying ethical concerns that relate to all health and research contexts. It also describes a set of substantive and procedural values that can be weighed up in addressing these concerns, and a step-by-step process for identifying, considering, and resolving the ethical issues arising from big data uses in health and research. This Framework is subsequently applied in the papers published in this Special Issue. These papers each address one of six domains where big data is currently employed: openness in big data and data repositories, precision medicine and big data, real-world data to generate evidence about healthcare interventions, AI-assisted decision-making in healthcare, public-private partnerships in healthcare and research, and cross-sectoral big data. (shrink)

There is a growing expectation, or even requirement, for researchers to deposit a variety of research data in data repositories as a condition of funding or publication. This expectation recognizes the enormous benefits of data collected and created for research purposes being made available for secondary uses, as open science gains increasing support. This is particularly so in the context of big data, especially where health data is involved. There are, however, also challenges relating to the collection, storage, and re-use (...) of research data. This paper gives a brief overview of the landscape of data sharing via data repositories and discusses some of the key ethical issues raised by the sharing of health-related research data, including expectations of privacy and confidentiality, the transparency of repository governance structures, access restrictions, as well as data ownership and the fair attribution of credit. To consider these issues and the values that are pertinent, the paper applies the deliberative balancing approach articulated in the Ethics Framework for Big Data in Health and Research to the domain of Openness in Big Data and Data Repositories. Please refer to that article for more information on how this framework is to be used, including a full explanation of the key values involved and the balancing approach used in the case study at the end. (shrink)

This book details the underlining philosophical approaches to ethical theories and how these can be used to structure an approach to day-to-day ethical issues, and thereby resolve them. It provides an understanding of the ethical theories which underpin decisions in health care by first laying the foundation with a philosophical framework and then going on to develop this into an examination of contemporary health care dilemmas and professional issues. Not available in the U.S.

New materialisms argue for a more science-friendly humanities, ventilating questions about methodology and subject matter and the importance of the non-human. However, these new sites of attention - climate, biology, affect, geology, animals and objects - tend to leverage their difference against language and the discursive. Similarly, questions about ontology have come to eclipse, and even eschew, those of epistemology. While this collection of essays is in kinship with this radical shake-up of how and what we study, the aim is (...) to re-navigate what constitutes materiality. These efforts are encapsulated by a rewriting of the Derridean axiom, 'there is no outside text' as 'there is no outside nature.' What if nature has always been literate, numerate, social? And what happens to 'the human' if its exceptional identity and status is conceded quantum, non-local and ecological implication? (shrink)

This article focuses on a resonant debate initiated by the publication of Judith Jarvis Thomson’s groundbreaking article “On Defense of Abortion” in 1971. It is my contention that philosophers who argued against Thomson based on what has come to be called the “Responsibility Objection” did not fully examine the gender assumptions embedded in their logic. Rather than attempt to prove the flaw in the Responsibility Objection directly, I demonstrate it by applying the same logic used to discuss women’s responsibilities to (...) men to prove that it also supports forcing men to get a vasectomy. What I show is that the Responsibility Objection, when no longer clothed in a set of gendered assumptions, is not logically convincing. Further, given that the Responsibility Objection supports the logic the U.S. Supreme Court recently relied on in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health in overruling Roe vs. Wade, the examination of the flaws in this logic is timely and important. (shrink)

Unmet legal needs contribute to housing, income, and food insecurity, along with other conditions that harm health and drive health inequity. Addressing health injustice requires new tools for the next generations of lawyers, doctors, and other healthcare professionals. An interprofessional group of co-authors argue that law and medical schools and other university partners should develop and cultivate Academic Medical-Legal Partnerships (A-MLPs), which are uniquely positioned to leverage service, education, and research resources, to advance health justice.

A key ethical issue arising in data linkage research relates to consent requirements. Patients’ consent preferences in the context of health research have been explored but their consent preferences regarding data linkage specifically have been under-explored. In addition, the views on data linkage are often those of patient groups. As a result, little is known about lay people’s views and their preferences about consent requirements in the context of data linkage. This study explores lay people’s views and justifications regarding the (...) acceptability of conducting data linkage research without obtaining consent. (shrink)

'...as an introductory text, the book is admirable: it sets out the questions clearly and specifies the terms of the debate at every juncture.' - Ann Oakley, British Book News.

Montesquieu is famous as a tireless critic of despotism, which he associates overtly with Asia and the Middle East and not with the apparently more moderate Western models of governance found throughout Europe. However, Vickie B. Sullivan argues that a creaful reading of Montesquieu's enormously influential The Spirit of the Law reveals the surprising result that he recognizes that Europe itself is susceptible to despotic practices - and that the threat emanates not from the East but rather from certain despotic (...) ideas that inform Western institutions and practices. Sullivan guides readers through Montesquieu's sometimes veiled yet sharply critical accounts of Machiavelli, Hobbes, Aristotle, and Plato, as well as various Christian thinkers have brough forth despotic ideas in the form, for example, of brutal Machiavellianism, of Hobbes's justifications for the rule of one, of Plato's reasoning that denied slaves the right of natural defense, and of the Christian teachings that equated heresy with treason. Such ideas, Montesquieu shows, inform such revered European institutions as the French monarchy and the Roman Catholic Church. In this new reading of Montesquieu's masterwork, Sullivan corrects the misconception that it offers simple, objective observations, showing it to be instead a powerful critique of European politics that would become remarkably and regrettably prescient after Montesquieu's death, when despotism repeatedly emerged in Europe with virulent intensity. -- from dust jacket. (shrink)

BackgroundCarefully planned research is critical to developing policies and interventions that counter physical, psychological and social challenges faced by young people living with HIV/aids, without increasing burdens. Such studies, however, must navigate a ‘vulnerability paradox’, since including potentially vulnerable groups also risks unintentionally worsening their situation. Through embedded social science research, linked to a cohort study involving Adolescents Living with HIV/aids (ALH) in Kenya, we develop an account of researchers’ responsibilities towards young people, incorporating concepts of vulnerability, resilience, and agency (...) as ‘interacting layers’.MethodsUsing a qualitative, iterative approach across three linked data collection phases including interviews, group discussions, observations and a participatory workshop, we explored stakeholders’ perspectives on vulnerability and resilience of young people living with HIV/aids, in relation to home and community, school, health care and health research participation. A total of 62 policy, provider, research, and community-based stakeholders were involved, including 27 ALH participating in a longitudinal cohort study. Data analysis drew on a Framework Analysis approach; ethical analysis adapts Luna’s layered account of vulnerability.ResultsALH experienced forms of vulnerability and resilience in their daily lives in which socioeconomic context, institutional policies, organisational systems and interpersonal relations were key, interrelated influences. Anticipated and experienced forms of stigma and discrimination in schools, health clinics and communities were linked to actions undermining ART adherence, worsening physical and mental health, and poor educational outcomes, indicating cascading forms of vulnerability, resulting in worsened vulnerabilities. Positive inputs within and across sectors could build resilience, improve outcomes, and support positive research experiences.ConclusionsThe most serious forms of vulnerability faced by ALH in the cohort study were related to structural, inter-sectoral influences, unrelated to study participation and underscored by constraints to their agency. Vulnerabilities, including cascading forms, were potentially responsive to policy-based and interpersonal actions. Stakeholder engagement supported cohort design and implementation, building privacy, stakeholder understanding, interpersonal relations and ancillary care policies. Structural forms of vulnerability underscore researchers’ responsibilities to work within multi-sectoral partnerships to plan and implement studies involving ALH, share findings in a timely way and contribute to policies addressing known causes of vulnerabilities. (shrink)

CSR is now an important issue for all companies, large and small. Companies are under pressure to behave responsibly from their consumers, in their purchasing activities, from the government and regulators, from the investment community and from potential employees.

The Dutch microbiologist/biochemist Albert Jan Kluyver was an early proponent of the idea of biochemical unity, and how that concept might be demonstrated through the careful study of microbial life. The fundamental relatedness of living systems is an obvious correlate of the theory of evolution, and modern attempts to construct phylogenetic schemes support this relatedness through comparison of genomes. The approach of Kluyver and his scientific descendants predated the tools of modern molecular biology by decades. Kluyver himself is poorly recognized (...) today, yet his influence at the time was profound. Through lens of today however, it has been argued that the focus by Kluyver and others to create taxonomic and phylogenetic schemes using morphology and biochemistry distorted and hindered progress of the discipline of microbiology, because of a perception that the older approaches focused too much on a reductionist worldview. This essay argues that in contrast the careful characterization of fundamental microbial metabolism and physiology by Kluyver made many of the advances of the latter part of the twentieth century possible, by offering a framework which in many respects anticipated our current view of phylogeny, and by directly and indirectly training a generation of scientists who became leaders in the explosive growth of biotechnology. (shrink)

Abstract:This article repositions Thomas Arnold as a major nineteenth-century historian through an analysis of his most important work, the History of Rome (1838–42). While scholars have focused primarily on Arnold's role as headmaster of Rugby School and Liberal Anglican theologian, I examine his historical contribution in the context of the Romantic movement. Building on the work of B. G. Niebuhr and Giambattista Vico, Arnold interpreted the contest between the patricians and plebeians at Rome as emblematic of a universal class struggle, (...) in which failure to find a compromise between the rich and the poor would inevitably lead to disaster. (shrink)

Certain English writers of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, whom scholars often associate with classical republicanism, were not, in fact, hostile to liberalism. Indeed, these thinkers contributed to a synthesis of liberalism and modern republicanism. As this book argues, Marchamont Nedham, James Harrington, Henry Neville, Algernon Sidney, and John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon, the co-authors of a series of editorials entitled Cato's Letters, provide a synthesis that responds to the demands of both republicans and liberals by offering a politically (...) engaged citizenry as well as the protection of individual rights. The book also reinterprets the writings of Machiavelli and Hobbes to show that each contributed in a fundamental way to the formation of this liberal republicanism. (shrink)

Parents who are facing decisions about life-sustaining treatment for their seriously ill or dying child are supported by their child's doctors and nurses. They also frequently seek other information sources to help them deal with the medical and ethical questions that arise. This might include written or web-based information. As part of a project involving the development of such a resource to support parents facing difficult decisions, some ethical questions emerged. Should this information be presented in a strictly neutral fashion? (...) Is it problematic if narratives, arguments or perspectives appear to favour stopping over continuing life-sustaining treatment? Similar questions might arise with written materials about decisions for adults, or for other ethically contentious decisions. This paper explores the meaning of ‘balance’ in information provision, focusing particularly on written information about life-sustaining treatment for children. We contrast the norm of non-directiveness in genetic counselling with the shared decision-making model often endorsed in end-of-life care. We review evidence that parents do not find neutrality from medical professionals helpful in discussions. We argue that balance in written information must be understood in the light of the aim of the document, the most common situation in which it will be used, and any existing biases. We conclude with four important strategies for ensuring that non-neutral information is nevertheless ethically appropriate. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 63.3 (2002) 425-446 [Access article in PDF] Giving Orders: Theory and Practice in the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina Vicki Hsueh Indians. Of Edisto Ashapo and Combohe to the South our friends. Of Wando Ituan Sewee and Sehey to the north came to our assistance and were zealous and resolute in it 1000 bowmen In our want supplied us. Q. Spaniards. What we shall (...) doe to the Spaniards if we invade them we brake the peace, if we sit still we loose our reputation with the Indians our friends. Westoes. Inland man eaters. Country. To the northward more sickly, about Ashley River fertile and of a wonderful growth. Tatchequea. A very fruitfull Country 8. days jorney by the North west the Emperor our friend and enemy to the Westoes and to hard for them. Q. Settlem't. 500 people will secure the settlement 1000 perfect it. desires supplys of necessarys till that time Excerpt from Carolina Memoranda in the handwriting of John Locke, Esq., 15 September 1670 Within the last decade, scholars such as James Tully, Barbara Arneil, and Bhikhu Parekh have performed a crucial intervention on modern constitu-tionalism's behalf. 1 Not only has constitutionalism in the modern age been [End Page 425] plagued by assumptions of cultural uniformity and an on-going inability to adjudicate between competing cultural claims, but it has been unable effectively to diagnose those limitations and dilemmas. The root of the problem, James Tully suggests, is ultimately a matter of historical perspective. "[T]he tendency," he writes, "is not to notice the philosophical and ideological debates over the last three hundred years... only the result of these debates is seen—the victorious modern language of constitutional uniformity—and claims for recognition are viewed through its framework as if it were impartial and universal." 2 In response Tully and others have sought to tackle this predicament at its historical root. Identifying modern constitutionalism's colonial origins as a significant part of the problem, their studies address the development of constitutionalism and colonialism as an entwined phenomenon in the early modern period, focusing particularly on the British-American context. In this sense, Locke's Two Treatises of Government stands as an exemplary illustration of the period's entangled colonial and constitutional temperaments. Well-known for its influential articulation of compact and resistance, the Two Treatises, Barbara Arneil argues "were written as a defence of England's colonial policy in the new world against the sceptics in England and the counter-claims of both the aboriginal nations and other European powers in America." 3 Accordingly, present-day constitutionalism continues to bear the weighty legacy of those colonial rationales. "[T]he language of modern constitutionalism," Tully further explains, "which has come to be authoritative was designed to exclude or assimilate cultural diversity and justify uniformity. The design is difficult to see because this 'modern' language has become the customary way of thinking about, reflecting on and envisioning a just constitutional order." Ultimately, Tully submits, citing Wittgenstein, "A picture held us captive. And we could not get outside it, for it lay in our language and language seemed to repeat it to us inexorably." 4This much-needed thickening of constitutionalism's historical context has enriched our awareness of constitutionalism's vexed origins, as it has proffered potent tools for interrogating current cultural adjudication. Yet, a troubling predicament persists. As if caught within the tenacious grip of the language of modern constitutionalism, Tully, Arneil, and Parekh insistently portray seventeenth-century British-American colonialism solely as a straightforward process of appropriation and assimilation without addressing or incorporating the [End Page 426] complex and contingent elements of that history in its emergence. Lacking the various negotiations and accommodations between settler and indigene in ambition and actualization, their portrayals crucially underplay the dynamic relationship between theories of constitutionalism and practices of colonialism—an approach that ultimately serves to reinscribe the narrative of triumphalist progress within their critiques. 5This problematic is the context for my reading of the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina,1669... (shrink)

This article examines how care functions as a critical feature in decolonial political theory and the politics of refusal. In recent years, political theorists have emphasized how refusal challenges the legitimacy of settler colonial government, asserts indigenous presence, and fuels decolonial politics. Care, I argue, plays a significant and under-examined role in the politics of refusal. I look, first, to the writings of William Apess to better examine the cruelty of settler colonial care and to highlight how indigenous reworkings of (...) care enact political presence and agency. I then examine how care has been taken up by contemporary indigenous activists in the Idle No More, Standing Rock, and Walking with Our Sisters movements. Care – expressed in online and on-the-ground grieving, social mobilization around environmental and health concerns, and teach-ins and healing practices – draws on affective intensities to build indigenous community, enact indigenous liberation, imagine and pursue radical alternatives, and create allied networks of support. In these examples, affective responses of joy, outrage, and mourning are not simply incidental accompaniments to the politics of refusal; they explain why refusal matters and how refusal in turn can challenge settler memory and pursue transformative decolonial politics. (shrink)

Background: Depression is the largest cause of mental ill health worldwide. Although interventions such as Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) may offer interesting and acceptable treatment options, current clinical guidelines do not include these interventions in their recommendations mainly because of what is perceived as insufficient research evidence. The 2015 Cochrane review on DMT for depression includes only three RCTs leading to inconclusive results. It is therefore, necessary to also look beyond such designs in order to identify and assess the range (...) of current evidence. Methods: We therefore, conducted a systematic review of studies that aimed to explore the effectiveness in the use of DMT with people with depression. This led to a qualitative narrative synthesis followed by a subgroup analysis and a sensitivity analysis. In all meta-analyses a random effects model was used with Standardised Mean Differences (SMD) to accommodate for the heterogeneity of studies and outcome measures. Results: From the 817 studies reviewed, eight studies met our inclusion criteria. 351 people with depression (mild to severe) participated, 192 of whom attended DMT groups while receiving treatment as usual (TAU) and 159 received TAU only. Qualitative findings suggest there was a decrease in depression scores in favour of DMT groups in all studies. Subgroup analysis performed on depression scores before and three months after the completion of DMT groups suggested changes in favour of the DMT groups. When sensitivity analysis was performed, RCTs at high risk of bias were excluded, leaving only studies with adult clients up to the age of 65. In these studies, the highest effect size was found favouring DMT plus TAU for adults with depression, when compared to TAU only. Conclusions: Based on studies with moderate to high quality, we concluded that DMT is an effective intervention in the treatment of depression with adults. Furthermore, by drawing on a wide range of designs with diverse quality, we were able to compile a comprehensive picture of relevant trends. Despite the fact that there remains a paucity of high-quality studies, the results have relevance to both policy-making and clinical practice, and become a platform for further research. (shrink)

Over the last two decades our understanding of the relationship of gender, politics and the state has been transformed almost beyond recognition by the mutual interrogation of feminism and political science. This volume provides an overview of this dynamic and growing field, which reflects both its expanding empirical scope and the accompanying theoretical development and debate. The first three essays focus primarily on conceptual and theoretical issues: the meaning of 'gender'; the state's role in the construction of gender within the (...) public and private sphere; and the political representation of gender differences within liberal democracy. The remaining six provide analyses of more concrete issues of state policy and participation in differeing national political contexts: abortion politics in Ireland; the local politics of prostitution in Britain, the impact on women's political participation of economic change in China, Latin America and political change in Russia, and the gender impact of state programmes of land reform. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Narrative Symposium:Living Organ DonationLaura Altobelli, Sherri Bauman, Janice Flynn, Andy Heath, Joseph Jacobs, Tim Joos, Amy K. Lewensten, Donna L. Luebke, Sarah A. McDaniel, Donald Olenick, Laurie E Post, Vicky Young, Blake Adams, Anonymous One, Michael Sauls, Christine Wright, Shannon D. Wyatt, and Cara Yesawich• An Altruistic Living Donor’s Story• Surgery for the Soul• Kidney Donation Story• The Essence of Giving—A Transplant Story• Love—the Risk Worth Taking• My (...) Donation Journey• A Life For A Life: My Gift To My Dad• Lessons Learned: The Realities of Living Organ Donation• Sarah’s List Exchange Experience• Accelerated Living Donation• Liver Donor Nightmare• Adrift After Donation• Getting Our Child Off Dialysis• A Living Donor’s Journey• The Spare Kidney• Living Donors are People Too• The Gift of Life—Walking by Faith• Journey of an Altruistic, Non–designated Living DonorCopyright © 2012 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

The starting point of this paper is Hannah Arendt's positive comment on Simone Weil's La condition ouvrière, in The Human Condition. I first offer a brief reconstruction of Arendt's interpretation of Marx's analysis of labor which is the context in which the above-mentioned comment appears. This interpretation is based, I claim, on a (mis)reading which consists in a rather systematic blurring of the distinction between labor as a universal and irreducible human activity and labor in its historically determined capitalist form, (...) which is the object of Marx's critique, i.e., alienated labor. Following that, I discuss Weil's construal of labor and I shed light on its affinities with the Marxian problematic. My aim is to show that Arendt's comment does not do justice to the problems that Weil addresses both with and beyond Marx. (shrink)

Background: Randomized controlled trials have been criticized for their inability to identify and differentiate the causal mechanisms that generate the outcomes they measure. One solution is the development of realist trials that combine the empirical precision of trials' outcome data with realism's theoretical capacity to identify the powers that generate outcomes. Main Body: We review arguments for and against this position and conclude that critical realist trials are viable. Using the example of an evaluation of the educational effectiveness of virtual (...) reality simulation, we explore whether Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling can move statistical analysis beyond correlational analysis to support realist identification of the mechanisms that generate correlations. Conclusion: We tentatively conclude that PLS-SEM, with its ability to identify ‘points of action’, has the potential to provide direction for researchers and practitioners in terms of how, for whom, when, where and in what circumstances an intervention has worked. (shrink)

By promoting greater alignment between law and capital, litigation financing has the potential to further escalate the substantial restructuring that is occurring throughout the legal profession. This article examines regulation of the relationship between litigation funders and lawyers in three common law jurisdictions: the United Kingdom; the United States; and Australia, against the backdrop of a sea change in the way in which legal services are being delivered. It argues that a broad prescriptive approach rather than proscriptive prohibitions are the (...) best way to regulate the emerging relationship between law and capital. (shrink)

This comprehensively updated and expanded revision of the successful second edition continues to provide detailed coverage of the ever-growing range of research topics in vision. In Part I, the treatment of visual physiology has been extensively revised with an updated account of retinal processing, a new section explaining the principles of spatial and temporal filtering which underlie discussions in later chapters, and an up-to-date account of the primate visual pathway. Part II contains four largely new chapters which cover recent psychophysical (...) evidence and computational model of early vision: edge detection, perceptual grouping, depth perception, and motion perception. The models discussed are extensively integrated with physiological evidence. All other chapters in Parts II, III, and IV have also been thoroughly updated. (shrink)

Do you ever wonder why some people just rub you the wrong way? Or why you automatically click with others? Or maybe you even ask yourself, "Who am I, really?" Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could understand why people are the way they are--and even better understand yourself? Now you can! And it's simple and fun! Based on the ancient Five Elements model from Chinese medicine, Dr. Vicki Matthews has developed a simple way to describe our five basic personality (...) types and the predictable ways in which they interact. Take your first step toward happier and more harmonious relationships in every area of your life--including a better relationship with yourself! The result of years of personal and professional experience, this invaluable book can improve every relationship you have and make your life better! -- Publisher. (shrink)

Anthropology diffracted : originary humanicity -- Just figures?: forensic clairvoyance, mathematics, and the language question -- Enumerating language : "The unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics" -- Natural convers(at)ions : or, what if culture was really nature all along? -- (Con)founding "the human" : rethinking the incest taboo -- Culpability and the double-cross : Irigaray with Merleau-Ponty.

In exploring phenomenological literature, it is evident that the term ‘phenomenology’ holds rather different meanings depending upon the context. Phenomenology has been described as both a philosophical movement and an approach to human science research. The phenomenology of Husserl, Heidegger, Gadamer, and Merleau-Ponty was philosophical in nature and not intended to provide rules or procedures for conducting research. The Canadian social scientist, van Manen, however, introduced specific guidelines for conducting human science research, which is rooted in hermeneutic phenomenology and this (...) particular method has been employed in professional disciplines such as education, nursing, clinical psychology, and law. The purpose of this paper is to explore the difference between the phenomenological method as described by van Manen and that of other philosophers such as Husserl, Heidegger, Gadamer, and Merleau-Ponty. In so doing, the author aims to address the blurred boundaries of phenomenology as a research method and as a philosophical movement and highlight the influence of these blurred boundaries on nursing knowledge development. (shrink)

I remember my immediate fascination with an edited collection, now twenty years old, Who Comes After the Subject? The title seemed to entirely displace the identity of the subject, the “of-courseness” of its uniquely human definition. Indeed, its provocation did more than destabilise the what and where of the subject, as if we might extend this complexity, albeit in attenuated form, to non-human entities. The more radical implication was a destabilisation of human identity itself—its circumscribed location—together with the progress narrative (...) that made the arrival of language, technology and agential smarts synonymous with human achievement. As contemporary concern about planetary health is galvanized around the unique power of human agency to either ruin or redeem an impassive and defenceless Nature, a “before” that lacks what being a subject affords, this article will linger over the logic that continues to sustain this story. By reworking Derrida’s “originary writing” as “originary humanicity,” a different sense of ecological involvement might be possible. (shrink)

Machiavelli's ambiguous treatment of religion has fueled a contentios and long-standing debate among scholars. Whereas some insist that Machiavelli is a Christian, others maintain he is a pagan. Sullivan mediates between these divergent views by arguing that he is neither but that he utilizes elements of both understandings arrayed in a wholly new way. She develops her argument by distinguishing among the three Romes that can be understood as existing in Machiavelli's political thought: the first is the Rome of the (...) Christian era, dominated by the pope; the second is the republican Rome of pagan times, which Machiavelli praises; and the third is an idealized Rome that is neither entirely pagan nor entirely Christian. Sullivan draws primarily from the Florentine Histories, The Prince, and the Discourses to offer a unique study of Machiavelli's political thought. Her examination of Machiavelli's three Romes will engage readers concerned with political thought, philosophy of the state, and Machiavelli. (shrink)