The multi-disciplinary unit Social Responsibility in Action was developed for students with an interest in ethics who were completing undergraduate degrees in Arts, Commerce, Design or Science at an Australian research-intensive university. The academic objectives of this unit were to increase student awareness, knowledge, understanding and critical thinking skills related to various ethical issues. Lecturers from five disciplines collaborated in the design and delivery of SRA, which comprised lectures, tutorials and a research-based project. Anonymous surveys were administered at the start (...) and end of the semester to obtain feedback on student expectations and learning experience, respectively. Data across three student cohorts showed that at the start of semester, 80% of student comments indicated a desire to expand their interest of ethical matters, 59% a desire to gain understanding and knowledge and 59% to gain critical thinking or communication skills. SRA was extremely well received by students, with 98% of respondents indicating that this multi-disciplinary ethics unit had met their expectations. Students also found that the variety of teaching styles, unit content and multi-disciplinary approach stimulated learning. (shrink)

In their article, “Rare Disease, Advocacy and Justice: Intersecting Disparities in Research and Clinical Care,” Halley et al. (2023) use three case examples to describe challenges patients with rar...

In writing about `whiteness' we are trying to enact a `way of talking' that draws in part on Aboriginal ideas about how to conduct a conversation or tell a story. We also use Homi Bhabha's ideas of `third space' (an `interruptive, interrogative, and enunciative' space) and hybridity as a related way to think through the problems of essentializing binaries and rigid identities. In Aboriginal cultures in Australia and Canada, rather than adopting the `neutral' or `objective' stance common in the academy, (...) it is customary to introduce oneself to one's audience, providing a context to assist in interpretation and exchange. Without such an introduction, real stories cannot be told and productive conversations cannot happen. We thus begin our conversation with each other and with you by examining our personal relationship to the idea of whiteness in order to reveal some of its complexity in Canada and Australia. `Whiteness' as an abstraction has proved useful in moving the invisible norm to visibility, but we show how an awareness of `whiteness' in the two locations can be recuperated to re-privilege the already privileged. Aboriginal speakers and writers have theorized `whiteness', in many cases from outside the academy, in the process `hybridizing' traditional genres. For many of them, Aboriginality, like whiteness, is a construct that often stands in the way of thinking clearly about where to go next in the fight against racism. (shrink)

People with disabilities use more medical care and see health professionals more often than do those of the same age, ethnic group, or economic class who do not have impairments. An indisputable medical goal is.

I argue for adopting a conception of obligation that is broader than the conception commonly adopted by moral philosophers. According to this broader conception, the crucial marks of an obligatory action are, first, that the reasons for the obliged party to perform the action include an exclusionary reason and, second, that the obliged party is the appropriate target of blaming reactive attitudes, if they inexcusably fail to perform the obligatory action. An obligation is directed if the exclusionary reason depends on (...) the relationship between the obliged person and the person to whom they owe the obligatory action, and the latter person is positioned to personally blame the obligated person for inexcusably failing to perform the obligatory action. Some direc- ted obligations are not owed as a matter of right, and the person to whom the obligatory action is owed is the only person positioned to blame nonperformance. Other directed obligations are owed as a matter of right, and people who are not part of the relationship grounding the obligation nevertheless are also positioned to (impersonally) blame non-performance. Only the rights-based form of directed obligation has received signifi- cant attention from moral philosophers, yet the former—which is at the heart of what I call “personal bonds”—is a pervasive and significant theme of our ordinary interpersonal lives. (shrink)

What exactly is hope and how does it influence our decisions? In How We Hope, Adrienne Martin presents a novel account of hope, the motivational resources it presupposes, and its function in our practical lives. She contends that hoping for an outcome means treating certain feelings, plans, and imaginings as justified, and that hope thereby involves sophisticated reflective and conceptual capacities. Martin develops this original perspective on hope--what she calls the "incorporation analysis"--in contrast to the two dominant philosophical conceptions (...) of hope: the orthodox definition, where hoping for an outcome is simply desiring it while thinking it possible, and agent-centered views, where hoping for an outcome is setting oneself to pursue it. In exploring how hope influences our decisions, she establishes that it is not always a positive motivational force and can render us complacent. She also examines the relationship between hope and faith, both religious and secular, and identifies a previously unnoted form of hope: normative or interpersonal hope. When we place normative hope in people, we relate to them as responsible agents and aspire for them to overcome challenges arising from situation or character. Demonstrating that hope merits rigorous philosophical investigation, both in its own right and in virtue of what it reveals about the nature of human emotion and motivation, How We Hope offers an original, sustained look at a largely neglected topic in philosophy. (shrink)

In cases of identity crowding, a subject consciously sees items in a figure, even though they are presented too closely together for her to shift attention to each item. Block uses such cases to challenge the view that attention is necessary for consciousness. I argue that in identity crowding cases, subjects really do attend to the items. Specifically, they attend to the figure as a global object that contains the individual items as parts. To support this view, I provide evidence (...) that attention can be directed to a global object or a local object. My response helps to defend the view that attention is necessary for conscious perception. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe standard view in philosophy of mind is that the way to understand the difference between perception and misperception is in terms of accuracy. On this view, perception is accurate while...

This article defends a theory of diffuse attention and distinguishes it from focal attention. My view is motivated by evidence from psychology and neuroscience, which suggests that we can deploy visual selective attention in at least two ways: by focusing on a small number of items, or by diffusing attention over a group of items taken as a whole. I argue that diffuse attention is selective and can be object‐based. It enables a subject to select an object to guide behavior, (...) albeit in a different way than focusing does. (shrink)

Some ethicists assert that there is a consensus that maximising medical outcomes takes precedence as a principle of resource allocation in emergency triage of absolutely scarce resources. But the nature of the current severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus 2 pandemic and the history of debate about balancing equity and efficiency in resource allocation do not support this assertion. I distinguish a number of concerns with justice and balancing considerations that should play a role in critical care triage policy, focusing on (...) discrimination and on fundamental egalitarian and social justice concerns. (shrink)

The increasing use of opioid treatment agreements has prompted debate within the medical community about ethical challenges with respect to their implementation. The focus of debate is usually on the efficacy of OTAs at reducing opioid misuse, how OTAs may undermine trust between physicians and patients and the potential coercive nature of requiring patients to sign such agreements as a condition for receiving pain care. An important consideration missing from these conversations is the potential for racial bias in the current (...) way that OTAs are incorporated into clinical practice and in the amount of physician discretion that current opioid guidelines support. While the use of OTAs has become mandatory in some states for certain classes of patients, physicians are still afforded great leeway in how these OTAs are implemented in clinical practice and how their terms should be enforced. This paper uses the guidelines provided for OTA implementation by the states of Indiana and Pennsylvania as case studies in order to argue that giving physicians certain kinds of discretion may exacerbate racial health disparities. This problem cannot simply be addressed by minimising physician discretion in general, but rather by providing mechanisms to hold physicians accountable for how they treat patients on long-term opioid therapy to ensure that such treatment is equitable. There are no data in this work. (shrink)

The feminist in academe, says Paula Bennett, is like Procne married to Tereus, "inextricably wedded to the sources of her harm." An ethical justification of academic feminism can be found, not in cooperation and affiliation, but in the strategies currently necessary to ensure curricular and cultural diversity. Historically contextualized and strategically politicized, this ethic is founded on the claim that universities are places where we may all learn to know what is other than ourselves.

Attention seems to raise a problem for pure representationalism, the view that phenomenal content supervenes on representational content. The problem is that shifts of attention sometimes seem to bring about a change in phenomenal content without a change in representational content. I argue that the representationalist can meet this challenge, but that doing so requires a new view of the representational content of perception. On this new view, the representational content of perception is always relative to a way of attending. (...) I call this the attention-indexed view of perceptual content. (shrink)

Are the small and indolent cancers found in abundance in cancer screening normal variations, risk factors, or disease? Naturalists in philosophy of medicine turn to pathophysiological findings to decide such questions objectively. To understand the role of pathophysiological findings in disease definition, we must understand how they mislead in diagnostic reasoning. Participants on all sides of the definition of disease debate attempt to secure objectivity via reductionism. These reductivist routes to objectivity are inconsistent with the Bayesian nature of clinical reasoning; (...) when they appeal to the sciences, they are inconsistent with what philosophy of biology tells us about its natural kinds. Proposals that we narrow the scope of our claims in the disease definition debates are useful, but paradigms can still distort our reasoning in particular cases, even when we are self-conscious about their status. (shrink)

The seriousness of the risk that healthcare workers faced during SARS, and their response of service in the face of this risk, brings to light unrealistic assumptions about duty and risk that informed the debate on duty to care in the early years of HIV/AIDS. Duty to care is not based upon particular virtues of the health professions, but arises from social reflection on what response to an epidemic would be consistent with our values and our needs, recognizing our shared (...) vulnerability to disease and death. Such reflection underwrites a strong duty of care, but one not to be borne solely by the altruism and heroism of individual healthcare workers. (shrink)

Purpose– This paper aims to consider selected results from the Arts and Humanities Research Council -funded “Managing Access to the internet in Public Libraries” project, from 2012-2014. MAIPLE has explored the ways in which public library services manage use of the internet connections that they provide for the public. This included the how public library services balance their legal obligations and the needs of their communities in a public space and the ethical dilemmas that arise.Design/methodology/approach– The researchers used a mixed-method (...) approach involving a review of the literature, legal analysis, a questionnaire survey and case studies in five public library authorities.Findings– UK public library services use a range of methods to regulate internet access. The research also confirms previous findings that filtering software is an ubiquitous tool for controlling access to and protecting library users from “inappropriate”, illegal and harmful internet content. There is a general, if sometimes reluctant, acceptance of filtering software as a practical tool by library staff, which seems to contrast with professional codes of ethics and attitudes in other countries. The research indicates that public library internet access will be a valued service for some time to come, but that some aspects of how public library services regulate internet access is currently managed can have socially undesirable consequences, including blocking legitimate sites and preventing users from accessing government services. Education could play a greater part in helping the general population to exercise judgement in selection of materials to view and use. This does not preclude implementing stricter controls to protect children, whilst allowing public libraries to continue providing a social good to those who are unable to otherwise participate in the digital age.Research limitations/implications– The response to the survey was 39 per cent meaning that findings may not apply across the whole of the UK. The findings of this study are compared with and supplemented by other quantitative sources, but a strength of this study is the depth of understanding afforded by the use of case studies.Originality/value– This paper provides both a quantitative and qualitative analysis of how internet access is managed in UK public libraries, including how library services fulfil their legal obligations and the ethical implications of how they balance their role in facilitating access to information with their perceived role as a safe and trusted environment for all members of their communities. The findings add to the international discussion on this issue and stimulate debate and policy making in the UK. (shrink)

This conceptual review seeks to reframe the view of academic integrity as something to be enforced to an academic skill that needs to be developed. The authors highlight how practices within academia create an environment where feelings of inadequacy thrive, leading to behaviours of unintentional academic misconduct. Importantly, this review includes practical suggestions to help educators and higher education institutions support doctoral students’ academic integrity skills. In particular, the authors highlight the importance of explicit academic integrity instruction, support for the (...) development of academic literacy skills, and changes in supervisory practices that encourage student and supervisor reflexivity. Therefore, this review argues that, through the use of these practical strategies, academia can become a space where a culture of academic integrity can flourish. (shrink)

It is gratifying that thoughtful philosophers and bioethicists like Mahowald and Nelson are continuing to address the objections to prenatal testing that have been made by disability scholars and advocates. But it is frustrating to see those objections presented in ways that reflect the doubts of those who reject them more than the intentions of those who make them, in ways that make those objections appear censorious toward pregnant women and prospective parents or naïve about nonverbal expression. We recognize that (...) disability critics share the responsibility for these misunderstandings, that their objections to prenatal disability testing have not always been made as clearly or consistently as they might have been. We therefore welcome this opportunity for clarification and rebuttal. Briefly, we will argue against Mahowald that it is not apparent how prospective parents could have a duty to potential offspring requiring them to prevent the birth of any child expected to have a life worth living. And we will remind Nelson that our primary concern is with the perpetuation of stigma; that even if any reason for abortion can be framed in terms of a trait of the fetus to be aborted, only certain reasons for abortion are based on the rejection of future children because of stigmatized traits. (shrink)

PurposeSocial exclusion as a result of gender, race, and class inequality is perhaps one of the most pressing challenges associated with the development of a diverse information technology workforce. Women remain under represented in the IT workforce and college majors that prepare students for IT careers. Research on the under representation of women in IT typically assumes women to be homogeneous in nature, something that blinds the research to variation that exists among women. This paper aims to address these issues.Design/methodology/approachThe (...) paper challenges the assumption of heterogeneity by investigating how the intersection of gender, race, and class identities shape the experiences of Black female IT workers and learners in the USA.FindingsThe results of this meta‐analysis offer new ways of theorizing that provide nuanced understanding of social exclusion and varied emancipatory practices in reaction to shared group exposure to oppression.Originality/valueThis study on the under‐representation of women as IT workers and learners in the USA considers race and class as equally important factors for understanding variation among women. In addition, this paper provides rich insights into the experiences of Black women, a group that is largely absent from the research on gender and IT. (shrink)

In Canada, laws and policies consistently reject the commodification of human organs and tissues, and Canadian practice is consistent with international standards in this regard. Until the Assisted Human Reproduction Act of 2004, gamete donation in Canada was an exception: Canadians could pay and be paid open market rates for gametes for use in in vitro fertilization. As sections of the AHR Act forbidding payment for gametes and permitting only reimbursement of receipted expenses gradually came into effect in 2005, Canada (...) did away with this anomaly. Medical practice and legal prohibitions in assisted human reproduction are now consistent with other areas of medicine where tissues and organs are taken from one person to benefit others: Altruistic donation, rather than selling and buying, will be the norm. (shrink)

The interrogation of Meletus in the Apology at 24c4–28al is not infrequently seen as a typical case of all that is intellectually and artistically dissatisfying in Plato's practice of the genre of philosophical dialogue: not only are we presented with a philosopher who makes some claim to being committed to setting a particularly stringent standard for honesty in argumentation making sophistical arguments, but we are presented also with a cardboard interlocutor who is forced by the hand of Plato to acquiesce (...) to those arguments in a fashion that is completely dissatisfying to the reader. The best anyone seems to do to save Plato from these charges of artistic incompetence and intellectual dishonesty is to appeal to such a level of historical accuracy for the text that the stupidity of Meletus' responses can be attributed to the stupidity of Meletus himself, or to point out features of the political and legal situation that might prevent Meletus from answering the questions by drawing on his true motivation—which is presumably more coherent. Taylor says of this passage:The humour of the situation is that the prosecutor cannot venture to say what he means by either of his charges without betraying the fact that, owing to the ‘amnesty’, the matters complained of are outside of the competency of the court… Hence, when Meletus is pressed to explain what he means, he has to take refuge in puerile nonsense. (shrink)

Some argue that the concept of medical need is inadequate to inform the design of a universal health care system—particularly an institutional rather than a residual system. They argue that the concept contradicts the idea of comprehensiveness; leads to unsustainable expenditures; is too indeterminate for policy; and supports only a prioritarian distribution. I argue that ‘comprehensive’ understood as ‘including the full continuum of care’ and ‘medically necessary’ understood as ‘prioritized by medical criteria’ are not contradictory, and that UHC is a (...) solution to the problem of sustainability, not its cause. Those who criticize ‘medical need’ for indeterminacy are not transparent about the source of their commitment to their standards of determinacy: they promote standards that are higher than is necessary for legitimate policy, ignoring opportunity costs. Furthermore, the indeterminacy of concepts affects all risk-sharing systems and all systems that rely on medical standard of care. I then argue that the concept of need in itself does not imply a minimal sufficientist standard or a prioritarian distribution; neither does the idea of legitimate public policy dictate that public services be minimalist. The policy choice for a system of health care that is comprehensive and offers as good care as can be achieved when delivered on equal terms and conditions for all is a coherent option. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:I Had Never Heard Someone Use That Word BeforeAdrienne Feller NovickThe patient was dying. As the social worker, I had arranged the meeting and sat shoulder to shoulder with the family and the attending physician in the small nondescript room. The family was grief-stricken and asked intelligent questions as they made difficult decisions about end-of-life care for their loved one. The doctor spoke with gentle kindness, acknowledging their difficult (...) decision as he completed the neon pink Medical Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment (MOLST) form and left the room. I was tangled up with emotions; I felt relieved that the meeting had gone smoothly, sad for the patient and family, and in awe of the doctor for his ability to lead the difficult conversation. I stayed behind to ask the family if there was anything I could do to help them. [End Page E4]Before I could speak, the patient's wife turned to me and said, "I am so glad that k--- left the room." (Using a derogatory word for a person of the Jewish faith). My brain began processing the statement. I am a Jewish woman. Did I hear that right? Did she say what I think she said? Should I say something? I froze, and time seemed to stop. She was looking at me expectantly, waiting for a response. Her face reminded me of someone waiting for the other person to return a "high five." I was flooded with emotion. A succession of thoughts ran through my head, everything from being rude in response or getting physical. I did neither. I said nothing. I smiled and left the room feeling like I had been gut-punched.I was in denial. I made excuses for the wife; she was stressed. I kept thinking I must not have heard her correctly and that I was overreacting. I continued to work with the family as though nothing had happened until the patient died five days later. I felt ashamed and never told anyone about what happened. I regretted not saying anything. I replayed the conversation in my mind and felt depressed and angry. Inside I felt complicit for not speaking up, but I had no words. I assumed bias in healthcare was rare. I did nothing.Years later, after I completed a patient visit in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), I observed a group of surgical residents doing rounds. The attending welcomed me to join this valuable clinical learning experience. As the group approached the next bed, the patient pointed to one resident and loudly said, "I don't want a doctor who looks like that to come near me." I gasped aloud and froze, waiting to see what would happen next. The attending looked directly at the patient and said calmly, "We are all here to help you. That is not an appropriate thing for you to say." Then, he turned to the resident and nodded, directing them to resume their bedside assessment. The patient mumbled something inaudibly and said nothing.To my astonishment, the doctor acknowledged the microaggression (a microaggression is a statement, action, or incident regarded as discrimination), addressed the issue, respectfully supported the resident, created a safe space for everyone on the healthcare team and resumed quality patient care without missing a beat. He modeled a strategy to address patient bias and taught a valuable skill. This was a learning moment for me. It helped me refocus my past experience and provided me with a useful strategy to address bias in the future.As a member of the medical ethics consultation service, I listen, provide support, and aid in challenging communications. I had the opportunity to model the communication strategy I acquired in the ICU. The medical ethics team was consulted for a patient refusing treatment. The patient was disrespectful to healthcare team members, cursing at nurses and residents, using ethnic slurs, and saying he "would rather die than let one of them touch him. I entered the patient's room with the healthcare team, introduced myself, and explained the reason for my visit. The patient defiantly agreed he had used slurs, saying he wanted to go home. I continued, everyone here... (shrink)

In this paper, I outline a Kantian moral psychology and use it to generate an analysis of the emotional attitude, love. At the heart of this moral psychology is a distinction between rational and subrational motives, and the thesis that interpersonal emotional attitudes like love are governed by a norm of respect. I show how an analysis of love that relies on this moral psychology—which I call “the incorporation conception” of love—tightly fits with paradigmatic cases of romantic love, reveals both (...) the continuities and differences between romantic and other forms of love, and also explicates our ambivalence about certain cases. Finally, I argue that this analysis, although it sees love as essentially a bundle of volitions, has the resources to respond to both David Velleman’s and Niko Kolodny’s critiques of volition-based analyses of love. Taken as a whole, the discussion provides an argument for both this analysis of love and the moral psychology it presupposes. (shrink)

The interrogation of Meletus in the Apology at 24c4–28al is not infrequently seen as a typical case of all that is intellectually and artistically dissatisfying in Plato's practice of the genre of philosophical dialogue: not only are we presented with a philosopher who makes some claim to being committed to setting a particularly stringent standard for honesty in argumentation making sophistical arguments, but we are presented also with a cardboard interlocutor who is forced by the hand of Plato to acquiesce (...) to those arguments in a fashion that is completely dissatisfying to the reader. The best anyone seems to do to save Plato from these charges of artistic incompetence and intellectual dishonesty is to appeal to such a level of historical accuracy for the text that the stupidity of Meletus' responses can be attributed to the stupidity of Meletus himself, or to point out features of the political and legal situation that might prevent Meletus from answering the questions by drawing on his true motivation—which is presumably more coherent. Taylor says of this passage: The humour of the situation is that the prosecutor cannot venture to say what he means by either of his charges without betraying the fact that, owing to the ‘amnesty’, the matters complained of are outside of the competency of the court… Hence, when Meletus is pressed to explain what he means, he has to take refuge in puerile nonsense. (shrink)