Der Buchtitel zitiert Goethes Prophetie im Faust I und verweist auf die „Banalität des Bösen“, die im 20. Jahrhundert zum breit diskutierten Thema wurde. Sowohl Philosophie als auch Literatur zeigen die Spuren auf, in denen „der Böse“ sich verflüchtigt hat, um einer Vielgesichtigkeit des Bösen Platz zu machen. Im Buch werden diese Prozesse anhand von einschlägigen Texten nachvollzogen. Sie bieten in Darstellung und Interpretation eine Tiefenanalyse der zunehmenden Verrohung der westlichen Kultur. Aus dem Inhalt: Der Pakt mit dem Teufel * (...) Goethes Faust * Amélie Nothomb: Böses Mädchen – Antéchrista * Jonathan Littell: Die Wohlgesinnten * Der künstliche Mensch * Der Golem * Cynthia Ozicks weiblicher Golem * Mary Shelley: Frankenstein * Nachdenken über das Böse * Das Böse als Möglichkeit bei Leibniz * Die Bedeutungslosigkeit des Bösen bei Herder * Die Entdeckung des radikal Bösen bei Kant * Das mythologisch begründete Böse bei Schelling * Die Kultur als Keimzelle allen Bösen bei Jean-Jacques Rousseau * Radikalisierung der Freiheit bei Jean-Paul Sartre * Der Verlust des Teufels bei Sören Kierkegaard * Die Schwermut bei Romano Guardini * Der Dialog wider das Böse bei Hannah Arendt * Die Bedeutung der Ehrfurcht bei Albert Schweitzer. (shrink)

In the dissertation I provide an account of action descriptions which emphasizes their role as explanations of consequences. By showing that consequences are ascribed to an action under a description, and only when that description can explain the consequence, I undermine the view that consequences are brute events. Roughly, I reason as follows. If consequences were brute events, then their ascription to an action wouldn't hinge on how we understand the action. We could, for instance, say in ordinary circumstances "John (...) tensed his finger" and as a consequence "Mary became a widow" without any untowardness at all. I show both that we do not do this and that we cannot do it. That we do not do it is supported primarily by linguistic intuitions; mainly I show that there is an infelicity in ascribing to an action a consequence which is not explained by that action. To support the claim that we cannot do this I argue that if there were no "fit" between action and consequence that would make communication difficult. ;I then use this characterization of action descriptions and consequences to serve as a criterion for identifying the privileged description of an action. Any one action may have several action descriptions. In light of this, there is a question raised about which, if any, of these descriptions is privileged. I show that within the wider social context there is a description of the action which is dominant. Then I argue that this description is and should be chosen in virtue of the explanatory power of action descriptions with respect to consequences. (shrink)

A collection of essays on the human genome, European patent law, cloning, and genetic malpractice suits.

To revitalize nursing science, there is a need for a new approach to guide nurse scientists in addressing complex problems in health care. By applying theoretical concepts from a revolutionary philosopher of science, Paul K. Feyerabend, new nursing knowledge can be produced using creativity and pluralistic approaches. Feyerabend proposed that methods within and outside of science can produce knowledge. Despite the recognition of Feyerabendian philosophy within science, there is currently a lack of literature regarding the relevance of Feyerabendian philosophy for (...) nursing science. We aim to (a) describe and critique Feyerabendian concepts, (b) discuss the potential application of Feyerabendian philosophy for knowledge production within gerontological nursing and (c) describe theoretical possibilities for nurse scientists in using Feyerabendian philosophy to guide nursing knowledge development. We begin by introducing Feyerabend's life and his inspirations for his theoretical concepts, epistemological anarchism, theoretical pluralism and humanitarianism, and conclude by offering suggestions of how to apply Feyerabendian philosophy in nursing research. (shrink)

To test if dreams contain remote or never-experienced motor skills, we collected during 6 weeks dream reports from 15 paraplegics and 15 healthy subjects. In 9/10 subjects with spinal cord injury and in 5/5 with congenital paraplegia, voluntary leg movements were reported during dream, including feelings of walking , running , dancing , standing up , bicycling , and practicing sports . Paraplegia patients experienced walking dreams just as often as controls . There was no correlation between the frequency of (...) walking dreams and the duration of paraplegia. In contrast, patients were rarely paraplegic in dreams. Subjects who had never walked or stopped walking 4–64 years prior to this study still experience walking in their dreams, suggesting that a cerebral walking program, either genetic or more probably developed via mirror neurons is reactivated during sleep. (shrink)

Meaningful participant engagement has been identified as a key contributor to the success of efforts to share data via a “Medical Information Commons”. We present findings from expert stakeholder interviews aimed at understanding barriers to engagement and the appropriate role of MIC participants. Although most interviewees supported engagement, they distinguished between individual versus collective forms. They also noted challenges including representation and perceived inefficiency, prompting reflection on political aspects of engagement and efficiency concerns.

Desire After Affect offers a detailed analysis of the affective turn and its consequences for the humanities.

A medical information commons is a networked data environment utilized for research and clinical applications. At three deliberations across the U.S., we engaged 75 adults in two-day facilitated discussions on the ethical and social issues inherent to sharing data with an MIC. Deliberants made recommendations regarding opt-in consent, transparent data policies, public representation on MIC governing boards, and strict data security and privacy protection. Community engagement is critical to earning the public's trust.

The prelims comprise: Introduction The Physician and the Provider Organization The Physician and the Payer Organization Dealing with Systems Conclusion Notes References.

Images That Move is concerned with how images take place in wider worlds: how they move around, via processes of transmission and uptake, but, equally importantly, how they move their audiences affectively. Images play a significant part in projects of "poetic world-making" and political transformation. They participate in the production of commensuration or of incommensurability, enact moments of prophecy or exposure, and attract or repel spectators' attention. Images move, then, but not just as they wish, and any examination of images (...) in motion must also recognise the blockages and breakdowns that prevent their movement as well as the enframings or "stickinesses" that trap them in particular places, prevent them from reaching others, or hedge their arrival in specific ways. The contributors explore topics ranging from high art to mass media, religious iconography to pornography, and popular photography to political cartoons in a range of contexts and media including photography in early twentieth century China, art and literature in contemporary South Africa, upscale real estate development in India, occult media images and the aesthetic of appearance in urban Indonesia, and film censorship in Nigeria. All of these instances of the visual continuum require different ways of highlighting and addressing the problematics of images in motion. Images That Move traces some of the tangled paths of images' travels and returns, unfolding their effects and aftereffects and scanning the diverse and variable publics-fixed or ephemeral, situated or dispersed-that these moving images call into being. Contributors: Ernst van Alphen, Christiane Brosius, Steven C. Caton, Finbarr Barry Flood, Brian Larkin, Oliver Moore, Rosalind C. Morris, Christopher Pinney, Patricia Spyer, Mary Margaret Steedly. (shrink)

Bioethics, clinical ethics, and professional ethics are mature, well-developed fields of applied ethics that focus on medical research, patient autonomy and patient care, patient–healthcare professional relationships, and issues that arise in clinical and other medical settings. However, despite these developments, little attention has been paid to the organizational aspects of healthcare in these fields. This is surprising, because in the last 30 years healthcare has become more and more institutionalized in provider, management, and insurer organizations. Despite JCAHO's preoccupation with organizational (...) ethics during the last decade, the philosophical underpinnings of their requirements have been less explored in the literature. Clinical ethics remains preoccupied with clinical patient care and professional ethics with individual professional guidelines; even the American College of Healthcare Executives focuses primarily on healthcare managers, not on healthcare organizations. (shrink)

Mammalian sex chromosomes exhibit marked sexual dimorphism in behavior during gametogenesis. During oogenesis, the X chromosomes pair and participate in unrestricted recombination; both are transcriptionally active. However, during spermatogenesis the X and Y chromosomes experience spatial restriction of pairing and recombination, are transcriptionally inactive, and form a chromatin domain that is markedly different from that of the autosomes. Thus the male germ cell has to contend with the potential loss of X‐encoded gene products, and it appears that coping strategies have (...) evolved. Genetic control of sex‐chromosome inactivation during spermatogenesis does not involve pairing or the presence of the Y chromosome or an intact X chromosome, and may therefore be under exogenous control by the gonad. Sex‐chromosome reactivation during oogenesis and inactivation during spermatogenesis probably reflect specific meiotic events such as recombination. Understanding these phenomena may help explain other sex‐related differences in genetic recombination. (shrink)

Drawing on a landscape analysis of existing data-sharing initiatives, in-depth interviews with expert stakeholders, and public deliberations with community advisory panels across the U.S., we describe features of the evolving medical information commons. We identify participant-centricity and trustworthiness as the most important features of an MIC and discuss the implications for those seeking to create a sustainable, useful, and widely available collection of linked resources for research and other purposes.

The current situation amidst the pandemic has caused such negativities to people, especially among students. It has affected thewell-being and happiness that everyone experiences. In, on the other hand, students who were enrolled amidst the pandemic were more likely to experience mental exhaustion such as anxiety and depression, as this current situation limits and affect their academic performances and the level of happiness they feel. This study investigates the relationship between happiness and depression among senior high school students here in (...) the Philippines. The findings revealed a significant correlation between happiness and depression (r=0.041). (shrink)

In his essay on Seneca, T.S. Eliot used theHercules Furens as his example to illustrate ‘this curious freak of non-theatrical drama’. Even though Senecan scholarship has by and large moved away from his indictment, the sense that the attention seems to be directed away from the stage points to the play's unique dramaturgy. The surest indicator of this reverse orientation is the conspicuous absence of Hercules himself for much of the play. Hercules is permanently ‘elsewhere’. His entrance is delayed for (...) a long time; once home, he rushes offstage after a few lines to kill Lycus. He returns onstage only to be attacked by madness, and is drawn inside the palace again to kill his wife and sons. When his madness abates, he falls asleep onstage; on waking, he longs for a place beyond the known world and finally exits into exile. This article proposes a closer examination of the semiotics of space, especially the symbolic value of the offstage. Seneca is constantly drawing attention to the pull towards the stage perimeter and the unseen offstage, characterizing the cosmic nature of Hercules’ conflict with Juno and questioning the hero's place in the world as the son of an immortal father. (shrink)