Through its adoption of the biomedical model of disease which promotes medical individualism and its reliance on the individual-based anthropology, mainstream bioethics has predominantly focused on respect for autonomy in the clinical setting and respect for person in the research site, emphasizing self-determination and freedom of choice. However, the emphasis on the individual has often led to moral vacuum, exaggeration of human agency, and a thin (liberal?) conception of justice. Applied to resource-poor countries and communities within developed countries, autonomy-based bioethics (...) fails to address the root causes of diseases and public health crises with which individuals or communities are confronted. A sociological explanation of disease causation is needed to broaden principles of biomedical ethics and provides a renewed understanding of disease, freedom, medical practice, patient-physician relationship, risk and benefit of research and treatment, research priorities, and health policy. (shrink)
In this paper I examine Chalmers and Jackson’s defence of the a priori entailment thesis, that is, the claim that microphysical truths a priori entail ordinary non-phenomenal truths such as ‘water covers 60% of the Earth surface’, which they use as a premise for an argument against the possibility of a reductive explanation of consciousness. Their argument relies on a certain view about the possession conditions of macroscopic concepts such as WATER, known as ascriptivism. In the paper I distinguish two (...) versions of ascriptivism: reductive versus non-reductive ascriptivism. According to reductive ascriptivism, competent users of a concept have the ability to infer truths involving such concept from lower-level truths, whereas according to non-reductive ascriptivism, all that is required in order to be a competent user of a concept is to be able to infer truths involving that concept from other truths, which need not be lower-level truths. I argue, first, that the a priori entailment thesis is committed to reductive ascriptivism, and secondly, that reductive ascriptivism is problematic because it trivializes the notion of a priori knowledge. Therefore, I conclude that Chalmers and Jackson have not presented a convincing case for the claim that microphysical truths entail ordinary non-phenomenal truths a priori, especially when we understand this claim in the sense that is relevant for their argument against the possibility of a reductive explanation of consciousness. (shrink)
Bernard Lonergan's cognitive theory challenges us to raise questions about both the cognitive process through which obesity is perceived as a behaviour change issue and the objectivity of such a moral judgment. Lonergan's theory provides the theoretical tools to affirm that anti-fat discrimination, in the United States of America and in many industrialized countries, is the result of both a group bias that resists insights into the good of other groups and a general bias of anti-intellectualism that tends to set (...) common sense against insights that require any thorough scientific analyses. While general bias diverts the public's attention away from the true aetiology of obesity, group bias sustains an anti-fat culture that subtly legitimates discriminatory practices and policies against obese people. Although anti-discrimination laws may seem to be a reasonable way of protecting obese and overweight individuals from discrimination, obesity bias can be best addressed by reframing the obesity debate from an environmental perspective from which tools and strategies to address both the social and individual determinants of obesity can be developed. Attention should not be concentrated on individuals' behaviour as it is related to lifestyle choices, without giving due consideration to the all-encompassing constraining factors which challenge the social and rational blindness of obesity bias. (shrink)
There is increasing consensus that the right to health can provide ethical, policy and practical groundings for health systems development. The goals of the right to health are congruent with those of health systems development, which are about strengthening health promotion organizations and actions so as to improve public health. The poor shape and performance of health systems in Chad question the extent of realization of the right to health. Due to its comprehensiveness and inclusiveness, the right to health has (...) the potential of being an organizational and a normative backbone for public health policy and practice. It can then be understood and studied as an integral component of health systems development. (shrink)
Good nutrition plays an important role in the optimal growth, development, health and well-being of individuals in all stages of life. Healthy eating can reduce the risk of chronic diseases, such as heart disease, stroke, diabetes and some types of cancer. However, the capitalist mindset that shapes the food environment has led to the commoditization of food. Food is not just a marketable commodity like any other commodity. Food is different from other commodities on the market in that it is (...) explicitly and intrinsically linked to our human existence. While possessing another commodity allows for social benefits, food ensures survival. Millions of people in United States of America are either malnourished or food insecure. The purpose of this paper is to present a critique of the current food system using four meanings of the common good--as a framework, rhetorical device, ethical concept and practical tool for social justice. The first section of this paper provides a general overview of the notion of the common good. The second section outlines how each of the four meanings of the common good helps us understand public practices, social policies and market values that shape the distal causal factors of nutritious food inaccessibility. We then outline policy and empowerment initiatives for nutritious food access. (shrink)
Universal access to antiretroviral treatment (ART) in Chad was officially declared in December 2006. This presidential initiative was and is still funded 100% by the country’s budget and external donors’ financial support. Many factors have triggered the spread of AIDS. Some of these factors include the existence of norms and beliefs that create or increase exposure, the low-level education that precludes access to health information, social unrest, and population migration to areas of high economic opportunities and gender-based discrimination. Social forces (...) that influence the distribution of dimensions of well-being and shape risks for infection also determine the persistence of access barriers to ART. The universal access policy is quite revolutionary but should be informed by the systemic barriers to access so as to promote equity. It is not enough to distribute ARVs and provide health services when health systems are poorly organized and managed. Comprehensive access to ART raises many organizational, ethical and policy problems that need to be solved to achieve equity in access. This paper argues that the persistence of access barriers is due to weak health systems and a poor public health leadership. AIDS has challenged health systems in a manner that is essentially different from other health problems. (shrink)
The ethical and legal challenges posed by assisted reproduction techniques are both profound and breathtaking, with most societies unable to fully comprehend one technique before another one, even more daring, emerges. The wrongful implantation of embryos in two women undergoing in vitro fertilisation treatments at two separate clinics in the UK seriously vitiates the traditional concept of who is a parent. In one case, a patient’s embryos were wrongly implanted into another woman seeking similar treatment, and in the second, a (...) woman’s eggs were fertilised using sperm from a man other than her husband.In the first mix-up, neither member of the recipient couple was the genetic parent of the child, while in the second case, the recipient mother was the genetic mother and her husband was not the genetic father. The mix-ups resulted in litigation to determine who the rightful parents were. First, I will show in this paper that, although the outcome of the application of English law in both cases was in agreement with the outcome prescribed by basic principles of Islamic law and bioethics, that agreement is based on different reasoning in the two traditions. Next, I will show that the profound ethical implications of reproductive technologies begs for a more pluralistic bioethical discourse than the one-dimensional analysis applied by secular Western societies that currently dominates the enquiry, particularly as most Western societies are more or less multicultural and multireligious. (shrink)
In the context of understanding Nature’s Contribution to People, this article explores the Mapuche value system and its contributions to living well by conserving nature. Through the context-specific approach, the findings shows that the Mapuche Az-Mapu is important for bio-cultural conservation in Chile. Deepening understanding of the distinct Mapuche value system shows the importance of rights and sovereignty for other coastal stateless nations who are enhancing bio-cultural conservation around the world. The article explores the importance of maintaining Mapuche values in (...) the context of Indigenous Marine Areas in Chile and linking to land-based rights. This research makes use of semi structured interviews and intercultural dialogue among the authors, to understand how traditional Mapuche concepts under the framework of Az-Mapu, are continued today in local marine conservation and other ecosystems. In this context, we ask how well these eudemonic relational values resonate with Mapuche values of nature. This article shows that rights for the marine environment can be expanded to additionally allow indigenous communities safeguard wetlands, lakes and forests which are indivisible under Az-Mapu. Greater recognition of this different form of valuation can better account for the dynamic relations between individuals, cultures, and ecosystems, as well as showing the importance in allowing indigenous communities to take back control of conservation under their own terms. (shrink)
The aim of this paper is to investigate the variety of symmetric closure algebras, that is, closure algebras endowed with a De Morgan operator. Some general properties are derived. Particularly, the lattice of subvarieties of the subvariety of monadic symmetric algebras is described and an equational basis for each subvariety is given.
Inspired by a Danez Smith poem, this essay is a ‘little prayer’ for LGBTQIA+ people and organizers to be able to collectively grieve the family and friends they have lost, the relations they had to end, the social privileges they never had, or lost before and after sharing their queerness. It argues for the militant force of this slow-paced, ghostly, and ambiguous grief in queer lives, and in the LGBTQIA+ movements in Turkey and elsewhere. The author draws on 4 years (...) of organizing at Boysan’s House – a living memory space, and community hub in Istanbul – and the 12-hour oral history conducted with Mother Sema, who has been mobilizing her motherhood and her grief as a pro-LGBTQIA+ organizer since 2006. The essay suggests that ambiguous grief can be relearned and re-membered as a radically transformative force that is already constitutive of queer communities. It situates the histories and presents of Mother Sema and Boysan’s House amid diverse experiences of resilience and resistance through motherhood, queer kin making, and mourning. In so doing, the essay builds on the militant activisms of the Saturday Mothers/people, the Peace Mothers, the organized family members of LGBTQIA+ people, and the trans communities in Turkey. It is thus an inquiry into ways of housing and transforming ambiguous grief in the LGBTQIA+ movement, in the post-July 2016 coup attempt Turkey. (shrink)
The paper offers a philosophically infused analysis of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. The main idea is that McCarthy’s novel is primarily a statement on the meaning of life. Once this idea is argued for and endorsed, by using a parallel between The Road and a 19th century Hungarian dramatic poem, The Tragedy of Man, the paper goes on to argue that the most plausible – although admittedly not the only possible – interpretation of The Road is that it advocates a (...) religious account of the meaning of life that uses what I call a practical conception of God (that borrows some of its aspects from Kant’s philosophy of religion). (shrink)
