2021 marks Dylan's 80th birthday and his 60th year in the music world. It invites us to look back on his career and the multitudes that it contains. Is he a song and dance man? A political hero? A protest singer? A self-portrait artist who has yet to paint his masterpiece? Is he Shakespeare in the alley? The greatest living exponent of American music? An ironsmith? Internet radio DJ? Poet (who knows it)? Is he a spiritual and religious parking meter? (...) Judas? The voice of a generation or a false prophet, jokerman, and thief? Dylan is all these and none. The essays in this book explore the Nobel laureate’s masks, collectively reflecting upon their meaning through time, change, movement, and age. They are written by wonderful and diverse set of contributors, all here for his 80th birthday bash: celebrated Dylanologists like Michael Gray and Laura Tenschert; recording artists such as Robyn Hitchcock, Barb Jungr, Amy Rigby, and Emma Swift; and 'the professors’ who all like his looks: David Boucher, Anne Margaret Daniel, Ray Monk, Galen Strawson, and more. Read it on your toaster! (shrink)

A categorical, higher dimensional algebra and generalized topos framework for Łukasiewicz–Moisil Algebraic–Logic models of non-linear dynamics in complex functional genomes and cell interactomes is proposed. Łukasiewicz–Moisil Algebraic–Logic models of neural, genetic and neoplastic cell networks, as well as signaling pathways in cells are formulated in terms of non-linear dynamic systems with n-state components that allow for the generalization of previous logical models of both genetic activities and neural networks. An algebraic formulation of variable ‘next-state functions’ is extended to a Łukasiewicz–Moisil (...) Topos with an n-valued Łukasiewicz–Moisil Algebraic Logic subobject classifier description that represents non-random and non-linear network activities as well as their transformations in developmental processes and carcinogenesis. The unification of the theories of organismic sets, molecular sets and Robert Rosen’s (M,R)-systems is also considered here in terms of natural transformations of organismal structures which generate higher dimensional algebras based on consistent axioms, thus avoiding well known logical paradoxes occurring with sets. Quantum bionetworks, such as quantum neural nets and quantum genetic networks, are also discussed and their underlying, non-commutative quantum logics are considered in the context of an emerging Quantum Relational Biology. (shrink)

This paper reviews the literature concerning the neural correlates of the self, the relationship between self and memory and the profile of memory impairments in Alzheimer’s disease and explores the relationship between the preservation of the self and anosognosia in this condition. It concludes that a potential explanation for anosognosia in AD is a lack of updating of personal information due to the memory impairments characteristic of this disease. We put forward the hypothesis that anosognosia is due in part to (...) the “petrified self.”. (shrink)

In the outpatient ultrasound suite of a major urban medical center, the mood is somber. A young woman lies tense and anxious. Pregnant for the first time, she has experienced early first-trimester bleeding. The radiologist relates the ultrasound findings: there has been a small hemorrhage, but there is a six-week-size fetus with normal cardiac activity. Translation: the baby is alive! The woman quietly sobs, happy but apprehensive.Across the drive, in the main hospital building, a young boy lies unresponsively comatose in (...) the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. He was hit by a car while riding his bicycle. He is relying on a ventilator to breath, but his cardiovascular system is supporting itself. After a series... (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Despite sustained attention to ethical leadership in organizations, scholarship remains largely descriptive. This study employs an empirical approach to examine the consequences of ethical leadership on leader promotability. From a sample of ninety-six managers from two independent organizations, we found that ethical leaders were increasingly likely to be rated by their superior as exhibiting potential to reach senior leadership positions. However, leaders who displayed increased ethical leadership were no more likely to be viewed as promotable in the near-term compared to (...) those who displayed less ethical leadership. Our findings also show ethical culture and pressure to achieve results are important contextual factors that moderate the relationships between ethical leadership and leader promotability to senior leadership roles. (shrink)

An overview of the following three related papers in this issue presents the Emergence of Highly Complex Systems such as living organisms, man, society and the human mind from the viewpoint of the current Ontological Theory of Levels. The ontology of spacetime structures in the Universe is discussed beginning with the quantum level; then, the striking emergence of the higher levels of reality is examined from a categorical—relational and logical viewpoint. The ontological problems and methodology aspects discussed in the first (...) two papers are followed by a rigorous paper based on Category Theory, Algebraic Topology and Logic that provides a conceptual and mathematical basis for a Categorical Ontology Theory of Levels. The essential links and relationships between the following three papers of this issue are pointed out, and further possible developments are being considered. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has led a number of countries to introduce restrictive ‘lockdown’ policies on their citizens in order to control infection spread. Immunity passports have been proposed as a way of easing the harms of such policies, and could be used in conjunction with other strategies for infection control. These passports would permit those who test positive for COVID-19 antibodies to return to some of their normal behaviours, such as travelling more freely and returning to work. The introduction of (...) immunity passports raises a number of practical and ethical challenges. In this paper, we seek to review the challenges relating to various practical considerations, fairness issues, the risk to social cooperation and the impact on people’s civil liberties. We make tentative recommendations for the ethical introduction of immunity passports. (shrink)

On 8 October 2020, the British Medical Association published the results of its survey of BMA members on physician-assisted dying. With 28 986 respondents, this was one of the largest surveys of medical opinion on this topic ever carried out. This represents 19.35% of those who received an invitation to participate and the respondents were broadly representative of the BMA’s overall membership. The BMA was clear throughout this process that the results of the survey would not determine its policy. Its (...) current policy of opposition to all forms of physician-assisted dying would remain unless and until the Representative Body, which makes BMA policy, decided otherwise. The survey results would, however, inform a future debate on policy, currently scheduled to take place in June 2021. When asked what the BMA’s position should be on whether there should be a change in the law to allow doctors to prescribe drugs for an eligible patient to self-administer to end their own life, 40% said the BMA should be supportive, 33% opposed, 21% thought the BMA should be neutral and 6% were undecided. In relation to their own personal views, 50% were supportive, 39% opposed and 11% undecided. When asked whether they would be willing to participate in some way in the process, if it were to be legalised, 36% said yes, 45% said no and 19% were undecided. The same three questions were asked about a change in the law to allow doctors to administer drugs to end the life of an eligible patient. In response, 40% thought the BMA should oppose such a change, 30% thought the BMA should be supportive and 23% thought the BMA should be neutral; 7% of members responding were undecided on this question. In …. (shrink)

In this article, we outline a novel approach to understanding the role of responsibility in health promotion. Efforts to tackle chronic disease have led to an emphasis on personal responsibility and the identification of ways in which people can ‘take responsibility’ for their health by avoiding risk factors such as smoking and over-eating. We argue that the extent to which agents can be considered responsible for their health-related behaviour is limited, and as such, state health promotion which assumes certain forms (...) of moral responsibility should be avoided. This indicates that some approaches to health promotion ought not to be employed. We suggest, however, that another form of responsibility might be more appropriately identified. This is based on the claim that agents have prudential reasons to maintain their health, in order to pursue those things which make their lives go well—i.e. that maintenance of a certain level of health is rational for many agents, given their pleasures and plans. On this basis, we propose that agents have a self-regarding prudential responsibility to maintain their health. We outline the implications of a prudential responsibility approach to health promotion. (shrink)

The ACA shifted U.S. health policy from centering on principles of actuarial fairness toward social solidarity. Yet four legal fixtures of the health care system have prevented the achievement of social solidarity: federalism, fiscal pluralism, privatization, and individualism. Future reforms must confront these fixtures to realize social solidarity in health care, American-style.

I Propose to re-explore here some aspects of a very shop-worn question: ‘Was Hobbes in any sense an atheist?’ Three centuries ago, Hobbes's personal security in part depended on the way his contemporaries answered this question; today, the validity of several current accounts of his philosophy are similarly bound up with it. These accounts vary extraordinarily, all the way from Polin's confident assertion that ‘ pour qui sait lire entre les lignes, … c'est ľatheísme qui triomphe implicitement ’, to Taylor's (...) equally firm belief that ‘a certain kind of theism is necessary to make [Hobbes's] theory work.’ 1 And now the latest of the Taylorians, Prof. Howard Warrender, has published his book The Political Philosophy of Hobbes , in which Hobbes's statements regarding the place of God are again treated as an essential part of his theory; and the charge explicitly made, that there are no sound grounds for regarding them as ‘the product of confusion or pretence on Hobbes's part’. (shrink)

Health promotion efforts are commonly directed towards encouraging people to discard ‘unhealthy’ and adopt ‘healthy’ behaviours in order to tackle chronic disease. Typical targets for behaviour change interventions include diet, physical activity, smoking and alcohol consumption, sometimes described as ‘lifestyle behaviours.’ In this paper, I discuss how efforts to raise awareness of the impact of lifestyles on health, in seeking to communicate the need for people to change their behaviour, can contribute to a climate of ‘healthism’ and promote the moralisation (...) of people’s lifestyles. I begin by summarising recent trends in health promotion and introducing the notion of healthism, as described by Robert Crawford in the 1980s. One aspect of healthism is moralisation, which I outline and suggest is facilitated by efforts to promote health via information provision and educational strategies. I propose that perceived responsibility plays a role in mediating the tendency to moralise about health and behaviour. Since I argue that states ought to avoid direct and indirect moralisation of people’s health-related behaviour, this suggests states must be cautious with regard to the use of responsibility-indicating interventions to promote health. (shrink)

Combatting chronic, lifestyle-related disease has become a healthcare priority in the developed world. The role personal responsibility should play in healthcare provision has growing pertinence given the growing significance of individual lifestyle choices for health. Media reporting focussing on the ‘bad behaviour’ of individuals suffering lifestyle-related disease, and policies aimed at encouraging ‘responsibilisation’ in healthcare highlight the importance of understanding the scope of responsibility ascriptions in this context. Research into the social determinants of health and psychological mechanisms of health behaviour (...) could undermine some commonly held and tacit assumptions about the moral responsibility of agents for the sorts of lifestyles they adopt. I use Philip Petit's conception of freedom as ‘fitness to be held responsible’ to consider the significance of some of this evidence for assessing the moral responsibility of agents. I propose that, in some cases, factors outside the agent's control may influence behaviour in such a way as to undermine her freedom along the three dimensions described by Pettit: freedom of action; a sense of identification with one's actions; and whether one's social position renders one vulnerable to pressure from more powerful others. (shrink)

During the first UK wave of the pandemic, there were two areas of immediate ethical concern for the medical profession. The first was the possibility that life-saving resources could be overwhelmed. Early reports from hospitals in the Italian city of Bergamo suggested that ventilatory support might need rationing and emergency ‘battlefield’ triage was a real possibility.1 In the UK, several professional bodies, including the British Medical Association and the Royal College of Physicians rapidly developed guidance for doctors should triage become (...) a reality.2 The second issue was the acute shortage of personal protective equipment. Where doctors were unable to protect their patients – and themselves – from the risk of COVID-19, ethical challenges emerged. Ordinarily, doctors and patients do not present risks of significant harm to each other. To shift to a position where every patient – and every health professional – could potentially be a threat presented serious clinical and ethical challenges. To treat with inadequate PPE, so options for mitigating harms are radically reduced, deepens the challenges. Among the questions the BMA wrestled with was the extent of doctors’ duties to treat infected or potentially infected patients in the absence of effective PPE. The BMA was clear that despite obligations to treat, medicine is not a self-sacrificing profession: there were limits to the risk doctors could be required to expose themselves to.3 These issues no longer seem so pressing. In the UK at least, there is adequate PPE and with the second steep wave behind us, and significant numbers vaccinated, it is less likely that triage will be required in the UK. But as those concerns have receded so other ethical questions have arisen. Among them is a cluster of issues associated with what might be called COVID-19’s indirect harms. Understandably, in response to …. (shrink)

To many Western students of India, svarāj and mokṣa have often seemed to represent two very different ideals of freedom, the former social, political, and modern; the latter individual, spiritual, and traditional. It is not surprising that the Hindu ideal of spiritual freedom is most commonly known by the term mokṣa , for it is this word that is usually listed as the fourth and supreme goal in the famous four ends of man . The first three ends, desire , (...) success , and morality , find their fulfillment within society, while mokṣa , it is generally said, takes one beyond society. It is pertinent to note, as Ingalls and others have pointed out, that mokṣa is a relatively late term, which came to be added to the older, first three goals of man. As a noun, mokṣa does not appear until the latest of the Upanisads, and then only three times, in Śvetāśvatara 6.16 and Maitrī 6.20 and 30. In addition, some orthodox schools did not accept the ideal of mokṣa for several more centuries, the Mīmāṁsā denying it until the eighth century A.D. (shrink)

In a recent judgment1 the Court of Protection was highly critical of health professionals for continuing to provide clinically-assisted nutrition and hydration in the face of disagreement about the patient’s best interests, without seeking to resolve the issue. This hearing had been set up specifically to consider whether GU’s dignity had been properly protected, and if not why not, given concerns raised by the Official Solicitor about what she considered to be “a complete abrogation of responsibility to consider properly or (...) at all, and to determine whether it was in GU’s best interests and therefore lawful to continue to give him an invasive medical treatment, CANH.” In April 2014, at 63 years old and living in Thailand, GU sustained severe injuries after suffering from an electrocution accident. He sustained a cardiorespiratory arrest with a significant delay before cardiopulmonary resuscitation was started and was unconscious and unresponsive. In September 2014 he was transferred to the UK. In August 2018, GU’s brother made a request for a best interests decision concerning the continuation of CANH. The family met to discuss this and all except GU’s son, agreed that continuing CANH was not in GU’s best interests. In view of the fact that there was not unanimity among the family, a decision was made that CANH should continue. Commenting on this decision, Mr Justice Hayden said ‘the apparent assumption that in the face of family disagreement ‘ therefore will continue to be cared for by nursing staff ” is a troubling non sequitur’ and stressed that ‘family dissent to a medical consensus should never stand in the way of an incapacitated patients’ best interests being properly identified’. He also made clear that the responsibility for ensuring that a best interests assessment is undertaken rests with the …. (shrink)

Examine the first-year student experience as so rarely seen from the community college perspective and increase the odds of the new-to-college students’ success. For three decades, U.S. higher education has paid increasing attention to the beginning college experience—to ensure that entering students make a successful transition to college. Yet, much of the extant research and practice literature focuses on the experience of first-year students entering four-year colleges and universities. Fulfilling the Promise of the Community College is an insightful publication that (...) provides a thought-provoking, idea-inspiring look at the unique characteristics of the community college and its students. In addition, it explores the barriers to success these students face as well as strategies for ensuring that their higher education goals can be achieved. Authors describe successful adaptations of faculty development initiatives, first-year seminars, common reading programs, academic and career advising, learning communities, and STEM initiatives in the community college setting. (shrink)

Currently, many women who are expecting to give birth have no option but to attempt vaginal delivery, since access to elective planned caesarean sections (PCS) in the absence of what is deemed to constitute ‘clinical need’ is variable. In this paper, we argue that PCS should be routinely offered to women who are expecting to give birth, and that the risks and benefits of PCS as compared with planned vaginal delivery should be discussed with them. Currently, discussions of elective PCS (...) arise in the context of what are called ‘Maternal Request Caesarean Sections’ (MRCS) and there is a good deal of support for the position that women who request PCS without clinical indication should be provided with them. Our argument goes further than support for acceding to requests for MRCS: we submit that healthcare practitioners caring for women with uncomplicated pregnancies have a positive duty to inform them of the option of PCS as opposed to assuming vaginal delivery as a default, and to provide (or arrange for the provision of) PCS if that is the woman's preferred manner of delivery. (shrink)

Properties sometimes attributed to the “particle” aspect of a neutron, e.g., mass and magnetic moment, cannot straightforwardly be regarded in the Bohm interpretation of quantum mechanics as localized at the hypothetical position of the particle. This is shown by examining a series of effects in neutron interferometry. A related thought-experiment also provides a variation of a recent demonstration that which-way detectors can appear to behave anomolously in the Bohm theory.

In December, the National Data Guardian 1 for health and care in England, Dame Fiona Caldicott, published the outcomes of a public consultation about the Caldicott Principles and the role of Caldicott Guardians.1 The Caldicott Principles are good practice guidelines which have been used by health and social care organisations in the UK since 1997 to ensure that people’s data are kept safe and used in an ethical way.2 The role of the Caldicott Guardian is well-established in the UK. Caldicott (...) Guardians are senior people which support the upholding of the Caldicott Principles within organisations. In response to views expressed during the consultation the NDG has added an eighth Caldicott Principle to the existing seven and will use her statutory powers to issue guidance about the appointment of Caldicott Guardians for health and adult social care organisations. The new eighth Caldicott Principle is: ‘Inform patients and service users about how their confidential information is used’. It provides that: > A range of steps should be taken to ensure no surprises for patients and service users, so they can have clear expectations about how and why their confidential information is used, and what choices they have about this. These steps will vary depending on the use: as a minimum, this should include providing accessible, relevant and appropriate information - in some cases, greater engagement will be required. The NDG explains that the introduction of the new principle was prompted by consideration of the role that the legal concept of ‘reasonable expectations’ should play in shaping the circumstances under which health and care data may be legitimately shared. The NDG does not envisage that this principle will establish reasonable expectations as a legal basis in its own right …. (shrink)

This new edition of Hegel's Lectures on the History of Philosophy sets forth clearly, for the first time for the English reader, what Hegel actually said. These lectures challenged the antiquarianism of Hegel's contemporaries by boldly contending that the history of philosophy is itself philosophy, not just history. It portrays the journey of reason or spirit through time, as reason or spirit comes in stages to its full development and self-conscious existence, through the successive products of human intellect and activity. (...) These lectures proved to be extremely influential on the intellectual history of the past two centuries. They are crucial to understanding Hegel's own systematic philosophy in its constructive aspect, as well as his views on the centrality of reason in human history and culture. Volume I holds additional importance because, as well as setting out Hegel's discussion of the history of Chinese and Indian philosophy, it presents the interesting and significant changes that Hegel made to the stage-setting introduction to these lectures across the years from 1819 to 1831. This edition adapts the considerable editorial resources of the German edition that it translates, to the needs of the general reader as well as the serious scholar, so as to constitute an unparalleled resource on this topic in the English language. (shrink)