While researchers have examined the types of ethical issues that arise in long-term care, few studies have explored long-term care nurses’ experiences of moral distress and fewer still have examined responses to initial moral distress. Using an interpretive description approach, 15 nurses working in long-term care settings within one city in Canada were interviewed about their responses to experiences of initial moral distress, resources or supports they identified as helpful or potentially helpful in dealing with these situations, and factors that (...) hindered nurses in their responses. Using a thematic analysis process, three major themes were identified from the nurses’ experiences: (i) the context of the situation matters; (ii) the value of coming together as a team; and (iii) looking for outside direction. The work of responding to initial moral distress was more fruitful if opportunities existed to discuss conflicts with other team members and if managers supported nurses in moving their concerns forward through meetings or conversations with the team, physician, or family. Access to objective others and opportunities for education about ethics were also identified as important for dealing with value conflicts. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Barrow and Newton E. W. STRONG As E. A. Buxrr HAS ADDUCED,Isaac Barrow (1630-1677) in his philosophy of space, time, and mathematical method strongly influenced the thinking of Newton: The recent publication of an early paper written by Newton (his De gravitatione et aequipondio fluidorum)2 affords evidence not known to Burtt of Newton's indebtedness in philosophy to Barrow, his teacher. Prior to its publication in 1962, this paper was (...) utilized by Alexandre Koyrd in his essay, "Newton and Descartes," 3 a study based on the third Horblit Lecture in the History of Science which he gave at Harvard University, March 8, 1961. Koyr8 maintains that there is a radical opposition in Newton's Principia not only to Descartes' purely scientific theories but also to the Cartesian philosophy. Yet, as he remarks, "we do not find in the Principia an open criticism of the philosophy of Descartes.... " He attributes this fact principally "to the very structure of the Principia: it is essentially a book on rational mechanics, which provides principles for physics and astronomy. In such a book there is a normal place for the discussion of Cartesian optics, but not of the conception of the relations of mind and body, and other such things." Koyrd asserts, nonetheless, that the criticism is not absent. It lurks in Newton's carefully worded definitions of fundamental concepts--those of space, time, motion, and matter--and becomes more apparent in the Optice of 1706 and in the second odition of the Principia. In support of this argument, he makes much of young Newton's unfini.~hed paper. He holds that this essay is of exceptional value "as it enables us to get some insight into the formation of Newton's thought, and to recognize that preoccupation with philosophic problems was not an external additatmentum but an integral dement of his thinking." 4 As concerns "young Newton's conception of space in its being and in its relation to God and time," Koyrd remarks that we learn from this essay The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science (New York, 1927), p. 144. A. Rupert Hall and Marie Boas Hall, Unpublished Scientific Papers of Isaac Newton (Cambridge, 1962), Introduction, pp. 75-88; Latin text, pp. 90-121; English translation, pp. 121156. " Newtonian Studies (Harvard University Press, 1965), pp. 53-114. " Newtonian Studies, pp. 82-83. In his De gravitatione et aequipondio fluidorum, Newton is indeed engrossed with philosophic problems. With regard, however, to the announced purpose of his paper, namely, "to treat of the science of gravity and solid bodies in fluids by two methods," does Newton represent kis metaphysical "explanation of the nature of body" as an element of his science essential to its completeness7 He does not do so. At the end of his explanation he remarks: "I have already digressed enough; let us return to the main theme." He proceeds to set forth fifteen more definitions and then turns to the demonstration of two "Propositions on Non-Elastic Fluids." [155] 156 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY "that space is necessary, eternal, immutz~ble, and unmovable, that though we can imagine that there is nothing in space we cannot think space is not.., and that if there is no space, God would be nowhere. We learn also that all points of space are simultaneous and that, therefore, the divine omnipresence does not introduce composition in God.... " What we here learn from Newton about space in confutation of Descartes is to be found in Barrow's tenth mathematical lecture, "'Of Space, and Impenetrability." 5 In this lecture, Barrow opposes both Descartes and Hobbes. He objects, as does Newton, to the position taken by Descartes in his Principia Philosophiae, namely, "it is necessary.forMatter to be infinitely extended." He proceeds, as does Newton, to show how "very much Cartesius's great Subtility has failed him in this Case" to conclude that there is space empty of matter and distinct from magnitude from which an infinity of matter cannot be deduced. The correspondence of arguments tendered by Barrow and Newton indicates that the tenth lecture constituted a source from which Newton gleaned principal objections to Descartes' Principia Philosophiae. Although Koyr~ makes reference to Burtt's... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Religious Perspectives on Bioethics, Part ILaura Jane Bishop (bio) and Mary Carrington Coutts (bio)This is Part One of a two part Scope Note on Religious Perspectives on Bioethics. Part Two will be published in the December 1994 issue of this Journal. This Scope Note has been organized in alphabetical order by the name of the religious tradition.Contents for Parts 1 and 2Part 1Part 2I.GeneralI.Native AmericanII.African Religious TraditionsReligious TraditionsIII.Bahá'í FaithII.Protestantism—willIV.Buddhism (...) and Confucianisminclude a general sectionV.Eastern Orthodoxyand sections focused onVI.Hinduismspecific denominations.VII.IslamIII.Roman CatholicismVIII.JainismIX.JudaismIntroductionThe many religions of the world bring diverse, and occasionally divergent, attitudes to bioethical issues. These beliefs may guide patients and health care professionals as they seek or provide health care. In an attempt to facilitate understanding of and access to information about these beliefs in our pluralistic and global society, this Scope Note identifies literature by the world's major religious groups on topics relating to bioethics.Topics covered by this Scope Note include general attitudes to health and [End Page 155] health care, the physician-patient relationship, treatment refusal, abortion, contraception, sterilization, reproductive technologies, genetics, mental health, human experimentation, organ transplantation and donation, death, euthanasia, suicide, and prolongation of life. Material was not available on all of these topics for each religion.The literature gathered here represents only a small portion of the available writing on religion and medicine, and is limited to that which comments explicitly on bioethical issues. Some faiths have a rich tradition of writing in bioethics; for others the literature is more limited. Variation in coverage is not intended to indicate the relative importance of a faith, but reflects accessibility and space constraints. Individuals interested in obtaining additional information are encouraged to contact the National Reference Center for Bioethics Literature.Specific citations about a region or country were chosen because of the predominance of a religious tradition within the population. In all cases, variation in spelling represents author usage. This Scope Note treats only the literature published in English, and every attempt has been made to identify English language sources for these faiths.It is important to remember that doctrinal and theological differences exist even within the same denomination and that views of individual patients, family members, and health care providers should be sought.Dictionaries and EncyclopediasMelton, J. Gordon, ed. Encyclopedia of American Religions. Fourth edition. Detroit: Gale Research, 1993. 1217 p. Basic information about the history, sacred texts, membership, educational facilities, publications, and North American addresses are provided for 1,730 churches, denominations, sects, and cults. Bibliographies for many faiths supplement this extensive resource.Reich, Warren T., ed. Encyclopedia of Bioethics. New York: Free Press, Macmillan, 1978. 4 volumes. Articles on all the major religions as they relate to bioethics are included in this highly-regarded encyclopedia. In addition, many of the topical essays feature a section on the views of various faiths on the topic under discussion. For the best use of the Encyclopedia, see the subject index in volume 4. (Note: a revised, second edition is due to be published by Macmillan in late 1994.)GeneralAmerican Psychiatric Association. Committee on Religion and Psychiatry. Guidelines Regarding Possible Conflict Between Psychiatrists' Religious Commitment and Psychiatric Practice. American Journal of Psychiatry 147 (4): 542, April 1990. The American Psychiatric Association recommends that psychiatrists respect their patients' religious beliefs and that they not impose their own [End Page 156] beliefs on their patients.Bankowski, Z., and Bryant, J. H. Health Policy, Ethics and Human Values: Proceedings of the XVIIth CIOMS Round Table Conference, Athens Greece. Geneva: Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences, 1985. 336 p. Many sections of this volume address issues where religion impacts health policymaking. Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Latin America, and Asia are highlighted for the varied ways in which their religions and cultures are integrated into the provision of health care.Batchelor, Edward, ed. Abortion: The Moral Issues. New York: Pilgrim Press, 1982. 246 p. Batchelor compiles a collection of essays by experts on religious ethics as they relate to abortion. Includes... (shrink)

The essentialism story is a version of the history of biological classification that was fabricated between 1953 and 1968 by Ernst Mayr, who combined contributions from Arthur Cain and David Hull with his own grudge against Plato. It portrays pre-Darwinian taxonomists as caught in the grip of an ancient philosophy called essentialism, from which they were not released until Charles Darwin's 1859 Origin of Species. Mayr's motive was to promote the Modern Synthesis in opposition to the typology of idealist morphologists; (...) demonizing Plato served this end. Arthur Cain's picture of Linnaeus as a follower of 'Aristotelian' (scholastic) logic was woven into the story, along with David Hull's application of Karl Popper's term, 'essentialism', which Mayr accepted in 1968 as a synonym for what he had called 'typological thinking'. Although Mayr also pointed out the importance of empiricism in the history of taxonomy, the essentialism story still dominates the secondary literature. The history of the first telling of the essentialism story exposes its scant basis in fact. (shrink)

William Sidney Allen, 1918B2004 George Wishart Anderson, 1913B2002 Albinia Catherine de la Mare, 1932B2001 John Stanton Flemming, 1941B2003 Patrick Gardiner James William Harris, 1940B2004 John Gilbert Hurst, 1927B2003 Casimir Lewy, 1919B1991 George Donald Alastair MacDougall, 1912B2004 Henry Colin Gray Matthew, 1941B1999 Edward Miller, 1915B2000 Michio Morishima, 1923B2004 William Brian Reddaway, 1913B2002 Marjorie Ethel Reeves, 1905B2003 Charles Martin Robertson, 1911B2004 Conrad Sebastian Robert Russell, 1937B2004 Arnold Joseph Taylor, 1911B2002 Kathleen Mary Tillotson, 1906B2001 Glanmor Williams, 1920-2005.

The current widespread belief that taxonomic methods used before Darwin were essentialist is ill-founded. The essentialist method developed by followers of Plato and Aristotle required definitions to state properties that are always present. Polythetic groups do not obey that requirement, whatever may have been the ontological beliefs of the taxonomist recognizing such groups. Two distinct methods of forming higher taxa, by chaining and by examplar, were widely used in the period between Linnaeus and Darwin, and both generated polythetic groups. Philosopher (...) William Whewell congratulated pre-Darwinian taxonomists for not adhering to the rigid ideal of definition used in the mathematical sciences. What he called the method of types is here called the method of exemplars because typology has been equated with essentialism, whereas the use of a type species as the reference point or prototype for a higher category was a practice inconsistent with essentialism. The story that the essentialism of philosophers dominated the development of systematics may prove to be a myth. (shrink)

The positive psychology landscape is changing, and its initial identity is being challenged. Moving beyond the “third wave of PP,” two roads for future research and practice in well-being studies are discerned: The first is the state of the art PP trajectory that will continue as a scientific discipline in/next to psychology. The second trajectory links to pointers described as part of the so-called third wave of PP, which will be argued as actually being the beginning of a new domain (...) of inter- or transdisciplinary well-being studies in its own right. It has a broader scope than the state of the art in PP, but is more delineated than in planetary well-being studies. It is in particular suitable to understand the complex nature of bio-psycho-social-ecological well-being, and to promote health and wellness in times of enormous challenges and changes. A unique cohering focus for this post-disciplinary well-being research domain is proposed. In both trajectories, future research will have to increase cognizance of metatheoretical assumptions, develop more encompassing theories to bridge the conceptual fragmentation in the field, and implement methodological reforms, while keeping context and the interwovenness of the various levels of the scientific text in mind. Opportunities are indicated to contribute to the discourse on the identity and development of scientific knowledge in mainstream positive psychology and the evolving post-disciplinary domain of well-being studies. (shrink)

Zoologist A. J. Cain began historical research on Linnaeus in 1956 in connection with his dissatisfaction over the standard taxonomic hierarchy and the rules of binomial nomenclature. His famous 1958 paper ‘Logic and Memory in Linnaeus's System of Taxonomy’ argues that Linnaeus was following Aristotle's method of logical division without appreciating that it properly applies only to ‘analysed entities’ such as geometric figures whose essential nature is already fully known. The essence of living things being unanalysed, there is no basis (...) on which to choose the right characters to define a genus nor on which to differentiate species. Yet Cain's understanding of Aristotle, which depended on a 1916 text by H. W. B. Joseph, was fatally flawed. In the 1990s Cain devoted himself to further historical study and softened his verdict on Linnaeus, praising his empiricism. The idea that Linnaeus was applying an ancient and inappropriate method cries out for fresh study and revision. (shrink)

Reading the Shape of Nature vividly recounts the turbulent early history of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard and the contrasting careers of its founder Louis Agassiz and his son Alexander. Through the story of this institution and the individuals who formed it, Mary P. Winsor explores the conflicting forces that shaped systematics in the second half of the nineteenth century. Debates over the philosophical foundations of classification, details of taxonomic research, the young institution's financial struggles, and the personalities (...) of the men most deeply involved are all brought to life. In 1859, Louis Agassiz established the Museum of Comparative Zoology to house research on the ideal types that he believed were embodied in all living forms. Agassiz's vision arose from his insistence that the order inherent in the diversity of life reflected divine creation, not organic evolution. But the mortar of the new museum had scarcely dried when Darwin's Origin was published. By Louis Agassiz's death in 1873, even his former students, including his son Alexander, had defected to the evolutionist camp. Alexander, a self-made millionaire, succeeded his father as director and introduced a significantly different agenda for the museum. To trace Louis and Alexander's arguments and the style of science they established at the museum, Winsor uses many fascinating examples that even zoologists may find unfamiliar. The locus of all this activity, the museum building itself, tells its own story through a wonderful series of archival photographs. (shrink)

The current picture of the history of taxonomy incorporates A. J. Cain's claim that Linnaeus strove to apply the logical method of definition taught by medieval followers of Aristotle. Cain's argument does not stand up to critical examination. Contrary to some published statements, there is no evidence that Linnaeus ever studied logic. His use of the words “genus” and “species” ruined the meaning they had in logic, and “essential” meant to him merely “taxonomically useful.” The essentialism story, a narrative that (...) has most pre-Darwinian biologists steeped in the world view of Plato and Aristotle, is ill-founded and improbable. (shrink)

Introduction -- The problem of Socrates : Kierkegaard and Nietzsche -- Kierkegaard : Socrates vs. the God -- Nietzsche : call for an artistic Socrates -- Plato's Socrates -- Love, generation, and political community (the Symposium) -- The prologue -- Phaedrus' praise of nobility -- Pausanias' praise of law -- Eryximachus' praise of art -- Aristophanic comedy -- Tragic victory -- Socrates' turn -- Socrates' prophetess and the daemonic -- Love as generative -- Alcibiades' dramatic entrance -- Alcibiades' images of (...) socrates -- Alcibiades' praise of Socrates' virtues -- Aftermath -- The incompleteness of the Symposium -- Self-knowledge, love, and rhetoric (Plato's Phaedrus) -- The setting -- Non-lovers (Lysias' speech and Socrates' first speech) -- Souls and their fall -- Lovers and their ascent -- Prayer to love -- Contemporary rhetoric and politics -- A genuine art of rhetoric -- Writing -- Prayer to Pan -- Who is the friend? (the Lysis) -- Joining the group -- Getting acquainted -- Seeking a friend -- Are friends the ones loving, the ones loved, or both? -- Are likes friends? -- Are unlikes friends? -- Are those who are neither good nor bad friends to the good? -- Are the kindred friends? -- Who might friends be? -- Friendly communities -- Socratic philosophizing -- Socrates' youthful search for cause -- Socrates' second sailing and the ideas -- Piety, poetry, and friendship. (shrink)

Inspired and in honor of the work of noted political theorist Mary P. Nichols, the essays in this volume explore political ideas and implications in a range of works of philosophy, literature, and film from classical antiquity to the present day, creating an interdisciplinary conversation across genres.

Two important criticisms of contemporary liberalism turn to Aristotle's political thought for support that which advocates participatory democracy, and that sympathetic to the rule of a virtuous or philosophic elite. In this commentary on Aristotle's politics the author explores how Aristotle offers political rule as an alternative to both the rule of aristocratic virtue and an unchecked participatory democracy. Writing in lucid prose, she offers an interpretation grounded in a close reading of the text, and combining a respectful and patient (...) attempt to understand Aristotle in his own terms with a wide, sympathetic, and argumentative reading in the secondary literature. (shrink)

In this book, Mary P. Nichols argues for the centrality of the idea of freedom in Thucydides' thought.

I consider Ralph Waldo Emerson’s creative appropriation of a philosophical doctrine that helps to make sense of an attitude towards life, its gifts and its burdens, that is often expressed in Puritan diaries. The doctrine, now known as the doctrine of continuous creation, holds that in conserving the world, God re-creates it at every moment, making the same creative effort at each ever-advancing now that God made at the very beginning. Continuous creation was explicitly endorsed by at least one Puritan (...) diarist, Jonathan Edwards, and it helps to explain the intense self-inspection and valiant response to life to which other Puritan diarists (including Emerson's aunt, Mary Moody Emerson) testify. Continuous creation was an important ingredient in the idealism of Edwards and, once translated, it became an important ingredient in the idealism of Emerson. My primary aim to describe Emerson’s creative translation of the doctrine as Edwards understood it, but I also discuss Emerson's relation to the Puritan diary, considered as a literary form. I close by suggesting that for us, a version of the doctrine of continuous creation can perhaps be a source of optimism and an incentive to action, as I believe it was for Emerson. I also comment briefly on Emerson's grateful reliance on text-to-text translations. When Emerson studied translations of sacred texts from around the world, what he heard was not difference and dissent, but agreement: agreement on the very points that united him with Edwards, different as they were in other ways. (shrink)

Thomas Henry Huxley and Charles Darwin discovered in 1857 that they had a fundamental disagreement about biological classification. Darwin believed that the natural system should express genealogy while Huxley insisted that classification must stand on its own basis, independent of evolution. Darwin used human races as a model for his view. This private and long-forgotten dispute exposes important divisions within Victorian biology. Huxley, trained in physiology and anatomy, was a professional biologist while Darwin was a gentleman naturalist. Huxley agreed with (...) John Stuart Mill's rejection of William Whewell's sympathy for Linnaeus. The naturalists William Sharp Macleay, Hugh Strickland, and George Waterhouse worked to distinguish two kinds of relationship, affinity and analogy. Darwin believed that his theory could explain the difference. Richard Owen introduced the distinction between homology and analogy to anatomists, but the word homology did not enter Darwin's vocabulary until 1848, when he used the morphological concept of archetype in his work on Cirripedia. Huxley dropped the word archetype when Richard Owen linked it to Plato's ideal forms, replacing it with common plan. When Darwin wrote in the Origin of Species that the word plan gives no explanation, he may have had Huxley in mind. Darwin's preposterous story in the Origin about a bear giving birth to a kangaroo, which he dropped in the second edition, was in fact aimed at Huxley. (shrink)

Scholars have recently argued that in the Symposium Plato is critical of Socrates and falls closer than his philosophic spokesman to the side of poetry in the old quarrel between philosophy and poetry. Contrary to such interpretations, I argue that on the basis of his experience of a philosophic life, Socrates responds to the poets Plato presents in that dialogue, offering a superior understanding not only of Love but of poetry itself. Far from self-sufficient, but like Love “dwell[ing] always in (...) need” and generating through teaching, Socrates both requires and supports political life. The state between poverty and resource that accounts for the pursuit of wisdom and its self-generation through questioning others also accounts for the ongoing human activities that keep political communities alive and flourishing. At issue is not simply Plato’s attitude toward Socrates, but the very nature of philosophy and its relation to the political community. (shrink)

This book takes a fresh look at Socrates as he appeared to three ancient writers: Aristophanes, who attacked him for his theoretical studies; Plato, who immortalized him in his dialogues; and Aristotle, who criticized his political views. It addresses the questions of the interrelation of politics and philosophy by looking at Aristophanes' Clouds, Plato's Republic, and Book II of Aristotle's Politics--three sides of a debate on the value of Socrates' philosophic life. Mary Nichols first discusses the relation between Aristophanes and (...) Plato, showing that the city as Socrates' place of activity in the Republic resembles the philosophic thinktank mocked in Aristophanes' Clouds. By representing the extremes of the Republic's city, Plato shows that the dangers attributed by Aristophanes to the city are actually inherent in political life itself. They were to be moderated by Socratic political philosophy rather than Aristophanean comedy. Nichols concludes by showing how Aristotle addressed the question at issue between Plato and Aristophanes when he founded his political science. Judging Plato's and Aristophanes' positions as partial, Nichols argues that Aristotle based his political science on the necessity to philosophy of political involvement and the necessity to politics of philosophical thought. (shrink)

In order to better understand the meaning of Socrates’ philosophic life, Nichols explores the theme of caring that is prominent in Socrates’ Apology. What is the relation between the examined life that he says is the only one worth living for a human being and the care he claims and shows for others, especially the young of Athens? Nichols discusses Socrates’ illustrations of philosophic caretaking from the Symposium, Phaedrus, and Theaetetus, both his own caretaking activities as well as his teachings (...) about love and generation, the art of words, and midwifery. Finally, she argues that the god who “commands” an answer to his oracular riddle, as Socrates interprets it in the Apology, serves as a model for the union of questioning and caretaking central to Socrates' life of philosophizing. Through his presentation of Socrates, Plato therefore offers an alternative to the Eleatic Stranger’s view of divine and human care in the Statesman that forms a backdrop to Socrates’ defense in the Apology. (shrink)

Is truth itself natural? This is an important question for both those working on truth and those working on naturalism. For theorists of truth, answering the question of whether truth is natural will tell us more about the nature of truth (or lack of it), and the relations between truth and other properties of interest. For those working on naturalism, answering this question is of paramount importance to those who wish to have truth as part of the natural order. In (...) this paper, we focus primarily on the kinds of theories of truth that occupy the central positions in current debates about truth, namely correspondence theories, deflationary theories, epistemic theories, and pluralist theories, and aim to discern the extent to which truth is a natural property on each view. (shrink)

Carl Becker's classic 1931 address "Everyman his own historian" holds lessons for historians of science today. Like the professional historians he spoke to, we are content to display the Ivory- Tower Syndrome, writing scholarly treatises only for one another, disdaining both the general reader and our natural readership, scientists. Following his rhetoric, I argue that scientists are well aware of their own historicity, and would be interested in lively and balanced histories of science. It is ironic that the very professionalism (...) that ought to equip us to write such histories has imposed on us a powerful taboo that renders us unable to do so. We who count ourselves sophisticated in describing the effects of social forces upon past scientists have been remarkably unconscious of the ways our own practices are being shaped by our need to distinguish ourselves from scientists who write history. Our fear of presentism in general and Whig history in particular is really a taboo, that is, an excessive avoidance enforced by social pressure. It succeeds at making our work distinct from histories written by scientists, but at the awful cost of blotting out the great fact of scientific progress. Scientists may be misguided in expecting us to celebrate great men, but they are right to demand from historians an analysis of the process of testing and improvement that is central to science. If progress in general is a problematic term, we could label the process "emendation.". (shrink)