The second meeting of British and Soviet philosophers, continuing the discussion of problems of ethics begun in the fall of 1968 in England, was held in Tbilisi in October 1969. This time the British philosophers journeyed to our country, by agreement between the Alliance of Friendship Societies and the Society of Friends . The group of five included philosophy teachers at a number of universities: David Bell , with whom we were well acquainted from our debates in East Greenstead, Steven (...) Lucas , Edward Honderik , Bernard Harrison , whom we had also met during our visit to Brighton, and the Secretary for European Affairs of the British Quaker organization, Alan Davis. On our side, the discussion was conducted by L. N. Mitrokhin and O. G. Drobnitskii , A. A. Ivin, N. Z. Chavchavadze, and A. F. Begiashvili. The Alliance of Friendship Societies was represented by the assistant chief of the Division of British Countries, F. I. Fedosov. (shrink)

A group of Soviet philosophers visited England from September 21 to October 4, 1968. There they participated in discussions on problems of the philosophy of morality. The trip was organized jointly by the Alliance of Friendship Societies and the Society of Friends in England. The British Society of Friends has long been conducting a diversified program of international cultural ties and personal contacts. The Quakers hold the latter to be particularly important in achieving mutual understanding among peoples. This was, however, (...) the first meeting of philosophers of our two countries. (shrink)

In recent years, Marxist ethicists have been turning with increasing frequency to the question of the structure of morality. This question has numerous aspects: the identification in morality of the principal aspects with differing ontological status; differentiation in morality of various components that, in their interaction, comprise the mechanism of normative regulation ; division of the object of ethical research into more specialized spheres of study; and construction of a system of categories in ethics that will in some way reflect (...) the structure of morality. Definite viewpoints have already been expressed on all these questions; discussions and debates are under way. The author of the present article shall limit his task to one of the narrower questions - analysis of the structure of moral consciousness. This task includes the following factors: study of the conceptual structure of moral thought, its formal schema and constructs; establishment of the place of each of the forms of concepts in a single system of moral consciousness - their logical relation and connection, subordination, and sequence of incorporation into the system ; and certain questions of the historical shaping of the structure of moral consciousness and the genesis of its concepts. (shrink)

In recent years, the question has been posed of the attitude of Marxist philosophy to what is termed the problem of value. The point is not only that bourgeois axiology, which has been developing for three-quarters of a century, has to be critically analyzed. Central to the question is whether a Marxist axiology is possible. In that connection the following is instructive. Authors who, with envious consistency, ignore the history of philosophy and begin to build a theory of value on (...) the basis of direct generalization "of all the known facts" often pose the problem of value precisely as it was formulated as early as the end of the 19th century. (shrink)

In November 1970, four Soviet philosophers, two from the Institute of Philosophy, USSR Academy of Sciences and two from Moscow University were in England for the purpose of continuing the discussion with British philosophers begun two years earlier. [See previously translated reports in Soviet Studies in Philosophy, Winter 1970-71 - Editor.] Like the previous trips, this one was organized by the Association of Soviet Friendship Societies and the British Society of Friends.

Gender discrimination and sexual harassment of female police officers by their male counterparts remain areas of liability where police departments appeared to have failed to effectively confront the nagging issues. However, the appreciable level of research conducted on these issues in the global North has not been matched by the South, where issues bordering on sexual violence have cultural underpinnings. Drawing from the case of the Nigeria Police Force, feminist analysis was used to explore the lived reality of 43 female (...) officers in a qualitative study. Participants expressed distress in abiding by structural discriminatory regulations against female officers which include non-admittance of married women into the force, forbidding unmarried officers from getting pregnant, and a stipulated minimum of three-year work period before a female officer can marry. Findings also indicated that participants suffer a variety of sexual harassment, intimidation, and, violence from their male colleagues, while they feel constrained in reporting their victimization. Important policy and practical implications requiring the Nigerian police to address hegemonic masculinity and promote gender equality were provided. (shrink)

Boldly focusing on sexuality as a crucial definer of social order, Being and Symptom argues that there is an "M theory" -- a master theory of theories -- not only in Quantum Physics, but also in Continental Philosophy, Psychoanalysis, and Sociology, disclosing how the ontological structure of the "fantastic four" ingredients of metaphysics (potentiality, impotentiality, actuality, completion) has recurred through time. Öğüt also seeks to turn Thomas Hobbes's political philosophy into a social theory within the fields of sexuality and sovereignty (...) and to locate parallels among Aristotle, Ibn Khaldun, Kant, Hegel, Heidegger, Foucault, Lacan, Agamben, Nash, Derrida, Girard, Kristeva, and Žižek, with a special emphasis on how Žižek has adapted Lacanian psychoanalysis into social theory. Öğüt conveys a highly original analysis of the unconscious of our social (sexual) relations, subjectivities, and politics. (shrink)

Background: Medicine is full of value conflicts. Limited resources and legal regulations may place doctors in difficult ethical dilemmas and cause moral distress. Research on moral distress has so far been mainly studied in nurses. Objective: To describe whether Norwegian doctors experience stress related to ethical dilemmas and lack of resources, and to explore whether the doctors feel that they have good strategies for the resolution of ethical dilemmas. Design: Postal survey of a representative sample of 1497 Norwegian doctors in (...) 2004, presenting statements about different ethical dilemmas, values and goals at their workplace. Results: The response rate was 67%. 57% admitted that it is difficult to criticise a colleague for professional misconduct and 51% for ethical misconduct. 51% described sometimes having to act against own conscience as distressing. 66% of the doctors experienced distress related to long waiting lists for treatment and to impaired patient care due to time constraints. 55% reported that time spent on administration and documentation is distressing. Female doctors experienced more stress that their male colleagues. 44% reported that their workplace lacked strategies for dealing with ethical dilemmas. Conclusion: Lack of resources creates moral dilemmas for physicians. Moral distress varies with specialty and gender. Lack of strategies to solve ethical dilemmas and low tolerance for conflict and critique from colleagues may obstruct important and necessary ethical dialogues and lead to suboptimal solutions of difficult ethical problems. (shrink)

Were it not for its stratospheric price, this book should be unconditionally recommended to students of Indian philosophy. It is the most thorough and scholarly study of early Indian logic and epistemology to date, offering much more than its title promises. The author analyzes all the crucial questions in the history of early Indian philosophy, to the utmost detail, including the discussion of all previous significant literature on each specific subject. The author's sound knowledge of Western logic, however, often leads (...) him to overlook the differences between the prelogical qualities and mystic symbolism of early Indian thought, and Western logic. But, this does not detract much from the value of the book as a complete and clear translation of Indian thought into the language and conceptions of the Western philosopher.—L. O. G. (shrink)

This paper presents an empirical test of Schlegel's “interaction interpretation” of the theory of special relativity. Analysis of the UTC time scales maintained at various observatory sites over the world indicates that neither Schlegel's “interaction interpretation” of the theory of relativity nor the conventional “space-time coordinate transformation interpretation” of relativity can significantly improve agreement between the UTC time scales. Instead evidence for the effects of accelerations on clock rates is suggested.

A succinct presentation of the Pratyabhijñä school of Kashmir Shaivism, written by Ksemaraja, disciple of Abhinavagupta. In as much as the previous translation by K. F. Leidecker is inexact and out of print, this new translation by Mr. Singh is most welcome, especially as it is faithful to the original, written in correct and smooth English, and the translator himself is trained in the Pratyabhijñä. Although the translation is carefully annotated, and Mr. Singh avoids philological questions, the reader needs to (...) have previous knowledge of Indian Philosophy and Sanskrit to understand the book.—L. O. G. (shrink)

A short and well balanced study of the early history and position of the lower castes of India, as seen in the code of Manu. Tiwari is to be commended not only on her clarity of expression and excellent diction—"avis rara" in Indian scholarship—but also on her broadness of vision concerning such a touchy question. The author's view is that "class-war" originated and maintained the Hindu class system; she discards race and ritual impurity as the prime causes of the caste (...) structures, but fails to present or refute all the evidence to the contrary. This book has little of interest for the student of philosophy, but, should be of interest to Indologists.—L. O. G. (shrink)

In this paper, we purposed further study on rough functions and introduced some concepts based on it. We introduced and investigated the concepts of topological lower and upper approximations of near-open sets and studied their basic properties. We defined and studied new topological neighborhood approach of rough functions. We generalized rough functions to topological rough continuous functions by different topological structures. In addition, topological approximations of a function as a relation were defined and studied. Finally, we applied our approach of (...) rough functions in finding the images of patient classification data using rough continuous functions. (shrink)

This report outlines the findings from a Delphi study designed to establish consensus on the definitions of cognitive style and learning style amongst an international style researcher community. The study yields long-needed definitions for each construct that reflect high levels of agreement. In a field that has been criticised for a bewildering array of definitions and a proliferation of terms and concepts, this study represents an important step to address confusion in the meaning of the two terms. New researchers interested (...) in styles are encouraged to draw on these definitions when developing new research agendas aimed at deepening our understanding of style as a core construct in educational psychology. (shrink)

RationaleSurrogates of critically ill patients often have inaccurate expectations about prognosis. Yet there is little research on how intensive care unit clinicians should discuss prognosis, and existing expert opinion-based recommendations give only general guidance that has not been validated with surrogate decision makers.ObjectiveTo determine the perspectives of key stakeholders regarding how prognostic information should be conveyed in critical illness.MethodsThis was a multicenter study at three academic medical centers in California, Pennsylvania, and Washington. One hundred eighteen key stakeholders completed in-depth semistructured (...) interviews. Participants included 47 surrogates of adult patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome; 45 clinicians working in study ICUs, including physicians, nurses, social workers, and spiritual care providers; and 26 experts in health communication, decision science, ethics, family-centered care, geriatrics, healthcare disparities, palliative care, psychology, psychiatry, and critical care.Measurements and main resultsThere was broad support among surrogates for existing expert recommendations, including truthful prognostic disclosure, emotional support, tailoring the disclosure strategy to each family's needs, and checking for understanding. In addition, stakeholders offered suggestions that add specificity to existing recommendations, including: In addition to conveying prognostic estimates, clinicians should help families "see the prognosis for themselves" by showing families radiographic images and explaining the clinical significance of physical manifestations of severe disease at the bedside. Many physicians did not support using numeric estimates to convey prognosis to families, whereas many surrogates, clinicians from other disciplines, and experts believed numbers could be helpful. Clinicians should conceptualize prognostic communication as an iterative process that begins with a preliminary mention of the possibility of death early in the ICU stay and becomes more detailed as the clinical situation develops. Although prognostic information should be initially disclosed by physicians, other members of the multidisciplinary team-nurses, social workers, and spiritual care providers-should be given explicit role responsibilities to reinforce physicians' prognostications and help families process a poor prognosis emotionally.ConclusionsFamily members, clinicians, and experts identified specific communication behaviors that clinicians should use to discuss prognosis in the critical care setting. These findings extend existing opinion-based recommendations and should guide interventions to improve communication about prognosis in ICUs. (shrink)