scholarly journals “Oh, Dignity too?” Said the Robot: Human Dignity as the Basis for the Governance of Robotics

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lexo Zardiashvili ◽  
Eduard Fosch-Villaronga
Keyword(s):  
Human Dignity ◽  
Data Protection ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Personal Care ◽  
Healthcare Applications ◽  
Wheelchair Users ◽  
The Past ◽  
Human Contact ◽  
European Institutions

AbstractHealthcare robots enable practices that seemed far-fetched in the past. Robots might be the solution to bridge the loneliness that the elderly often experience; they may help wheelchair users walk again, or may help navigate the blind. European Institutions, however, acknowledge that human contact is an essential aspect of personal care and that the insertion of robots could dehumanize caring practices. Such instances of human–robot interactions raise the question to what extent the use and development of robots for healthcare applications can challenge the dignity of users. In this article, therefore, we explore how different robot applications in the healthcare domain support individuals in achieving ‘dignity’ or pressure it. We argue that since healthcare robot applications are novel, their associated risks and impacts may be unprecedented and unknown, thus triggering the need for a conceptual instrument that is binding and remains flexible at the same time. In this respect, as safety rules and data protection are often criticized to lack flexibility, and technology ethics to lack enforceability, we suggest human dignity as the overarching governance instrument for robotics, which is the inviolable value upon which all fundamental rights are grounded.

scholarly journals Novas perspectivas em Direito de Família e o princípio da autonomia privada: um estudo à luz da eficácia dos direitos fundamentais nas relações privadas / New prospects in Family Law and the private autonomy principle: a study about effectiveness of fundamental rights in private relations

2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Teila Rocha Lins D'Albuquerque
Keyword(s):  
Human Dignity ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Personal Autonomy ◽  
Civil Law ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Family Unit ◽  
Private Autonomy ◽  
Property Regime ◽  
Freedom Of Action

Resumo: O presente artigo investiga a ingerência da autonomia privada nas relações de direito de família. Parte-se da nova concepção de família em que existe liberdade de atuação entre as partes componentes da entidade familiar para definir os contornos de suas vidas e alcançar uma realização plena, exercendo direitos fundamentais da dignidade da pessoa humana e autonomia privada. Essa reflexão inclui a própria composição familiar, o regime de bens do casamento e a negação da autonomia ao idoso, situações que têm se alterado junto às atuais diretrizes de estudo e aplicação do direito civil à luz da Constituição Federal.Asbtract: This paper investigates the interference of private autonomy in family law relationships. It starts with the new concept of family where there is freedom of action between the component parts of a family unit to define the contours of their lives and achieve fulfillment, exercising fundamental rights of human dignity and personal autonomy. This reflection includes family composition itself, the matrimonial property regime and the denial of autonomy to the elderly, situations that has changed with the current study guidelines of civil law in the light of the Constitution.

The Unusual Cruelty of Nursing Homes Behind Bars

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (5) ◽  
pp. 264-271
Author(s):  
Rachel E. López
Keyword(s):  
Nursing Homes ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Prison Population ◽  
Financial Burden ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
The United States ◽  
Term Care ◽  
Trained Staff ◽  
State Prisons ◽  
The Cost

The elderly prison population continues to rise along with higher rates of dementia behind bars. To maintain the detention of this elderly population, federal and state prisons are creating long-term care units, which in turn carry a heavy financial burden. Prisons are thus gearing up to become nursing homes, but without the proper trained staff and adequate financial support. The costs both to taxpayers and to human dignity are only now becoming clear. This article squarely addresses the second dimension of this carceral practice, that is the cost to human dignity. Namely, it sets out why indefinitely incarcerating someone with dementia or other neurocognitive disorders violates the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. This conclusion derives from the confluence of two lines of U.S. Supreme Court precedent. First, in Madison v. Alabama, the Court recently held that executing someone (in Madison’s case someone with dementia) who cannot rationally understand their sentence amounts to cruel and unusual punishment. Second, in line with Miller v. Alabama, which puts life without parole (LWOP) sentences in the same class as death sentences due to their irrevocability, this holding should be extended to LWOP sentences. Put another way, this article explains why being condemned to life is equivalent to death for someone whose neurodegenerative disease is so severe that they cannot rationally understand their punishment.

Contributory Factors for Obesity in Elderly: Review of the Literature

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nur Raihan Ismail ◽  
Noor Aman Hamid
Keyword(s):  
English Language ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Dietary Factors ◽  
Health Concern ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Contributory Factors ◽  
The Past ◽  
Prevalence Of Obesity ◽  
Program Intervention ◽  
Future Education

Introduction: The prevalence of obesity has been rising, adding to morbidity and mortality. As the proportion of elderly aged 60 years and above grows, so too the prevalence of obesity among this population. Obesity in the elderly is a rapidly growing public health concern as it contributes to significant changes in the health of older people. Objective: This review aims to assess the contributory factors for obesity in the elderly over the past decade. Methods: A literature search was conducted. The search was restricted to articles written in the English language published from 2008 to 2018. Qualitative studies were excluded. Results: A total of 19 full articles were retrieved, of which 18 cross-sectional and one cohort were included. The contributory factors were divided into three components: (a) socio demographic characteristics, (b) medical history and dietary factors and (c) environmental factors. Conclusions: This review informs an emerging knowledge regarding contributory factors for obesity and has implications for future education and program intervention in fighting obesity in the elderly.

Causes of Death

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Anderson ◽  
Corinne Roughley
Keyword(s):  
Heart Disease ◽  
Pulmonary Tuberculosis ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Causes Of Death ◽  
Whooping Cough ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
World War Two ◽  
World War ◽  
The Past ◽  
Disease Mortality

The principal reported causes of death have changed dramatically since the 1860s, though changes in categorization of causes and improved diagnosis make it difficult to be precise about timings. Diseases particularly affecting children such as measles and whooping cough largely disappeared as killers by the 1950s. Deaths particularly linked to unclean environments and poor sanitary infrastructure also declined, though some can kill babies and the elderly even today. Pulmonary tuberculosis and bronchitis were eventually largely controlled. Reported cancer, stroke, and heart disease mortality showed upward trends well into the second half of the twentieth century, though some of this was linked to diagnostic improvement. Both fell in the last decades of our period, but Scotland still had among the highest rates in Western Europe. Deaths from accidents and drowning saw significant falls since World War Two but, especially in the past 25 years, suicide, and alcohol and drug-related deaths rose.

Ela Longespee's Roll of Benefits: Piety and Reciprocity in the Thirteenth Century

Traditio ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 64 ◽  
pp. 1-56
Author(s):  
Emilie Amt
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Religious Institutions ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
Specific Content ◽  
Reciprocal Relationships ◽  
Oxford University ◽  
The Past ◽  
National Archives

Ipsa autem, bonorum temporalium liberalissima ac spiritualium avida beneficiorum …— 1293 charter of Oxford University, describing Ela LongespeeIn 1293, the elderly and twice-widowed Ela Longespee, countess of Warwick, or someone acting on her behalf, gathered together eighteen charters that had been issued to her over the past dozen years and sent them to the bishop of Lincoln, to be confirmed and copied into a single roll. The original charters have long since vanished, but the enrolled copy survives in The National Archives at Kew. Its component documents, all of them detailed grants to Ela by religious institutions in the Oxford area, are highly unusual; even when compared to the few surviving parallels, they stand out for their specific content. The roll itself, comprising eighteen such documents in a private archive created for a thirteenth-century laywoman, is unique. And when it is examined along with other surviving evidence of Ela's religious activities, it provides us with an extraordinary perspective on the reciprocal nature of religious patronage at this time. What is especially unusual about Ela's case is that we know much more about what the religious promised to Ela than what she granted to them. Thus Ela Longespee's records tell us the side of the story that is seldom told when we look at records of religious patronage; they reveal the return that donors expected in the late thirteenth century, with increasing precision and urgency. Using a chronological framework, this essay will examine the surviving documents, tell the story of Ela's life, and explore the most interesting dimension of that story: her startlingly explicit reciprocal relationships with religious institutions.

scholarly journals A Bibliometric Analysis of Human-Machine Interaction Methodology for Electric-Powered Wheelchairs Driving from 1998 to 2020

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (14) ◽  
pp. 7567
Author(s):  
Xiaochen Zhang ◽  
Lanxin Hui ◽  
Linchao Wei ◽  
Fuchuan Song ◽  
Fei Hu
Keyword(s):  
The Elderly ◽  
Research Field ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Human Machine Interaction ◽  
Research Directions ◽  
The Past ◽  
Power Wheelchairs ◽  
The Disabled ◽  
Future Research Directions ◽  
Machine Interaction

Electric power wheelchairs (EPWs) enhance the mobility capability of the elderly and the disabled, while the human-machine interaction (HMI) determines how well the human intention will be precisely delivered and how human-machine system cooperation will be efficiently conducted. A bibliometric quantitative analysis of 1154 publications related to this research field, published between 1998 and 2020, was conducted. We identified the development status, contributors, hot topics, and potential future research directions of this field. We believe that the combination of intelligence and humanization of an EPW HMI system based on human-machine collaboration is an emerging trend in EPW HMI methodology research. Particular attention should be paid to evaluating the applicability and benefits of the EPW HMI methodology for the users, as well as how much it contributes to society. This study offers researchers a comprehensive understanding of EPW HMI studies in the past 22 years and latest trends from the evolutionary footprints and forward-thinking insights regarding future research.

scholarly journals WebRTC - Realtime Communication for the Open Web Platform

Queue ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-93
Author(s):  
Niklas Blum ◽  
Serge Lachapelle ◽  
Harald Alvestrand
Keyword(s):  
High Speed ◽  
Network Access ◽  
The Past ◽  
Human Contact ◽  
High Speed Network ◽  
The World ◽  
Web Platform

In this time of pandemic, the world has turned to Internet-based, RTC (realtime communication) as never before. The number of RTC products has, over the past decade, exploded in large part because of cheaper high-speed network access and more powerful devices, but also because of an open, royalty-free platform called WebRTC. WebRTC is growing from enabling useful experiences to being essential in allowing billions to continue their work and education, and keep vital human contact during a pandemic. The opportunities and impact that lie ahead for WebRTC are intriguing indeed.

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