scholarly journals Neuroethics and philosophy

2014 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-203
Author(s):  
Jovan Babic

Neuro-ethics is probably fastest growing part of applied ethics. The main thesis is that certain natural processes in brain and nerves produce certain moral, and immoral, behaviors. All these processes can be explained causally, and (if this is so) neuro-ethics might be the final result of neuroscience. There are some metaphysical and ethical pitfalls to be considered, however, like the (incorrect) conflation of causal explanation and rational justification in definingvalues, not only non-moral values but moral values as well. Certainly, the knowledge of how neurological processes function could help to enhance the quality of human life, not only in coping with defects but also in improving the so-called ?normal life?. This implies that neuroethics is instrumental, dealing with values which are instrumental as well. However, neuroethics, it seems, aspires to go further than that: to explain how goals come into existence and what their articulation should look like. All of this should be causally explained, or at least explainable; and the main focus of the paper is an analysis of this aspiration. The analysis refers to some important distinctions like the distinction between causes and reasons, explanation and justification, or the one between means and ends. At the end of the paper there is a section about applications, where some of the benefits and risks are summarily indicated, with a conclusion that neuroethics surely might help in advancing the overall quality of human life, individual and social.

1996 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 292-300 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sherwood O. Cole

From the vantage point of an outsider, it has been observed that most attempts at clinical integration focus on psychological and theological issues while avoiding considerations of biological influences. Two examples (homosexuality and heterosexual sex offenses) are given as a demonstration of how the inclusion of biological considerations improve the quality of integrative activity. While not having a natural affinity for biological explanations, clinical colleagues are, nevertheless, challenged to expand their view of integration to include biological dimensions. Further suggested guidelines for including biological interests in integration include (a) the human brain and mind constitute an example par excellence of God's creative purpose in human life; (b) God has chosen the physical processes of the brain/mind as a vehicle for expressing Christian experiences; and (c) problems having their source in the spiritual realm can influence neurological processes just as much as can psychological factors. Cautionary notes are offered regarding the dangers of biological reductionism and determinism to the process of integration. Finally, it is concluded that this perspective on integration is based upon a Christian world view and that all data-base sources must undergo the same degree of critical examination.


Author(s):  
Jörn Rüsen

The paper starts with a systematical analysis of the interrelationship of humanism and nature. It proceeds to a historical reconstruction of this relationship in the development of Western humanism from ancient Rome via Renaissance till the Enlightenment of the 18th century. In both respects the result of the analysis is the same: The Western tradition of humanism is characterised by a gap between an emphasis on the cultural quality of human life on the one hand and nature on the other one. Men are entitled to dominate and govern nature and use it for their purpose. This fits into an idea of a progressing destructive relationship between man and nature in the West. On the other the tradition of humanism has put the gap between man and nature into a harmonising cosmological or theological context. In this context a simple destructive relationship between man and nature is not possible. The humanism of today has to pick up the challenge of the ecological crisis and to refer to its tradition where man and nature are mediated into a meaningful and sense-bearing interrelationship. Instead of simply referring to the traditional cosmology a convincing idea of this mediation or even synthesis can only be made plausible by referring to the already pre-given synthesis between nature and culture, the human body.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 124
Author(s):  
Raymona Rosilla ◽  
Mia Azizah ◽  
Desy Setiawati

Phosphate Content in Cikaniki RiverThe Cikaniki River is one of the tributaries of Cisadane, which crosses the provinces of West Java and Banten. This river has a very high function and value for human life and water ecosystem. Phosphates formed naturally in formed of rock and undergo a weathering process, rocks gradually break down into phosphate ions dissolved in water. Phosphates in orthophosphates are produced by nature and are found in waste, whereas polyphosphates are often used in detergents, but in water the form of poly will turn into an ortho form. The analysis to find out the phosphate content in Cikaniki River. Phosphate analysis of river water refers to SNI 06-6989.31-2005, using the uv-vis spectrophotometric method in ascorbic acid. The results showed that the phosphate content in Cikaniki River still fulfilled the Standard Quality of PP no. 82 of 2001, is <0.2 mg / L except in Kampung Babakan Liud area. Phosphate contamination in river water can be derived from natural processes as well as from the addition of contamination due to human activities in the form of agriculture, industry, and household activities and the presence of excessive phosphate can lead to explosive growth of algae in the waters.Keywords: River, Phosphate, ascorbic acid, wasteABSTRAKSungai Cikaniki adalah salah satu anak sungai Cisadane, yang melintasi Provinsi Jawa Barat dan Banten. Sungai ini memiliki fungsi dan nilai yang sangat tinggi bagi kehidupan manusia dan ekosistem air. Fosfat terjadi secara alami dalam bentuk batuan dan mengalami proses pelapukan, batuan secara bertahap mengurai menjadi ion fosfat yang larut dalam air. Fosfat dalam bentuk ortofosfat diproduksi oleh alam dan ditemukan di limbah, sedangkan polifosfat sering digunakan dalam detergen, tetapi di dalam air bentuk poli akan berubah menjadi bentuk orto. analisis untuk mengetahui kandungan fosfat di Sungai Cikaniki. Analisis fosfat pada air sungai mengacu kepada SNI 06-6989.31-2005, menggunakan metode spektrofotometri uv-vis secara asam askorbat. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan kadar Fosfat di Sungai Cikaniki masih memenuhi Baku Mutu PP No. 82 Tahun 2001, yaitu  < 0,2 mg/L kecuali pada daerah  Kampung Babakan Liud. Pencemaran Fosfat di air sungai dapat berasal dari proses alamiah  maupun berasal dari penambahan cemaran akibat aktifitas manusia yang berupa pertanian, perindustrian, maupun kegiatan rumah tangga dan keberadaan fosfat yang berlebihan dapat menyebabkan terjadinya ledakan pertumbuhan alga di perairan.Kata Kunci: Sungai, Fosfat, asam askorbat, limbah


Pneuma ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frank D. Macchia

AbstractLevison’s Filled with the Spirit explores the deep difference between the two Testaments in how Spirit filling is understood. While the Old Testament holds Spirit filling to be a flourishing of human life through an interaction of divine and human initiatives, the New Testament sees it as a subsequent gift granted supernaturally through faith in Christ. Yet, there is also a sense of continuity in the midst of this difference, especially in how the flourishing of life resists death. This review appreciatively explores Levison’s understanding of such biblical tensions and continuities in the light of the one-sided accent of Pentecostalism on the supernatural quality of life in the Spirit, but also in the light of the question as to whether or not Levison has unnecessarily widened the gap between the pneumatologies of the two Testaments.


PMLA ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 129 (4) ◽  
pp. 783-789 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Bushnell

For many commentators on tragic temporality, tragic time is the “now,” binding the characters—the actors of the catastrophe—in the anxiety and horror of a blinding present moment. As Northrop Frye observed in his Fools of Time, “The basis of the tragic vision is being in time, the sense of the one-directional quality of life, where everything happens once and for all, where every act brings unavoidable and fateful consequences, and where all experience vanishes, not simply into the past, but into nothingness, annihilation” (3). In performance, in particular, that presentness feels relentless: as Stanley Cavell writes, tragic performance “demands a continuous attention to what is happening at each here and now, as if everything of significance is happening at this moment, while each thing that happens turns a leaf of time” (93). This sense of the present mimics our everyday sense of how we live in this world: in David Kastan's words, “Tragic time is, then, the experiential time of human life—a time, that like life itself to which it is inextricably tied, is directional, irreversible, and finite” (80).


Author(s):  
Vladyslav Kopytkov

The work is dedicated to the newest approach in legal science, the phenomenon of cyclicality. Cyclicality is a long-standing philosophical idea and concept that is practised in various scientific fields. To become a scientific theory and paradigm, it has gone a long evolutionary way from antiquity to modernity. The cyclical approach is in the "armament" of many sciences. It provides scientists with a whole methodological basis for scientific research, a completely different vision of the processes occurring in various spheres of human life. Unfortunately, modern jurisprudence still pays little attention to the phenomenon of cyclicality, its study in law. However, some developments of scientists indicate a growing interest to these issues. For example, Yu. A. Tikhomirov notes that the cyclical approach to the development of law allows us to abandon the mechanistic attitude to it and simplified assessments on the one hand, from a purely "text" perception of law as a set of legal acts that come in place of each other - on the other hand. With its help, there is an opportunity to reveal, understand and consciously influence all stages of life of both public and private law. To see their connections and crossovers, to identify the hidden facets of law. The concept of cyclicality has also become the basis for the "theory of constitutional cycles" by A.N. Medushevsky, who identifies evolutionary and revolutionary models of constitutional cycling, various models of constitutional cycles in post-socialist countries, and assesses exit strategies. He comes to the main conclusion that the cyclicality is traced in the constitutional development of different countries of the world, in particular, it is manifested in the laws of adoption and modification of the constitution. Due to cyclicality, we are able to analyze the past, model the future, trace the dynamics of any legal phenomena and processes. On the example of the "legislative cycle", we see that cyclicality can be both a form of legislative process and a methodological tool for legislative activity. Through the category of "life cycles" of law, the social, "living" nature of law is manifested, its dynamic essence is revealed. The cycle extends the conceptual and categorical apparatus of theoretical jurisprudence. This approach is also important in the study of deterministic and bifurcation processes in law. The interdisciplinary, integrative nature of the doctrine of cyclicality allows extrapolating into the sphere of modern jurisprudence some knowledge and developments in other sciences, in particular, economics and politics. All this suggests that the phenomenon of cyclicality is important in the process of studying the legal reality, in the process of learning it. Both the paradigm and the methodological basis of cyclicality can play a significant role in changing the quality of law. We also emphasize that today there are already substantial developments in the law, which uses the cyclical approach, however, these are only "first swallows". The theoretical and methodological potential of this approach for general theoretical and applied jurisprudence is only beginning to be discovered by researchers. It is possible to express confidence that addressing these issues by interested specialists will be useful to both science and society.


2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 234-244
Author(s):  
Thomas Sören Hoffmann

The article compares different models of bioethics. The dominant model considers bioethics as just a new area of applied ethics focusing in its origin mainly on questions of medical ethics like those rising from reproductive medicine. Within the framework of this concept, the formal application of ethical principles on medical practices is normally understood as a strategy for the preservation of personal autonomy of the individual. Another model linked e.g. to the names of Van Rensselaer Potter or Hans Jonas can be called a "holistic" one and refers to ethical issues discussed within the greater context of "general meditation" of life in general, nature and human life-worlds. Holistic bioethics focuses on the idea of integrity, and it also allows an internal "living" pluralism of perspectives, which corresponds to the self-differentiation of life in a plurality of life-worlds. The third model is an integrative bioethics which not only tries to combine the perspectives of autonomy on the one hand, life and nature as a whole on the other, but also shows that bioethics is founded on its own sources of normativity (e.g. in the idea of life). From these sources also rises its task of “integrating” the perspectives of different scientific disciplines on issues of life in general. The concept of "integrative bioethics" is promoted in the article because of the following characteristics: integrative bioethics considers all kinds of interaction between autonomous persons, living beings and nature in general; it is transdisciplinary and therefore based on a dialogue of all sciences in which bioethical awareness of the problem may arise; it is open also to non-scientific manifestations of individual and social consciousness and therefore in discussing live in a normative sense nevertheless stays in contact with the real life-worlds of real people. At the end of the article integrative bioethics is discussed with regard to the example of the meaning of the idea of a “natural will”.


2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 19-31
Author(s):  
Danuta Ślęczek-Czakon

The concept of the quality of life: The medical and the bioethical aspectThe concept of the quality of life initially contained mainly objective indicators. It was only later that it was extended so as to include the subjective ones as well. Upon its transfer from its original medical context into the social sciences, the concept of the quality of life has inspired a new approach to sick persons. It is now acknowledged that it is not enough to merely prolong a life. It also has to meet the standards generally recognized by active, healthy people. In the assessment of the quality of life both objective state of human health and socio-economic status and subjective satisfaction with life and perception of each other indicators are used. It is used, among other things, to evaluate the effects of medical and non-medical health care and medical intervention. In bioethics, it is noted that the term diminishes the value of human life. The methods used to assess the value of human life based on economic analysis and the measuring of the quality of life can lead to undesirable consequences. Conclusion: on the one hand, the estimation of the quality of life is imminent for various reasons; on the other hand, however, it raises ethical objections.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 54-60
Author(s):  
Rostyslav Kupchyk ◽  
Halyna Miasoid

The rapid development of modern digital technologies entails an increase in the quantity and quality of changes in the communication system. Digitalization affects the transformation of communication processes, creating new conditions for information exchange, interaction and communication. The aim is to study the modern cultural trends in the communication development in the conditions of digitalization. In order to achieve the goal, the article provides the terminological analysis of the concepts of "communication" and "digitalization", considers the main features and trends of the digitalization process, analyzes the transformation of communication and highlights the features of digitalization in Ukraine. Methodology. The culturological approach was used as the methodological tool of the research, which allowed to carry out scientific analysis of the studied phenomena through cultural determination and provided a panoramic multidimensional view and polysystemic explanation of the essence of cultural trends in the communication in conditions of digitalization. Results. It is concluded that digitalization is the process of systematization, use, processing of information in digital format to optimize, automate, improve communication and increase its productivity. Modern digitalization processes appear as a cultural trend that affects all spheres of human life, has a global character and creates fundamentally new forms and means of communication. On the one hand, there is an optimization and improvement of communication interaction, on the other – there is a commercialization of the communication environment, its pragmatism and rationalization. Value/originality. The analysis of digitalization as a cultural trend is carried out and the essence of its influence on communication in modern culture is revealed. Practical implications. The results of the research are an analysis of communication transformations in the conditions of digitalization in integrity and systematization, which, in our opinion, will complement the theoretical developments on this issue, as well as will help to develop the practical solutions to overcome the consequences of these transformations and will help to determine these changes in the future.


Author(s):  
Muhammad Yusuf Pulungan

Nowadays, science is expanding more advances. The expansion produces out a very rapid technology so that human being can get many easier and huge lifes. An advance science isn’t almost escorted by meaningful humanity awareness. Even in an advance country always spared from science and technology problems that appeared inside. The citizens tend to be materialist, individualist, and far lose in doing religious of moral values. It’s almost right that “Even science and technology may give a better quality of human life, however not source represent a skill-even less an absolute value of something behave. Why’s wrong? It can be because of tauhid basic or divinity of education systems now has been ignored or didn’t integrate in education process.”


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