Death on Every Weekend

This essay is a personal account of situations experienced by a medical technician in a large emergency room. It includes examples of stressful situations that daily confront medical personnel and the inability of medical institutions to aid them in understanding and coping with death and dying. Stemming from these stressful situations, the paper illustrates the importance of the need for medical institutions to pay direct attention to the stressful topic of death itself if the medical personnel are to work efficiently in an environment where death and dying are everyday occurrences. Although some institutions do offer in-service sessions to nurses, these services are far and few between. But the stress for all medical personnel remains high, and there remains an unfulfilled need to teach effective thanatological techniques to all medical personnel.     

Comment on evaluating cognitive demand

In 2005 Shieh and Chen found differences in EEG responses when using computer- and paper-based display media, which they attributed to different cognitive demands. This paper supports this interpretation by reporting an unpublished study in which cognitive demand was measured using a self-report workload measure.     

Zhuangzi on Friendship and Death

Zhuangzi suggests that death is a transformation that we commonly and mistakenly think means the end of someone but really just marks a new phase of existence. This metaphysical thesis is presented at several points in the text as an explanation of distinctively Daoist responses to death and loss. Some (such as Wong 2006) take a Daoist response to death, as presented by Zhuangzi, to indicate dual perspectives on friendship and death. But I argue that the metaphysical view sketched above is consistent with a unified perspective, allowing the Daoist to enjoy deep friendships without risking some potential for grief typically associated with strong attachment. However, it leaves the Daoist best suited to friendships with those who endorse the same metaphysics. Furthermore, while the grief associated with the death of a friend is somewhat mitigated, the Daoist has reason to mourn even given this thesis.     

Death

Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics - There is a classic problem which confronts any attempt to assign death a value. On the assumption that death is personal annihilation, death deprives evil of a...     

Counselling on Death and Dying

The growing concern for improved quality of care for the dying and the bereaved is reviewed. The growth of the hospice movement, home-care teams and self-help groups are referred to, together with the attempts that have been made to evaluate the effectiveness of bereavement counselling. In the light of current work and formal psychological studies, an outline of the grief process is given. Reference is made to possible future developments in this field and to the importance of counselling skills being acquired by a wider range of people than at present.     

When demand accelerates demand: Trailing the bandwagon

Consumers generally prefer scarce products, which has been related to their exclusiveness. Currently scarce products, however, are not necessarily exclusive, but could be scarce because many other consumers previously bought them. We propose that consumers also prefer scarce products in this situation, which an appeal to uniqueness cannot explain. Three experiments support our predictions and reveal that scarcity effects even occur when consumers only see traces of others' behavior through emptied shelf space. Furthermore, this bandwagon effect disappears when uniqueness is threatened due to others in close spatial distance.     

"脑死亡"立法的伦理学思辩

目前 ,欣闻一份符合中国国情的“脑死亡”诊断标准 ,已经由卫生部初步制定了出来 ,正广泛征求各方意见加以修改和完善。这标志着我国的“脑死亡”立法工作已经进入了实质性的准备阶段。然而 ,立法背后引发的伦理学讨论告诉我们 ,让承载着数千年道德标准的生死观让位于新锐的“脑死亡” ,我们仍有一段漫长的路要走。1　生死观之辩人类文明的发展 ,如果从生死哲学的立场来看 ,即是对生死 ,尤其是死亡逐渐加深认识及理解的过程。中国千百年来形成的乐生恶死的传统观念根深蒂固 ,“天覆地载 ,万物备悉 ,莫贵于人”强调的正是人生命的重要性。人…     

Death and gratitude: Death reflection enhances gratitude

Although gratitude is important to the good life, little is known about factors that enhance gratitude. Some have suggested that traumatic events such as near-death experiences and life-threatening illnesses might enhance gratitude. If reflecting on death causes one to appreciate life as a limited resource, this might enhance gratitude. This study investigated this theory. Participants were randomly assigned to a death reflection condition, a traditional mortality salience condition, or to a control condition. Participants in the death reflection and the mortality salience conditions showed enhanced gratitude compared to individuals in the control condition, supporting the theory that becoming aware of one's mortal limitations enhances gratitude for the life that what one has.     

Death:

In the near future there will be some changes in our patterns of dying, but only in superficial and circumstantial ways. The present views of what death is and what causes natural death probably will not change. The brightest prospects for new learnings about death are from the new physics and the new metaphysics it has produced, and possibly from scientifically respectable psychic data.     

Venerating Death

Abstract

In this paper, I am concerned with elucidating and expanding our attitudes toward our own death. As it is, our common attitudes toward our death are the following: we fear our premature death, and we dread our inevitable death. These attitudes are rational, but I want to argue that our attitudes toward death should be more complicated than this. A condition upon our value, our preciousness, as creatures is that we are vulnerable, and our vulnerability is, at bottom, a vulnerability to death. A corollary of this is that we could not be loved, either by ourselves or by others, for one cannot love—be concerned for—a being invulnerable to death. As a consequence, death plays a deep and abiding role in our value systems. Our susceptibility to premature and inevitable death is a condition upon our being valuable creatures and, in turn, it is a condition upon our being loved. Given the high value that we place on being valuable creatures who deserve love, we should equally place a high value on the constitutive conditions for being precious and loved. If, as I suggest, one of these conditions is that we will die, we should see our deaths not simply as something to fear or dread, but as something of great importance in our lives. Our deaths should be treated with awe, respect, and even praise.