Beneficence and procreation

Consider a duty of beneficence towards a particular individual, S, and call a reason that is grounded in that duty a “beneficence reason towards S.” Call a person who will be brought into existence by an act of procreation the “resultant person.” Is there ever a beneficence reason towards the resultant person for an agent to procreate? In this paper, I argue for such a reason by appealing to two main premises. First, we owe a pro tanto duty of beneficence to future persons; and second, some of us can benefit some of those persons by procreating. In support of the first premise I reject the presentist account of time in favor of the view that future persons are just as real as presently existing persons. I then argue that future persons are like us in all the morally relevant ways, and since we owe duties of beneficence to each other, we also owe duties of beneficence to future persons. In support of the second premise I offer an account of benefiting according to which an individual can be benefited by an action even if it makes her no better off than she would have been, had the action not been performed. This account of benefiting solves what I call the “non-identity benefit problem.” Finally, I argue that having a life worth living is a benefit, and some of us can cause some persons that benefit by causing them to exist.     

Euthanasia,Autonomy and Beneficence

Our interpretation of the Greek term sarx (σ?ρξ) has great impact on how we view the anthropology and theology expressed in Paul’s letters, and in Luke/Acts. This article takes Nida and Taber’s depiction of the semantic componential structure of σ?ρξ in Luke 24:39 and in Romans 11:14 as a starting point for a discussion of the semantic structure of σ?ρξ in these texts. The hermeneutical and translational principle of mental cascades (Lakoff and Wehling) provides a way to describe the associative links that exist between concepts in any language. Often, but not always, σ?ρξ has been translated into the English term flesh.     

Therapist Self Disclosure in Group Psychotherapy from an Intersubjective and Self Psychological Standpoint

The history of therapist self disclosure is traced from the early struggles of Ferenczi and Burrow to its valued, yet still ambivalent, contemporary status. The symmetry of self disclosure by therapist and group members is differentiated from the parity of their different roles and responsibilities. Using a case example, the process is discussed through which a therapist's self disclosure fosters task-appropriate satisfaction of selfobject needs as it also helps group members articulate and loosen archaic selfobject binds. The therapy group is described as a transitional space within which a therapist's disclosure offers members an intersubjective bridge to the therapist as well as a model for members' own active participation in the group's work.     

Intelligence,Wellbeing and Procreative Beneficence

If Savulescu's (2001, 2009) controversial principle of Procreative Beneficence (PB) is correct, then an important implication is that couples should employ genetic tests for non‐disease traits in selecting which child to bring into existence. Both defenders as well as some critics of this normative entailment of PB have typically accepted the comparatively less controversial claim about non‐disease traits: that there are non‐disease traits such that testing and selecting for them would in fact contribute to bringing about the child who is expected to have the best life. We challenge this less controversial claim, not by arguing deductively for its falsity, but by showing that Savulescu's central argument for this presumably less controversial claim fails. Savulescu offers intelligence as the paradigm example of a testable non‐disease trait such that testing and selecting for it would increase the likelihood that the child selected would be the one who is expected to have the best life (or at least as good a life as the others). We provide a series of arguments aimed at demonstrating that Savulescu's argument from intelligence fails. If our arguments are successful, the upshot is not that PB is false, but more modestly, that the burden of proof remains squarely with Savulescu.     

孔子的"仁"

孔子的“仁”属于一个伦理学范畴,也是一个政治学范畴,还是一个修身学的范畴,“仁”具有“爱一切人”的含义,这与孔子的出身和所处的社会地位有关。     

论有益原则

试图澄清我国医学伦理学著作编写者以及医生在临床实践中往往加以混淆的有益和行善两个概念,并阐释有益这一最为基本的伦理原则的意义。由三部分组成：有益的概念、在一般哲学和伦理学语境中有益的意义,以及生命伦理学语境中的有益。结论是,使病人、受试者、公众、社会受益的有益原则是所有临床医生、与健康有关的科学家、公共卫生人员,以及与健康有关的政策制定者和立法者应该尽的义务,而不是可做可不做的“行善”。而且有益原则应该在诸伦理原则中拥有优先地位。

     

Aggregation, Partiality, and the Strong Beneficence Principle

Consider the Strong Beneficence Principle (SBP): Persons of affluent means ought to give to those who might fail basic human subsistence until the point at which they must give up something of comparable moral importance. This principle has been the subject of much recent discussion. In this paper, I argue that no coherent interpretation of SBP can be found. SBP faces an interpretive trilemma, each horn of which should be unacceptable to fans of SBP; SBP is either (a) so strong as to be patently absurd; (b) implausible given its acceptance of a form of numbers skepticism; (c) drained of all its demanding force. In the conclusion, I show how the problems with SBP generalize to all similarly demanding principles of beneficence.     

Attack on the Self: Charismatic Leadership and Authoritarian Group Supervision

Charismatic group leadership carries the potential for indoctrination and abuse when countertransference issues remain unexamined. This paper is a personal account of participation by the author in an authoritarian and confrontational supervisory experience with self-serving charismatic leadership. Group casualties are portrayed and discussed. This report applies self-psychological principles to understand the powerful merger of the compliant self and idealized object. Further, the dynamics of group identification with the aggressor are described through the Ferenczian lens of confusion of tongues.     

医学科学能力的局限性与仁爱的无限性

医学科学作为医学的一个组成部分,其在医疗实践中的能力有限是一个不争的事实。用建构观而非真理观看待医学科学的局限性,用质疑并不断进取的眼光规避对医学科学的盲目崇拜,合理定位医者与医疗的实际价值。用归属真理的常识守住医生与患者各自判断与行为的底线。患者避免过度就医,医者避免过度行医。并用叙事的方式呈现医疗,用康复的方式实践医疗,用人性的关爱温暖医疗,重建医患互信,让医疗不再冷漠。     

Torture and judgments of guilt

Although torture can establish guilt through confession, how are judgments of guilt made when tortured suspects do not confess? We suggest that perceived guilt is based inappropriately upon how much pain suspects appear to suffer during torture. Two psychological theories provide competing predictions about the link between pain and perceived blame: cognitive dissonance, which links pain to blame, and moral typecasting, which links pain to innocence. We hypothesized that dissonance might characterize the relationship between torture and blame for those close to the torture, while moral typecasting might characterize this relationship for those more distant from it. Accordingly, this experiment placed participants into one of two different roles in which people may be exposed to torture. Participants in the proximal role of prison staffer saw suffering torture victims as relatively more guilty, while participants in the relatively distant role of a radio listener saw suffering victims as more innocent.     

Torture and Religious Practice1

Abstract : This essay explores the connection between religious practices and torture with specific reference to the debate in the USA about ‘waterboarding’ as part of the so‐called War on Terror. After isolating some defining features of torture, the essay examines the historical background of waterboarding in the symbolism of Christian baptism and how this symbolism was used during the Inquisition and the Reformation as part of the torture of heretics and others. Mindful of this sordid use of a Christian rite meant to celebrate new life, the essay thereby clarifies Christian responsibility in the political order. That responsibility requires uncovering the religious roots of some forms of torture, resisting their use by the State, and, further, seeking to render current Christian practice both humane and life giving.     

Explaining the Belief in God for Self, In–Group, and Out–Group Targets

Previous work suggests that people perceive their attitudes and beliefs as deriving from an internal, rational thought process, but not from an emotional process or from external sources. This work has examined explanations for the belief in God using such an attributional approach. The current study examines the explanations individuals give for why (1) they themselves, (2) the group of those who hold the same belief position, or (3) the group of those who hold the opposite position, believe (or not) in God. The attributional dimensions of internality, externality, emotionality, and rationality are used to assess explanations for belief or nonbelief. Believers reported arriving at their own belief position because of an internal, rational process despite the average characterization of the belief in God as less rational and more emotional.     

Phases of Group Development: A View from Self Psychology

This paper delineates four phases of group development from the standpoint of self psychological theory. The author contends that a stable sense of groupself develops over time and that the groupself has a distinct number of phases, each of which has a therapeutic impact on members. The individual patient's selfobject experiences include a relationship to the group-as-a-whole, a transference state of which the leader is but one part. Thus, rather than dilute the transference, group analysis offers a unique opportunity to help the individual experience him or herself within a selfobject matrix that extends beyond the dyad. Group analysis leads to a strengthening of the self, especially as it enables the self to experience itself as part of a group identity, which provides alter-ego selfobject experiences, as well as a sense of acceptance within a larger community. This paper attempts to clarify how different selfobject experiences may be highlighted within the groupself at different stages of group development.