Vilius Dranseika

Two decades have passed since the first attempts were made to establish systematic ethical review of human research in the Baltic States. Legally and institutionally much has changed. In this paper we provide an historical and structural overview of ethical review of human research and identify some problems related to the role of ethical review in establishing quality research environment in these countries. Problems connected to (a) public availability of information, (b) management of conflicts of interest, (c) REC composition and motivation of REC members, and (d) differing levels of stringency of ethical review for different types of studies, are identified. Recommendations are made to strengthen cooperation among the Baltic RECs

Nichols and Bruno claim that the folk judge that psychological continuity is necessary for personal identity. In this article, we evaluate this claim. First, we argue that it is likely that in thinking about hypothetical cases of transformations, the folk do not use a unitary concept of personal identity, but instead rely on different concepts of ‘person’, ‘identity’, and ‘individual’. Identity can be ascribed even when post-transformation individuals are no longer categorized as persons. Second, we provide new empirical evidence suggesting that the folk do not consider psychological continuity to be necessary for an individual to be categorized as a person or for ascribing identity over time and through transformations. In this, we assume, along with Nichols and Bruno, that folk judgments about identity can be read off the use of proper names. Furthermore, we raise some doubts about the ability of current experimental designs to adequately distinguish between qualitative and numerical identity jud..

Biomedical research involving human subjects is an arena of conflicts of interests. One of the most important conflicts is between interests of participants and interests of future patients. Legal regulations and ethical guidelines are instruments designed to help find a fair balance between risks and burdens taken by research subjects and development of knowledge and new treatment. There is an universally accepted ethical principle, which states that it is not ethically allowed to sacrifice individual interests for the sake of society and science. This is the principle of precedence of individual. But there is a problem with how to interpret the principle of precedence of individual in the context of research without prospect of future benefit involving children. There are proposals trying to reconcile non-beneficial research involving children with the concept of the best interests. We assert that this reconciliation is flawed and propose an interpretation of the principle of precedence of individual as follows: not all, but only the most important interests of participants, must be guaranteed; this principle should be interpreted as the secure participant standard. In consequence, the issue of permissible risk ceiling becomes ethically crucial in research with incompetent subjects.

Two decades have passed since the first attempts were made to establish systematic ethical review of human research in the Baltic States. Legally and institutionally much has changed. In this paper we provide an historical and structural overview of ethical review of human research and identify some problems related to the role of ethical review in establishing quality research environment in these countries. Problems connected to (a) public availability of information, (b) management of conflicts of interest, (c) REC composition and motivation of REC members, and (d) differing levels of stringency of ethical review for different types of studies, are identified. Recommendations are made to strengthen cooperation among the Baltic RECs.

Straipsnyje siūlomos konceptualios priemonės, leidžiančios formuluoti tvirtinimą, kad tose socialinių mokslų filosofijos teorijose, kuriose veiksmų atpažinimas yra laikomas metodologiniu socialinio aiškinimo pagrindu, jis yra traktuojamas kaip „virtus dormitiva“. Tuomet veiksmų atpažinimas gali būti suprantamas kaip tiesioginė veiksmų tipų įžvalga elgsenoje arba neapibrėžta, holistinė veiksmų interpretavimo procedūra. Abiem atvejais susiduriama su neskaidrios ir toliau neaiškinamos pažįstančiojo episteminės galios postulavimu. „Virtus dormitiva“ problema tampa ypač aštri, jei pripažįstame veiksmo atpažinimo problemos metodologinį pirmumą prieš veiksmo aiškinimo problemą1.Pagrindiniai žodžiai: veiksmų atpažinimas, veiksmų aiškinimas, veiksmų tipai ir atvejai, socialinių mokslų filosofija