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71The need for new ontologies in psychiatryPhilosophical Explorations 20 (2): 146-159. 2017.Although researchers in psychiatry have been trying for decades to elucidate the pathophysiology underlying mental disorders, relatively little progress has been made. One explanation for this failure is that diagnostic categories in psychiatry are unlikely to track underlying neurological mechanisms. Because of this, the US National Institutes of Mental Health has recently developed a novel ontology to guide research in biological psychiatry: the Research Domain Criteria. In this paper, I argue…Read more
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44Gender differences in depression: Explanations from feminist ethicsInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 4 (1): 69. 2011.Although depression is among the more common types of mental disorders, it is significantly more common in women than in men. In this article, I draw on feminist analyses of personhood and of autonomy to explain the greater prevalence of depression among women. I argue that such an approach builds on earlier feminist critiques of psychiatry, but provides a more nuanced explanation of how social factors can affect women’s mental health by emphasizing that women with depression are not merely pass…Read more
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26The (dis)unity of nursing scienceNursing Philosophy 15 (4): 250-260. 2014.This paper looks at the implications of contemporary work in philosophy of science for nursing science. Early work on the nature of theories in nursing was strongly influenced by logical empiricism, and this influence remains even long after nurse scholars have come to reject logical empiricism as an adequate philosophy of science. Combined with the need to establish nursing as an autonomous profession, nursing theory's use of logical empiricism has led to serious conceptual problems. Philosophe…Read more
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220New Research, Old Problems: Methodological and Ethical Issues in fMRI Research Examining Sex/Gender Differences in Emotion ProcessingNeuroethics 6 (2): 319-330. 2011.Neuroscience research examining sex/gender differences aims to explain behavioral differences between men and women in terms of differences in their brains. Historically, this research has used ad hoc methods and has been conducted explicitly in order to show that prevailing gender roles were dictated by biology. I examine contemporary fMRI research on sex/gender differences in emotion processing and argue that it, too, both uses problematic methods and, in doing so, reinforces gender stereotype…Read more
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40Feminist bioethics: At the center, on the margins (review)International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 4 (2): 154-159. 2011.Feminist Bioethics: At the Center, on the Margins is a collection of essays that “reflect on the positioning of feminist bioethics” (xi). The volume editors suggest that the discipline of feminist bioethics, twenty years after it began, faces tension between becoming incorporated into mainstream bioethics, which would mean that it has greater influence on bioethics as a whole, and remaining “on the margins,” where it can perhaps better continue its critical project of drawing attention to the wa…Read more
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62Physiological mechanisms and epidemiological researchJournal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice 19 (3). 2013.
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53Vulnerability, health, and illnessInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 5 (2): 147-161. 2012.Although it is intuitively obvious that having health problems makes people vulnerable, neither bioethics nor the philosophy of medicine has paid much attention to the relationship between vulnerability and health or illness. In this paper, I draw on work by Erinn Gilson on the nature of vulnerability in order to address this lack, showing that attending to vulnerability illuminates the relationship between health and illness.
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108Marcum, James A., An introductory philosophy of medicine: humanizing modern medicine: Springer, New York, 2008, 376 pp., $149 , 1-40-2067968Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 31 (5): 391-393. 2010.
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15Capacities in psychiatry: a commentary on HubbelingJournal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice 18 (5): 1019-1019. 2012.
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21The Canadian Assisted Human Reproduction Act: Protecting Women's Health While Potentially Allowing Human Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer into Non-Human OocytesAmerican Journal of Bioethics 7 (2): 71-73. 2007.No abstract
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10Philip Kitcher’s “Science in a Democratic Society” (review)Journal of Philosophy, Science and Law 12 1-4. 2012.
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21Feminist bioethics: At the center, on the margins. edited by Jackie Leach Scully, Laurel E. Baldwin-Ragaven, and Petya FitzpatrickInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 4 (2): 154-159. 2011.Jackie Leach Scully, Laurel E. Baldwin-Ragaven, and Petya Fitzpatrick, Feminist Bioethics: At the Center, on the Margins, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010, reviewed by Robyn Bluhm
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3Beyond neurosexism : is it possible to defend the female brain?In Robyn Bluhm, Anne Jaap Jacobson & Heidi Lene Maibom (eds.), Neurofeminism: issues at the intersection of feminist theory and cognitive science, Palgrave-macmillan. 2012.
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91Neurosexism and NeurofeminismPhilosophy Compass 11 (11): 716-729. 2016.As neuroscience has gained an increased ability to enchant the general public, it has become more and more common to appeal to it as an authority on a wide variety of questions about how humans do and should act. This is especially apparent with the question of gender roles. The term ‘neurosexism’ has been coined to describe the phenomenon of using neuroscientific practices and results to promote sexist conclusions; its feminist response is called ‘neurofeminism’. Here, our aim is to survey the …Read more
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41Neurofeminism: issues at the intersection of feminist theory and cognitive science (edited book)Palgrave-Macmillan. 2012.Going beyond the hype of recent fMRI "findings," this interdisciplinary collection examines such questions as: Do women and men have significantly different brains? Do women empathize, while men systematize? Is there a "feminine" ethics? What does brain research on intersex conditions tell us about sex and gender?
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43Evidence‐based medicine and philosophy of scienceJournal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice 16 (2): 363-364. 2010.
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145Self‐Fulfilling Prophecies: The Influence of Gender Stereotypes on Functional Neuroimaging Research on EmotionHypatia 28 (4): 870-886. 2013.Feminist scholars have shown that research on sex/gender differences in the brain is often used to support gender stereotypes. Scientists use a variety of methodological and interpretive strategies to make their results consistent with these stereotypes. In this paper, I analyze functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) research that examines differences between women and men in brain activity associated with emotion and show that these researchers go to great lengths to make their results co…Read more
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51Jeremy Howick: The philosophy of evidence-based medicine: Wiley-Blackwell, West Sussex, UK, 2011, 229 pp, $58.95 , ISBN: 9781405196673 (review)Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 32 (6): 423-427. 2011.
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Beyond the basicsIn Luc Faucher & Christine Tappolet (eds.), The modularity of emotions, University of Calgary Press. 2008.
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793Diseases, patients and the epistemology of practice: mapping the borders of health, medicine and careJournal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice 21 (3): 357-364. 2015.Last year saw the 20th anniversary edition of JECP, and in the introduction to the philosophy section of that landmark edition, we posed the question: apart from ethics, what is the role of philosophy ‘at the bedside’? The purpose of this question was not to downplay the significance of ethics to clinical practice. Rather, we raised it as part of a broader argument to the effect that ethical questions – about what we should do in any given situation – are embedded within whole understandings of …Read more
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118No Need for Alarm: A Critical Analysis of Greene’s Dual-Process Theory of Moral Decision-MakingNeuroethics 7 (3): 299-316. 2014.Joshua Greene and his colleagues have proposed a dual-process theory of moral decision-making to account for the effects of emotional responses on our judgments about moral dilemmas that ask us to contemplate causing direct personal harm. Early formulations of the theory contrast emotional and cognitive decision-making, saying that each is the product of a separable neural system. Later formulations emphasize that emotions are also involved in cognitive processing. I argue that, given the acknow…Read more
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31Evidence-based medicine and patient autonomyInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 2 (2): 134-151. 2009.Evidence-based medicine was developed to ensure that health-care decisions are based on the best available research evidence. Making this evidence available to patients is supposed to increase their autonomy by putting them in a position to make better-informed choices. In this paper, I draw on work in feminist bioethics to critique EBM’s approach to involving patients in decision making, in which patients are asked merely to select their preferences among various possible treatment outcomes but…Read more
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45Clinical Trials as Nomological Machines: Implications for Evidence-Based MedicineIn Harold Kincaid & Jennifer McKitrick (eds.), Establishing medical reality: Methodological and metaphysical issues in philosophy of medicine, Springer Publishing Company. 2007.
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97The epistemology and ethics of chronic disease research: Further lessons from ecmoTheoretical Medicine and Bioethics 31 (2): 107-122. 2010.Robert Truog describes the controversial randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) therapy in newborns. Because early results with ECMO indicated that it might be a great advance, saving many lives, Truog argues that ECMO should not have been tested using RCTs, but that a long-term, large-scale observational study of actual clinical practice should have been conducted instead. Central to Truog’s argument, however, is the idea that ECMO is an unusual case. …Read more
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4Knowing and Acting in Medicine (edited book)Rowman & Littlefield International. 2016.The first volume in the rapidly growing field of philosophy of medicine to focus on the relationship between knowledge and clinical practice and policy.
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41Beyond the Basics: The Evolution and Development of Human EmotionsCanadian Journal of Philosophy 36 (sup1): 73-94. 2006.The suggestion that at least some emotions are modular captures a number of our intuitions about emotions: they are generally fast responses to a stimulus, they are involuntary, and they are easily distinguished from one another; we simply know that, for example, anger feels different than fear. Candidates for modular emotions are usually the so-called “basic” emotions - anger and fear are good examples of these. Defenders of emotion theories that focus on basic emotions, such as Paul Ekman in p…Read more
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245In Conversation: Ruth Macklin, Alison Reiheld, Robyn Bluhm, Sidney Callahan, and Frances Kissling Discuss the Marlise Munoz Case, Advance Directives, and Pregnant WomenInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 8 (1): 156-167. 2015.Feminist bioethicists of a variety of persuasions discuss the 2013 case of Marlise Munoz, a pregnant woman whose medical care was in dispute after she became brain dead.
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