Public Safety v. Individual Liberties: Some "Facts" and "Theories"

Public health and civil liberties

The opinion pieces that constitute this month’s ‘Talking Point’ address the old conflict between the enforcement of public health measures and the inevitable infringements of individual rights and liberties that are the result. The task of the ‘neutral commentator’ is made difficult by the fact that the authors are not particularly at odds with each other. George Annas argues that compulsory en...

Facts and Theories

Patchy subcortical lesions are frequently identified on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain in the elderly.On computed tomography (CT) these lesions appear as periventricular zones of lucency and have been termed "leuko-araiosis" by Hachinski and colleagues. Despite limited knowledge of the pathological correlates of the lesions, there has been speculation about their nature, pathophy...

Modernization: Theories and Facts

Our purpose is to distinguish two theories that relate economic development and democracy and to examine some facts in light of these theories. While ultimately the interesting questions concern the mechanisms that mediate between economic development and the dynamics of political regimes, we must nevertheless identify the facts to be explained before plunging into explanations. Hence, we stick...

Facts and Theories

The gradual cumulative cultural evolution of locally adaptive technologies has played a crucial role in our species’ rapid expansion across the globe. Until recently, human artifacts were not obviously more complex than those made by organisms that lack cultural learning and have limited cognitive capacities. However, cultural evolution creates adaptive tools much more rapidly than genetic evol...

The continuing tensions between individual rights and public health. Talking Point on public health versus civil liberties.