Since its inception, evidence policymakers have vacillated with respect to whether the rule barring hearsay evidence at trial is a doctrine designed to promote decisional accuracy or a doctrine designed to promote procedural justice. To the extent that policymakers view the rule barring hearsay evidence as promoting decisional accuracy, the rationale for this view stems from the “testimonial tr...

The dominant theory of human nature in modern intellectual life is based on the doctrines of the blank slate, the noble savage, and the ghost in the machine; these doctrines are being challenged by the sciences of the mind, brain, genes, and evolution. Behavioral geneticists have found that all behavioral traits are partially heritable—challenging the doctrine of the blank slate. Evolutionary p...

The medical profession consistently strives to uphold patient empowerment, equality and safety. It is ironic that now, at a time where advances in technology and knowledge have given us an increased capacity to preserve and prolong life, we find ourselves increasingly asking questions about the value of the lives we are saving. A recent editorial by Professor Raanan Gillon questions the emphasi...

The so-called Monro-Kellie doctrine states that with an intact skull, the sum of the volume of the brain plus the cerebrospinal fluid volume plus the intracranial blood volume is constant. Therefore an increase in one should cause a reduction in one or both of the remaining two. The researcher who expressed the doctrine in such a way was indeed Harvey Cushing in 1925, during a lecture in Edinbu...

A central question in contemporary epistemology and philosophy of mind is whether the thesis of content externalism threatens a common doctrine about privileged access. According to this doctrine, an individual knows the contents of her thoughts independently of empirical observation. It is argued that if the contents of a subject’s thoughts are in part individuated by environmental factors, as...

I argue that opposition to contraception is not made any less implausible by the application of the Doctrine of Double Effect, as for example in the case of the recent argument according to which double effect can be deployed to make the prescription of Combined Oral Contraceptives compatible with Catholic teachings. I argue that opposition to contraception is not made any less implausible by t...