The author argues that ours has been called an age of trauma. Yet, neither trauma nor PTSD are scientific concepts. Trauma has been around forever, even if it was not called that. PTSD is the creation of a group of Vietnam veterans and psychiatrists, designed to help explain veterans’ suffering. This does not detract from the value of PTSD, but sets its historical and social context. The author...

The philosophical debate surrounding the moral status of the embryo has reached the public arena. The author of this paper examines some of the common arguments against embryo experimentation, including an influential article by Professor Ian Kennedy. He concludes that these arguments do not succeed in demonstrating that the intentional creation of embryos for research purposes is wrong, unless...

This comment addresses the inadequacies of research and development for diseases endemic in developing countries and explores how the patent system can inhibit innovation for new drugs for neglected diseases. The author analyzes four strategies to encourage innovation, including open source initiatives, patent pools, prizes, and wild card patent extensions, and examines how these alternative sy...

This study evaluates the outcome of ozone therapy given to 55 patients suffering from post-herpetic neuralgia, for whom “conventional” therapies brought no relief. The author makes several considerations regarding the assessment of pain, the details of ozone therapy, the coadjuvant medication, and the criteria for the evaluation of the results, i.e. the reduction or elimination of pain. From th...

The author discusses the validity of the claim that, in Antiquity, effective contraceptives and abortifacients were available, were widely used, and their use was responsible for the decline of population in certain periods. After reviewing the maneuvers and drugs used for those purposes, the author concludes that ancient physicians did not have at their disposal effective contraceptives and ab...

The author looks back on the first half century of operating systems and selects his favorite papers on classic operating systems. These papers span the entire history of the field from the batch processing systems of the 1950s to the distributed systems of the 1990s. Each paper describes an operating system that combines significant ideas in an elegant way. Most of them were written by the pio...

This paper explores why Iran was a particularly fertile ground for repeated visitation of cholera in the 19th century. Along with certain unique Iranian cultural and religious factors, the author demonstrates how Iranian urban ecology, particularly the qanat system, contributed to the fatal spread of the epidemic. These multi-faceted conditions, the author concludes, resulted in distinct modes ...

The author defines hysteria in terms of specific observable classes of interpersonal behaviors and examines the impact of these behaviors on the receiver. The hysteric communicates frailty and helplessness, thus structuring the interpersonal environment to ensure attention and inhibit aggression. The development of these roles is shown in histories of female hysterics, who were selectively rein...

This case note examines the recent High Court decision of Betfair Pty Limited v Western Australia. This decision focused on s 92 of the Constitution. First, the author argues that the decision is significant because it offered a restatement of principle, re-contextualised s 92 in a ‘new economy’ and confirmed the relevance of early US Commerce Clause authority in Australian s 92 jurisprudence. ...