Think of trust as the currency of social capital. Managing trusted relationships is a complex and risky social, emotional, and strategic problem. Social networking systems are still fairly new, so while earning the trust of their users is being increasing
In a new book, ''Pathologies of Power'' (University of California), Dr. Farmer, who has worked and lived in Haiti for the past 20 years, criticizes human rights advocates and bioethicists for giving short shrift to the health problems of the poor.
Our professors do the research. They write the papers and proofread them. They even do the peer review. Then they sign the copyright over to publishers, who don’t pay them a dime —they’re paid by grants and salary, our taxes, and tuition. Harvard th
Open-access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions. What makes it possible is the internet and the consent of the author or copyright-holder.
WITNESS (www.witness.org) uses video to open the eyes of the world to human rights violations :: It is an international human rights organization that empowers others to use video to create meaningful change in laws, policies, practices and behaviors. We partner with grassroots organizations and networks around the world to train them to use the power of video to create change.
British Columbia’s Supreme Court ruled last week [in Carter v AG Canada] that provisions of the Criminal Code that ban physician-assisted suicide are unconstitutional. Madam Justice Lynn Smith suspended her ruling for one year to give Parliament time to draft new legislation. A government spokeswoman said Ottawa is still reviewing the judgment, but her reminder that Parliament voted not to change the physician-assisted suicide law just two years ago has only added to the sense that there will be an appeal. Ms. Taylor – a 64-year-old who suffers from Lou Gehrig’s disease – was granted a constitutional exemption that permits her to proceed with physician-assisted suicide during the one-year period, though she must meet a number of conditions.
Terminally ill patients who want to commit suicide should be able to receive medical help to die, a government adviser on care for the elderly has said. Martin Green, a dementia expert for the Department of Health, said patients who were too frail to take their own lives were being denied “choice” and “autonomy” because assisted suicide is illegal in the UK. In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, he urged ministers to review the law and suggested that a referendum or a free vote in Parliament should be called to settle policy on the issue. “If you’re going to give people ‘choice’, it should extend to whether or not they want to die,” he said.
A man who is almost completely paralysed is taking legal action in a bid to end his life. His solicitors have told the BBC that they believe his case could have major implications for the way prosecutors in England, Wales and Northern Ireland deal with assisted suicides.
Marcia Angell was an editor of the most prestigious medical journal in the world for two decades. She currently gives monthly lectures on ethics to faculty at Harvard Medical School. And she served on a panel that gave advice on medical issues to the White House. But Dr. Angell’s credentials were challenged, Wednesday, in the Supreme Court of British Columbia when a lawyer for the federal Department of Justice tried to prevent her affidavit from being entered in a case concerning physician-assisted suicide.
In the case of V.C. v. Slovakia the Court found a violation of the prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment and of the right to respect for private and family life concerning the sterilisation of a young Slovakian woman of Roma origin.
Russel Ogden has seen enough people end their own lives to convince him that a planned and fully accountable suicide is a right all Canadians should have. This week in the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Mr. Ogden and the Farewell Foundation For The Right To Die will be fighting both the provincial and federal governments to make “self-chosen death” a legal option.
SAN JOSE — Costa Rica, a nation that takes pride in its respect for civil liberties, is being sued for failing to lift a ban on in-vitro fertilization (IVF), as it remains the only country in the Americas that prohibits the procedure. The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights said on Monday it will take Costa Rica to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights for not legalizing IVF after the commission twice extended its previous deadline for the country to do so. In-vitro fertilization was banned in Costa Rica in 2000 under pressure from the Catholic Church. Some couples have taken their cases to the Inter-American Court, which is based in Washington, and 50 couples have joined to file the petition. President Laura Chinchilla has made efforts to prevent the case from reaching the court, but she was met with sluggish action on the part of Costa Rican lawmakers.
The B.C. Civil Liberties Association says it wants to challenge Canada's assisted-suicide laws alone. The BCCLA represents four plaintiffs seeking to change Canada's assisted-suicide laws, including a dying woman who won the right to have her trial expedited because her health is failing. Gloria Taylor suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. On Wednesday, a B.C. Supreme Court judge ruled Taylor's trial should be heard in November because of the woman's rapidly deteriorating condition. A similar lawsuit is simultaneously being brought forward by the Farewell Foundation. The group's co-founder Russell Ogden is lobbying to join the BCCLA's lawsuit if its own challenge is struck down. Ogden argues testimony from his application should be part of the civil liberties association's case because it's unfair to assess the quality of either challenge.
US military medical ethics evolved during its involvement in two recent wars, Gulf War I and the War on Terror. Norms of conduct for military clinicians with regard to the treatment of prisoners of war and the administration of non-therapeutic bioactive agents to soldiers were set aside because of the sense of being in a ‘new kind of war’. Concurrently, the use of radioactive metal in weaponry and the ability to measure the health consequences of trade embargos on vulnerable civilians occasioned new concerns about the health effects of war on soldiers, their offspring, and civilians living on battlefields. Civilian medical societies and medical ethicists fitfully engaged the evolving nature of the medical ethics issues and policy changes during these wars. Medical codes of professionalism have not been substantively updated and procedures for accountability for new kinds of abuses of medical ethics are not established. Looking to the future, medicine and medical ethics have not articul
Predictive testing for Huntington’s disease was introduced in the late 1980s. It was offered reluctantly, however, because of the lack of treatment available for identified gene carriers and the potential for genetic discrimination—that is, the unfair and inappropriate treatment of a person or group on the basis of genetic information. In the linked cross sectional survey (doi:10.1136/bmj.b2175), Bombard and colleagues assess the nature and prevalence of genetic discrimination in a cohort of asymptomatic genetically tested and untested people at risk for Huntington’s disease.
Debbie Purdy, who wants her husband to accompany her to Switzerland for an assisted suicide without fear of prosecution, took her case to the United Kingdom’s highest court, the House of Lords, for a final appeal this week. Ms Purdy, who has progressive multiple sclerosis, scored an important victory on the first day of the two day hearing, when the director of public prosecutions, Keir Starmer, conceded that article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, the right to respect for private life, applies to cases like hers.
Open Excess: Der Heidelberger Appell. Verleger und Autoren wehren sich auf Initiative des Heidelberger Professors Roland Reuß gegen eine „Enteignung“ durch Google und Open Access. Ihre Argumentation ist haarsträubend, voller Fehler und gefährlich.
WhatDoIKnow sends in a story about an appeals court ruling in a singular case that might have the effect of narrowing "fair use" rights for transformative uses of artworks.
IRP (www.internetrightsandprinciples.org) is an initiative formed by people and institutions who work together to connect human rights and the Internet for all.
Dive into the world of The Probe, where investigative journalism meets in-depth news analysis. Explore exclusive stories, uncover hidden truths, and gain unparalleled insights into issues of public interest.
Albrecht Götz von Olenhusen gehört zu den Unterzeichnern des von Roland Reuß initiierten, von vielen Schriftstellern, Wissenschaftlern und Verlagen unterzeichneten Aufrufs "Für Publikationsfreiheit und die Wahrung der Urheberrechte".
What is morphological freedom? I would view it as an extension of one’s right to one’s body, not just self-ownership but also the right to modify oneself according to one’s desires.
If you support open access to peer-reviewed research articles and their preprints, then read my blog and newsletter. See what's been done and what you can do to help the cause. If you're not sure what open access is, then see my overview.
"The truth is, when these folks protested at Stonewall 40 years ago, no one could have imagined that you or, for that matter, I would be standing here today."
The US Trade Representative issued a release just prior to the launch of the New Zealand round of Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement negotiations that has left no doubt the US is the biggest barrier to official release of the ACTA text. Unlike most other ACTA countries that have called for transparency without condition, the US has set conditions that effectively seek to trade its willingness to release the text for gains on the substance of the text
As well as taking an active part in OFCOM's code of obligations in regards to the ill-conceived Digital Economy Act (the UK three-strikes law for filesharers), niche ISP Andrews & Arnold have identified various loopholes in the law, the main one being that a customer can be classified as a communications provider. They have now implemented measures so in your control panel you may register your legal status and be classed as such.
In September 2008, the European Court of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECtHR) upheld a breach of Article 13 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), in that the UK failed to provide RK and AK with an effective legal remedy for the removal of their child from their care as a result of medical misdiagnosis. The case throws into focus the approach the domestic UK courts have on the rights of third parties, in particular, the rights of parents where their children are subjected to negligent medical treatment.
European Court judges in Strasbourg have ruled against Germany in an assisted suicide case, saying a widower's rights were infringed. Ulrich Koch challenged the German ban on actively helping someone commit suicide. His paralysed wife died after taking poison in Switzerland in 2005. The judges did not rule on the ban, but said the German courts should have examined Mr Koch's complaint. On assisted suicide, the judges said it was up to individual nations to decide. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ordered Germany to pay Mr Koch 2,500 euros (£1,600; $2,460) in damages and 26,736 euros for legal costs. There was a violation of Article Eight of the European Convention on Human Rights (right to respect for private and family life) because of the German courts' refusal to examine the merits of Mr Koch's complaint, the ruling said.
Ms. Taylor, the British Columbia woman who was the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit that challenged laws against physician-assisted deaths, died unexpectedly Thursday of an infection resulting from a perforated colon. Ms. Taylor died peacefully and painlessly, as she had hoped, Ms. Pastine said. She was 64. In June, the B.C. Supreme Court ruled that physician-assisted deaths are protected by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and granted Ms. Taylor a personal exemption that would have allowed her the right to seek a physician-assisted death. The federal government appealed that decision, as well as the exemption that applied to Ms. Taylor. The B.C. Court of Appeal in August upheld that exemption. The lawsuit is now headed for the B.C. Court of Appeal and a hearing is scheduled for March, 2013. Four plaintiffs – three individuals and the BCCLA – remain part of the proceedings.
Privacy International (PI) is a human rights group formed in 1990 as a watchdog on surveillance and privacy invasions by governments and corporations. PI is based in London, England, and has an office in Washington, D.C. PI has conducted campaigns and res
TakePart is a social action website with news, information and blogs for political and socially conscious activists. Watch trailers for socially conscious films such as An Inconvenient Truth, The Kite Runner, The Visitor, The Soloist, Pressure Cooker, Food, Inc., and Darfur Now. Browse through blogs on social issues ranging from global warming and human rights to politics and international news. Join TakePart and learn how you can take part in making a difference through TakePart research and legal action regarding social change.
The Hill spotlights a study released by the Computer & Communications Industry Association, which concludes that companies relying on fair use generate $4.7 trillion in revenue to the US economy every year. The report claims that fair use — an exception to the copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted materials — is crucial to innovation. It adds that employment in fair use industries grew from 16.9 million in 2002 to 17.5 million in 2007 and one out of eight US workers is employed by a company benefiting from protections provided by fair use (PDF). Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) says the reasonable fair use of content needs to be preserved; otherwise, content owners will control access to movies, music, and art that will no longer be available for schools, research, or web browsing. Lofgren tied the copyright issue with the question of net neutrality. Without net neutrality 'content owners will completely control and lock down content. We're going to be sorry characters when we actually don't see fair use rights on the Web,' says Lofgren. 'If we allow our freedom to be taken for commercial purposes, we will have some explaining to do to our founding fathers and those who died for our freedom.
A new generation of historians is exploring some of the untold stories of the civil rights movement and its legacies: the experiences not of heroes or murderous villains, but of ordinary Southern whites.
Think of trust as the currency of social capital. Managing trusted relationships is a complex and risky social, emotional, and strategic problem. Social networking systems are still fairly new, so while earning the trust of their users is being increasing
A. Mehta, R. Bhagat, H. Chheda, und S. Sanghani. International Journal on Recent and Innovation Trends in Computing and Communication, 3 (2):
866--868(February 2015)