Cosmic Loops

This paper explores a special kind of loop of grounding: cosmic loops. A cosmic loop is a loop that intuitively requires us to go "around" the entire universe to come back to the original ground. After describing several kinds of cosmic loop scenarios, I will discuss what we can learn from these scenarios about constraints on grounding; the conceivability of cosmic loops; the possibility of cosmic loops; and the prospects for salvaging local reflexivity, asymmetry and transitivity of grounding in a world containing a cosmic loop of ground. The considerations raised in this paper also bear on what we should think about relations that are meant to support grounding relations: in particular, revisions to theories of the part-whole relation are discussed

The Great Recession and Okun\u27s Law

Okun’s Law expresses a relationship between economic growth and changes in the unemployment rate. Recent work by Herzon (2012) and Duy (2012) provide evidence that the relationship between growth and changes in the unemployment rate may have changed as a result of the Great Recession. I test for this by estimating the growth-unemployment relationship using a panel model across fifty U.S. states from the years 1998 to 2011 controlling for the labor force participation rate. I find that the unemployment rate has indeed been more responsive to economic growth after the Great Recession than it was before the recession and hypothesize about some reasons for this change

Working with family carers: towards a partnership approach

The use of the term ‘family (informal) carer’, as it is currently conceptualized, is recent and is largely the product of increased attention in the academic and policy literature over the last two decades. Despite their fairly late arrival on the scene, family carers now occupy centre stage in UK government policy, having being described by the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, as the ‘unsung heroes’ of British life, who are essential to the fabric and character of Britain. Such recognition stems from the growing realization that family carers are the lynchpin of community care, providing 80% of all the care needed at an estimated saving to the UK government of some £40 billion annually

Gerontological nursing: professional priority or eternal Cinderella?

Over thirty years ago geriatric nursing, as it was then called, was at the forefront of nursing research in the United Kingdom. Concurrent with the emergence of geriatric medicine as a distinct speciality, the pioneering study of Doreen Norton and colleagues (Norton et al. 1962) served to highlight both the deficits that existed in the hospital care of older people and the enormous potential of nursing to improve the situation, particularly for the ‘irremediable’ patient (Norton 1965). Caring for those who could not be cured but required on-going support was seen to constitute ‘true nursing’ and was identified as an area of practice in which nurses should excel (Norton 1965, Wells 1980). Such potential went largely unrealised, however, as nursing focused on acute, hospital-based care (Nolan 1994). As a consequence, those working in continuing care struggled to find value in their work and patients were subjected to ‘aimless residual care’ (Evers 1991), a situation exacerbated by the continued application of the biomedical model (Reed and Watson 1994). Despite claims that nurses working with older people have ‘special skills’ (Royal College of Nursing 1993), the nature of such skills has therefore never fully been explicated. Indeed, Armstrong-Esther et al. (1994) asked what nurses currently contribute to the well-being of elderly people and, following their study, suggested that nurses must take the initiative and expand their role if ‘we are going to avoid simply warehousing the elderly until they die’. The need to act is particularly pressing at present as the spectre of ‘bed-blockers’ emerges once more and there is growing professional concern that older people may soon be denied the right to receive care from a qualified nurse (Nursing Times 1996)

REFORMING THE DELIVERY OF PUBLIC DENTAL SERVICES IN IRELAND: POTENTIAL COST IMPLICATIONS. ESRI RESEARCH SERIES NUMBER 80 APRIL 2019

This report details the results of an analysis of the potential cost implications of proposed changes to aspects of the model of delivery of publicly-financed dental services in Ireland, as set out in the new National Oral Health Policy (Department of Health, 2018b). Currently, dental services in Ireland are financed and delivered in a mixed public-private system, with most individuals paying out-of-pocket fees to independent dental practitioners. The public system currently finances the delivery of dental healthcare services to adult medical cardholders via the Dental Treatment Services Scheme (DTSS); to non-medical cardholder eligible adults via the Treatment Benefit Scheme (TBS); and to children and adults requiring special and complex care via the Public Dental Service (PDS). This report deals with proposed changes to the delivery of preventive dental healthcare services under the DTSS and PDS

Impossibility and Impossible Worlds

Possible worlds have found many applications in contemporary philosophy: from theories of possibility and necessity, to accounts of conditionals, to theories of mental and linguistic content, to understanding supervenience relationships, to theories of properties and propositions, among many other applications. Almost as soon as possible worlds started to be used in formal theories in logic, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, metaphysics, and elsewhere, theorists started to wonder whether impossible worlds should be postulated as well. In many applications, possible worlds face limitations that can be dealt with through postulating impossible worlds as well. This chapter examines some of the uses of impossible worlds, and philosophical challenges theories of impossible worlds face