Next SectionCultural differences in end-of-life care and the moral disagreements these sometimes give rise to have been well documented. Even so, cultural considerations relevant to end-of-life care remain poorly understood, poorly guided, and poorly resourced in health care domains. Although there has been a strong emphasis in recent years on making policy commitments to patient-centred care and respecting patient choices, persons whose minority cultural worldviews do not fit with the worldviews supported by the conventional principles of western bioethics face a (...) perpetual struggle in getting their care needs met in a meaningful, safe, and healing way. In this essay, attention is given to exploring why cultural differences exist, why they matter, and how health care providers should treat them in order to reduce the incidence and impact of otherwise preventable harmful moral outcomes in end-of-life care. In addressing these questions, a novel application of the renowned terror management theory will be made. (shrink)

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19), was first detected in Wuhan province in China during late December 2019 and was designated as being highly infectious. The World Health Organization (WHO) labeled it a “pandemic” on March 11, 2020. Throughout human history, experience has shown that prejudices and viruses spread simultaneously during a viral pandemic. Outgroup members have been associated with various diseases and non-human vectors of diseases. Some epidemics have been named according to various outgroups, just as the novel coronavirus has been (...) referred to by some as the “Wuhan virus” or the “Chinese virus.” Associating a virus with a sociodemographic group builds a false illusionary correlation, which can lead to stigmatization and discrimination. Pandemics can also stimulate violent xenophobic reactions. Besides the obvious harmful consequences for the individuals targeted, pandemic-related discrimination also affects the spread of the virus through its effect on public attitudes toward prevention and restriction, health service procurement, and in the establishment of health-related policies. It is important to first understand the relevant concepts and processes, and also to understand the underlying causes of discrimination in order to fight it. Social psychology offers multidimensional and comprehensive explanations of prejudice and discrimination. This review’s primary aim was to examine the motivations behind COVID-19-related discrimination based on social psychological perspectives. In line with this aim, the review first defines discrimination in detail, plus the related concepts and main social psychological theories on prejudice and discrimination. Then, pandemic-related discrimination in light of past experiences is discussed and explanations put forward for the theoretical perspectives and inferences specific to COVID-19. Finally, recommendations are made in order to prevent and combat discrimination related to infectious diseases. (shrink)

İngiltere, Avrupa’da en fazla Müslüman nüfusa sahip ülkelerden biridir ve ülkede Müslümanlara yönelik olumsuz tutumlar giderek artmaktadır. Yabancılara yönelik bu olumsuz tutumların birçok farklı psikolojik nedeni bulunmaktadır. Dehşet Yönetimi Kuramı kapsamında yapılan çeşitli araştırmalar, bu nedenlerden birisinin bireylere ölümün hatırlatılması olduğunu iddia etmektedir. Bu kurama göre, hayatta kalmak gibi güçlü bir motivasyona sahip olan insan aynı zamanda bu çabalarının bir gün başarısız olacağını bilir ve ölüm kaygısı yaşar. Ölümün hatırlatıldığı bireyler, ölüm kaygısının üstesinden gelmek için kendi kültürlerine yöneldiklerinde, diğer kültürlere (...) yani dış gruplara veya onların üyelerine karşı önyargı geliştirirler veya onlara karşı olumsuz tutumlar edinirler. Bu iddianın test edilmesi için 2018 yılı içerisinde İngiltere’de 50 kişinin katılımıyla bir deney gerçekleştirilmiştir. Deney grubuna ölümü hatırlatıcı video izlettirilmiş; daha sonra deney ve kontrol gruplarına Müslümanlara yönelik tutumları ölçen sorular yöneltilmiştir. Elde edilen veriler analiz edildiğinde, ölümün hatırlatıldığı bireylerin (deney grubu), Müslümanlara yönelik tutumlarının, diğer bireylerden (kontrol grubu) daha olumsuz olduğu tespit edilmiştir. (shrink)

In several works Teresa Brennan examines how, contrary to social notions of the separate and contained self, all that exists in the natural world is connected energetically. She identifies a “foundational fantasy” whereby the ego comes into existence and is maintained by the notion that it controls the mother. The effects of this fantasy are socially oppressive and, in the technological era, environmentally disastrous. M;y examination of narratives and images in ancient myth, popular culture, literature, and art suggest ways to (...) counteract the destructive fantasy through re-symbolization of the relation to what Brennan understands as the original/living nature, which is correlated to the mother's body. (shrink)

Seriously engaging with the needs, hardships, and aspirations of future generations is an emotional experience as much as an intellectual endeavor. In this essay we describe a guided visualization exercise used to overcome the emotional barriers that often prevent us from dealing effectively with intergenerational decisions. The meditation and dreaming technique was applied to a diverse group of researchers who engaged in a visualized encounter with future generations. Following the exercise, we concluded that a serious analysis of intergenerational conflict requires (...) us to confront our own mortality. Also, somewhat surprisingly to workshop participants, our desire to become stewards of the planet was driven by our fear of death as well as our egoist yearning for immortality. We posit that imagining the unknown with visioning practices might increase our emotional resilience, and hence improve our ability to confront the burdens of intergenerational responsibility. (shrink)

Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, and Tom Pyszczynski offer experimental confirmation for Ernest Becker's claim that the fear of death is a powerful unconscious motive producing polarized worldviews and scapegoating. Their suggestion that their findings also prove Sigmund Freud's theory of repression, with worldviews as its irrational products, is questionable, although Becker's own statements about worldviews as “illusions” seem to invite such interpretation. Their basic theory does not depend on this, however, and abandoning it would enable them to take better advantage (...) of their finding that worldviews incorporating the values of rationality and tolerance tend to counteract polarization effects. (shrink)

This paper explores the meaning of dreamless sleep. First, I consider four reasons why we commonly pass over sleep's ontological significance. Second, I compare and contrast death and sleep to show how each is oriented to questions regarding the possibilities of "being-a-whole." In the third and final part, I explore the meaning and implications of "being-toward-sleep," arguing that human existence emerges atop naturally anonymous corporeality (i.e. living being). In sum, I try to show that we can recover an authentic — (...) if somewhat ambiguous — sense of "being-a-whole" only by recognizing the ontological significance of dreamless sleep. (shrink)

This article is about evil and its function in educational discourse. The research posits, using work in postsecularism and particularly through an historical, legal, and theological read of prophetic indictment and the function of the jeremiad in educational policy, that the terms of educational debate are rendered in a legal rather than a deliberative discursive framework. This lends itself, then, to the creation of evil others opposed to one’s own preferred policy prescriptions and renders much of the discussion about and (...) around the need for conversation and comity moot. The authors propose attending to the function of evil in education as well as positing an historical approach to thinking about why we often can’t think differently about educational arguments. (shrink)

There are important studies that have directly focused on how, in times of conflict, it is possible for previously law abiding people to commit the most atrocious acts of cruelty and violence. The work of Erich Fromm, Hannah Arendt, Zygmunt Bauman and Ernest Becker have all contemplated the driving force of aggression and mass violence to further our understanding of how people are capable of engaging in extreme forms of cruelty and violence. This paper specifically addresses these issues by focusing (...) on C. P. Taylor’s play Good. This provocative play examines how a seemingly ‘good’ and intelligent university professor can gradually become caught up in the workings of the Third Reich. Taylor highlights the importance of appreciating how people can be steadily incorporated into an ideologically destructive system. I argue that the theatre is a powerful medium to explore these complex issues. The audience of Good find themselves confronted with the following question—‘What would you have done?’. (shrink)

Ernest Becker’s work addresses the implications that arise from being aware of our own mortality. Like Sartre, Becker recognises that human beings have the potential to transcend and look beyond their immediate situation, but his work also confronts the darker aspects of human existence that arise from our self-awareness. The aim of the paper is to provide an overview of Becker’s work and to show the potential of Becker’s theory of evil to inform a number of contemporary debates in the (...) social sciences. Although Becker’s work directly examines why human beings can act so inhumanly towards one another, his theory is not altogether pessimistic. The paper concludes by arguing that Becker’s theory intended to create new possibilities for living in more creative and humane world. (shrink)

This article distinguishes between three projects in Ernest Becker's later work: his psychology of “religion,” his psychology of religion, and his psychology of Religion . The first is an analysis of culture and civilization as immortality projects, means by which to deny death. The second, which overlaps with the first, is a characterization of religion-as-practiced as a particularly effective immortality project vis-à-vis death anxiety. The third is less social scientific and more theological; Becker argues for a view of God that (...) is in the tradition of Søren Kierkegaard and Paul Tillich . Focusing on the second of these projects—as much has already been written on the first, and little can be said about the third—this article evaluates Becker's claims about religion-as-practiced in light of recent developments in social cognitive psychology. (shrink)

This paper attempts to explain how and why nonhuman animals elicit disgust in human beings. I argue that animals elicit disgust in two ways. One is by triggering disease–protection mechanisms, and the other is by eliciting mortality salience, or thoughts of death. I discuss how these two types of disgust operate and defend their conceptual and theoretical coherence against common objections. I also outline an explanatory challenge for disgust researchers. Both types of disgust indicate that a wide variety of animals (...) produce aversive and avoidant reactions in human beings. This seems somewhat odd, given the prominence of animals in human lives. The challenge, then, is explaining how humans cope with the presence of animals. I propose, as a hypothesis for further exploration, that we cope with animals, and our disgust responses to them, by attributing mental states that mark them as inferior beings. To develop my proposal, I draw from recent research on dehumanization and infrahumanization. (shrink)

Money is a symbol. Beginning with this simple notion, we have completed a qualitative study of how money exists in people’s everyday lives and how it is used symbolically. A review of the financial, economic, psychological, and semiotic literature shows that even though money is written and talked about exhaustively, little symbol theory appears in economic writing, and we rarely found money mentioned in semiotic texts. We used a qualitative, phenomenological approach to identify critical thematic elements and underlying structures of (...) participants’ experience. We also incorporated an accepted symbol-structure template in our analysis of the functions, emotions, actions, and reactions in the transactions our participants described. Participants refer to money both as wealth in the abstract and as concrete amounts about to be used. Our analysis of money in the abstract describes a structure of experience involving belonging, privacy and secrecy, unequal distribution, quantitative uncertainty, reflections of life history, and values. Our analysis of money in the concrete reveals a symbolic intention and a variety of “Others” engaged in the symbolic action. (shrink)

Can we keep relying on sources of values dating back to the Axial Age, or do cognitive changes in the present age require a completely new foundation? An uncertainty arises with the crisis of values that can support the human in the age of artificial intelligence. Should we seek contemporary access points to the archaic origins of the species? Or must we also imagine new Anthropocenic-Axial values to reground the human event? In his most recent work, Habermas affirms the continuing (...) importance of the contemporary access to the First Axial values, but before him Jaspers anticipates that a second cognitive revolution opens areas that may be receptive to new value foundations. Habermas’ justification of the postsecular turn may not be thinkable without Jaspers’ discovery of the postaxial imaginary. (shrink)

According to terror management theory, humans rely on meaningful and permanence-promising cultural worldviews, like religion, to manage mortality concerns. Prior research indicates that, compared to religious individuals, atheists experience lower levels of meaning in life following reminders of death. The present study investigated whether reminders of death would change atheists’ meaning in life after exposure to normative support for atheism. Atheists were either reminded of death or a control topic and exposed to information portraying atheism as either common or rare, (...) and then asked to rate their perceived meaning in life. Results showed that reminders of death reduced meaning in life among atheists who were told that atheism is common. Results were consistent with the view that atheism reflects the rejection of religious faith rather than a meaningful secular terror managing worldview. Discussion considers implications for maintaining healthy existential wellbeing, identifies limitations, and highlights future research directions. (shrink)

The earliest known products of human imagination appear to express a primordial concern and struggle with thoughts of dying and of death and mortality. I argue that the structures and processes of imagination evolved in that struggle, in response to debilitating anxieties and fearful states that would accompany an incipient awareness of mortality. Imagination evolved to find that which would make the nascent apprehension of death more bearable, to engage in a search for alternative perceptions of death: a search that (...) was beyond the capability of the external senses. I argue that imagination evolved as flight and fight adaptations in response to debilitating fears that paralleled an emerging foreknowledge of death. Imagination, and symbolic language to express its perceptions, would eventually lead to religious behavior and the development of cultural supports. Although highly speculative, my argument draws on recent brain studies, and on anthropology, psychology, and linguistics. (shrink)