Philosophy of Mental Health

Self-illness ambiguity (SIA) has been understood, roughly, as a difficulty in delineating one's self from one's mental illness. In this paper, we explicate some of the previously neglected complexity of SIA, by distinguishing two forms of the phenomenon: (a) identity-related SIA ('How do I relate to my illness?') and (b) agential SIA ('Is it me or my illness that makes me act/think/feel a certain way?'). In addition, we differentiate general and particular varieties of these SIA-forms, as well as descriptive and analytic approaches to them. The resulting taxonomy allows (1) clarifying the growing SIA-literature, (2) supporting (self-)understanding in clinical contexts, and (3) drilling into the normatively significant features of SIA, e.g., enabling the better theorising of potential connections between agential SIA and questions of responsibility. Our taxonomy thus strengthens the conceptual foundation for future theories and applications of SIA.

Autor u ovom istraživanju želi iz vlastitog metodoontološkog viđenja razmotriti, u današnje doba sve češće korišten pojam mentalnog zdravlja. To se nastoji ostvariti prateći tragove onoga kako Erich Fromm u okvirima VII. poglavlja knjige S onu stranu okova iluzije (1962) koje nosi naziv upravo »Pojam mentalnog zdravlja«. Ovdje govori samo o Marxu koji smatra zdravim čovjekom onoga tko je produktivan i tko se iskreno zanima za svijet, a za Freuda bi »samo primitivan čovjek mogao biti nazvan zdravim«. Osim svih važnih Marxovih i Freudovih radova, kao i ovoga Frommova djela, posebna pažnja će se posvetiti i drugim njegovim djelima poput Zdravog društva (1955) i godinu dana kasnijeg Umijeća ljubavi (1956), ali svakako i rada Herberta Marcusea, posebno u djelu koje je objavljeno u godini (1955) kada i Frommovo Zdravo društvo, Eros i civilizacija.
A METHODOONTOLOGICAL VIEW OF THE CONCEPT OF MENTAL HEALTH IN MARX, FREUD AND THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL
In this presentation, the author wants to consider, from his own methodoontological point of view, the concept of mental health, which is increasingly used nowadays. This will be attempted by following the traces of Erich Fromm and his Chapter VII of the book Beyond the Chains of Illusion (1962), which is called “The Concept of Mental Health”. In that part of the book he only talks about Marx, who considers a healthy person to be the one who is productive and who is genuinely interested in the world, while for Freud “only a primitive man could be called healthy.” In addition to all the important works of Marx and Freud, as well as this work by Fromm, special attention will be paid to his other works such as Healthy Society (1955), The Art of Love (1956), but certainly also the works of Herbert Marcuse, especially that which was published in the year (1955) in which Fromm's Healthy Society and Eros and Civilization were also published.

en particular la que llamamos "filosófica" que desarrolla la metafísica del alma (psique) hasta una verdadera psicología (potencias-facultades, habitus-virtudes y vicios, actos), difiere de las propuestas contemporáneas, centradas en otras concepciones del hombre o en el desprecio por la metafísica. ¿Qué nociones de la antropología tomista pueden iluminar el arte de la psicoterapia? O, en otras palabras, ¿cuáles son las categorías de una psicoterapia integral de la persona? Para descubrirlo compararemos los principales autores que comenzaron a esbozarlas.

Las virtudes según Santo Tomás de Aquino ofrecen una clave profunda para el perfeccionamiento de las funciones mentales abordadas por la neuropsicología. Frente a un enfoque contemporáneo que tiende al reduccionismo, se plantea que las virtudes no solo transforman establemente al individuo, sino que también orientan la conducta hacia el bien, actuando sobre el alma y no meramente sobre los impulsos cerebrales. La psicoterapia tomista no se reduce a técnicas conductuales ni a estrategias de bienestar, sino que apunta a la perfección de los actos humanos en su Finalidad. Una verdadera psicología debe integrar la dimensión espiritual, sin lo cual incurre en imprudencia y negligencia terapéutica. Además, la psicología de las virtudes propuesta por Santo Tomás ofrece una respuesta lúcida y profunda a los dilemas más actuales de las neurociencias.

Autor u ovom istraživanju želi iz vlastita metodoontološkog viđenja razmotriti u današnje doba sve češće korišten pojam mentalnog zdravlja. To se nastoji ostvariti prateći tragove Ericha Fromma u okvirima VII. poglavlja knjige „S onu stranu okova iluzije” (1962), koje upravo nosi naziv „Pojam mentalnog zdravlja”. Ovdje on govori samo o Marxu, koji smatra zdravim čovjekom onoga tko je produktivan i tko se iskreno zanima za svijet, dok bi za Freuda „samo primitivan čovjek mogao biti nazvan zdravim”. Osim svih važnih Marxovih i Freudovih radova, kao i ovoga Frommovog djela, posebna će se pažnja posvetiti i drugim njegovim djelima, poput „Zdravog društva” (1955) i godinu dana kasnijeg „Umeća ljubavi” (1956), ali svakako i rada Herberta Marcusea, posebno u djelu koje je objavljeno u godini (1955) kada i Frommovo „Zdravo društvo” – „Eros i civilizacija”.

У овом раду аутор настоји да пре свега утврди шта би требало окарактерисати и успоставити под појмом метафизике здравља, односно показати како се овај појам директно тиче тумачења и појмовног конституисања Здравља у односу спрам онога како су различити мислиоци и ствараоци у другачијим историјским и филозофским епохама и периодима поимали Трансценденцију.
Осим овога биће представљено како појмови Здравља и Трасценденције своју релацију имају управо на хоризонту појмова Духовног, Душевног и Телесног, али у савременој филозофији све чешће (и) у хоризонту феноменологије здравља и другост(и), Другог, као и свих других.

El problema del dolor ha sido, tanto en el pasado como en la actualidad, una de las temáticas controversiales más discutidas en los diversos campos de estudio vinculados a los seres vivos y la mente. Ámbitos como la biología, la psicología y la filosofía han centrado sus investigaciones acerca del dolor abarcando no sólo a los seres humanos, sino también a los animales no humanos. Esto nos permite plantear las distinciones comúnmente establecidas sobre el dolor a la luz de las cuatro dimensiones causales-estructurales de los seres vivos propuestas por el autor argentino Juan José Sanguineti. En primer lugar, presentaremos algunas distinciones que categorizan el dolor como la nocicepción, el dolor como estado mental y el dolor afectivo- según diferentes disciplinas y perspectivas teóricas. A continuación, trataremos la interpretación que Sanguineti ofrece acerca del dolor y, por último, expondremos cómo aquellas distinciones pueden comprenderse dentro de las cuatro dimensiones causales más generales de los seres vivos: la dimensión inorgánica, la vegetativa, la sensitiva y la personal.

Existe consenso entre los más diversos y opuestos enfoques de la Psicología en que la relación que se establece entre paciente y psicólogo es un factor determinante en el éxito de la intervención propuesta. Sin embargo, cada uno de los enfoques, al diferir en sus objetivos y en lo que consideran signos de mejoría del paciente, también discrepan sobre qué características debe tener la relación terapéutica para que se produzca este resultado positivo.
Este artículo tiene como objetivo enumerar los pilares básicos de la relación terapéutica en la psicoterapia tomista, relacionándolos con las posturas y características del psicoterapeuta tomista.

This paper presents the epistemological context of mental health, arguing ‘mental health’ be used as the practical term as it accounts for and explains the functioning of psychology, psychiatry, neurology, and other disciplines that propose things about mental health and how to intervene in mental issue and disorder. Mental Health Philosophy accounts for the real functioning of people involved with mental health as phenomena, and as that which accounts for and explains functioning is the greatest sense is termed ‘true’. Real and true denote orientations. By this discernment, disciplinary activity is pronounced more accurately, and due to this greater accuracy, promotes a larger field for understanding of what is happening and enhances the potential effectiveness of treatment for mental issues. By grounding material efforts in this substantive philosophy, the realization of Mental Health Philosophy will allow practitioners to have much less doubt in their ability, its adoption in pedagogical approaches to training (including its empirical scientific branches) will benefit the discipline of mental health overall, and the awareness it promotes will move the helping professions forward significantly.

This is the third of a series of papers that will constitute an upcoming book on the phenomenology of mental health. This paper poses a psychological explanation for the experience of imposter syndrome. The three components that were part of my primary education for my master's degree in counseling were in equal parts education upon psychological and psychiatric material and use of its instruments, counseling skills, and self-reflection. At my university, the lean of education was on the latter two and I attribute the confidence in my ability to treat and understanding of mental issue to believing in my experience tempered by humility and growth orientation as the source of knowledge. In short, it is engagement with but not necessarily embodiment of phenomenology which allows for mental health and its effective treatment. I pose epistemological discipline explains and accounts for the phenomenology of psychology and offers a way forward into a responsible future in the address for mental health.

This is Part 1 of a 2-part mental health philosophy exploration of mental health through the lens of what is actually happening. I propose in the light of phenomenalism that mental health is a process of self-revealing over self-disclosure. It critiques modern psychology's reliance on empirical methods and definitions, suggesting that true mental health arises from the necessity of being itself, and the psychology does not contain nor account fully for mental health, however useful its products. A discernment of mental health and well-being is also offered.

Emotions  have  been  studied  by  psychology  from  a  primarily  physiological approach as a strategy for empirically validating its finding. This was a consequence  of  methodological  behaviorism  and its influence on the field of psycho-logical  research.  As  a  consequence,  emotions  were  often  dissociated  from  cognitions  and  presented  as  mere  outcomes  of  physiological  processes.  In  the  1970s,  Appraisal  Theory  (Magda  B.  Arnold)  emerged,  proposing  a  different  approach  that highlights the cognitive dimension to emotions. But is this approach really new? Here we argue that although its contributions  are  scientifically  consistent  and innovative,  they  are  rooted  in  elements  of classical philosophy from Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas. In this paper, we will review two essays (Peters and Lazarus) to connect and assess a psychological theory alongside the underlying philosophy.

En el mundo medieval del que Petrarca fue crítico y heredero, el análisis de la razón y, en general, de las funciones propias del cerebro, no pertenecía a un ámbito concreto del saber. Sin embargo, los estudios de medicina presentaban una particularidad específica: la necesidad de que su abordaje teórico ofreciera explicación satisfactoria no sólo al funcionamiento normal de estas operaciones sino también a las alteraciones de las mismas. Este trabajo aborda esta particularidad, real o desarrollada retóricamente para delimitar un espacio profesional propio, prestando especial atención al valor epistemológico que la medicina escolástica concedió a la subjetividad del loco. Palabras clave: historia de las funciones cerebrales, historia de la locura, historia de la subjetividad del paciente, docencia médica medieval, medicina medieval.

De Asúa, Miguel. Discourse on animals in the 13th century was organized around a certain number of literary genres. Each of them resulted from the transformation of the materials received from Antiquity, embedded an epistemological project and answered to a specific rhetorical demand. Albert the Great’s commentary on De animalibus is taken here as a synthesis between different ways of talking about animals. This paper considers, firstly, how Albert’s De animalibus aims at the articulation of the medical and philosophical discourses on animals. Secondly, in what way Albert solves the problem of the integration of the discourse de natura rerum within the framework of the Aristotelian commentary. The first point is analyzed focusing on the controversies between physicians and philosophers about the origin of the veins, the existence of the female sperm and the ultimate components of the living beings. The second section discusses the way Albert modified Thomas of Cantimpré’s De natura rerum in order to include its material into his own commentary.

En este artículo se discuten aspectos de la figura del médico en el contexto europeo hacia finales del siglo XVIII y principios del XIX. Se han escogido dos textos sobre la influencia y tratamiento de las pasiones en relación con las enfermedades, cuyos autores (Clément-Joseph Tissot y William Falconer) usan el discurso para presentarse como detentadores de una función imprescindible en la regulación ética de los individuos-pacientes. La consolidación del médico a lo largo del siglo XIX como eje central de la sociedad se origina en estos intentos de extender las prácticas terapéuticas más allá del cuerpo hacia la vida moral del individuo. Trataremos de mostrar un tramo del proceso genealógico del médico en su relación con las pasiones del alma, y cómo este proceso está relacionado con un tipo de conocimiento médico y con la constitución de formas específicas de autoridad y de intimidad entre médico y paciente.

JUAN LUIS LORDA IÑARRA ampliar mis estudios, lo reconozco con agradecimiento. Este trabajo pretende llevar luz sobre unos puntos muy determinados de su pensamiento-el estudio teológico del dolor, su presencia misteriosa en Cristo, etc.-pero me ha obligado a conocer otros y muy variados elementos de su doctrina filosófica y teológica que se encuentran implicados allí. Lo que puede resultar costoso al principio, redunda al final como un gran beneficio. Por mi parte, espero haber contribuido a poner de relieve algunos aspectos que resultaban poco conocidos. También es esta la ocasión de agradecer el aliento y la ayuda del Director de la Tesis, D. Fernando Ocáriz Braña. Se ha dicho que no es posible recompensar como merecen ni el regalo de la vida, ni el de la ciencia. Adviertiéndolo aquí quiero cumplir, al menos, con ese deber mínimo que es reconocer la deuda contraída. Agradezco también a las demás personas que me ayudaron a llevar a cabo ese estudio, y a las que ahora han contribuido a su publicación parcial. ÍNDICE DE LA TESIS*

Главна хипотеза овог рада тиче се утицаја античке грчке науке на Платонову филозофију, а у конкретном случају дијалога Тимај, она гласи да је за разумевање најтежих делова овог списа античка грчка медицина од велике помоћи. То се пре свега односи на појам простора (χώρα), за чије разумевање, поред стандардног геометријског, нудим још један, хипократски модел. Тврдим да су оба модела једнако важна за разумевање феномена простора у Тимају и да се они међусобно не искључују. хипократски списи на које се том приликом позивам су: Περὶ ἀρχαίης ἰητρικῆς, Περὶ γονῆς, Περὶ γυναικείων и Περὶ φυσέως παιδίου. Аргументацију градим узевши појам δύναμις за жижни појам и трасирајући његову употребу од хипократика преко Платоновог Федра, закључно са Тимајем. То чиним зато што сматрам да: 1) артикулација биолошког модела за разумевање феномена простора у Тимају иде управо преко појма δύναμις и 2) Платонова примена појма δύναμις не одступа, ни смисаоно ни садржински, од хипократске. Истовремено, анализа коју спроводим омогућава ми да, бар у датом случају, одговорим на проблем тзв. ,,дијалектичке апропријације"-све чешћи приговор савремених теоретичара ране грчке филозофије упућен Платону да преузима појмове предсократоваца и/или научника мењајући их до непрепознатљивости, због чега не представља поуздан извор за реконструисање значења филозофских термина у раној грчкој филозофији или у грчкој науци.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE ANCIENT GREEK MEDICINE
ON PLATO’S PHILOSOPHY:
THE CASE STUDY OF THE TIMAEUS
S u m m a r y

This paper researches the influence of ancient Greek medicine on Plato’s
philosophy, in particular in relation to his Timaeus. In order to understand Plato’s
complex notion of space (the notorious χώρα), besides the standard geometrical
model, I offer an additional, Hippocratic one. What is more, I argue that both of
the models are equally important for understanding Plato’s concept of space and
that they are not mutually exclusive. I structure the argument by taking the term
δύναμις to be the focal one for the matter in question, and I trace its emergencies
throughout the following line of thought: the Hippocratics–Plato’s Phaedrus–the
Timaeus. The Hippocratic writings to which I refer are Περὶ ἀρχαίης ἰητρικῆς,
Περὶ γονῆς, Περὶ γυναικείων and Περὶ φυσέως παιδίου. At the same time, this
allows me to show that Plato’s usages of the term δύναμις do not deviate, neither
in meaning nor in content, from the Hippocratic ones. Finally, the conducted
analysis enables me, at least in the analyzed case, to give a negative answer to
the problem of the so-called “dialectical appropriation” – a modern theorists’ of
early Greek philosophy increasingly common objection (here) to Plato that he
takes over the prominent concepts of the early Greek philosophy and science and
changes them beyond recognition, which is why his writings do not represent a
reliable source for reconstructing the original meanings of the terms in question.
Additionally, at the end of the paper, I question the very notion of “dialectical
appropriation”.
Кey words: δύναμις, Plato, Hippocratic medicine, space/receptacle, dialectic
appropriatmion

Resumen………………………………………………………………………... 4 4. La tristeza en la Suma Teológica 4.1. Lugar de la doctrina sobre la tristeza en la STh…………………………. 4.2. Lugar de la tristeza en las pasiones concupiscibles……………………... 4.3. Qué es la tristeza………………………………………………………... 4.4. Qué causa la tristeza…………………………………………………….. 4.5. Cómo se manifiesta la tristeza…………………………………………... 4.6. Remedios ante la tristeza……………………………………………….. 5. Convergencias entre la doctrina sobre la tristeza de Santo Tomás de Aquino en la Suma Teológica (q.35 a 39) y el Trastorno Depresivo Mayor descrito en el DSM-5………………………………………………..

Many African countries have a shortage of health workers. As a response, in 2012, the Ministers of Health in the WHO African Region endorsed a Regional Road Map for Scaling Up the Health Workforce from 2012 to 2025. One of the key milestones of the roadmap was the development of national strategic plans by 2014. It is important to assess the extent to which the strategic plans that countries developed conformed with the WHO Roadmap. We examine the strategic plans for human resource for health (HRH) of sub-Saharan African countries in 2015 and assess the extent to which they take into consideration the WHO African Region’s Roadmap for HRH. A questionnaire seeking data on human resources for health policies and plans was sent to 47 Member States and the responses from 43 countries that returned the questionnaires were analysed. Only 72% had a national plan of action for attaining the HRH target. This did not meet the 2015 target for the WHO, Regional Office for Africa’s Roadmap. The p...

Autistic people report experiencing greater comfort socialising and easier communication with other autistic people compared to with non-autistic people. Despite autism being stereotypically associated with a lack of social motivation or community, an autistic community has been described briefly in the literature but is not yet well understood. Autistic community connectedness (ACC) may play an important role in promoting and protecting wellbeing for autistic people. This qualitative study involved interviewing autistic individuals (N = 20) in-person, via a video-based platform, over a text-based platform, or over email (according to the needs of the participants) to investigate ACC. Critical grounded theory tools were used to collect and analyse the data. Three elements of ACC were apparent in the data: belongingness, social connectedness, and political connectedness. Belongingness referred to the general sense of similarity that autistic people experienced with other autistic peo...

XIIIª Jornadas de Filosofía Medieval "La realidad del Corazón en el pensamiento medieval" Av. Alvear 1711, CABA 17-20 de abril de 2018 «DE MOTU CORDIS. LA POSICIÓN DEL AQUINATE EN TORNO A LA REALIDAD DEL CORAZÓN» RESUMEN Este trabajo representa nuestro esfuerzo por comprender la realidad del corazón humano, tal como la concibe Santo Tomás de Aquino en su opúsculo De motu cordis, presumiblemente escrito durante los años 1272-1273. Y lo haremos siguiendo principalmente el desarrollo de dos autores que lo han profundizado, obviamente y además del texto fuente. Nos referimos a los estudios del Dr. Caponnetto 1 y del Dr. Alby 2 . Con este intento, además de adentrarnos en el pensamiento del Aquinate sobre dicho tema, buscaremos dejar en claro el contexto en el que fue escrito. Así como también cuáles fueron las posiciones dominantes de la época, a las que el Angélico se opone o, mejor decir, con las cuales debate. Una nota que merece la pena ser destacada es la alusión que haremos del texto fuente con el cual los pensadores mencionados contrastan el opúsculo del Doctor Común; puesto que hemos podido consultar la versión del De motu cordis de Alfredo de Sareshel (sive Alvredus Anglicus), en la edición de Clemens Baeumker 3 . A tales efectos, presentaremos una a una las circunstancias en la que Santo Tomás redacta el opúsculo y la situación en la que se encontraba la medicina medieval. A continuación, repasaremos los argumentos principales de Ánglico y del Angélico para,

In this paper, we present the results of an online survey concerning the social perception of people with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). The analysis of the online survey conducted in Poland from March to May 2020, in which 355 Polish speaking respondents took part and which consisted of two parts: closed-ended questions and open-ended statementsshows that there is a cognitively interesting discrepancy between the relatively high level of knowledge declared by respondents and the more negative and stereotypical attitude towards people with ASD visible in the open-ended responses. Particularly noteworthy is the fact that relations between the respondents and neurotypical people are lined with fear, anxiety and insecurity. The survey results seem to unequivocally indicate the necessity for further educational projects that deepen knowledge and raise awareness of people with ASD.

Context
Numerous analyses emphasize the historical variability and social construction of the autism category. As a result, many beliefs and stereotypes about autism function unconsciously in social awareness as background knowledge.

Problem
We present the results of a survey concerning the social perception of autism and we draw attention to the possible impact of the specific ways in which people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are perceived, as revealed in the survey, on how this social identity might be created.

Method
A questionnaire consisting of two parts-closed-ended questions and free associations-was used in the survey. 355 participants answered the questions concerning the nature of autism, its causes, sources of information and experiences in contact with people on the spectrum.

Results
The results shows that there exists a cognitively interesting divergence between the level of knowledge declared by the respondents, based on credible sources, which is indicative of a positive attitude toward people with ASD, and the more negative attitude seen in the free associations.

Implications
Despite the level of social reflective knowledge, relations between people with ASD and neurotypical people seem to be lined with feelings such as fear, anxiety or uncertainty. This should draw attention to the need for a deeper and more conscious analysis of societal beliefs about autism.

Constructivist content
The theoretical framework for this survey is social representations theory (SRT), which derives from the constructivist paradigm. By showing the important role of individuals' background knowledge in the construction of autism social representation, the results of the survey confirm the usefulness of the constructivist approach to the analysis of the autism phenomenon.

Addressing  methodological  issues,  I  try  to  clarify  relations  between  radical  constructivism  and  the theories  used  as  a  basis  of  study  by describing  how  social  influences  experienced  by  individuals  are  constructed.
Also, I welcome the way other methodological questions may enrich future research  by  raising  the  issue  of  personal contact and inclusion of the first-person perspective  in  the  construction  of  autism. Next,  I discuss  (a)  the need  to  rethink  the  contemporary  psychiatric/diagnostic category of autism; (b) some strong and weak points of  the enactivist perspective; (c) the issue of inclusion of the “self–illness”  relation  in  research on autism, as well as the validity of the term  “illness”  in  this  concept;  and  (d) the possibility of thinking about autism from the phenomenological perspective inspired by Heidegger’s category of understanding.

proximally causes memory loss, both being presumably susceptible to a quantitative rendition-the continuum in question for Fulford is one of human value. Drawing upon the resources of philosophical value theory (e.g., Fulford, 1989; Hare, 1952), Fulford provides an account of the difference-in the order of valuebetween physical and mental illness, a difference he locates precisely in the extent to which they are differentially valued: Philosophical value theory generates a model which. .. suggests that the negative value judgements by which experiences. .. are. .. marked out as. .. illness, are the origin of the negative value judgements by which, in turn, the underlying bodily causes of those experiences. .. are marked out as pathological, and, hence, as diseases (2004, p. 75n, emphases added).

proximally causes memory loss, both being presumably susceptible to a quantitative rendition-the continuum in question for Fulford is one of human value. Drawing upon the resources of philosophical value theory (e.g., Fulford, 1989; Hare, 1952), Fulford provides an account of the difference-in the order of valuebetween physical and mental illness, a difference he locates precisely in the extent to which they are differentially valued: Philosophical value theory generates a model which. .. suggests that the negative value judgements by which experiences. .. are. .. marked out as. .. illness, are the origin of the negative value judgements by which, in turn, the underlying bodily causes of those experiences. .. are marked out as pathological, and, hence, as diseases (2004, p. 75n, emphases added).

This study sought to assess actions which Indonesia, Sudan, and Tanzania took to implement the health workforce commitments they made at the Third Global Forum on Human Resources for Health (HRH) in November 2013. The study was conducted through a survey of published and gray literature in English and field research consisting of direct contacts with relevant ministries and agencies. Results show that the three countries implemented interventions to translate their commitments into actions. The three countries focused their commitments on improving the availability, geographical accessibility, quality of education, and performance of health workers. The implementation of the Recife commitments primarily entailed initiatives at the central level, such as the adoption of new legislation or the development of accreditation mechanisms. This study shows that action is more likely to take place when policy documents explicitly recognize and document HRH problems, when stakeholders are involved in the formulation and the implementation of policy changes, and when external support is available. The Recife Forum appears to have created an opportunity to advance the HRH policy agenda, and advocates of health workforce development in these three countries took advantage of it.

Many African countries have a shortage of health workers. As a response, in 2012, the Ministers of Health in the WHO African Region endorsed a Regional Road Map for Scaling Up the Health Workforce from 2012 to 2025. One of the key milestones of the roadmap was the development of national strategic plans by 2014. It is important to assess the extent to which the strategic plans that countries developed conformed with the WHO Roadmap. We examine the strategic plans for human resource for health (HRH) of sub-Saharan African countries in 2015 and assess the extent to which they take into consideration the WHO African Region’s Roadmap for HRH. A questionnaire seeking data on human resources for health policies and plans was sent to 47 Member States and the responses from 43 countries that returned the questionnaires were analysed. Only 72% had a national plan of action for attaining the HRH target. This did not meet the 2015 target for the WHO, Regional Office for Africa’s Roadmap. The p...

The articles in this special issue have demonstrated how unprecedented transitions have come with both challenges and opportunities for health financing. Against the background of these challenges and opportunities, the Working Group on Health Financing at the Chatham House Centre on Global Health Security laid out, in 2014, a set of policy responses encapsulated in 20 recommendations for how to make progress towards a coherent global framework for health financing. These recommendations pertain to domestic financing of national health systems, global public goods for health, external financing for national health systems and the cross-cutting issues of accountability and agreement on a new global framework. Since the Working Group concluded its work, multiple events have reinforced the group's recommendations. Among these are the agreement on the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals, the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa and the release of...

We conducted a follow-up analysis of the implementation of the Human Resources for Health (HRH) commitments made by country governments and other actors at the Third Global Forum on HRH in 2013. Since then member states of the WHO endorsed Universal Health Coverage as the main policy objective whereby health systems strengthening, including reinforcement of the health workforce, can contribute to several Sustainable Development Goals. Now is the right time to trace the implementation of these commitments and to assess their contribution to broader global health objectives. The baseline data for this policy tracing study consist of the categorisation and analysis of the HRH commitments conducted in 2014. This analysis was complemented in application of the health policy triangle as its main analytical framework. An online survey and a guideline for semistructured interviews were developed to collect data. Information on the implementation of the commitments is available in 49 countri...

As alarm over a global mental health crisis which rivals the climate change conundrum in severity, along with its debilitating toll of human depression and attendant inability to function normally, one vital element that remains undisclosed and therefore completely overlooked remains that most practicing psychiatrists have no clear idea of the causes of mental illness. They admittedly continue the practice of treating systems and defining mental affliction only as a set of symptoms which have been exhibited for more than six weeks.
This deplorable lacuna acts as a formidable knowledge gap which should set off an alarm for anyone even remotely feeling in need of professional clinical mental health support.
So the question becomes; where to begin in attempting to ameliorate this unacceptable situation.
This paper is intended as an opening 'sketch' or overview of what we know so far, but more importantly suggesting, in strong terms, that Spinoza's psychology of the 'emotions' offers the only coherent and  demonstratively accurate depictions of human nature and its 'base' components of the emotional triumvirate of 'desire', 'pleasure' and 'pain'.
Included are a set of suggested resources for the reader to come up to speed with what is, admittedly, a work in progress. This entails educating  everyone to the need for an alternative diagnosis and treatment regimen.
Regards,
Charles M. Saunders

Revista Chilena de Estudios Medievales | eISSN 0719-689X Resumen El presente estudio persigue la significación propia de la noción de via inveniendi aplicada a las ciencias especulativas en los textos de Tomás de Aquino. Su razón estaría fundamentalmente en el siguiente considerando: la exploración del intelecto y sus operaciones, y aquella de la razón han sido llevadas a cabo con mayor rigurosidad reflexiva, mientras que el movimiento propio de la razón como inquisitiva sobre la experiencia parecería disolverse en tales estudios, que atañen más a las relaciones generales de intelecto-razón, o gnoseología en general. De este modo se prosigue una ampliación de sentido de esta temática ya conocida según el detalle del movimiento racional inventivo. Palabras clave Tomás de Aquino, ciencias especulativas, via inveniendi, ratio inferior et superior. Abstract This study examines the precise meaning of via inveniendi applied to speculative sciences in Thomas Aquinas' texts. Its reason would be considered mainly in the following topic: a research about intellectual faculty, its operations and that of reasoning, which have been studied in depth. Nevertheless, the specific movement of reasoning as via inveniendi about the experience seems not to have been considered in those studies, which shows more the general relationship between intellect and reasoning or general gnoseology. Therefore, the scope of this paper is to enhance the understanding of the rational inventive movement. Keywords Thomas Aquinas, speculative sciences, via inveniendi, ratio inferior et superior.

RESUMEN El mundo islámico fue a lo largo de la Edad Media el mayor medio de divulgación de la ciencia griega clásica. El Tacuinum sanitatis, obra del persa Ibn But ִ lā n (siglo 5 H. / XI J. C.), sigue los contenidos de los tratados hipocráticos de los siglos V y IV a. C. Estos textos dan importancia a la dieta, entendida como el equilibrio del hombre con su entorno y de los ali-mentos con los ejercicios físicos. El Tacuinum sanitatis fue escrito con un innovador uso de tablas sinópticas, usadas con anterioridad en el campo de la Astronomía. En ellas se propone al hombre del Medioevo una medicina práctica y preventiva. PALABRAS CLAVE: Ibn Butִ lā n. Higiene y dietética medieval árabe. Tacuinum sanitatis. ABSTRACT «The Latin tradition of Tacuina. Text and image to service of medical science». During the Middle Ages, the Islamic world was the most important means of difussion of classical Greek science. The Tacuinum Sanitatis written by the Persian Ibn Butִ lā n (5 th A. H. / 11 th A. D. century), summarizes the contents of the Hippocratic texts from the fifth and the fourth centuries B.C. These texts give importance to the diet as a balance between man and his environment and food and physical exercises. The Tacuinum sanitatis was composed using an innovative presentation of contents in synoptic tables, which had earlier been used in the field of Astronomy. These tables recommend a practice and preventive medicine to the people of the Middle Ages. KEY WORDS: Ibn Butִ lā n. Medieval Arabic hygiene and dietary. Tacuinum sanitatis. 0. GENERALIDADES Probablemente la medicina sea la disciplina que aporte más luz sobre los comportamientos sociales y culturales de una época a partir de la transmisión de sus conocimientos, porque indaga en la causa de una enfermedad-aporta el nombre, el género, la condición social y la edad-y establece un diagnóstico y unas pautas que seguir a continuación en relación a un enfermo y su entorno, al mismo tiempo que nos ofrece información sobre los hábitos alimenticios, la higiene como preven-ción de la enfermedad, los comportamientos sexuales, etc 1. Su estudio supone, sin duda, una buena forma de conocer la sociedad medieval.

U ovom završnom (diplomskom) radu pokušali smo iz svih, manje ili više (prihvatljivih), filozofsko-metodoloških perspektiva pristupimo problemu „zdravlja“ koji se samom svojom egzistencijom, kao „filozofski pojam“ nameće kroz tok istorije zapadne kontintentalne misli.  Ovaj pojam, koji se kao termin u srpskom piše i na srpskom jeziku kaže: „zdravlje“, engleskom jeziku „health“, (staro)grčkom „ύγιεια“, latinskom: „sanitas“, francuskom „santé“ i najzad nemačkom „Gesundheit“, pokušali smo da kroz najrazličitije kontekste osvetlimo u okviru posebnih filozofskih učenja i utvrdimo na koje sve načine ova učenja ulaze u misaoni splet koji nam ispostavlja širina ovog pojma.  Od ontološke i metafizičke, preko gnoseološko-epistemološke, pa do praktičkobio-etičke pozicije mogli smo doći samo jednom „vijugavom“, kako opštom tako i filozofskom metodologijom, koja nikada ne sme da zaboravi na sopstveni pojam koji prati, što se nadamo se ni u ovom istraživanju nije dogodilo.  U zaključku smo pružili dodatne perspektive i pokušali da „spustimo filozofsku loptu“ na neko „neuzdrmano i sigurno tlo“ - „kopno“ sopstvenih ili nekih dodatnih istraživanja drugih na ovu temu.

An Interlude but no Sidetrack

                        Welcome to the Pity-party
-The Most Stultifying and Debilitating Emotion among them All!

Self-pity comes on like a bad actor in a B-movie; hiding in the shadows in a dark alley, just waiting for a vulnerable personality to pass close by in the dark, pelting rain. But, in its ‘affect’ it punches far above its weight, it, in fact, pretty much packs a near knockout punch when it comes to our confidence and self-esteem.
It is not abundantly clear whether each and every one of us is currently in or susceptible to its slimy grasp. What is clear is that self-pity when it ‘blossoms’ spits out a venomous poison which infects our very being and its gravest threat comes as a blindside punch that we almost never see coming nor do we quite feel it even as it is delivered. Others among the negative emotions come on head-on gangbusters. They announce their presence loud and clear, never leaving a shadow of a doubt as to their arrival in our lives. This does not diminish their impact, but at least we are given fair warning that they have arrived and must be dealt with somehow. Even when we do not have any idea how or precisely what action to take.
But not self-pity, it barely announces itself and often comes on sounding like an old comfortable friend who should be welcomed and taken in. Therein lies the trap. Self-pity acts like quicksand on our spirits. It moves and acts so quickly that we move from feeling sorry for ourselves, ‘Poor old me, someone else just took another swipe at me that I in no way deserve!’ We move from this ‘emotion’ almost instantaneously to, ‘I’ll show them, I’ll leave and never come back, and no one will know where I am! I don’t need this or these people.’ Before many moments elapse, it morphs into, ‘I know what to do, I’ll take myself out, that’ll teach them!’
From that first hint of doubt through the stages from denial to anger to retribution and finally to contemplating self-harm, all these happen in a heartbeat.

It often begins with a seemingly innocuous feeling, a sense of some slight which has been directed our way. But it always ends in a full-blown ‘pity party’, in whatever form it takes in a person inner-thoughts.


Spinoza recognized that each of us is bound and restricted in our efforts to be self-satisfied and self-assured by the recurrence of self-doubt. Doubts that we cannot quite put a name to, but which catch us off guard at the unlikeliest of moments and pre-occupy our thinking.
Sometimes it may begin with a feeling that a particular individual just does not like us. It may be in the work setting, or with a relative, perhaps an in-law. For whatever reason this person lets slip out, from time to time, some little seemingly derogatory comment about you, to your face. It usually occurs at random moments and is not usually overheard by anyone but you. It is never so egregious as to remove any doubt as to its nature and pointed purpose. But it happens.
It’s a bother to have someone direct negative feelings in our direction, particularly when it’s done surreptitiously. We can’t quite be certain what to do about it, but it wounds. Its effects begin to pre-occupy our thoughts and we cannot shake them off. This is one example of how the ‘pity party’ begins.

But what comes next is the most curious and dangerous part of this self-reflection process. As we mull over this slight and why it keeps being directed towards us, a strange effect begins to inflate the reverie. We can term it ‘fictionalizing an event’. It is an unconscious and entirely non-intentional happening, but we begin to inflate both the nature and magnitude of the offensive attitude and the remarks. Not too long after that we begin to conduct an imaginary dialogue with the offender. In it, we strike back at them with slams on their person and personality. We now can readily see before our mind’s eye each and every time a negative remark was aimed at us by this person. Regardless of the date, time or year, each and every slight stands out as a singularity. But even that is not the most curious aspect of this miasmic memory.
Soon we blur this affront by agglomerating with it other times and other people who have offended us.
Whether these events happened years or even decades ago.
Before long we feel so terribly sad and lost that we picture ourselves gaining retribution by calling out the perpetrator. But then we realize that since it is, we alone, who have direct knowledge of these denigrations and the magnitude of our sorrow and confusion pushes us beyond the bounds of reason where we contemplate running away and perhaps even worse; that we are completely alone in our suffering, it cannot be shared with anyone. To speak of it would be too humiliating.

This is what Spinoza meant by human bondage to our emotions. It is also why we are moving together from proposition to proposition in this His Part Four of the “Ethics”; hopefully to discover what can be done to free our minds from this accursed ‘Fortuna’! 

Only one step remains for the reader if this little thought experiment is to bear any fruit. That is to recognize this self-pity mechanism as a feature in your own private ‘life’ of the mind.
There could be a multiplicity of these scenarios produced here after the formulaic method, in the hopes that the overlap among scenes would be voluminous enough and of a wide enough distribution so as to capture the attention of each reader to the presence of this potentially psychologically destructive force of self-pity in each one’s life.
But Spinoza did not use this approach, quite the opposite in fact. He wrote in a manner which offered just enough of an explication so as to point us in the right direction. And so that is the aim in this pictorial.