Electronic Threats to Humane Healthcare by Stephen Bertman

Stephen Bertman addresses the issues involved in the use of technology in healthcare. He suggests that the increasing use of technology by residents tends to lead to a situation where it is difficult for them to gain all information needed concerning the conditions of their patients. Furthermore, it is as a result of the development of technology that healthcare practitioners have ended up using it as an easy way out in the care and treatment process of their patients. The result of these situations is that these individuals fail to get details concerning their patients that technology tends to miss. In addition, it is as a result of the use of technology that there has also been a considerable increase in levels of negligence among medical practitioners, especially considering that an increase in their workload has made them more reliant on technology. The interpersonal interactions that were the basis of patient-physician relationships are slowly dying away to be replaced by impersonal relationships where physicians do not take an active interest in the welfare of their patients and instead only focus on getting their jobs done. Therefore, Bertman, in this speech, sensitizes medical practitioners to make sure that they put aside the constant use of technology and instead get back to the root of medical traditions where the patient comes first.

Don't Tweet Your Brains Out by John Ramsay

John Ramsay, in his speech, shows that while Twitter has been able to ensure that there is the advancement of social good, it also has the potential to ruin the lives of those individuals who use it. This is especially the case where Ramsay makes reference to Jofi Joseph, a White House official who ended up losing his job because he lived a double life on Twitter where he made confidential and at times snide remarks, concerning his bosses, available on the network. The result was that he ended up being fired from his job despite having been among the most promising individuals at the White House who, just before being fired, had been slotted for promotion. Ramsay notes that even his bosses could not believe that such a brilliant man could descend so far from his position as to essentially bring down his career through the temptations brought about by a social network that did no really add any quality to his life. Therefore, the major lesson of the speech is that individuals have to be careful concerning what they choose to make public through social networks because they have the risk of jeopardizing their own lives and careers.

Coincidence?

Amazing coincidences, while extremely rare, happen in the real world. This is mainly because they help to bring about a situation where the individuals involved end up questioning the events that are taking place around them and wondering whether or not they were destined to take place. The lives of individuals all over the world are in one way or another connected and this is the reason why the actions of individuals in one part of the world might end up affecting the lives of others in another part. Such instances can be seen in The Garden of Forking Paths, which is a story that promotes the idea that amazing coincidences actually take place. The lives of Yu Tsun and Stephen Albert, despite their not knowing it, are connected as seen through the manner in which Albert seems to be attracted to the work of Tsui Pen, and ancestor of Yu Tsun. Albert’s admiration for the work of Tsui Pen is an amazing coincidence because in the process, he does not realize that his life is going to be ended by a descendant of the person that he admires. Additionally, when Yu Tsun decides to go on a mission to kill Albert in order to send a message to his German masters, he ends up being surprised that the individual that he wants to kill is one who may have removed the should of mystery concerning his own past. However, despite the realization of the coincidence revolving between these two individuals, Yu Tsun ends up putting duty first by killing Albert.

Plato’s view of amazing coincidence can be considered to be one that is extremely complex. This is seen through the advancement of the belief that it is extremely rare to find a coincidence between interest and duty among individuals. This is a highly significant observation because it shows that individuals in society tend to choose between one and the other. Those individuals who are able to maintain a balance between their duties and interests are extremely rare and this is the reason why it is difficult for such coincidences to happen. Therefore, Plato suggests that in order to find a coincidence, individuals have to dismiss the common notions concerning interest and duty and consider them to be essentially mistaken. The dismissal of these ideas makes all the difference because those individuals who do so come to the conclusion that catering for either their obligations or interests lead to a situation where it is nearly impossible to find a situation where they are not causing harm. Plato seems to push for a definition of coincidence which involves those actions or incidents that take place in society according to their natural order rather than being promoted by the illusive definitions that human beings have placed on them. Thus, if all the illusive definition of terms that are used in society were dispelled, it would be possible to come to the realization that those aspects of life that are called coincidences tend to happen more often than is realized.

Descartes seems to promote the idea that coincidence comes about as a result of the familiarity of individuals with sensory objects. This is especially considering that this familiarity makes it extremely difficult for individuals to notice the diverse incidents that take place in their lives. In those times that they really do notice, they term these incidents as coincidences and do not realize that all of the actions that seem coincidental actually take place on a daily basis. The result is that human beings often seek to rationalize the incidents that happen around them to such an extent that they come to give material attributes to those aspects of life that are immaterial. Based on this view, amazing coincidences are common things that take place on a daily basis and it is as a result of the loss of communion with spiritual realities that human beings have experienced that when they encounter these realities, they end up seeking the refuge of their bodies. It is through being used to observing events from a physical level that individuals are hardly aware of the world around them and when they witness glimpses of the manner through which they are all connected, they are termed coincidences and interpreted as random events. Consequentially, it is essential for individuals to ensure that they attain a greater understanding of the events taking place in their lives, especially coincidences, by withdrawing from the sensory experiences that they have on a daily basis.

Disarming Iran: A First Step by Barack Obama

Barack Obama’s speech seeking to address the Iranian nuclear program is one that promotes the idea that the United States is ready for negotiations. This is especially the case considering that at the time the speech was being made, Iran had just elected a new president who was more open to negotiations with the West and this speech was a means of showing the world that the United States had also chosen to follow suit. However, Obama also offers a warning to the Iranians that if they do not cooperate fully with the United States, they will face further isolation from the international community through the imposition of sanctions. It is also essential that Obama also made comments concerning the steps that have been taken by the United States and its allies to ensure that the Iranian nuclear program is brought to a halt including the imposition of a broad array of sanctions. Additionally, Obama’s statements, especially concerning the willingness to engage with Iran, contain a message of hope that the United States and Iran will be able to reach a deal that will promote the interests of both nations while containing the nuclear ambitions of the latter.

A Most Masculine State: Gender, Politics and Religion in Saudi Arabia

The issue of women’s rights and their contribution to society is one of the most pertinent debates that are taking place in the contemporary world. This is because a significant number of individuals have come to believe that women have been oppressed by male dominance for a long time and that it is time to ensure that their rights as individuals are respected. The achievement of this goal has the potential of making sure that there is the advancement of means through which women can become active participants in society while at the same time promoting gender equality. An important case concerning the rights of women in the contemporary world is that of Saudi Arabia; a country that has been vilified for years for denying women even the most basic of rights that are enjoyed by women elsewhere in the world. Madawi Al-Rasheed’s book A Most Masculine State: Gender, Politics, and Religion in Saudi Arabia is an extremely important addition to the scholarship concerning the manner through which women are treated in this country. This is because it provides an important contribution to the manner through which the relationship between the state and religion can end up leading to the denial of rights to women in their societies. It also creates the advancement of a situation where there is a conversation concerning the status of women in Saudi Arabia and what can be done to ensure that there is the achievement of a larger debate concerning the association between gender and religion.

While Al-Rasheed does not dispute the central position that is played by religion, she suggests that gender stratification in Saudi Arabia has developed because of a complexity of factors not necessarily related to religion. The result has been that there has been considerable gender stratification in the country to such an extent that women are essentially seen as not equal to their male counterparts. She draws on her research concerning the history of Saudi Arabia to come to the conclusion that because the country was essentially a new state that lacked a unifying national narrative, its leadership turned to the Wahhabi religious revival as a means of fostering religious nationalism. A consequence of this situation was that rather than growing towards the achievement of social cohesion through the use of a nationalist narrative, the new political establishment sought to achieve legitimacy through the use of religious nationalism. This created a situation where religious nationalism ended up becoming distinct from religion because it enforced those characteristics that may have been considered too radical even from a religious standpoint. The religious nationalism of Saudi Arabia developed on a path identical to secular nationalism and this in such a way that promoted the creation of an environment where the state got involved in almost every aspect of life. Through this analysis, Al-Rasheed is able to develop a strong insight into the relationship between gender, politics, the state, and religion through a diversity of contexts. She shows the manner through which gender stratification in the country was legitimized through the association between these aspects of social life.

The religious nationalism present in Saudi Arabia is unique because it is one that has been combined with the intense modernization of the state since the beginning. A result of this situation is that modernization, which has been at the center of state formation since its earliest days, has worked hand in hand with religion in order to affect the gender system in a diversity of ways. One of the arguments that this author makes is that there have been considerable fluctuations to the manner through which the gender gap has been affected over the last fifty years. This gender gap has been maintained through state sponsored interventions rather than by religion. The trend has been legitimized through the manner in which the state has taken what appear to be contradictory stances on a diversity of issues concerning gender. One of the most prominent of these has been widespread encouragement of the education of women yet these individuals have ended up being restricted one they have completed their education. Furthermore, state sanctioned religious fatwas have been common in undermining the gains made by women in society because there has been a failure to consider the impact that that they might have on women who have been empowered by education. Moreover, the state has taken initiatives aimed at bolstering its international image through the promotion of a situation where there is an increase in the public presence of some women. Most of the latter have been those who support the status quo and are unlikely to challenge it, with other being kept in the background. Therefore, Al-Rasheed concluded that the abundant oil wealth of Saudi Arabia has been both an obstacle and facilitator of the participation of women in public life.

From the beginning of her book, Al-Rasheed issues a challenge against the simplistic and often contradictory image of women in Saudi Arabia. She challenges the assumption that the women in this country are either the veiled victims of an extremely patriarchal society or glamorous cosmopolitan entrepreneurs. These stereotypical representations have for the most part thrived because of a scarcity of literature of high quality concerning gender relations in Saudi Arabia and the actual lives of the women in this country. The second part of the book is instrumental in showing the manner through which the women in this country have reflected on the gender system and in some cases even ended up challenging it. Al-Rasheed makes an extremely sensitive and sophisticated analysis of interviews, literary texts, and personal exchanges with the women of Saudi Arabia in a bid to show that these individuals are not as homogenous as they seem. Instead, they are individuals of varying backgrounds and different convictions who live their own lives as independently as they would like. This statement poses a direct challenge to those individuals who believe that the women of Saudi Arabia are all victims of the religious nationalism that has dominated the country for decades. It shows that the women of this country are as independent of thought and as aware of the social circumstances around them as other women in the rest of the world. Al-Rasheed seeks to show that women in Saudi Arabia are free thinking beings who, because of their diversity in backgrounds, have different ways of thinking. She also advances the conviction that the women of this country are all independent in their thought, and are not all victims, as is often represented in Western media when it comes to its depiction of these women.

In her analysis, Al-Rasheed considers the diversity of viewpoints of women such as Raja al-Sani and Bariyya al-Bishr. The latter, who is a sociologist, has raised considerable objections concerning the negative manner though which women are treated in the country based on the restrictions that have been placed on them when it comes to becoming active participants in politics and economics. Al-Sani, on the other hand, is a woman that is well known for being a member of the second generation of Saudi women writers as seen through the success of her novel, Girls of Riyadh, which performed very well at a commercial level. Al-Rasheed therefore makes use of the opinions of these women to show that the women of Saudi Arabia are not as homogenous as is often thought and are instead independent individuals who also have very strong opinions concerning their society. In addition, she also considers the contributions that have been made by numerous other women in Saudi society, including those women who are strictly committed to the Islamic tradition and believe that it is essential to apply Islamic solutions to everyday problems. A result of this analysis is that Al-Rasheed comes up with a means through which to show the diversity of opinion that can be found among Saudi women, and this to such an extent that shows that they are extremely complex and sophisticated individuals rather than the oppressed and restricted individuals of Western narrative. The achievement of this goal cannot be underestimated because it promotes the idea that women in Saudi Arabia are mistresses of their own lives and have actually taken an active part in challenging the negative narrative concerning them.