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The Emergence of Biolaw ::The European Experience and the Evolutionary Approach /
This book introduces "biolaw" as an integrated and distinct field in contemporary legal studies. Corresponding to the legal dimension of bioethics, the term "biolaw" is already in use in academic and research activities to denote legal issues emerging mostly from advanced technological applications. This book is a genuine attempt to rationalize the field of biolaw after almost four decades of continuous production of relevant legislation and judgments worldwide. This experience is a robust basis for defending a) a separate legal object, covering the total of legal norms that govern the management of life as a natural phenomenon in all its possible forms, and b) an "evolutionary" approach that opens the discussion on a future conciliation of legal regulation with the Theory of Evolution on the ground of biolaw
Artificial Intelligence and Human Rights: Towards an Advanced International Binding Regulation?
With the rapid development of AI applications in the most important areas of economic, political and social life, the regime for the protection of fundamental rights has been significantly affected. This reality gives rise to initiatives for new legislation at international, supranational and national level. At the level of international law in particular, this legislation currently focuses on the formulation of general principles and guidelines. What is lacking is more specific regulation in situations where the introduction of AI causes uncertainty as to the protection of specific rights, particularly where conflicts arise between them. This article attempts to formulate proposals for such a more specific regulation, based on widely acknowledged principles of international law. Given that technological development and its impact on today’s societies know no national limitations, the adoption of this ‘next step’ in international law may well determine the smooth adaptation of AI to the values of democratic societies
Artificial Intelligence in Biomedicine: A Legal Insight
The involvement of artificial intelligence in biomedicine promises better support for decision-making both in conventional and research medical practice. Yet two important issues emerge in relation to personal data handling, and the influence of AI on patient/doctor relationships. The development of AI algorithms presupposes extensive processing of big data in biobanks, for which procedures of compliance with data protection need to be ensured. This article addresses this problem in the framework of the EU legislation (GDPR) and explains the legal prerequisites pertinent to various categories of health data. Furthermore, the self-learning systems of AI may affect the fulfillment of medical duties, particularly if the attending physicians rely on unsupervised applications operating beyond their direct control. The article argues that the patient informed consent prerequisite plays a key role here, not only in conventional medical acts but also in clinical research procedures
'Vague Oviedo': Autonomy, Culture and the Case of Previously Competent Patients
The paper examines the ethical and legal challenges of making decisions for previously competent patients and the role of advance directives and legal representatives in light of the Oviedo Convention. The paper identifies gaps in the Convention that result in conflicting instructions in cases of a disagreement between the expressed prior wishes of a patient, and the legal representative. The authors also examine the legal and moral status of informally expressed prior wishes of patients unable to consent. The authors argue that positivist legal reasoning is insufficient for a consistent interpretation of the relevant provisions of the Convention and argue that ethical argumentation is needed to provide guidance in such cases. Based on the ethical arguments, the authors propose a way of reconciling the apparent inconsistencies in the Oviedo Convention. They advance a culturally sensitive approach to the application of the Convention at the national level. This approach understands autonomy as a broader, relational consent and emphasizes the social and cultural embeddedness of the individual. Based on their approach, the authors argue that there exists a moral obligation to respect the prior wishes of the patient even in countries without advance directives. Yet it should be left to the national legislations to determine the extent of this obligation and its concrete forms
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
The present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
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