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The Future of Bioethics Publishing: Ethical Risks and Infrastructural Power @ WCB2026
Interested in Bioethics Commons? Register your interest and co-dream it with us (~3 min): https://survey.borant.eu/s/bioethics-commons-wcb Academic publishing is not a neutral vehicle for bioethical knowledge: it embeds implicit and explicit value assumptions that shape who can publish, how credit is assigned, and which voices become authoritative. Recent developments (multiple failures of OA transformative agreements, peer review…
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Democracy and Health. Mapping the Field & Developing Design Principles for Democratizing Healthcare Governance @ WCB 2026
Abstract Democratic ideals are invoked frequently in debates on health and healthcare governance, yet the meaning and practical implications of “democracy” in this context often remain underspecified. This workshop builds on an ongoing scoping review that maps how the relationship between democracy and health is conceptualized across the bioethics, public health, and health policy literature.…
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The making of digital ghosts: designing ethical AI afterlives
The rapid proliferation of AI-mediated digital afterlife technologies, from chatbots trained on personal data to voice clones and posthumous avatars, has generated a substantial body of ethical literature identifying the moral risks of posthumous simulation. Yet this growing consensus has not been matched by frameworks capable of translating ethical principles into operational design constraints. This…
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Misinformation, Disinformation, and Autonomy. Against the Epistemic Paternalism Trap @ Brocher Foundation 2026
Most tools developed to counter the issues of misinformation and disinformation at scale replicate the very problem they aim to solve. By filtering, flagging, and moderating content, such tools replace human judgment with algorithmic judgment rather than empowering the people navigating the information ecosystem. This is what we refer to as the epistemic paternalism trap.…
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Analyzing freedom: Understanding swiss COVID-19 narratives through NLP analysis
Background Beyond the public health challenges it posed, the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the fragility of public discourses, particularly regarding moral key terms such as freedom. Understanding how these terms, including freedom, are used across different forms of public communication is critical for promoting an informed dialogue during crises and reducing societal polarization. Objective This study…
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The structural fingerprints of disinformation: a content-agnostic framework
Infodemics fuel the proliferation of misinformation and disinformation, often outpacing the effectiveness of existing countermeasures. Current interventions—such as debunking and psychological inoculation—typically address either specific instances of false or misleading content or the known manipulative tactics through which such content spreads. While these approaches are effective and scalable, most remain inherently corrective and struggle to…
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Moral contentions in the COVID-19 discourses: a qualitative content analysis of Moral Key Terms in Swiss public discourses
Moral Key Terms (MKTs) have been used in public discourses to challenge or support efforts to manage COVID-19. We developed four themes that illustrate this through a theory-driven qualitative content analysis of a dataset consisting of newspaper articles, social media posts, and responses from the online platform PubliCo. MKTs were used to contend how democratic…
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The phenomenon of ‘value extraction’ in Open Access
Background Open Access (OA) agreements were introduced to remove financial barriers to scientific dissemination and promote equity in knowledge access. As Article Processing Charges (APCs) have shifted from individual researchers to institutions, access to OA publishing has become an institutional asset, unevenly distributed across institutions, countries, and career stages. Purpose This article introduces and defines…
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Conspiracy theory as a component of religious biopolitics
The biopolitics of identity-centered religious movements has been a primary source of conspiracy theories in recent decades. This paper explores the shared characteristics of three examples of identity-centered religious and political movements with biopolitical agendas from three different parts of the world: Christian nationalism in the United States, Hindu nationalism in India, and political Islam…
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Analyzing Misinformation and Disinformation: Understanding Swiss COVID-19 Narratives Through Natural Language Processing Analysis
Abstract Background:The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the challenges posed by the rapid spread of misinformation and disinformation, exacerbating societal polarization and institutional distrust. Understanding how misinformation and disinformation is understood and framed in public discourse is essential to developing strategies for building societal resilience and promoting informed decision-making during crises. Objective:This study explores the use…
