InTuition

Matthew Hodder - Writer In this series of short articles, writers for InTuition will be looking at the biggest issues political parties need to deal with in the upcoming general election. In this article, Matthew Hodder will look at issues of funding within the NHS: The fundamental issue that I would like to see given some serious attention in the next party manifesto regards the NHS. For years now, healthcare services in the UK have been suffering cuts and over-stretched services that are causing shortages of staff, longer hours for doctors and worst still, an increasing wait time for treatment. Even basic trends like this one show how the situation has developed over the years of austerity. Free-at-point-of-service health care is such a valuable asset to the UK, and to see it suffer so much is truly saddening as almost everyone relies on the National Health Service. One of the reasons, philosophically, why health care in general is so valuable is that it serves as a proxy f...

Megan Tomlinson - Writer In this series of short articles, writers for InTuition will be looking at the biggest issues political parties need to deal with in the upcoming general election. In this article, Megan Tomlinson will look at the issue of our future relationship to the EU: Following three years of political stagnation, the recent consensus over the Prime Minister’s deal in the House of Commons on 22nd October marks a possible turning point in the Brexit stalemate. Yet after all this time, the UK has only gently touched upon the future relationship of the UK with the European Union, having been preoccupied with the withdrawal process itself under Article 50. Therefore, election manifestos will provide a rare opportunity for political parties to give a clear standpoint on their ambitions for the future of UK trade policy. Options for a trading model with the EU are vast; at their most skeletal, there is the fall-back option of membership of the World Trade Organisation (WT...

Daniel Priestley - Writer and Editor They say there are two things in life that are certain: death and taxes. Death has been around as long as humans have been living and the oldest known burial took place about 130,000 years ago. Rituals, burials and funerals are seen as perhaps the earliest form of religious practice and show that humans have long been concerned about what happens after death. Alongside burials, cremation - the practice of reducing a corpse to its essential elements by burning - traces back to at least the Ancient Greeks as early as 1000 BC. However cremation didn’t really become popular in the modern world until 1874 when Queen Victoria’s surgeon published a book on the topic called Cremation: The Treatment of the Body After Death. Problems surrounding the procedures associated to death have often drawn creative and sometimes bizarre solutions. For example, when the black death killed an estimated 50 million people, or 60% of the population of Europe at the time...

Matthew Hodder - Writer John Harris establishes that presumed, or proxy consent is no justification to medically treat patients, thus informed consent remains the most important method to ethically justify medical interventions, based on a respect for autonomy and a concern for welfare (Harris, 2003, p.10). This essay shall briefly explain Harris's justification for his ‘best interests test' which seeks to reject and replace presumed consent when medical intervention is needed in cases where consent is difficult to ascertain. In response I shall explain that there is not much of a difference between the `best interests test' and presumed consent. I shall then explore why presumed consent is adequate to allow physicians to act in cases of medical emergency, showing that Harris's concerns are not necessary. In medical decision-making, informed consent is a key ethical driver. It feeds directly into the notion of autonomy as it allows the physician to administer t...

Lani Bond - Writer Amidst the rise of climate change protests and continued advances in government pressure for action, it is incredible to be reminded of how the union of people - with a common motivation - can create such positive change. After watching an interview with Jordan Peterson about climate change in 2018, I was disturbed by this highly influential psychologist’s adamance against the human ability to successfully find climate change solutions. As a best-selling author and public speaker with a large devoted fan-base, his opinions are highly influential to his followers. This article aims to challenge the inefficiency of narrow-minded thinking, questioning one of Peterson’s views: that political parties cannot be united in the fight against climate change. Undermining Activism The divide between the left and the right has historically led to political backlash against activists for any cause. In terms of climate change, its deniers are typically associated with right...

Niamh Brook - Writer The morning of the 4th July 2019, I raced down the stairs like a child on Christmas morning to join my mother and my boyfriend to start the first episode of Stranger Things 3. Ever since I binged the first season during a sick day in October 2016, I have loved the show. Almost daily I listen to a piece of music from the score; I have a T-shirt with the shows logo on (and is the only film/ tv shirt I wear out the house), and I have re-watched the first season numerous times. The first season, I think, is a brilliant example of the potential of television. It is wonderfully crafted. Characters are well defined with clear arcs, each with a purpose to drive the story. The pastiche that the show is most famous for has so many layers from costume and set design, shots and the overall story within the show. Season 1 is great. Okay? When the second season came along in October 2017, it changed the course of the show. It was no longer the case of a missing child. A whod...

Lily Frost - Writer This is the first part of a series where I will delve into the Bhopal gas tragedy. Many young people may not have heard of this industrial disaster because it happened before they were alive. Therefore in this first part I will discuss what actually happened in the events that took place on the 2nd/3rd of December 1984. This year marks 35 years since the Bhopal Disaster; the disaster that was dubbed the 'Hiroshima of the chemical industry’. On the 3rd December 1984, a massive cloud of poisonous gas was released from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India. It is believed that 42 tonnes of this poisonous gas was exposed to more than 500,000 people. It has been reported that within the first 72 hours after the leak, up to 10,000 people died. Later, 15,000 people died of related diseases. Many years after the event, people are still struggling day to day with chronic and debilitating illnesses as a consequence. Thus, this disaster is by no means over. ...