Michael Isfort

Bio: Michael Isfort is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Medicine & Transthyretin. The author has an hindex of 1, co-authored 1 publications receiving 109 citations.

Knowledge and action

Abstract: THE disproportion between poverty and unemployment and the abundance made possible by power production is leading men everywhere to question the basis of a political and economic system which permits the existence of such a paradox of maldistribution. It is no longer merely a question whether effective measures could be taken if those in authority possessed sufficient knowledge and understanding of the situation, but whether the present system permits them to take any effective action without the whole system being radically reformed. The non-success which has thus far attended the efforts or pleadings of politicians is not only fast breeding a general distrust of their policies but also a disposition to consider far-reaching changes in the structure of society.

Multidisciplinary amyloidosis care in the era of personalized medicine

Abstract: Amyloidosis refers to a group of conditions where abnormal protein—or amyloid—deposits in tissues or organs, often leading to organ malfunction. Amyloidosis affects nearly any organ system, but especially the heart, kidneys, liver, peripheral nervous system, and gastrointestinal tract. Neuromuscular deficits comprise some of its ubiquitous manifestations. Amyloidosis can be quite challenging to diagnose given its clinical heterogeneity and multi-system nature. Early diagnosis with accurate genetic and serologic subtyping is key for effective management and prevention of organ decline. In this review, we highlight the value of a multidisciplinary comprehensive amyloidosis clinic. While such a model exists at numerous clinical and research centers across the globe, the lack of more widespread adoption of such a model remains a major hindrance to the timely diagnosis of amyloidosis. Such a multidisciplinary care model allows for the timely and effective diagnosis of amyloidosis, be it acquired amyloid light amyloidosis (AL), hereditary transthyretin amyloidosis (hATTR), or wild type amyloidosis (TTR-wt), especially in the current era of personalized genomic medicine. A multidisciplinary clinic optimizes the delivery of singular or combinatorial drug therapies, depending on amyloid type, fibril deposition location, and disease progression. Such an arrangement also helps advance research in the field. We present our experience at The Ohio State University, as one example out of many, to highlight the centrality of a multi-disciplinary clinic in amyloidosis care.

Perceived utility of electrodiagnostic testing in critical illness myopathy and polyneuropathy: A survey of intensive care unit providers

Abstract: Critical illness myopathy (CIM) and critical illness polyneuropathy (CIP) are common disorders associated with substantial morbidity. Electrodiagnostic studies (EDx) are effective in diagnosing CIM/CIP and identifying mimicking conditions. We surveyed intensive care unit (ICU) providers to better understand their approach to ICU‐acquired weakness (ICU‐AW) and the perceived utility of EDx.

Information Avoidance: Who, What, When, and Why:

Abstract: Although acquiring information can provide numerous benefits, people often opt to remain ignorant. We define information avoidance as any behavior designed to prevent or delay the acquisition of av...

Belief, credence, and norms

Abstract: There are currently two robust traditions in philosophy dealing with doxastic attitudes: the tradition that is concerned primarily with all-or-nothing belief, and the tradition that is concerned primarily with degree of belief or credence. This paper concerns the relationship between belief and credence for a rational agent, and is directed at those who may have hoped that the notion of belief can either be reduced to credence or eliminated altogether when characterizing the norms governing ideally rational agents. It presents a puzzle which lends support to two theses. First, that there is no formal reduction of a rational agent’s beliefs to her credences, because belief and credence are each responsive to different features of a body of evidence. Second, that if our traditional understanding of our practices of holding each other responsible is correct, then belief has a distinctive role to play, even for ideally rational agents, that cannot be played by credence. The question of which avenues remain for the credence-only theorist is considered.

The Epistemic Side-Effect Effect

Abstract: Knobe (2003a, 2003b, 2004b) and others have demonstrated the surprising fact that the valence of a side-effect action can affect intuitions about whether that action was performed intentionally. Here we report the results of an experiment that extends these findings by testing for an analogous effect regarding knowledge attributions. Our results suggest that subjects are less likely to find that an agent knows an action will bring about a side-effect when the effect is good than when it is bad. It is further argued that these findings, while preliminary, have important implications for recent debates within epistemology about the relationship between knowledge and action.

Contrastive Knowledge Surveyed

Abstract: Suppose that Ann says, “Keith knows that the bank will be open tomorrow.” Her audience may well agree. Her knowledge ascription may seem true. But now suppose that Ben—in a different context—also says “Keith knows that the bank will be open tomorrow.” His audience may well disagree. His knowledge ascription may seem false. Indeed, a number of philosophers have claimed that people’s intuitions about knowledge ascriptions are context sensitive, in the sense that the very same knowledge ascription can seem true in one conversational context but false in another. This purported fact about people’s intuitions serves as one of the main pieces of evidence for epistemic contextualism, which is (roughly speaking) the view that the truth conditions of a knowledge attribution can differ from one conversational context to another. Opponents of contextualism have replied by trying to explain these purported intuitions in other ways. For instance, they have proposed that these purported intuitions may be explained via shifts in what is at stake for the subject, pragmatic shifts in what is assertible, or performance shifts in our liability to error. Yet a recent series of empirical studies threatens to undermine this whole debate. These studies presented ordinary people with precisely the sorts of cases that have been discussed in the contextualism literature and gave them an opportunity to say whether they agreed or disagreed with the relevant knowledge attributions. Strikingly, the results suggest that people simply do not have the intuitions they were purported to have. Looking at this recent evidence, it is easy to come away with the feeling that the whole contextualism debate was founded on a myth. The various sides offered

Do you know more when it matters less

Abstract: According to intellectualism, what a person knows is solely a function of the evidential features of the person's situation. Anti-intellectualism is the view that what a person knows is more than simply a function of the evidential features of the person's situation. Jason Stanley (2005) argues that, in addition to “traditional factors,” our ordinary practice of knowledge ascription is sensitive to the practical facts of a subject's situation. In this paper, we investigate this question empirically. Our results indicate that Stanley's assumptions about knowledge ascriptions do not reflect our ordinary practices in some paradigmatic cases. If our data generalize, then arguments for anti-intellectualism that rely on ordinary knowledge ascriptions fail: the case for anti-intellectualism cannot depend on our ordinary practices of knowledge ascription.