User:Mwrmwrmwr/Stephen G. Post

Stephen G. Post PhD, is Founder and Director of the Center for Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care, and Bioethics at Stony Brook University. Prior to his arrival at Stony Brook University, he was Professor in the School of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University. His PhD was completed in 1983 at the University of Chicago. He is most well known for his work in both dementia and altruism, though his work in theology and psychology led to the de-pathologizing of religious belief in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistic Manual (DSM IV). In addition to being an accomplished academic, he is a committed public intellectual who has written for or been interviewed by such diverse periodicals as Parade (magazine), O: The Oprah Magazine , The New York Times, and Psychology Today. He is also a member of the board of trustees at the John Templeton Foundation.

Academic Work
Stephen Post has focused on ethical issues surrounding cognitive disability and dementia since the late 1980's. This work has been recognized through his election as a member of the Medical and Scientific Advisory Panel of Alzheimer's Disease International. He is also a pioneer in the field of altruism and compassionate love. Through the Institute for Research on Unlimited Love ,an Ohio-based 501 (c)(3) established in July 2001 that he founded with support from philanthropist John Templeton and the Templeton Foundation, he was able to fund research in the science of altruism as well as its philosophical underpinnings. In 2007 he co-authored the blockbuster Why Good Things Happen to Good People: How to Live a Longer, Healthier, Happier Life by the Simple Act of Giving. At the Center for Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care, and Bioethics he hopes to bring a broader and more integrative approach to the issues traditionally studied by bioethicists. The work at the Center aims to humanize the illness experience for both the patient and doctor as well as to study the integral function of the dynamic of compassion in the art of healing and the experience of recovery.

Awards & Honors

 * Elected Hastings Center Fellow 1994
 * Senior Scholar in the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University
 * Elected Member of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia for "distinguished contributions to medicine in 2003.
 * Hope in Healthcare Award, 2008
 * Kama Book Award in Medical Humanities from World Literacy Canada, 2008