In his treatise on the commodification of medicine, the renowned bioethicist, Edmund Pelligrino, M.D. quoted Socrates, who asked his students, "But tell me, your physician, is he a moneymaker, an earner of fees, or a healer of the sick?" The student understood that physicians are healers first. While championing his health care reform package, President Obama was often heard to say, "We need to let doctors be doctors." If the "ideal" were the "everyday," perhaps this would work. But what motivates physicians? What affects the decisions they make in caring for patients? lt;brgt;lt;brgt;Dr. Nancy Holekamp is an office-based, super-specialist retina surgeon. Dr. Nick Holekamp is a hospital-based generalist pediatrician who cares for medically-complex children and their families. Despite being at opposite ends of the healthcare continuum, they share an understanding that physician behavior, like human behavior in general, happens on a spectrum from "doing the right thing" to greed-inspired self-interest. By sharing some of their personal experience, they hope to highlight the physician's role in the healthcare industry.

Beyond dispute, the Internet has changed the way most of us live our lives. Access to the sum total of human knowledge from our living room couch has impacted the way we work, the way we play, and the way we interact with other people on a global scale. Of course, we pay a heavy price for this level of access. Our parents had certain expectations of privacy, but what about our children and grandchildren who are growing up in this world of global access? lt;brgt;lt;brgt; In this talk, Denny Boynton, Technology Evangelist for Microsoft, will look at these issues and shed some light on these changing expectations of privacy in the Information Age.

Words to Live By: Reflections on the Writing Life From a 40-Year Veteran is a memoir of a remarkable career that began with little more than a vague dream—to write—and proved that with a bit of talent and a lot of determination one can achieve any goal, no matter how improbable. Bobbi intended the title to describe the way she has earned her living for more than half her life, but when one of her editors read it, the editor felt the title intimated at life lessons learned along the way. This morning's platform is about those lessons. lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Currently a working ghostwriter, editor, and writing coach, Bobbi Linkemer has been a magazine editor, corporate communicator, executive speech writer, and marketing manager, working with audio, video and various print media. She has authored 16 books. Her passion is helping other writers at all levels convey their messages through fine words. She teaches courses in "Writing, Publishing, and Promoting a Nonfiction Book" at St. Louis Community College.

In times of adversity the faithful turn their thoughts and hope to God. Where do agnostics or atheists go, what can they do, when they need answers and reason seems insufficient?

To continue our month of platform addresses related to faith, Beth Damsgaard-Rodriguez, Executive Director of lt;a href="http://interfaithstl.org/" target="_blank"gt;Interfaith Partnership/Faith Beyond Wallslt;/agt;, of which the Ethical Society of St. Louis is a member, will speak about the work of her organization to bring together people of all faiths to improve St. Louis and to increase peace and understanding. lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Beth Damsgaard-Rodriguez is a St. Louis, Missouri native. She earned her Bachelor Degree in Human Services from University of Tennessee. Her work has involved her in various non-profit organizations including the role of house parent for a residential treatment center and a youth minister for a Presbyterian Church. Beth also served for three years in the Peace Corps in Costa Rica.

Faces of humanism: Robert Ingersoll and Felix Adler

In 2006, a deranged man named Charles Carl Roberts went into an Amish school in Nickel Mines, Lancaster County, and shot and killed five girls before committing suicide. The Amish community decided to respond not with anger or calls for vengeance but with radical forgiveness for the shooter and his family. lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Jim Mahanes was inspired to create a series of thirty paintings portraying the Amish people and their community after visiting with Amish youth and viewing a documentary film about this incident, "The Power of Forgiveness," produced by Martin Doblmeier of Journey Films. lt;brgt;lt;brgt; In this Platform, Mahanes will share his paintings and his fascination with the process of forgiveness among the Amish children who had been traumatized by the loss of their schoolmates. How do the developmental emotions of grief and anger coincide with the cultural expectations to forgive? lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Since 1975, watercolorist Jim Mahanes has painted the American land-scape with both realism and imaginative interpretation. A self-taught artist, Mahanes has advanced degrees in the behavioral sciences and practices family therapy in Louisville, Kentucky. He has been a faculty member of the University of Kentucky for more than 23 years. His art is the primary focus in his life now, however. According to the artist, "There is a close parallel between painting and therapy. The perceptual skills demanded of a clinician enhance the creative approach to painting and vice versa." lt;brgt;lt;brgt; You can visit lt;a href="http://www.Mahanes-art.com" target="_blank"gt;www.Mahanes-art.comlt;/agt; to see his Amish images.

All art is storytelling in one form or another. Artists create stories they want people to believe...at least for a while. Some art is forgettable, but some of it – the powerful stuff – stays with us for hours after we leave the theater or the gallery or after we turn off the television...and some of it we just can't shake. It takes on a life of its own, becoming more real than it has any right to be. Are our religious stories like this? Are they art run amok? How long should disbelief really be suspended? lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Gwydion Suilebhan is a playwright who self-identifies as a secular humanist and who lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife, Maura. His play "The Reals" is being performed by St. Louis's Hot City Theatre company for the 5th Annual GreenHouse New Play Festival. Gwydion earned his M.A. in poetry from Johns Hopkins University, and his poetry and articles have appeared in many publications. He has also taught playwriting, creative writing, and literature at Johns Hopkins and the Maryland Institute College of Art. He has received two Individual Artist Fellowships from the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities and has been accepted into the Mead Theatre Lab program three times. In 2009 he was a finalist for Outstanding Emerging Artist at the D.C. Mayor's Arts Awards.

Video games are a large part of our culture, yet many of us know little about this world. This platform address will introduce the multifaceted nature and fading boundaries of video entertainment, assessing the current direction of this form of media and exploring some of its inherent ethical implications.lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Joseph Koepke has been an early childhood and elementary educator for the past decade, and he has been a video game player his entire life. His work both in and out of the classroom building communities has provided.

Gardens enrich body, mind, and soul and enliven the human experience. A garden is the place where we can be fully present and engaged through all the senses. lt;brgt;lt;brgt; Linda Wiggen Kraft has been a garden designer since 1993. Her background in art, business, and meditation give her a unique approach to gardening that she will share in her presentation. She gives lectures and workshops throughout the U.S. She has written gardening columns for "The Healthy Planet" since 1998, in which she writes about the big picture of why we garden. Her work can be seen on her website: lt;a href="http://www.gardensforthesoul.com" target="_blank"gt;GardensForTheSoul.comlt;/agt;.