Bioethics

Is it morally wrong to take a life? Not really, say bioethicists

Michael Cook | 27 January 2012

Is it morally wrong to kill people? Not really, argue two eminent American bioethicists in an early online article in the Journal of Medical Ethics. Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, of Duke University, and Franklin G. Miller, of the National Institutes of Health believe that “killing by itself is not morally wrong, although it is still morally wrong to cause total disability”.

Is pregnancy unethical? Yes, says UK bioethicist

Michael Cook | 20 January 2012

Here is contrarian bioethics at its best. Pregnancy and childbirth are so painful, risky and socially restrictive for women that public funding should urgently be directed to the development of artificial wombs. This is the only way to achieve true equality between men and women for then neither women nor men would then be limited by having children and the burdens of reproducing the species would be shared equally.

Looking for films about bioethics?

Michael Cook | 17 December 2011

Hey, this is pretty cool: an annotated list of dramas and documentaries about bioethical topics at the Scottish Council on Human Bioethics (SCHB). It was launched this week.

Has the time come for “queer bioethics”?

Michael Cook | 16 December 2011

As same-sex marriage gains traction in the legal sphere, what about in bioethics? Two bioethicists at the University of Pennsylvania have issued a stirring call for a “queer bioethics” in the leading journal Bioethics.

Sex selection: not as awful as you thought

Michael Cook | 16 December 2011

Bioethicist Timothy F. Murphy, at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Chicago, argues in the journal Bioethics, that “the natural sex ratio cannot be a sound moral basis for prohibiting parents from selecting the sex of their children”. What he objects to is the notion that there exists a natural state of affairs which should not be changed.

Does the slippery slope to euthanasia make sense?

Michael Cook | 02 December 2011

Two words guaranteed to spark derision on a blog are Slippery and Slope. They are dismissed with either a smirk as a hoary old chesnut, scaremongering or religious sophistry. However, the slippery slope, the notion that small steps today will inevitably lead to bad policies later on, still has a lot of life in it – at least judging from the number of articles in learned journals which keep refuting it.

Daughter will receive transplant of her mother’s womb

Jared Yee | 26 October 2011

Melinda Arnold, after many years of wanting to be a mother, is set to receive a transplant of her mother’s womb.

Are we morally obliged to participate in research?

Michael Cook | 22 October 2011

Bioethics debates are often robust, but it’s not every day that they make a reader sick. This was the reaction of Professor Bill Gleason, of the University of Minnesota Medical School, a columnist for the Chronicle of Higher Education. He had just attended a seminar at his university, “Do people have a moral obligation to participate in research?”. The contrarian views of Rosamund Rhodes, of Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, in New York, were so unsettling that he needed three beers to come back to earth.

Nominations for a bioethics hall of fame

Michael Cook | 15 October 2011

As part of a promotional interview in The Atlantic, Dr Jonathan Moreno was asked to nominate organisations and individuals for a “bioethics hall of fame”. His selection gives outsiders an insight into main currents in American bioethics thinking

Nevada doctor charged in alleged stem cell case

Jared Yee | 15 October 2011

A Nevada paediatrician has been charged with conspiring to implant chronically ill patients with stem cells collected from human placentas.

Bioethics commission rules Guatemalan STD research unethical

Jared Yee | 31 August 2011

US researchers violated ethical boundaries when they deliberately infected Guatemalan prisoners, mental health patients and prostitutes with sexually transmitted diseases in a 1940s research project, a presidential commission concluded on Tuesday.

Removing the ethics from bioethics

Michael Cook | 27 August 2011

The New York Times philosophy blog likes edgy topics like does truth matter, isn’t it all relative, and can we have morals without God? The latest edgy assertion comes from bioethicist Joel Marks, a scholar at the Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics at Yale University, who has recently swung around to the view that there is no difference between right and wrong.

NY Times columnist attacks “liberal bioethics”

Michael Cook | 20 August 2011

Progressive bioethics came under attack this week in the New York Times. Columnist Ross Douthat complained that the growing acceptance of “foetal reduction”, or the abortion of one or more foetuses in a multiple birth, illustrated the failure of “liberal” thinkers to say No to anything. The column has been whizzing around the blogosphere, creating much comment.

Can you morally enhance a hoodie?

Michael Cook | 14 August 2011

A Google search for “London+riots+bioethics” yielded nothing of any value. But future discussions about how to respond to mass hooliganism may well require bioethicists. At least that is what a debate between two leading utilitarian bioethicists in the journal Bioethics suggests.

Call for renewal of bioethics in military

Jared Yee | 22 July 2011

Bioethicist Steven Miles, of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, has called for a renewal of military medical ethics in the US.

Does neuroethics have a future?

Michael Cook | 15 July 2011

What is the half-life of ethical specialties? Following recent speculation about the future of bioethics, it seems to be getting shorter.

Does bioethics have a future?

Michael Cook | 09 July 2011

Despite pugnacious assertions of right and wrong, permissible and impermissible, the future of bioethics (and perhaps bioethicists, as well) is often clouded by self-doubt. Few have expressed this better than the editor of the Journal of Medicine & Philosophy, bioethicist H. Tristam Engelhardt Jr, of Rice University in Texas. In a brilliant overview of the state of his discipline, he concludes that there are no definitive answers.

Bioethics for your smart phone

Michael Cook | 04 June 2011

If you are a fan of Philosophy Bites, the addictive podcast site featuring intelligent 15-minute interviews with professional philosophers about their work, you should like Bio-Ethics Bites. This features leading bioethicists speaking with Nigel Warburton & David Edmonds team.

Committee investigates ethical violations in HPV vaccine trials

Jared Yee | 04 June 2011

An expert committee set up to investigate the conduct of trials of human papillomavirus (HPV) in India has reported far-reaching ethical violations.

South Florida ob-gyns reject overweight women

Jared Yee | 27 May 2011

Several ob-gyn doctors in South Florida have rejected patients because they are obese, sparking criticism from ethicists.