According to the normativists, dispositionalist theories of meaning fail because meaning is normative, not descriptive. One way to understand this notion of normativity is in terms of semantic correctness conditions. Anti-normativists typically accept that meaning implies semantic correctness but deny that this in turn implies that meaning is normative. Jeffrey Kaplan has recently argued that while semantic correctness may not imply full-blown normativity, semantic correctness is not descriptive either. I contend that Kaplan's argument has two main problems. First, his focus (...) on dispositionalism leaves it open for other descriptive facts to provide the basis of semantic correctness conditions. Second, he fails to show that the problems of dispositionalism are connected to semantic correctness in a way that demonstrates problems with descriptive theories of meaning. (shrink)

We have a reason to use information which is available about such genes in our reproductive decision-making; (3) couples should selec.

In this article I discuss the problem of embodied subjectivity, viewed from the perspective of spatiality. The questions I address arise from my ethnographic study on chronic pain. My main argument is that, in contrast to philosophical understanding of space as an a priori, or as a container, space and spatiality are shaped and reshaped through the body in pain. What characterizes most patients' experiences of space is movement. This can be understood through Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological theory of the lived body (...) but needs in addition a cultural contextualization. Because of biomedical thinking, in Western settings chronic pain is liminal. It does not fit the biomedical categories of disease or space. This profoundly shapes patients' understanding of their subjectivity as homeless, and their experience of spatiality as estranged and exiled. (shrink)

There are no egalitarians in a pandemic. The scale of the challenge for health systems and public policy means that there is an ineluctable need to prioritize the needs of the many. It is impossible to treat all citizens equally, and a failure to carefully consider the consequences of actions could lead to massive preventable loss of life. In a pandemic there is a strong ethical need to consider how to do most good overall. Utilitarianism is an influential moral theory (...) that states that the right action is the action that is expected to produce the greatest good. It offers clear operationalizable principles. In this paper we provide a summary of how utilitarianism could inform two challenging questions that have been important in the early phase of the pandemic: (a) Triage: which patients should receive access to a ventilator if there is overwhelming demand outstripping supply? (b) Lockdown: how should countries decide when to implement stringent social restrictions, balancing preventing deaths from COVID‐19 with causing deaths and reductions in well‐being from other causes? Our aim is not to argue that utilitarianism is the only relevant ethical theory, or in favour of a purely utilitarian approach. However, clearly considering which options will do the most good overall will help societies identify and consider the necessary cost of other values. Societies may choose either to embrace or not to embrace the utilitarian course, but with a clear understanding of the values involved and the price they are willing to pay. (shrink)

According to what we call the Principle of Procreative Beneficence, couples who decide to have a child have a significant moral reason to select the child who, given his or her genetic endowment, can be expected to enjoy the most well-being. In the first part of this paper, we introduce PB, explain its content, grounds, and implications, and defend it against various objections. In the second part, we argue that PB is superior to competing principles of procreative selection such as (...) that of procreative autonomy. In the third part of the paper, we consider the relation between PB and disability. We develop a revisionary account of disability, in which disability is a species of instrumental badness that is context- and person-relative. Although PB instructs us to aim to reduce disability in future children whenever possible, it does not privilege the normal. What matters is not whether future children meet certain biological or statistical norms, but what level of well-being they can be expected to have. (shrink)

Brain organoid research raises ethical challenges not seen in other forms of stem cell research. Given that brain organoids partially recapitulate the development of the human brain, it is plausible that brain organoids could one day attain consciousness and perhaps even higher cognitive abilities. Brain organoid research therefore raises difficult questions about these organoids' moral status – questions that currently fall outside the scope of existing regulations and guidelines. This paper shows how these gaps can be addressed. We outline a (...) moral framework for brain organoid research that can address the relevant ethical concerns without unduly impeding this important area of research. (shrink)

In order to prevent the rapid spread of COVID-19, governments have placed significant restrictions on liberty, including preventing all non-essential travel. These restrictions were justified on the basis the health system may be overwhelmed by COVID-19 cases and in order to prevent deaths. Governments are now considering how they may de-escalate these restrictions. This article argues that an appropriate approach may be to lift the general lockdown but implement selective isolation of the elderly. While this discriminates against the elderly, there (...) is a morally relevant difference—the elderly are far more likely to require hospitalisation and die than the rest of the population. If the aim is to ensure the health system is not overwhelmed and to reduce the death rate, preventing the elderly from contracting the virus may be an effective means of achieving this. The alternative is to continue to keep everyone in lockdown. It is argued that this is levelling down equality and is unethical. It suggests that in order for the elderly to avoid contracting the virus, the whole population should have their liberty deprived, even though the same result could be achieved by only restricting the liberty of the elderly. Similar arguments may also be applied to all groups at increased risk of COVID-19, such as men and those with comorbidities, the obese and people from ethnic minorities or socially deprived groups. This utilitarian concern must be balanced against other considerations, such as equality and justice, and the benefits gained from discriminating in these ways must be proportionately greater than the negative consequences of doing so. Such selective discrimination will be most justified when the liberty restriction to a group promotes the well-being of that group (apart from its wider social benefits). (shrink)

If a doctor is trying to decide whether or not to provide a medical treatment, does it matter ethically whether that treatment has already been started? Health professionals sometimes find it harder to stop a treatment (withdraw) than to refrain from starting the treatment (withhold). But does that feeling correspond to an ethical difference? In this article, we defend equivalence—the view that withholding and withdrawal of treatment are ethically equivalent when all other factors are equal. We argue that preference for (...) withholding over withdrawal could represent a form of cognitive bias—withdrawal aversion. Nevertheless, we consider whether there could be circumstances in which there is a moral difference. We identify four examples of conditional nonequivalence. Finally, we reflect on the moral significance of diverging intuitions and the implications for policy. We propose a set of practical strategies for helping to reduce bias in end-of-life decision making, including the equivalence test. (shrink)

The phenomenon of ‘structural irrationality’ covers a diverse range of combinations of attitudes, including (inter alia) contradictory beliefs, contradictory intentions, means–end incoherence, akratic incoherence, and cyclical preferences. This paper offers a novel, unified account of when a pattern of attitudes qualifies as structurally irrational. It begins by setting up the core of the view I will be defending: a set of attitudes is irrational if and only if it is impossible for those attitudes to be jointly successful. I show that (...) this view can account for a wide range of paradigmatically irrational combinations of attitudes. I then refine the account to make it sufficiently subjective. I argue that a set of attitudes is irrational only if the impossibility of their joint success is (i) logically transparent, (ii) subjectively inferable, and (iii) not justifiably denied. (shrink)

It may soon be possible to generate human organs inside of human-pig chimeras via a process called interspecies blastocyst complementation. This paper discusses what arguably the central ethical concern is raised by this potential source of transplantable organs: that farming human-pig chimeras for their organs risks perpetrating a serious moral wrong because the moral status of human-pig chimeras is uncertain, and potentially significant. Those who raise this concern usually take it to be unique to the creation of chimeric animals with (...) ‘humanised’ brains. In this paper, we show how that the same style of argument can be used to critique current uses of non-chimeric pigs in agriculture. This reveals an important tension between two common moral views: that farming human-pig chimeras for their organs is ethically concerning, and that farming non-chimeric pigs for food or research is ethically benign. At least one of these views stands in need of revision. (shrink)

There is growing concern that a global economic system fueled predominately by financial incentives may not maximize human flourishing and social welfare externalities. If so, this presents a challenge of how to get economic actors to adopt a more virtuous motivational mindset. Relying on historical, psychological, and philosophical research, we show how such a mindset can be instilled. First, we demonstrate that historically, financial self-interest has never in fact been the only guiding motive behind free markets, but that markets themselves (...) are representations of our individual and collective moral identities. Building on this understanding, we review the research on how economic incentives crowd out virtue-oriented concerns. We then introduce the concept of moral self-awareness (MSA), an evolving mindset informed by reflection on moral identity, namely what one’s actions say about oneself given the impacts on others or society that one’s action may effect. MSA comprises three fundamental aspects of virtue-oriented reasoning: pride, shame, and guilt. Finally, we offer a four-stage model anchored in systems theory, yielding ever more refined motivating strategies for maximizing human flourishing and social welfare externalities. (shrink)

There are ethical obligations to conduct research that contributes to generalisable knowledge and improves reproductive health, and this should include embryo research in jurisdictions where it is permitted. Often, the controversial nature of embryo research can alarm ethics committee members, which can unnecessarily delay important research that can potentially improve fertility for patients and society. Such delay is ethically unjustified. Moreover, countries such as the UK, Australia and Singapore have legislation which unnecessarily captures low-risk research, such as observational research, in (...) an often cumbersome and protracted review process. Such countries should revise such legislation to better facilitate low-risk embryo research.We introduce a philosophical distinction to help decision-makers more efficiently identify higher risk embryo research from that which presents no more risks to persons than other types of tissue research. That distinction is between future person embryo research and non-future person embryo research. We apply this distinction to four examples of embryo research that might be presented to ethics committees.Embryo research is most controversial and deserving of detailed scrutiny when it potentially affects a future person. Where it does not, it should generally require less ethical scrutiny. We explore a variety of ways in which research can affect a future person, including by deriving information about that person, and manipulating eggs or sperm before an embryo is created. (shrink)

The International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) has recently released the 2021 update of its guidelines. The update includes detailed new recommendations on human–animal chimera research. This paper argues that the ISSCR recommendations fail to address the core ethical concerns raised by neurological chimeras—namely, concerns about moral status. In minimising moral status concerns, the ISSCR both breaks rank with other major reports on human–animal chimera research and rely on controversial claims about the grounds of moral status that many people (...) will rightly reject. A more robust framework for regulating human–animal chimera research still needs to be developed. (shrink)

ABSTRACT It is accepted that treatment of previously competent, now incompetent patients can be limited if that is what the patient would desire, if she were now competent. Expressed past preferences or an advance directive are often taken to constitute sufficient evidence of what a patient would now desire. I distinguish between desires and rational desires. I argue that for a desire to be an expression of a person's autonomy, it must be or satisfy that person's rational desires. A person (...) rationally desires a course of action if that person desires it while being in possession of all available relevant facts, without committing relevant error of logic, and “vividly imagining” what its consequences would be like for her. I argue that some competent, expressed desires obstruct autonomy. I show that several psychological mechanisms operate to prevent a person rationally evaluating what future life in a disabled state would be like. Rational evaluation is difficult. However, treatment limitation, if it is to respect autonomy, must be in accord with a patient's rational desires, and not merely her expressed desires. I illustrate the implications of these arguments for the use of advance directives and for the treatment of competent patients. (shrink)

In this review article we describe the current scope, methods, and contents of medical ethics education in medical schools in Western English speaking countries (mainly the United Kingdom, the United States, and Australia). We assess the strengths and weaknesses of current medical ethics curricula, and students’ levels of satisfaction with different teaching approaches and their reported difficulties in learning medical ethics concepts and applying them in clinical practice. We identify three main challenges for medical ethics education: counteracting the bad effects (...) of the “hidden curriculum,” teaching students how to apply ethical knowledge and critical thinking to real cases in clinical practice, and shaping future doctors’ right character through ethics education. We suggest ways in which these challenges could be addressed. On the basis of this analysis, we propose practical guidelines for designing, implementing, teaching, and assessing a medical ethics program within a four-year medical course. (shrink)

Economic environmental valuation remains a much debated and contested issue. Concerns have been voiced that it is unable to capture the manifold immaterial values of ecosystems due to conceptual and methodological issues. Thus, additional value categories (social values) as well as novel valuation approaches like deliberative (monetary) valuation are areas of growing interest, yet the theoretical foundations are rather weak. Against this background, this article aims to develop a consistent conceptual framework for making sense of social values in economic environmental (...) valuation. Based on a holistic view of society and individuals, the role of institutions, the social environment, culture and transcendental values is emphasised. To synthesise diverging concepts of value into an economic concept and to account for the multidimensionality of social values, the framework consists of three spheres: social, natural and contextual. The novel framework demonstrates that social values may be integrated into a preference-based utility framework when denoting a holistic understanding of social preferences and human embeddedness in nature and society. (shrink)

Jeffrey Friedman’s Power Without Knowledge argues forcefully that there are inherent limitations to the predictability of human action, due to a circumstance he calls “ideational heterogeneity.” However, our resources for predicting human action somewhat reliably in the light of ideational heterogeneity have not been exhausted yet, and there are no in-principle barriers to progress in tackling the problem. There are, however, other strong reasons to think that disagreement among epistocrats is bound to persist, such that it will be difficult to (...) decide who has “the right answer” to a given technocratic problem. These reasons have to do with competing visions of the good society, fact/value entanglement, and the fragility of the facts of the social sciences. (shrink)

Some of my colleagues will sadly not be attending the IAB World Congress in Qatar. Amongst other things, they wish to take a stand against Qatar’s human rights record and the treatment of women and...

Our emotional lives are full of temporal asymmetries. Salient among these is that we tend to feel differently about painful or unpleasant events depending on their temporal location: we feel anxiety or trepidation about painful events we anticipate in the future, and relief when they are over. One question, then, is whether temporally asymmetric emotions such as relief have any ramifications for the metaphysics of time. On what has become the standard way of finessing this question, the asymmetry of relief (...) is an instance of the phenomenon of future-bias, a tendency to prefer painful events to be located in the past than in the future. The main question then posed is whether this pattern of preferences can be justified in the light of different metaphysical theories of time. In this paper I argue that this whole dialectic is misconceived. While many people may have future-biased preferences and these are a legitimate object of psychological study, this should be distinguished from the more basic phenomenon of relief that an unpleasant experience is over. Acknowledging the distinctness of these phenomena has two main consequences. First, if relief is not a manifestation of a time-biased preference, it is unclear what it would be for it to be justified or unjustified. This, in turn, should lead us to reassess how the psychology of relief bears on our metaphysical commitments. As I shall suggest, the real significance of the temporally asymmetric emotions for the metaphysics of time is that they manifest, and so reflection on them serves to draw our attention to, a structural feature of our awareness of the passage of time that resists re-articulation in other terms. (shrink)

Dementia affects millions of people throughout the world. Thinking through Dementia offers a critique of the main models used to understand dementia-the biomedical, neuropsychological, and social constructionist. It discusses clinical issues and cases, together with philosophical work that might help us to better understand and treat this illness.

This paper discusses whether rationality, morality or prudence impose process-requirements upon us. It has been argued that process-requirements fulfil two essential functions within a system of rational, moral or prudential requirements. These functions are considered to prove the existence of process-requirements. First, process-requirements are deemed necessary to ensure that rationality, morality or prudence can guide our deliberations and actions. Second, their existence is regarded as essential for the correctness of our ordinary explanations of why a person possesses a certain degree (...) of morality, rationality or prudence. However, I argue that these two functions are unable to show the existence of process-requirements. Instead, I propose a different essential function for process-requirements: they are necessary for attributing the correct degree of rationality, morality or prudence to a subject who is not entirely rational, moral or prudent. This function, I argue, necessitates the existence of process-requirements. (shrink)

Should people be assisted to die or be given euthanasia when they are suffering from terminal medical conditions? Should they be assisted to die when they are suffering but do not have a ‘diagnosable medical illness?’ What about assisted dying for psychiatric conditions? And is there a difference morally between assisted suicide, voluntary active euthanasia and voluntary passive euthanasia?These are deep questions directly addressed or in the background of the productive discussion between Varelius and Young.1 ,2 Their focus is whether (...) doctors should assist people to die who are ‘tired of life’ and experiencing ‘existential suffering’. An example was Edward Brongersma, an 86-year-old man, who was tired of life but with no serious medical condition, who was assisted by Dr Philip Sutorius to commit suicide in 1998. In the Netherlands, where euthanasia is legal, the Dutch Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that this was wrong because "edical expertise, by its nature, does not extend to questions and complaints that do not have a sick- ness or ailment—mental or physical—as their source.3"Sutorius was convicted, but not punished.Robert Young, considering this case, concurs, concluding, "a physician may justifiably consider that an individual who is ‘tired of life’ should consult a non-medical, professional counsellor, and if that produces no change in outlook, choose suicide. Outside Switzerland, an individual who makes that choice has to then be determined enough to do so unassisted .2"I will argue that there is, within current medical ethics and human rights, a method of assisted suicide which could fall within the limits of the law. But first I will review some recent cases involving requests for dying. I will then discuss an alternative which some may argue addresses these cases, and those of …. (shrink)

Can we employ the property of rationality in establishing what rationality requires? According to a central and formal thesis of John Broome’s work on rational requirements, the answer is ‘no’ – at least if we expect a precise answer. In particular, Broome argues that (i) the property of full rationality (i.e. whether or not you are fully rational) is independent of whether we formulate conditional requirements of rationality as having a wide or a narrow logical scope. That is, (ii) by (...) replacing a wide-scope requirement with a corresponding narrow-scope requirement (or vice versa), we do not alter the situations in which a person is fully rational. As a consequence, (iii) the property of full rationality is unable to guide us in determining whether a rational requirement has a wide or a narrow logical scope. We cannot resolve the wide/narrow scope debate by appealing to a theory of fully rational attitudes. This paper argues that (i), (ii) and (iii) are incorrect. Replacing a wide- with a corresponding narrow-scope requirement (or vice versa) can alter the set of circumstances in which a person is fully rational. The property of full rationality is therefore not independent of whether we formulate conditional requirements of rationality as having a wide or a narrow logical scope. As a consequence, the property of full rationality can guide us in determining what rationality requires – even in cases where we expect a precise answer. (shrink)

A pro-life view can be called harm-theoretic if it claims abortion is impermissible because of the harm caused to the fetus. These positions are important in the abortion discussion because they allow pro-lifers to argue abortion is impermissible without claiming the fetus is a moral person. A major problem with harm-theoretic abortion views is that they fall victim to the contraception reductio. The contraception reductio was originally posed toward the Future like Ours argument for the impermissibility of abortion, but I (...) show it is a problem for harm-theoretic positions in general. I argue that the currently proposed solutions aimed at solving the contraception reductio are unsatisfactory because they commit you to unnecessary controversial metaphysical positions, such as animalism and denying mereological universalism. Then, I give a new solution to the contraception reductio that avoids those metaphysical commitments. The main conclusion is that harm-theoretic views can avoid the contraception reductio by accepting a biological account of the harm of death. (shrink)

Mary Shelley’sFrankensteinhas captured the public imagination ever since it was first published over 200 years ago. While the narrative reflected 19th-century anxieties about the emerging scientific revolution, it also suggested some clear moral lessons that remain relevant today. In a sense,Frankensteinwas a work of bioethics written a century and a half before the discipline came to exist. This paper revisits the lessons ofFrankensteinregarding the creation and manipulation of life in the light of recent developments in stem cell and neurobiological research. (...) It argues that these lessons are becoming more relevant than ever. (shrink)

This essay criticizes the current approach to epistemic democracy. Epistemic democrats are preoccupied with the question of how a society can best exploit a given stock of knowledge. This article argues that the problem-solving capability of a society depends on two factors rather than one. The quality of decision-making depends both on how a democracy is able to make use of its stock of knowledge and on the size of the knowledge stock. Society’s problem-solving capability over time is therefore a (...) function of its ability to develop its knowledge exploitation mechanisms and the growth rate of its knowledge stock. Based on this enhanced model of social problem-solving, this essay compares two different political ideal types: experimental democracy, as commonly defended by epistemic democrats; and polycentric democracy, a model defended most commonly by political economists. (shrink)

The St Bartholomew's Day Massacre of 1572 polarised French constitutional ideas. Appearing on one side was a radicalised version of the French constitution. On the other side was the theory of royal absolutism systematically developed by Bodin. The central thesis of this book is that Bodin's absolutism was as unprecedented as the doctrine it opposed. Prior to the 1570s the mainstream of the French tradition had been tentatively constitutionalist and Bodin himself had given strong expression to that tendency in his (...) Methodus of 1566. His earlier theory of sovereignty, elaborated in that work, was implicitly adapted to a notion of limited supremacy. Professor Franklin's aim is to explain how this absolutist view was formed. In doing so, he has clarified many of the notorious obscurities in Bodin's thought and since much of the absolutist doctrine of the seventeenth century was either based on Bodin's theory or relied on similar assumptions, this study will be of great importance and interest to scholars of a later period. (shrink)

We develop and test a model of pseudo-transformational leadership. Pseudo-transformational leadership is manifested by a particular combination of transformational leadership behaviors, and is differentiated from both transformational leadership and laissez-faire -leadership. Survey data from senior managers show differential outcomes of transformational, pseudo-transformational, and laissez-faire leadership. Possible extensions of the theoretical model and directions for future research are offered.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be (...) preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

In the wake of ChatGPT’s release, academics and journal editors have begun making important decisions about whether and how to integrate generative artificial intelligence (AI) into academic publishing. Some argue that AI outputs in scholarly works constitute plagiarism, and so should be disallowed by academic journals. Others suggest that it is acceptable to integrate AI output into academic papers, provided that its contributions are transparently disclosed. By drawing on Taylor’s work on academic norms, this paper argues against both views. Unlike (...) “traditional” forms of plagiarism, use of generative AI can be consistent with the norms that should underlie academic research. In these cases, its use should neither be prohibited nor required to be disclosed. However, some careless uses of generative AI do threaten to undermine the quality of academic research by mischaracterizing existing literature. This, not “AI plagiarism,” is the real concern raised by ChatGPT and related technologies. (shrink)

I argue that pregnant women have a duty to refrain from behaviours or to allow certain acts to be done to them for the sake of their foetus if the foetus has a reasonable chance of living and being in a harmed state if the woman does not refrain from those behaviours or allow those things to be done to her. There is a proviso: that her refraining from acting or allowing acts to be performed upon her does not significantly (...) harm her. This duty does not presuppose that the foetus is a person. It is grounded on principles of respect for the interests of sentient beings and prevention of harm to future individuals. I give an argument for a general duty of easy rescue. (shrink)

ABSTRACTTo whom is a duty owed? Contractualism answers with an interest theory of direction. As such, it faces three challenges. The Conceptual Challenge requires acknowledgment that a duty is conceptually distinct from an interest. The Extensional Challenge requires an account of cases in which one who is owed a duty does not take an interest in the duty, or does not take as much of an interest as someone who is not owed the duty. The Positivist Challenge requires explanation of (...) the great flexibility of law and other social practices in positing duties that do not reflect the landscape of moral interests. Contractualism can be shown to meet these challenges once we acknowledge the centrality of the idea of a generic interest. Focusing on generic interests also illuminates the distinctive form of respect involved in directedness. (shrink)