An educated guess about the future of academic bioethics can only be made on the basis of the historical conditions of its success. According to its official history, which attributes its success primarily to the service it has done for the patient, it should be safe at least as long as the patient still needs its service. Like many other academic disciplines, it might suffer under the present economic downturn. However, in the plausible assumption that its social (...) role has not been exhausted yet, it should recover as soon as the economy does. But if, as this paper tries to argue, the success of academic bioethics should be attributed first and foremost to the service it has done for the neoliberal agenda, then its future would have to depend on the fate of the latter. The exact implications of the downturn for the neoliberal agenda are obviously impossible to predict. Among the various options, however, the one of going back to 'normal' seems to be the least likely. The other options suggest that the future of academic bioethics, as we have known it, is bleak. (shrink)

The successes of the human genome project and genomics research programs portend great potential to improve upon health and enhance life. As scientific advancements continue, bioethicists and policy makers deliberate over the social and ethical implications of genetic and genomic technologies and information (ggT/I). The application of ggT/I to human reproduction raises conceptual and moral questions about being human and the links between offspring, parents, and society. Given ggT/I’s ability to significantly affect the biological constitution of humans and future human (...) generations thinking through such issues is fundamental to ethical and policy analysis. By means of a systematic literature review and accompanying content analysis, this paper highlights the dominant ethical concerns raised within recent bioethics discourse over the use of ggT/I for human reproduction. Based on these findings it aso offers a framework through which, and demarcates where, religious perspectives can add value to genethics debates and policy deliberation. (shrink)

This article sketches a taxonomy of the activities in which bioethics academics engage, including activities that may make their own research more impactful, from little or no engagement outside academia to activism or extreme activism. This taxonomy, the first of its kind, may be useful in determining what obligations bioethics academics have in relation to activism and activities that fall short of activism.

BackgroundInstitutions of higher learning are persistently struggling with issues of academic dishonesty such as plagiarism, despite the availability of university policies and guidelines for upholding academic integrity.MethodologyThis was a descriptive qualitative study conducted on 37 students of a Healthcare Ethics course at an Australian tertiary institution from February 2016 to October 2018. The purpose of the study was to explore the reasons for plagiarism detected the TurnitinR plagiarism checking software and extensive review of manuscripts. The interviews were conducted (...) in private rooms and in strict confidence. Thematic analysis was manually done.ResultsFour major themes namely, lack of interest; pressure of time with competing priorities; lack of understanding of the policy on academic honesty, and “the determined students” were identified. Sub themes under lack of interest were lack of preparation and effort, low self-efficacy, poor studying techniques, and convenience of internet sources. Under pressure of time, the subthemes were, misplaced priorities, procrastination, high workloads, poor planning, competing interests, and the perception of availability of time at the start of the semester. Regarding lack of understanding of the policy on academic honesty, the subthemes identified were, lake of awareness of plagiarism, lack of awareness of acceptable similarity, conflicting messages from tutors and confusion with high school learning. The determined students were those that either made all effort to reduce plagiarism but still remained high, used the another language at home other than English, had poor paraphrasing techniques or lacked resources for English language editing.ConclusionThere are varied and diverse reasons for plagiarism. There is a need to systematically reinforce and educate students on issues pertaining to academic dishonesty and their associated implications. (shrink)

The author argues that bioethics ought properly to be regarded "both" as a consulting profession that counsels health practitioners in dealing with the individual problems they face "and" as an academic discipline that defines problem areas on its own and includes attention to the institutional and social aspects of health care. The argument is conducted by means of a brief history of bioethics and comparison of its development with that of history of medicine and sociology of medicine. (...) Several examples of the social issues in bioethics are examined. (shrink)

This article analyses, from a bioethics journal editor's perspective, the threats to academic freedom and freedom of expression that academic bioethicists and academic bioethics journals are subjected to by political activists applying pressure from outside of the academy. I defend bioethicists’ academic freedom to reach and defend conclusions many find offensive and ‘wrong’. However, I also support the view that academics arguing controversial matters such as, for instance, the moral legitimacy of infanticide should take (...) clear responsibility for the views they defend and should not try to hide behind analytical philosophers’ rationales such as wanting to test an argument for the sake of testing an argument. This article proposes that bioethics journals establish higher-quality requirements and more stringent mechanisms of peer review than usual for iconoclastic articles. (shrink)

This article by one of the Editors of Bioethics, published in the 25th anniversary issue of the journal, describes some of the revolutionary changes academic publishing has undergone during the last decades. Many humanities journals went from typically small print-runs, counting by the hundreds, to on-line availability in thousands of university libraries worldwide. Article up-take by our subscribers can be measured efficiently. The implications of this and other changes to academic publishing are discussed. Important ethical challenges need (...) to be addressed in areas such as the enforcement of plagiarism-related policies, the so-called ‘impact factor’ and its impact on academic integrity, and the question of whether on-line only publishing can currently guarantee the integrity of academic publishing histories. (shrink)

We sometimes forget that medical ethics has a history, and that many of the issues we discuss today have already been discussed many times previously. As the field grows older, and the pioneers retire, we are, however, given some opportunity to recognise that there is in fact such a history, and that we could learn much from paying attention to it. A number of histories of bioethics have been published, and collections centred around the work of major figures are (...) also starting to appear.Journal of Medical Ethics 2001;27:206–214 The present volume is a collection of papers centred around a critical discussion …. (shrink)

Translational ethics (TE) has been developed into a specific approach, which revolves around the argument that strategies for bridging the theory‐practice gap in bioethics must themselves be justified on ethical terms. This version of TE incorporates normative, empirical and foundational ethics research and continues to develop through application and in the face of new ethical challenges. Here, I explore the idea that the academic field of bioethics has not yet sufficiently analysed its own philosophical foundation for how (...) it can, and should, be practically relevant; neither has it comprehensively discussed the limitations on what impacts bioethicists should pursue. As a result, there has not been adequate training on how to suitably and appropriately impact real‐world practices. Moreover, bioethical perspectives are often competing with other strong interests, for example, economic and political, which may weaken their impact on policy‐making. The TE approach I propose can not only facilitate practical impacts of academic bioethics by being better informed by real‐world ethical issues but it also supports targeted and ethical justifications of the actual impact of academic work in real‐world contexts. In this paper, I clarify the premises for this TE approach, identify further challenges and sketch out potential solutions for the implementation of this methodological framework. (shrink)

Bioethics is a practically oriented discipline that developed to address pressing ethical issues arising from developments in the life sciences. Given this inherent practical bent, some form of advocacy or activism seems inherent to the nature of bioethics. However, there are potential tensions between being a bioethics activist, and academic ideals. In academic bioethics, scholarship involves reflection, rigour and the embrace of complexity and uncertainty. These values of scholarship seem to be in tension with (...) being an activist, which requires pragmatism, simplicity, certainty and, above all, action. In this paper I explore this apparent dichotomy, using the case example of my own involvement in international efforts to end forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China. I conclude that these tensions can be managed and that academic bioethics requires a willingness to be activist. (shrink)

If funding allocation is an indicator of a field’s priorities, then the priorities of the field of bioethics are misaligned because they perpetuate injustice. Social justice mandates priority for the factors that drive systematic disadvantage, which tend not to be the areas supported by funding within academic bioethics. Current funding priorities violate social justice by overemphasizing technologies that aim to enhance the human condition without addressing underlying structural inequalities grounded in racism, and by deemphasizing areas of inquiry (...) most frequently pursued by Scholars of Color. This lack of attention to upstream determinants of health in bioethics research perpetuates a gap in the resources needed to understand the experiences of communities disproportionately experiencing poor health, which is itself a form of epistemic injustice. Both social and epistemic injustices are apparent in the impact of these funding priorities on people of color, both in the public and in the bioethics community. (shrink)

Bioethics can be considered as a topic, an academic discipline, a field of study, an enterprise in persuasion. The historical specificity of the forms bioethics takes is significant, and raises questions about some of these approaches. Bioethics can also be considered as a governance practice, with distinctive institutions and structures. The forms this practice takes are also to a degree country specific, as the paper illustrates by drawing on the author’s UK experience. However, the UNESCO Universal (...) Declaration on Bioethics can provide a starting point for comparisons provided that this does not exclude sensitivity to the socio-political context. Bioethics governance practices are explained by various legitimating narratives. These include response to scandal, the need to restrain irresponsible science, the accommodation of pluralist views, and the resistance to the relativist idea that all opinions count equally in bioethics. Each approach raises interesting questions and shows that bioethics should be studied as a governance practice as a complement to other approaches. (shrink)

Islamic Bioethics presents a wide variety of perspectives and debates on how Islamic societies deal with the ethical dilemmas raised by biomedicine and new technologies. The book is a "constructive dialogue" between contributors selected from a multidisciplinary group of Muslim and non-Muslim scholars from different Islamic countries. The 11 chapters illuminate the diversity and complexity of the issues discussed in Islamic bioethics and pave the way to a better understanding of Islamic bioethics and dialogue in the global (...) bioethics community. The chapters take both theoretical and practical approaches to the topic, and each covers an emerging issue in Islamic bioethics. This book will be useful for academics and professional institutions in both Islamic and non-Islamic countries, and will be instrumental in providing researchers, scholars, students, policymakers and medical professionals with access to the latest issues and debates related to Islamic bioethics. Contributors include: Tariq Ramadan, Abdallah Daar, Ali Albar, Mohsin Ebrahim, Baharouddin Azizan Alastair Campbel, Bagher Larijani, Carol Taylor, Gamal Serour, James Rusthoven, Ilhan Ilkilic, Ingrid Mattson, Hassan Chamsi-Pasha, Jonathan Crane, Hakan Ertin, Mehunisha Suleman. (shrink)

The question that this paper tries to answer is Q: “Can good academic bioethics be done without commitment to moral theory?” It is argued that the answer to Q is an unequivocal “Yes” for most of what we could call “critical bioethics,” that is, the kind of bioethics work that primarily criticizes positions or arguments already in the literature or put forward by policymakers. The answer is also “Yes” for much of empirical bioethics. The second (...) part of the paper then provides an analysis of Q in relation to “constructive bioethics,” that is, bioethics work aimed at providing an argument for a particular position. In this part, it is argued that a number of the approaches or methods used that initially look like they involve no commitment to moral theory, nevertheless, involve such a commitment. This is shown to be the case for reflective equilibrium, mid-level theory, the use of theory fragments, and argument by analogy. (shrink)

By considering the history of bioethics and international humanitarian law, Joseph J. Fins contends that bioethics as an academic and moral community should stand in solidarity with Ukraine as it defends freedom and civility.

Many bioethics questions are resistant to journalistic exploration on account of their inherently philosophical dimensions. Such dimensions are ill-suited to what we may term the internal goods (in MacIntyre's sense) of the newspapers and mass media generally, which constrain newspaper coverage to an abbreviated form of narrative that, whilst not in itself objectionable, is nonetheless inimical to the conduct of philosophical reflection. The internal goods of academic bioethics, by contrast, include attention to philosophical questions inherent in bioethical (...) issues and value-enquiry. The danger for bioethics is that its agenda for reflective enquiry will, if dictated by this abbreviated narrative, be distorted in terms of both range and priorities, to the inevitable neglect of questions having a philosophical dimension to them. This danger can be avoided by a constructive partnership between the media and academic bioethics. The success of this partnership relies on four suggested provisos, for the meeting of which both journalists and academics bear responsibility. (shrink)

Though the papers in this volume for the most part address the question, “What is Christian about Christian Bioethics”, this paper addresses instead a closely related question, “How would a Christian approach to bioethics differ from the kind of secular academic bioethics that has emerged as such an important field in the contemporary university?” While it is generally assumed that a secular bioethics rooted in moral philosophy will be more culturally authoritative than an approach to (...) bioethics grounded in the contingent particularities of a religious tradition, I will give reasons for rejecting this assumption. By examining the history of the recent revival of academic bioethics as well as the state of the contemporary moral philosophy on which it is based I will suggest that secular bioethics suffers from many of the same liabilities as a carefully articulated Christian bioethics. At the end of the paper I will turn briefly to examine the question of how, in light of this discussion, a Christian bioethics might best be pursued. (shrink)

Bioethics is best viewed as both a second-order discipline and also part of public discourse. Since their goals differ, some bioethical activities are more usefully viewed as advancing public discourse than academic disciplines. For example, the “Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights” sponsored by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization seeks to promote ethical guidance on bioethical issues. From the vantage of philosophical ethics, it fails to rank or specify its stated principles, justify controversial (...) principles, clarify key terms, or say what is meant by calling potentially conflicting norms “foundational.” From the vantage of improving the public discourse about bioethical problems and seeking ethical solutions in the public arena, however, this document may have an important role. The goals and relations between bioethics as a second-order discipline and public discourse are explored. (shrink)

Academic freedom is an important good, but it comes with several responsibilities. In this commentary we seek to do two things. First, we argue against Francesca Minerva's view of academic freedom as presented in her article ‘New threats to academic freedom’ on a number of grounds. We reject the nature of the absolutist moral claim to free speech for academics implicit in the article; we reject the elitist role for academics as truth-seekers explicit in her view; and (...) we reject a possible more moderate re-construction of her view based on the harm/offence distinction. Second, we identify some of the responsibilities of applied ethicists, and illustrate how they recommend against allowing for anonymous publication of research. Such a proposal points to the wider perils of a public discourse which eschews the calm and careful discussion of ideas. (shrink)

Islamic bioethics is in good health, this article argues. During the twentieth century, academic researchers had to deal with a number of difficulties including the scarcity of available Islamic sources. However, the twenty-first century witnessed significant breakthroughs in the field of Islamic bioethics. A growing number of normative works authored by Muslim religious scholars and studies conducted by academic researchers have been published. This nascent field also proved to be appealing for research-funding institutions in the Muslim (...) world and also in the West, such as the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF) and the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). On the other hand, the article argues that contemporary Islamic bioethics is in need of addressing news issues and adopting new approaches for the sake of maintaining and improving this good health in the future. (shrink)

Ten qualitative research articles published from July 2013 through June 2014 on ethical topics in healthcare and health research are examined here. Full reference information is given for each article. A brief summary of the background, objectives, methods, results and conclusions is offered. These articles were chosen based on the quality of the work done and how well the work fits the interests of Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics readers.

Clinical ethics training programs are responsible for preparing their trainees to be competent ethics consultants worthy of the trust of patients, families, surrogates, and healthcare professionals. While the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities (ASBH) offers a certification examination for healthcare ethics consultants, no tools exist for the formal evaluation of ethics trainees to assess their progress toward competency. Medical specialties accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) use milestones to report trainees’ progress along a continuum (...) of professional development as a means of “operationalizing and implementing” medical competencies. Utilizing the Core Competencies for Healthcare Ethics Consultation and the ACGME and American Board of Pediatrics’ (ABP) Pediatric Milestones Project, we developed milestones for 17 subcompetencies in clinical ethics consultation and academic bioethics. As the field of clinical ethics becomes more standardized, such tools will be needed to promote the development of robust training programs and to certify that their graduates are competent practitioners. (shrink)

Historically, the preconditions for the emergence of bioethics in China. were political reforms and their applications. The Hanzhong Euthanasia Case and the publication of Qiu Ren-zong's academic work Bioethics played a significant role in the development of bioethics in China. Other contributory factors include the establishment of the Chinese Society of Medical Ethics/Chinese Medical Association (C.M.A), the publication of the Journal of Chinese Medical Ethics, and the teaching and education of bioethics in China. Major achievements (...) of bioethics in China include the establishment of ethics committee and ethics review system, active international communication and cooperation among the academic circles, and the successful management of the 8th World Congress of Bioethics in Beijing in 2006. Chinese bioethics focus on native Chinese realities and conditions, absorb the international research achievements in relevant fields, and combine international ideas with traditional Chinese doctrines. Admittedly, there are still some aspects to be improved, yet bioethics has attracted a lot of attention from the core leadership in China and has gained sound financial support, which augers well for its further development. This article also briefly introduces the development of bioethics in Hong Kong and Taiwan, China. (shrink)

Academic freedom can be defined as immunity against adverse reactions from the general public, designed to keep scholars unintimidated and productive even after they have published controversial ideas. Francesca Minerva claims that this notion of strict instrumental academic freedom is supported by Ronald Dworkin, and that anonymity would effectively defend the sphere of immunity implied by it. Against this, I argue that the idea defended by Minerva finds no support in the work by Dworkin referred to; that anonymity (...) would not in most cases effectively protect the kind of immunity sought after; and that in some cases it would not even be desirable to protect scholars from public reactions to their controversial claims. (shrink)

Bioethics is clearly a field in transition, if not confusion. Bioethics began as a scholarly, reflective, academic enterprise. Increasingly, however, some in bioethics are not as interested in producing scholarship as they are in practicing bioethics by providing services to institutions and clients.Bioethics also began as an interdisciplinary line of inquiry, with its major contributors all trained in some established discipline. We were and for the most part still are a field composed of theologians, (...) philosophers, lawyers, physicians, nurses, and social scientists who work in bioethics. Today, however, some young people actually aspire to be bioethicists. Increasingly, they have the option of being trained directly in bioethics, without any other disciplinary background.We are not the first field to find itself engaged in these kinds of transitions. In this short piece, I consider very briefly how two fields--health psychology and epidemiology- have approached similar branch points. (shrink)

The Covid-19 pandemic necessitated a shift to online teaching of bioethics, a field that relies on discourse and interactive teaching methods. This paper aims to highlight the challenges faced and lessons learned while describing the experience of having to shift to teaching bioethics online to students enrolled in the Postgraduate Diploma in Biomedical Ethics (PGD) and Master of Bioethics programs at the Centre of Biomedical Ethics and Culture (CBEC) in Pakistan. Opinions of students, mainly compromising mid-career healthcare (...) related professionals, were obtained through a survey (n = 13) and an in-depth group discussion via Zoom. Observations from core faculty (n = 7) were recorded through conducting a content analysis of monthly faculty meetings, enhanced by faculty narratives published in the Centre’s bi-annual newsletter. Faculty and students alike expressed unease with the online mode since it minimized chances of interaction with peers and faculty thus negatively affecting learning process. Juggling work responsibilities while taking synchronous online classes proved to be difficult for students particularly for clinicians, with unique issues for women. Faculty faced increased workload due to the necessity for development of innovative teaching methods and new assessment tools in order to maintain the standard of the academic programs. Despite the problems surrounding the online mode, students and faculty also acquired new skills during this period. Overall, there was a clear preference for on-campus learning, however against the backdrop of a pandemic, online mode was considered as the only viable option. (shrink)

This paper describes a global pattern of declining academic freedom, often driven by powerful political interference with core functions of academic communities. It argues that countering threats to academic freedom requires doubling down on ethics, specifically standards of justice and fairness in pursuing knowledge and assigning warrant to beliefs. Using the example of the selection of a Qatari university to host the 2024 World Congress of Bioethics, the authors urge fairness towards diverse groups over time and (...) efforts to counter injustices that conferences generate. (shrink)

Bioethics and humanities (inclusive of medical ethics, health care ethics, environmental ethics, research ethics, philosophy and medicine, literature and medicine, and so on) seems like one field; yet colleagues come from different academic disciplines with distinct languages, methods, traditions, core curriculum and competency examinations. The author marks six related "framework" features that unite and make it one distinct field. It is a commitment to (1) work systematically on some of the momentous and well-defined sets of problems about the (...) human condition that drive our field (such as death and dying, disability, confidentiality, professionalism, informed consent, abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, personhood, health-care resource allocation and environmental ethics, as well as the impact of new technologies, including genetic and reproductive); (2) use interdisciplinary approaches to unravel them; (3) employ cases and practical reasoning to understand problems and solve answers; (4) apply teaching methods and goals associated with John Dewey to make students better problem-solvers; (5) find morally justifiable solutions to the problems driving our field; and (6) seek interdisciplinary and collaborative scholarship, service or teaching. (shrink)

This book is a philosophically-oriented introduction to bioethics. It offers the reader an overview of key debates in bioethics relevant to various areas including; organ retrieval, stem cell research, justice in healthcare and issues in environmental ethics, including issues surrounding food and agriculture. The book also seeks to go beyond simply describing the issues in order to provide the reader with the methodological and theoretical tools for a more comprehensive understanding of current bioethical debates. The aim of the (...) book is to present bioethics as an interdisciplinary field, to explore its close relation to other disciplines (such as law, life sciences, theology and philosophy), and to discuss the conditions under which bioethics can serve as an academically legitimate discipline that is at the same time relevant to society. As a systematic and methodologically rigorous overview, Bioethics: Methods, Theories, Domains will be of particular interest to academics and students in the disciplines of Law, Medicine, Ethics and Philosophy. (shrink)

A collection celebrating some of the best essays from the Blackwell journals, Bioethics and Developing World Bioethics. Contributors include Helga Kuhse, Michael Selgelid and Baroness Mary Warnock, former Chair of the British Government’s Committee of Inquiry into Human Fertilization and Embryology’s. Traces some of the most important concerns of the 1980s, such as the ethics of euthanasia, reproductive technologies, the allocation of scarce medical resources, surrogate motherhood, through to a range of new issues debated today, particularly in the (...) field of genetics. Includes contributions that are still as hotly debated today as they were 20 years ago and serves as a salutary reminder that free and open discussion is vital to the health of the discipline itself. Includes eight sections comprising some of the journals' best publications in methodological issues, the health care professional-patient relationship, public health ethics, research ethics, genetics, as well as beginning- and end-of-life issues. Will serve the academic bioethicists as well as students of bioethics as an excellent source book. (shrink)

Slippery slope‐, taboo‐breaking‐ or Nazi‐analogy‐arguments are common, but not uncontroversial examples of the complex relationship between bioethics and the various ways of using historical arguments in these debates. In our analysis we examine first the relationship between bioethics and medical history both as separate disciplines and as argumentative practices. Secondly, we then analyse six common types of historical arguments in bioethics (slippery slope‐, analogy‐, continuity‐, knockout/taboo‐, ethical progress‐ and accomplice‐arguments), some as arguments within the academic debate (...) of bioethics, others as arguments within political and public debates over bioethical issues. We conclude by suggesting to bioethicists to better understand historical arguments as socially and culturally embedded practices of critical reflection of power, medical and government paternalism and possible future scenarios. More interdisciplinarity between ethicists and medical historians is needed to appropriately rationalize and understand the different legacies. (shrink)

This article examines the, hitherto comparatively unexplored, reception of Greek embryology by medieval Muslim jurists. The article elaborates on the views attributed to Hippocrates (d. ca. 375 BC), which received attention from both Muslim physicians, such as Avicenna (d. 1037), and their Jewish peers living in the Muslim world including Ibn Jumayʽ (d. ca. 1198) and Moses Maimonides (d. 1204). The religio‐ethical implications of these Graeco‐Islamic‐Jewish embryological views were fathomed out by the two medieval Muslim jurists Shihāb al‐Dīn al‐Qarāfī (d. (...) 1285) and Ibn al‐Qayyim (d. 1350). By putting these medieval religio‐ethical discussions into the limelight, the article aims to argue for a two‐pronged thesis. Firstly, pre‐modern medical ethics did exist in the Islamic tradition and available evidence shows that this field had a multidisciplinary character where the Islamic scriptures and the Graeco‐Islamic‐Jewish medical legacy were highly intertwined. This information problematizes the postulate claiming that medieval Muslim jurists were hostile to the so‐called ‘ancient sciences’. Secondly, these medieval religio‐ethical discussions remain playing a significant role in shaping the nascent field of contemporary Islamic bioethics. However, examining the exact character and scope of this role still requires further academic ventures. (shrink)

The translation of bedside experience to pedagogical content presents a unique challenge for the field of bioethics. The contributions are multidisciplinary, the practices are heterogeneous, and the work product is characteristically nuanced. While academic bioethics education programs have proliferated, developing content and pedagogy sufficient to teach clinical ethics effectively remains a longstanding challenge. The authors identify three reasons why progress towards this goal has been slow. First, there is a lack of robust, empirical knowledge for education focused (...) on praxis. Second, the methods employed in academic education tend to focus on traditional didactic approaches rather than engendering competency through interaction and practice—the principle means by which clinical ethicists work. Third, the data practitioners have captured has not been presented in a medium educators and students can most meaningfully interact with. In this paper, the authors describe a novel pedagogical tool: the Armstrong Clinical Ethics Coding System (ACECS) and interactive visual analytics dashboard. Together, these components comprise an educational platform that utilizes the empirical data collected by the institution’s ethics service. The tool offers four advantages. First, it aids with the identification of ethical issues that present during a consultation at that specific institution or medical unit by making use of a lingua franca comprehensible to both ethicists and non-ethicists. Second, content is centered on issue frequency, type, and relation to other issues. Iterating through cases, requestors, or hospital units allows one to understand cases typologically and through metanarratives that reveal relationships and subtle patterns. Third, the use of interactive data visualizations and data storytelling aids comprehension and retention. Fourth, the process of using the system necessitates understanding the manifold ways each case can be understood, accommodating a wide range of perspectives and ethical lenses, enhancing case analysis and self-reflection conducive to life-long learning. (shrink)

The theory of evolution of complex and comprising of human systems and algorithm for its constructing are the synthesis of evolutionary epistemology, philosophical anthropology and concrete scientific empirical basis in modern (transdisciplinary) science. «Trans-disciplinary» in the context is interpreted as a completely new epistemological situation, which is fraught with the initiation of a civilizational crisis. Philosophy and ideology of technogenic civilization is based on the possibility of unambiguous demarcation of public value and descriptive scientific discourses (1), and the object and (...) subject of the cognitive process (2). Both of these attributes are no longer valid. For mass, everyday consciousness and institutional philosophical tradition it is intuitively obvious that having the ability to control the evolutionary process, Homo sapiens came close to the borders of their own biological and cultural identity. The spontaneous coevolutionary process of interaction between the «subject» (rational living organisms) and the «object» (material world), is the teleological trend of the movement towards the complete rationalization of the World as It Is, its merger with the World of Due. The stratification of the global evolutionary process into selective and semantic (teleological) coevolutionary and therefore ontologically inseparable components follows. With the entry of anthropogenic civilization into the stage of the information society, firsty, the post-academic phase of the historical evolution of scientific rationality began, the attributes of which are the specific methodology of scientific knowledge, scientific ethos and ontology. Bioethics as a phenomenon of intellectual culture represents a natural philosophical core of modern post- academic (human-dimensional) science, in which the ethical neutrality of scientific theory principle is inapplicable, and elements of public-axiological and scientific-descriptive discourses are integrated into a single logic construction. As result, hermeneutics precedes epistemology not only methodologically, but also meaningfully, and natural philosophy is regaining the status of the backbone of the theory of evolution – in an explicit form. (shrink)

During 1992, academic bioethicists celebrated the 30th anniversary of bioethics. Some like to date the origin of modern secular bioethics to the advent of transplant technology that began with kidney transplantation in the early 1960s in the Seattle, Washington, area. This is certainly a good candidate for a starting point. Another might be the work of Joseph Fletcher in the New York area with the Euthanasia Society of America and with clergy training. Still another candidate for the (...) origins of secular bioethics would be the trial of physicians at the University of Virginia for transplanting a kidney at which the same Joseph Fletcher testified. At that trial, the alteration occurred in American law from a definition of death that focused on the cessation of heartbeat to one that focused on the cessation of brain function. (shrink)

The UNESCO International Bioethics Committee is an international body that sets standards in the field of bioethics. This collection represents the contributions of the IBC to global bioethics. The IBC is a body of 36 independent experts that follows progress in the life sciences and its applications in order to ensure respect for human dignity and freedom. Currently, some of the topics of the IBC contributions have been discussed in the bioethics literature, mostly journal articles. However, (...) this is a unique contribution by the scholars who developed these universal declarations and reports. The contributors have not only provided a scholarly up to date discussion of their research topics, but as members of the IBC they have also discussed specific practical challenges in the development of such international documents. This book will be suited to academics within bioethics, health care policy and international law. (shrink)

In a critical intervention into the bioethics debate over human enhancement, philosopher Melinda Hall tackles the claim that the expansion and development of human capacities is a moral obligation. Hall draws on French philosopher Michel Foucault to reveal and challenge the ways disability is central to the conversation. The Bioethics of Enhancement includes a close reading and analysis of the last century of enhancement thinking and contemporary transhumanist thinkers, the strongest promoters of the obligation to pursue enhancement technology. (...) With specific attention to the work of bioethicists Nick Bostrom and Julian Savulescu, the book challenges the rhetoric and strategies of enhancement thinking. These include the desire to transcend the body and decide who should live in future generations through emerging technologies such as genetic selection. Hall provides new analyses rethinking both the philosophy of enhancement and disability, arguing that enhancement should be a matter of social and political interventions, not genetic and biological interventions. Hall concludes that human vulnerability and difference should be cherished rather than extinguished. -/- This book will be of interest to academics working in bioethics and disability studies, along with those working in Continental philosophy (especially on Foucault). (shrink)

Bioethics education has remarkably grown across the globe in the last few decades. The data of the UNESCO Global Ethics Observatory proves that bioethics education is a global phenomenon with various bioethics institutions, teaching programs, and academicians. However, this situation does not mean that bioethics education has reached a stable and flawless level. Especially, the effectiveness of bioethics programs or their quality assessment is a major area that should be analyzed through more academic works. (...) For filling that gap, this article aims to formulate a general framework to address the quality standards and indicators in bioethics education. The article adapts Donabedian’s three approaches—structure, process, and outcome— as three levels to measure quality in bioethics education. The proposed model considers the indicators the ultimate quantifiable points by creating a sequential classification as the three levels, main categories, standards, and indicators, which means that it applies an inductive approach following a path from the indicators to the standards, from the standards to the main categories, and from the main categories to the levels in order to reach a conclusion about the effectiveness of each level. (shrink)

This article examines the evolution of bioethics over the past four decades since the publication of John Harris’ seminal work, “The Value of Life” (1985). It argues that while the core principles articulated by Harris remain relevant, bioethics has undergone significant transformation across four key domains. First, the expanding frontiers of biotechnology have necessitated engagement with complex issues beyond individual clinical ethics. Second, there has been a widening of the circle of moral concern to encompass nonhuman animals, disability (...) rights, and global health equity. Third, bioethics has become increasingly entangled with public policy and governance. Finally, the field has seen substantial academic proliferation and institutionalization. These developments have pushed bioethics to adapt its frameworks and methodologies while maintaining fidelity to foundational principles. This article concludes by considering the future challenges and opportunities for bioethics in an increasingly complex technological and social landscape. (shrink)

Tieu, Matthew As a contemporary academic discipline bioethics is a specialised though multidisciplinary field of study. It is the study of the ethical issues that arise from the biological and medical sciences, as well as clinical practice. It deals with important issues such as abortion, human embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia and reproductive technology, genetic modification, animal welfare, nanotechnology and neuroethics. The "Encyclopedia of Bioethics" defines bioethics as "the systematic study of the moral dimensions -including moral (...) vision, decisions, conduct and policies -of the life sciences and health care, employing a variety of ethical methodologies in an interdisciplinary setting". Bioethics is a branch or sub-discipline of what is referred to as "applied ethics". As such, it also draws upon those disciplines that address the nature of ethics, i.e. philosophy, psychology and religion. Bioethics as an academic discipline therefore involves both the natural sciences and the humanities. (shrink)

The term “globalization” was popularized by Marshall McLuhan in War and Peace in the Global Village. In the book, McLuhan described how the global media shaped current events surrounding the Vietnam War [1] and also predicted how modern information and communication technologies would accelerate world progress through trade and knowledge development. Globalization now refers to a broad range of issues regarding the movement of goods and services through trade liberalization, and the movement of people through migration. Much has also been (...) written on the global effects of environmental degradation, population growth, and economic disparities. In addition, the pace of scientific development has accelerated, with both negative and positive implications for global health. Concerns for national health transcend borders, with a need for shared human security and an enhanced role for international cooperation and development [2]. These issues have significant bioethical implications, and thus a renewed academic focus on the ethical dimensions of public health is needed. Future developments in science and health policy also require a firm grounding in bioethical principles. These core principles include beneficence; nonmaleficence ; respect for persons and human dignity ; and attention to equity and social justice. According to the World Health Organization [3], global ethical approaches should monitor and update ethical norms for research, as necessary; anticipate ethical implications of advances in science and technology for health; apply internationally accepted codes of ethics; ensure that agreed standards guide future work on the human genome; and ensure that quality in health systems and services is assessed and promoted. (shrink)

This book offers a unique and comprehensive outline of the ethos, the bioethics and the sexual ethics of the renowned anatomist and founder of modern geology, Niels Stensen. It tells the story of a student who is forced to defend himself against his professor who tries to plagiarize his first discovery, the “Ductus Stenonis”: the first performance test for the young researcher. The focal points are questions of bioethics, especially with regard to human reproduction, sexual ethics, the beginning (...) of life and the ensoulment of the embryo, together with frontiers of pastoral care. The book delineates Stensen’s ethos as well as its medico-ethical and theological implications and reception by researchers and physicians from the 17th century until today, and asks about his lasting significance. Despite dating back more than 300 years, Stensen’s character and his work offer up surprisingly topical answers to current questions on the nature of professional ethics in medical science and practice. Furthermore, “Ethos, Bioethics, and Sexual Ethics in Work and Reception of the Anatomist Niels Stensen : Circulation of Love” is the first academic book on bioethics and sexual ethics with a foreword by the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. A fascinating book for bioethicists, physicians, members of health professions, scientists, and theologians. (shrink)

Activism and bioethics have enjoyed a somewhat strained relationship. In this paper, I consider activism specifically from the perspective of junior academics. I will argue that although there may be a prima facie duty for bioethicists to be activists, countervailing considerations for junior academics may mean that they, in particular, should refrain from undertaking activist activities. I will argue this on the basis of two key claims. First, I argue that activism may come at a potential cost to the (...) academics who undertake it, and that these costs are potentially of greatest detriment to junior academics undertaking activism. Second, I argue that junior academics are likely to be less effective activists than established academics. Moreover, undertaking activism as a junior academic may prevent one from becoming an effective activist later. Finally, I will discuss the implications of this argument for activist commitments later in one’s career. (shrink)

The elderly are often considered a vulnerable group in public and academic bioethical debates and regulations. In this paper, we examine and challenge this assumption and its ethical implications. We begin by systematically delineating the different concepts of vulnerability commonly used in bioethics, before then examining whether these concepts can be applied to old age. We argue that old age should not, in and of itself, be used as a marker of vulnerability, since ageing is a process that (...) can develop in a variety of different ways and is not always associated with particular experiences of vulnerability. We, therefore, turn to more fundamental phenomenological considerations in order to reconstruct from a first person perspective the intricate interconnections between the experiences of ageing and vulnerability. According to this account, ageing and old age are phenomena in which the basic anthropological vulnerability of human beings can manifest itself in an increased likelihood of harm and exploitation. Thus, we plead for a combined model of vulnerability that helps to avoid problems related to the current concepts of vulnerability. We conclude first that old age as such is not a sufficient criterion for being categorized as vulnerable in applied ethics, and second that reflections on ageing can help to develop a better understanding of the central role of vulnerability in human existence and in applied ethics. (shrink)