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72Personhood, Dignity, Suicide, and EuthanasiaThe National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 1 (3): 329-343. 2001.
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11Bioethics: A Culture War (edited book)Upa. 2004.The purpose of this valuable book is to consider recent cultural trends in bioethics from a Catholic perspective. Bioethics is intended for a lay audience interested in understanding bioethical issues from a Catholic perspective
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67Rational Souls and the Beginning of Life (A Reply to Robert Pasnau)Philosophy 78 (306). 2003.The present essay takes up matters discussed by Robert Pasnau in his response to our previous criticism of his account of Aquinas's view of when a foetus acquires a human soul. We are mainly concerned with metaphysical and biological issues and argue that the kind of organization required for ensoulment is that sufficient for the full development of a human being, and that this is present from conception. We contend that in his criticisms of our account Pasnau fails clearly to distinguish first,…Read more
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48Total Brain Death and the Integration of the Body Required of a Human BeingJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 41 (3): 300-314. 2016.I develop and refine an argument for the total brain death criterion of death previously advanced by Germain Grisez and me: A human being is essentially a rational animal, and so must have a radical capacity for rational operations. For rational animals, conscious sensation is a pre-requisite for rational operation. But total brain death results in the loss of the radical capacity for conscious sensation, and so also for rational operations. Hence, total brain death constitutes a substantial cha…Read more
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153Total Brain Death: A Reply to Alan ShewmonBioethics 26 (5): 275-284. 2012.D. Alan Shewmon has advanced a well-documented challenge to the widely accepted total brain death criterion for death of the human being. We show that Shewmon's argument against this criterion is unsound, though he does refute the standard argument for that criterion. We advance a distinct argument for the total brain death criterion and answer likely objections. Since human beings are rational animals – sentient organisms of a specific type – the loss of the radical capacity for sentience invol…Read more
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227Substantial identity and the right to life: A rejoinder to Dean StrettonBioethics 21 (2): 93-97. 2007.ABSTRACT In this article, I reply to criticisms of Dean Stretton of the pro‐life argument from substantial identity. When the criterion for the right to life proposed by most proponents of the pro‐life position is rightly understood – being a person, a distinct substance of a rational nature – this position does not lead to the difficulties Stretton claims it does.
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28The Definition of Moral Virtue. By Yves R. Simon (review)Modern Schoolman 68 (2): 179-181. 1991.
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110The Ontological Status of Embryos: A Reply to Jason MorrisJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 39 (5): 483-504. 2014.In various places we have defended the position that a new human organism, that is, an individual member of the human species, comes to be at fertilization, the union of the spermatozoon and the oocyte. This individual organism, during the ordinary course of embryological development, remains the same individual and does not undergo any further substantial change, unless monozygotic twinning, or some form of chimerism occurs. Recently, in this Journal Jason Morris has challenged our position, cl…Read more
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40Physician-Assisted Suicide IsIn Arthur L. Caplan & Robert Arp (eds.), Contemporary debates in bioethics, Wiley-blackwell. pp. 25--213. 2014.
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5Reply to LachsIn Arthur L. Caplan & Robert Arp (eds.), Contemporary debates in bioethics, Wiley-blackwell. pp. 25--225. 2014.
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54The Basis for Being a Subject of Rights: the Natural Law PositionIn John Keown & Robert P. George (eds.), Reason, morality, and law: the philosophy of John Finnis, Oxford University Press. pp. 236. 2013.
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228The nature and basis of human dignityIn Adam Schulman (ed.), Human Dignity and Bioethics: Essays Commissioned by the President's Council on Bioethics, [president's Council On Bioethics. pp. 173-193. 2008.
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20The papal allocution concerning care for PVS patients: A reply to Fr. O'RourkeIn C. Tollefsen (ed.), Artificial Nutrition and Hydration, Springer Press. pp. 179--188. 2008.
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178Body-Self Dualism in Contemporary Ethics and PoliticsCambridge University Press. 2007.Profoundly important ethical and political controversies turn on the question of whether biological life is an essential aspect of a human person, or only an extrinsic instrument. Lee and George argue that human beings are physical, animal organisms - albeit essentially rational and free - and examine the implications of this understanding of human beings for some of the most controversial issues in contemporary ethics and politics. The authors argue that human beings are animal organisms and th…Read more
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120Evil as Such Is a PrivationAmerican Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 81 (3): 469-488. 2007.I reply to an article in the ACPA Proceedings of 2001 by John Crosby in which he challenged the position that evil as such is a privation. Each of his arguments attempts to present a counterexample to the privation position. His first argument, claiming that annihilation is evil but not a privation, fails to consider that a privation need not be contemporaneous with the subject suffering the privation. Contrary to his second argument, I explain that the repugnance of pain is consistent with its …Read more
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The Relationship Between Intellect and Will in Free Choice According to Aquinas and ScotusThe Thomist 49 (3): 321. 1985.
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11The Role and Responsibility of the Moral PhilosopherProceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 56 70-78. 1982.
Steubenville, Ohio, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Meta-Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Philosophy of Mind |
Philosophy of Religion |