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71Worth living or worth dying? The views of the general public about allowing disabled children to dieJournal of Medical Ethics 46 (1): 7-15. 2020.BackgroundDecisions about withdrawal of life support for infants have given rise to legal battles between physicians and parents creating intense media attention. It is unclear how we should evaluate when life is no longer worth living for an infant. Public attitudes towards treatment withdrawal and the role of parents in situations of disagreement have not previously been assessed.MethodsAn online survey was conducted with a sample of the UK public to assess public views about the benefit of li…Read more
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708Although religious belief is often claimed to help with physical ailments including pain, it is unclear what psychological and neural mechanisms underlie the influence of religious belief on pain. By analogy to other top-down processes of pain modulation we hypothesized that religious belief helps believers reinterpret the emotional significance of pain, leading to emotional detachment from it. Recent findings on emotion regulation support a role for the right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, a …Read more
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1216Methodological Issues in the Neuroscience of Moral JudgementMind and Language 25 (5): 561-582. 2010.Neuroscience and psychology have recently turned their attention to the study of the subpersonal underpinnings of moral judgment. In this article we critically examine an influential strand of research originating in Greene's neuroimaging studies of ‘utilitarian’ and ‘non-utilitarian’ moral judgement. We argue that given that the explananda of this research are specific personal-level states—moral judgments with certain propositional contents—its methodology has to be sensitive to criteria for a…Read more
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440The Neural Basis of Intuitive and Counterintuitive Moral JudgementSocial Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience 7 (4): 393-402. 2011.Neuroimaging studies on moral decision-making have thus far largely focused on differences between moral judgments with opposing utilitarian (well-being maximizing) and deontological (duty-based) content. However, these studies have investigated moral dilemmas involving extreme situations, and did not control for two distinct dimensions of moral judgment: whether or not it is intuitive (immediately compelling to most people) and whether it is utilitarian or deontological in content. By contrasti…Read more
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406The scientific study of belief and pain modulation: conceptual problemsIn F. P. Mario, M. F. P. Peres, G. Lucchetti & R. F. Damiano (eds.), Spirituality, Religion and Health: From Research to Clinical Practice., Springer. 2016.We examine conceptual and methodological problems that arise in the course of the scientific study of possible influences of religious belief on the experience of physical pain. We start by attempting to identify a notion of religious belief that might enter into interesting psychological generalizations involving both religious belief and pain. We argue that it may be useful to think of religious belief as a complex dispositional property that relates believers to a sufficiently thick belief sy…Read more
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2169The Neuroscience of Moral JudgmentIn Aaron Zimmerman, Karen Jones & Mark Timmons (eds.), Routledge Handbook on Moral Epistemology, Routledge. 2018.This chapter examines the relevance of the cognitive science of morality to moral epistemology, with special focus on the issue of the reliability of moral judgments. It argues that the kind of empirical evidence of most importance to moral epistemology is at the psychological rather than neural level. The main theories and debates that have dominated the cognitive science of morality are reviewed with an eye to their epistemic significance.
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78“Neglected Personhood” and Neglected Questions: Remarks on the Moral Significance of ConsciousnessAmerican Journal of Bioethics 8 (9). 2008.
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990The Moral Obligation to Create Children with the Best Chance of the Best LifeBioethics 23 (5): 274-290. 2008.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 proc…Read more
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685Autonomy and EnhancementNeuroethics 7 (2): 123-136. 2013.Some have objected to human enhancement on the grounds that it violates the autonomy of the enhanced. These objections, however, overlook the interesting possibility that autonomy itself could be enhanced. How, exactly, to enhance autonomy is a difficult problem due to the numerous and diverse accounts of autonomy in the literature. Existing accounts of autonomy enhancement rely on narrow and controversial conceptions of autonomy. However, we identify one feature of autonomy common to many mains…Read more
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55Functional neuroimaging and withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment from vegetative patientsJournal of Medical Ethics 35 (8): 508-511. 2009.Recent studies using functional magnetic resonance imaging of patients in a vegetative state have raised the possibility that such patients retain some degree of consciousness. In this paper, the ethical implications of such findings are outlined, in particular in relation to decisions about withdrawing life-sustaining treatment. It is sometimes assumed that if there is evidence of consciousness, treatment should not be withdrawn. But, paradoxically, the discovery of consciousness in very severe…Read more
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75Lay attitudes toward deception in medicine: Theoretical considerations and empirical evidenceAJOB Empirical Bioethics 7 (1): 31-38. 2016.Background: There is a lack of empirical data on lay attitudes toward different sorts of deception in medicine. However, lay attitudes toward deception should be taken into account when we consider whether deception is ever permissible in a medical context. The objective of this study was to examine lay attitudes of U.S. citizens toward different sorts of deception across different medical contexts. Methods: A one-time online survey was administered to U.S. users of the Amazon “Mechanical Turk” …Read more
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7Well-Being and EnhancementIn Julian Savulescu, Ruud ter Meulen & Guy Kahane (eds.), Enhancing Human Capacities, Blackwell. pp. 3--18. 2011.
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60How should we deal with misattributed paternity? A survey of lay public attitudesAJOB Empirical Bioethics 8 (4): 234-242. 2017.Background: Increasing use of genetic technologies in clinical and research settings increases the potential for misattributed paternity to be identified. Yet existing guidance from the President's Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Biomedical and Behavioral Research and the Institute of Medicine (among others) offers contradictory advice. Genetic health professionals are thus likely to vary in their practice when misattributed paternity is identified, and empirical investigation in…Read more
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Practical Neuropsychiatric EthicsIn K. W. M. Fulford, Martin Davies, Richard Gipps, George Graham, John Sadler, Giovanni Stanghellini & Tim Thornton (eds.), The Oxford handbook of philosophy and psychiatry, Oxford University Press. 2013.Philosophers have long been involved in the pursuit of a goal shared by researchers in psychiatry and the cognitive sciences: understanding the relationship between the functioning of the human mind and human well-being or suffering. For this reason there is a very large area of overlap between philosophical and psychiatric research. The overlap is particularly significant in the domain of practical ethics, which is concerned with understanding the moral dimension of policies and actions in the …Read more
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576Cohen’s Conservatism and Human EnhancementThe Journal of Ethics 17 (4): 331-354. 2013.In an intriguing essay, G. A. Cohen has defended a conservative bias in favour of existing value. In this paper, we consider whether Cohen’s conservatism raises a new challenge to the use of human enhancement technologies. We develop some of Cohen’s suggestive remarks into a new line of argument against human enhancement that, we believe, is in several ways superior to existing objections. However, we shall argue that on closer inspection, Cohen’s conservatism fails to offer grounds for a strong…Read more
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47Wittgenstein and His Interpreters: Essays in Memory of Gordon Baker (edited book)Wiley-Blackwell. 2007.Comprising specially commissioned essays from some of the most significant contributors to the field, this volume provides a uniquely authoritative and thorough survey of the main lines of Wittgenstein scholarship over the past 50 years, tracing the history and current trends as well as anticipating the future shape of work on Wittgenstein. The first collection of its kind, this volume presents a range of perspectives on the different approaches to the philosophy of Wittgenstein Written by leadi…Read more
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362Evolution, Genetic Engineering, and Human EnhancementPhilosophy and Technology 25 (4): 439-458. 2012.There are many ways that biological theory can inform ethical discussions of genetic engineering and biomedical enhancement. In this essay, we highlight some of these potential contributions, and along the way provide a synthetic overview of the papers that comprise this special issue. We begin by comparing and contrasting genetic engineering with programs of selective breeding that led to the domestication of plants and animals, and we consider how genetic engineering differs from other contemp…Read more
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73The Value of Sex in Procreative ReasonsAmerican Journal of Bioethics 10 (7): 22-24. 2010.This Article does not have an abstract
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157‘Utilitarian’ judgments in sacrificial moral dilemmas do not reflect impartial concern for the greater goodCognition 134 (C): 193-209. 2015.
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150Normal Human Variation: Refocussing the Enhancement DebateBioethics 29 (2): 133-143. 2013.This article draws attention to several common mistakes in thinking about biomedical enhancement, mistakes that are made even by some supporters of enhancement. We illustrate these mistakes by examining objections that John Harris has recently raised against the use of pharmacological interventions to directly modulate moral decision-making. We then apply these lessons to other influential figures in the debate about enhancement. One upshot of our argument is that many considerations presented a…Read more
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59Non-identity, self-defeat, and attitudes to future childrenPhilosophical Studies 145 (2): 193-214. 2009.Although most people believe that it is morally wrong to intentionally create children who have an impairment, it is widely held that we cannot criticize such procreative choices unless we find a solution to Parfit’s non-identity problem. I argue that we can. Jonathan Glover has recently argued that, in certain circumstances, such choices would be self-defeating even if morally permissible. I argue that although the scope of Glover’s argument is too limited, it nevertheless directs attention to …Read more
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319Brain damage and the moral significance of consciousnessJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 34 (1): 6-26. 2009.Neuroimaging studies of brain-damaged patients diagnosed as in the vegetative state suggest that the patients might be conscious. This might seem to raise no new ethical questions given that in related disputes both sides agree that evidence for consciousness gives strong reason to preserve life. We question this assumption. We clarify the widely held but obscure principle that consciousness is morally significant. It is hard to apply this principle to difficult cases given that philosophers of …Read more
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68Attitudes of Lay People to Withdrawal of Treatment in Brain Damaged PatientsNeuroethics 7 (1): 1-9. 2013.BackgroundWhether patients in the vegetative state (VS), minimally conscious state (MCS) or the clinically related locked-in syndrome (LIS) should be kept alive is a matter of intense controversy. This study aimed to examine the moral attitudes of lay people to these questions, and the values and other factors that underlie these attitudes.MethodOne hundred ninety-nine US residents completed a survey using the online platform Mechanical Turk, comprising demographic questions, agreement with trea…Read more
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80Brain damage and the moral significance of consciousnessJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 34 (1): 6-26. 2009.Neuroimaging studies of brain-damaged patients diagnosed as in the vegetative state suggest that the patients might be conscious. This might seem to raise no new ethical questions given that in related disputes both sides agree that evidence for consciousness gives strong reason to preserve life. We question this assumption. We clarify the widely held but obscure principle that consciousness is morally significant. It is hard to apply this principle to difficult cases given that philosophers of …Read more
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114The enhancement debate in neuroscience and biomedical ethics tends to focus on the augmentation of certain capacities or functions: memory, learning, attention, and the like. Typically, the point of contention is whether these augmentative enhancements should be considered permissible for individuals with no particular “medical” disadvantage along any of the dimensions of interest. Less frequently addressed in the literature, however, is the fact that sometimes the _diminishment_ of a capacity o…Read more
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382Disaster and DebateJournal of Moral Philosophy 15 (5): 516-544. 2018.Faced with a national tragedy, citizens respond in different ways. Some will initiate debate about the possible connections between this tragedy and broader moral and political issues. But others often complain that this is too early, that it is inappropriate to debate such larger issues while ‘the bodies are still warm’. This paper critically examines the grounds for such a complaint. We consider different interpretations of the complaint—cynical, epistemic and ethical—and argue that it can be …Read more
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433Bioconservatism, Partiality, and the Human-Nature Objection to EnhancementThe Monist 99 (4): 406-422. 2016.“Bioconservatives” in the human enhancement debate endorse the conservative claim that we should reject the use of biotechnologies that enhance natural human capacities. However, they often ground their objections to enhancement with contestable claims about human nature that are also in tension with other common tenets of conservatism. We argue that bioconservatives could raise a more plausible objection to enhancement by invoking a strain of conservative thought developed by G.A. Cohen. Althou…Read more
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101Neuroethics is an interdisciplinary field that arose in response to novel ethical challenges posed by advances in neuroscience. Historically, neuroethics has provided an opportunity to synergize different disciplines, notably proposing a two-way dialogue between an ‘ethics of neuroscience’ and a ‘neuroscience of ethics’. However, questions surface as to whether a ‘neuroscience of ethics’ is a useful and unified branch of research and whether it can actually inform or lead to theoretical insights…Read more
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130The trouble with being sincereCanadian Journal of Philosophy 41 (2): 215-234. 2011.Questions about sincerity play a central role in our lives. But what makes an assertion insincere? In this paper we argue that the answer to this question is not as straightforward as it has sometimes been taken to be. Until recently the dominant answer has been that a speaker makes an insincere assertion if and only if he does not believe the proposition asserted. There are, however, persuasive counterexamples to this simple account. It has been proposed instead that an insincere assertion that…Read more
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896Beyond sacrificial harm: A two-dimensional model of utilitarian psychologyPsychological Review 125 (2): 131-164. 2018.Recent research has relied on trolley-type sacrificial moral dilemmas to study utilitarian versus nonutili- tarian modes of moral decision-making. This research has generated important insights into people’s attitudes toward instrumental harm—that is, the sacrifice of an individual to save a greater number. But this approach also has serious limitations. Most notably, it ignores the positive, altruistic core of utilitarianism, which is characterized by impartial concern for the well-being of eve…Read more
Areas of Interest
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Metaphilosophy |
Philosophy of Mind |
Applied Ethics |
Meta-Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |