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1643Necessary Conditions for Morally Responsible Animal ResearchCambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 24 (4): 420-430. 2015.In this paper, we present three necessary conditions for morally responsible animal research that we believe people on both sides of this debate can accept. Specifically, we argue that, even if human beings have higher moral status than nonhuman animals, animal research is morally permissible only if it satisfies (a) an expectation of sufficient net benefit, (b) a worthwhile-life condition, and (c) a no unnecessary-harm/qualified-basic-needs condition. We then claim that, whether or not these n…Read more
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778Value Theory, Beneficence, and Medical Decision-MakingAmerican Journal of Bioethics 20 (3): 71-73. 2020.Volume 20, Issue 3, March 2020, Page 71-73.
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674Sentient Nonpersons and the Disvalue of DeathBioethics 30 (7): 511-519. 2016.Implicit in our everyday attitudes and practices is the assumption that death ordinarily harms a person who dies. A far more contested matter is whether death harms sentient individuals who are not persons, a category that includes many animals and some human beings. On the basis of the deprivation account of the harm of death, I argue that death harms sentient nonpersons. I next consider possible bases for the commonsense judgment that death ordinarily harms persons more than it harms sentient …Read more
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662Relieving pain using dose-extending placebosPAIN 157 1590-1598. 2016.Placebos are often used by clinicians, usually deceptively and with little rationale or evidence of benefit, making their use ethically problematic. In contrast with their typical current use, a provocative line of research suggests that placebos can be intentionally exploited to extend analgesic therapeutic effects. Is it possible to extend the effects of drug treatments by interspersing placebos? We reviewed a database of placebo studies, searching for studies that indicate that placebos given…Read more
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611Parents of Adults with Diminished Self-GovernanceCambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 25 (1): 93-107. 2016.Most theories of parenthood assume, at least implicitly, that a child will grow up to be an independent, autonomous adult. However, some children with cognitive limitations or psychiatric illness are unable to do so. For this reason, these accounts do not accommodate the circumstances and responsibilities of parents of such adult children. Our article attempts to correct this deficiency. In particular, we describe some of the common characteristics and experiences of this population of parents a…Read more
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569Ethical Reflections on Genetic Enhancement with the Aim of Enlarging AltruismHealth Care Analysis 24 (3): 180-195. 2016.When it comes to caring about and helping those in need, our imaginations tend to be weak and our motivation tends to be parochial. This is a major moral problem in view of how much unmet need there is in the world and how much material capacity there is to address that need. With this problem in mind, the present paper will focus on genetic means to the enhancement of a moral capacity—a disposition to altruism—and of a cognitive capacity that facilitates use of the moral capacity: the ability t…Read more
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508Moral Vegetarianism from a Very Broad BasisJournal of Moral Philosophy 6 (2): 143-165. 2009.This paper defends a qualified version of moral vegetarianism. It defends a weak thesis and, more tentatively, a strong thesis, both from a very broad basis that assumes neither that animals have rights nor that they are entitled to equal consideration. The essay's only assumption about moral status, an assumption defended in the analysis of the wrongness of cruelty to animals, is that sentient animals have at least some moral status. One need not be a strong champion of animal protection, then,…Read more
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489Ethics of patient activation: exploring its relation to personal responsibility, autonomy and health disparitiesJournal of Medical Ethics 43 (10): 670-675. 2017.Discussions of patient-centred care and patient autonomy in bioethics have tended to focus on the decision-making context and the process of obtaining informed consent, leaving open the question of how patients ought to be counselled in the daily maintenance of their health and management of chronic disease. Patient activation is an increasingly prominent counselling approach and measurement tool that aims to improve patients’ confidence and skills in managing their own health conditions. The st…Read more
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427Nonhuman Primates, Human Need, and Ethical ConstraintsHastings Center Report 46 (4): 27-28. 2016.“The Ethics of Infection Challenges in Primates,” by Anne Barnhill, Steven Joffe, and Franklin Miller, is an exceptionally timely contribution to the literature on animal research ethics. Animal research has long been both a source of high hopes and a cause for moral concern. When it comes to infection challenge studies with nonhuman primates, neither the hope—to save thousands of human lives from such diseases as Ebola and Marburg—nor the concern—the conviction that primates deserve especially …Read more
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407Animal rights: a very short introduction (edited book)Oxford University Press. 2002.This volume provides a general overview of the basic ethical and philosophical issues of animal rights. It asks questions such as: Do animals have moral rights? If so, what does this mean? What sorts of mental lives do animals have, and how should we understand welfare? By presenting models for understanding animals' moral status and rights, and examining their mental lives and welfare, David DeGrazia explores the implications for how we should treat animals in connection with our diet, zoos, an…Read more
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354Modal Personhood and Moral Status: A Reply to Kagan's ProposalJournal of Applied Philosophy 33 (1): 22-25. 2015.Kagan argues that human beings who are neither persons nor even potential persons — if their impairment is independent of genetic constitution — are modal persons: individuals who might have been persons. Moreover, he proposes a view according to which both personhood and modal personhood are sufficient for counting more, morally, than nonhuman animals. In response to this proposal, I raise one relatively minor concern about Kagan's reasoning — that he judges too quickly that insentient beings c…Read more
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338Is it wrong to impose the Harms of human life? A reply to BenatarTheoretical Medicine and Bioethics 31 (4): 317-331. 2010.Might it be morally wrong to procreate? David Benatar answers affirmatively in Better Never to Have Been , arguing that coming into existence is always a great harm. I counter this view in several ways. First, I argue against Benatar’s asserted asymmetry between harm and benefit—which would support the claim that any amount of harm in a human life would make it not worth starting—while questioning the significance of his distinction between a life worth starting and one worth continuing. I furth…Read more
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335The Case for Moderate Gun ControlKennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 24 (1): 1-25. 2014.In addressing the shape of appropriate gun policy, this essay assumes for the sake of discussion that there is a legal and moral right to private gun ownership. My thesis is that, against the background of this right, the most defensible policy approach in the United States would feature moderate gun control. The first section summarizes the American gun control status quo and characterizes what I call “moderate gun control.” The next section states and rebuts six leading arguments against this …Read more
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300Handguns, Moral Rights, and Physical SecurityJournal of Moral Philosophy 11 (1): 56-76. 2014.Guns occupy a major—sometimes terrible—place in contemporary American life. Do Americans have not only a legal right, but also a moral right, to own handguns? After introducing the topic, this paper examines what a moral right to private handgun ownership would amount to. It then elucidates the logical structure of the strongest argument in favor of such a right, an argument that appeals to physical security, before assessing its cogency and identifying two questionable assumptions. In light of …Read more
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280The Ethics of Animal Research: What Are the Prospects for Agreement?Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 8 (1): 23-34. 1999.Few human uses of nonhuman animals have incited as much controversy as the use of animals in biomedical research. The political exchanges over this issue tend to produce much more heat than light, as representatives of both biomedicine and the animal protection community accuse opponents of being and the like. However, a healthy number of individuals within these two communities offer the possibility of a more illuminating discussion of the ethics of animal research
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274Human Identity and BioethicsCambridge University Press. 2005.When philosophers address personal identity, they usually explore numerical identity: what are the criteria for a person's continuing existence? When non-philosophers address personal identity, they often have in mind narrative identity: Which characteristics of a particular person are salient to her self-conception? This book develops accounts of both senses of identity, arguing that both are normatively important, and is unique in its exploration of a range of issues in bioethics through the l…Read more
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259Special Section: Moving Forward in Animal Research Ethics Guest Editorial Reassessing Animal Research EthicsCambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 24 (4): 385-389. 2015.Animal research has long been a source of biomedical aspirations and moral concern. Examples of both hope and concern are abundant today. In recent months, as is common practice, monkeys have served as test subjects in promising preclinical trials for an Ebola vaccine or treatment 1 , 2 , 3 and in controversial maternal deprivation studies. 4 The unresolved tension between the noble aspirations of animal research and the ethical controversies it often generates motivates the present issue of the…Read more
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243Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status (edited book)Cambridge University Press. 1996.Transcending the overplayed debate between utilitarians and rights theorists, the book offers a fresh methodological approach with specific constructive conclusions about our treatment of animals. David DeGrazia provides the most thorough discussion yet of whether equal consideration should be extended to animals' interests, and examines the issues of animal minds and animal well-being with an unparalleled combination of philosophical rigor and empirical documentation. This book is an important …Read more
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223Animal ethics around the turn of the twenty-first centuryJournal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 11 (2): 111-129. 1998.A couple of decades after becoming a major area of both public and philosophical concern, animal ethics continues its inroads into main- stream consciousness. Increasingly, philosophers, ethicists, professionals who use animals, and the broader public confront specific ethical issues regarding human use of animals as well as more fundamental questions about animals’ moral status. A parallel, related development is the explo- sion of interest in animals’ mental lives, as seen in exciting new work…Read more
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211The Ethics of Confining Animals: From Farms to Zoos to Human HomesIn Beauchamp Tom & Frey R. G. (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Animal Ethics,, Oxford University Press. 2011.This article examines basic interests that animals have in liberty—the absence of external constraints on movement. It takes liberty to be a benefit for sentient animals that permits them to pursue what they want and need. Obviously farms, zoos, pets in homes, animals for sale in stores, circuses, and laboratories all involve forms of confinement that restrict liberty. The discussion aims to know the conditions, if there are any, under which such liberty-limitation is morally justified. It first…Read more
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204Moral Status As a Matter of Degree?Southern Journal of Philosophy 46 (2): 181-198. 2008.Some people contend that fetuses have moral status but less than that of paradigm persons. Many people hold views implying that sentient animals have moral status but less than that of persons. These positions suggest that moral status admits of degrees. Does it? To address this question, we must first clarify what it means to speak of degrees of moral status. The paper begins by clarifying the more basic concept of moral status and presenting two models of degrees of moral status. It then sketc…Read more
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201Moral enhancement, freedom, and what we (should) value in moral behaviourJournal of Medical Ethics 40 (6): 361-368. 2014.The enhancement of human traits has received academic attention for decades, but only recently has moral enhancement using biomedical means – moral bioenhancement (MB) – entered the discussion. After explaining why we ought to take the possibility of MB seriously, the paper considers the shape and content of moral improvement, addressing at some length a challenge presented by reasonable moral pluralism. The discussion then proceeds to this question: Assuming MB were safe, effective, and univers…Read more
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189Genetic enhancement, post-persons and moral status: a reply to BuchananJournal of Medical Ethics 38 (3): 135-139. 2012.Responding to several leading ideas from a paper by Allen Buchanan, the present essay explores the implications of genetic enhancement for moral status. Contrary to doubts expressed by Buchanan, I argue that genetic enhancement could lead to the existence of beings so superior to contemporary human beings that we might aptly describe them as post-persons. If such post-persons emerged, how should we understand their moral status in relation to ours? The answer depends in part on which of two gene…Read more
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182Human-animal chimeras: Human dignity, moral status, and species prejudiceMetaphilosophy 38 (2-3). 2007.The creation of chimeras by introducing human stem cells into nonhu- man animals has provoked intense concerns. Addressing objections that appeal to human dignity, I focus in this essay on stem cell research intended to generate human neurons in Great Apes and rodents. After considering samples of dignity- based objections from the literature, I examine the underlying assumption that nonhuman animals have lower moral status than personsFwith particular attention to what it means to speak of high…Read more
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178Enhancement technologies and human identityJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 30 (3). 2005.As the President's Council on Bioethics emphasized in a recent report, rapid growth of biotechnologies creates increasingly many possibilities for enhancing human traits. This article addresses the claim that enhancement via biotechnology is inherently problematic for reasons pertaining to our identity. After clarifying the concept of enhancement, and providing a framework for understanding human identity, I examine the relationship between enhancement and identity. Then I investigate two identi…Read more
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169The harm of death, time-relative interests, and abortionPhilosophical Forum 38 (1). 2007.Regarding the sinking lifeboat scenario involving several human beings and a dog, nearly everyone agrees that it is right to sacrifice the dog. I suggest that the best explanation for this considered judgment, an explanation that appears to time-relative interests, contains a key insight about prudential value. This insight, I argue, also provides perhaps the most promising reply to the future-like-ours argument, which is widely regarded as the strongest moral argument against abortion. Providin…Read more
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148Advance Directives, Dementia, and 'The Someone Else Problem'Bioethics 13 (5): 373-391. 1999.Advance directives permit competent adult patients to provide guidance regarding their care in the event that they lose the capacity to make medical decisions. One concern about the use of advance directives is the possibility that, in certain cases in which a patient undergoes massive psychological change, the individual who exists after such change is literally a (numerically) distinct individual from the person who completed the directive. If this is true, there is good reason to question the…Read more
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136Social Ethics Morality & Social Policy 8th EditionMcGraw-Hill. 2012.With an assortment of readings and perspectives from some of the most respected thinkers of our time, Social Ethics: Morality and Social Policy provides a balanced, engaging introduction to today’s most pressing social and moral problems. This highly popular anthology illuminates the issues at the heart of each contemporary problem and encourages critical, fair-minded examination of varying viewpoints―all presented in the words of those who embrace them. Helpful editorial features include substa…Read more
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134Pain, suffering, and anxiety in animals and humansTheoretical Medicine and Bioethics 12 (3). 1991.We attempt to bring the concepts of pain, suffering, and anxiety into sufficient focus to make them serviceable for empirical investigation. The common-sense view that many animals experience these phenomena is supported by empirical and philosophical arguments. We conclude, first, that pain, suffering, and anxiety are different conceptually and as phenomena, and should not be conflated. Second, suffering can be the result — or perhaps take the form — of a variety of states including pain, anxie…Read more
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National Institutes of HealthResearcher
Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Applied Ethics |
Meta-Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Areas of Interest
Philosophy of Mind |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |
20th Century Philosophy |