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5Disability Bioethics, Social Inclusion, and Whole-Eye TransplantationAmerican Journal of Bioethics 24 (5): 85-87. 2024.Matteo Laspro et al. (2024) provide a thought-provoking review of the ethical issues surrounding Whole-Eye Transplantation (WET). In this commentary, we expand on three of the concerns they raise i...
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11Accommodating Dory, but Disempowering Dopey? Dilemmas of Disability from Snow White to Finding DoryIn Richard B. Davis (ed.), Disney and Philosophy, Wiley. 2019-10-03.In the author's dual identities of Disney fanatic and philosopher of disability, he was as delighted as a five‐year‐old on their first trip to the Magic Kingdom to see the progress that Disney had made in Finding Dory by depicting what philosophers call the social model of disability. In contrast to the social model of disability, people often see the medical model, in which disability is understood as an individual problem to be remedied through medical treatment or charity. Not to get too far …Read more
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23Home Care in America: The Urgent Challenge of Putting Ethical Care into PracticeHastings Center Report 53 (3): 25-34. 2023.Home care is one of the fastest‐growing industries in the United States, providing valuable opportunities for millions of older adults and people with disabilities to live at home rather than in institutional settings. Home care workers assist clients with essential activities of daily living, but their wages and working conditions generally fail to reflect the importance of their work. Drawing on the work of Eva Feder Kittay and other care ethicists, we argue that good care involves attending t…Read more
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9Disability Bioethics and the “Liabilities” of Personal ExperienceAmerican Journal of Bioethics 23 (1): 31-33. 2023.In “Bioethics and the Moral Authority of Experience,” Ryan Nelson et al. (2022) argue that personal experience can simultaneously be an asset and a liability in the practice of bioethics and medici...
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24Serendipity and Social Justice: How Someone with a Physical Disability Succeeds in Clinical BioethicsNarrative Inquiry in Bioethics. forthcoming.Trainees with disabilities in health-related professions are often subjected to structural ableism in medicine: the discriminatory manifestation of lowered expectations towards people with disabilities by medical professionals. In this case study, I reflect on my experiences as the first individual with significant disabilities to be offered a postdoctoral fellowship in clinical bioethics at the National Institutes of Health. I focus on the following question: What arrangements need to be in pla…Read more
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5Mask Mandates and Dilemmas of Disability DifferenceHastings Center Report 52 (4): 4-5. 2022.A number of recent legal cases in the United States have considered both disability‐based exceptions to Covid‐19‐related mask mandates and disability‐based claims to stronger masking rules in states restricting the abilities of local governments to enforce mask mandates. We argue that a proper legal and ethical analysis of such cases requires understanding the distinction between disability accommodations and disability modifications. Disability accommodations are individualized adjustments that…Read more
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4Universally Designed Urban Environments: “A Mindless Abuse of the Ideal of Equality” or a Matter of Social Justice?In Michael Nagenborg, Taylor Stone, Margoth González Woge & Pieter E. Vermaas (eds.), Technology and the City: Towards a Philosophy of Urban Technologies, Springer Verlag. pp. 177-200. 2021.In “Justice and Nature,” Thomas Nagel rejects the idea that social equality requires the universal design of urban environments to accommodate people with disabilities. Universal design is a movement in architecture and other arenas to minimize the need to provide individual accommodations for people with disabilities by designing environments that are accessible to a wide range of individuals. I advance that Nagel inappropriately categorizes universal design as a matter of humanitarianism or ch…Read more
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20Unlocking the Voices of Patients with Severe Brain InjuryNeuroethics 15 (1): 1-15. 2022.This paper critically examines whether patients with severe brain injury, who can only communicate through assistive neuroimaging technologies, may permissibly participate in medical decisions. We examine this issue in the context of a unique case study from the Brain and Mind Institute at the University of Western Ontario. First, we describe how the standard approach to medical decision making might problematically exclude patients with communication impairments secondary to severe brain injury…Read more
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28Paying Attention to the Mouse Behind the CurtainSocial Theory and Practice 47 (4): 687-715. 2021.Is it possible that justice requires giving people with disabilities like autism sufficient opportunities to pursue a flourishing life by promoting accessibility at theme parks and other places of public accommodation? I explore this question by analyzing the ethical issues at play in a series of disability lawsuits against Disney Parks and Resorts. Drawing on the work of Martha Nussbaum and Chiara Cordelli, I argue that Disney has an obligation of justice to provide these plaintiffs with their …Read more
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10Disability, Aging, and the Importance of Recognizing Social Supports in Medical Decision MakingAmerican Journal of Bioethics 21 (11): 1-3. 2021.The two target articles in this issue draw an important connection between disability bioethics and geriatric bioethics. Dominic JC Wilkinson makes a pragmatic case for using frailty as a fa...
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29Paying Attention to the Mouse Behind the CurtainSocial Theory and Practice 47 (4): 687-715. 2021.Is it possible that justice requires giving people with disabilities like autism sufficient opportunities to pursue a flourishing life by promoting accessibility at theme parks and other places of public accommodation? I explore this question by analyzing the ethical issues at play in a series of disability lawsuits against Disney Parks and Resorts. Drawing on the work of Martha Nussbaum and Chiara Cordelli, I argue that Disney has an obligation of justice to provide these plaintiffs with their …Read more
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25Caring for People with Disabilities: An Ethics of RespectHastings Center Report 50 (1): 44-45. 2020.Eva Feder Kittay's Learning from My Daughter: The Value and Care of Disabled Minds is poised to make a major contribution to the disability literature and is likely to spark controversy among disability scholars. The book's central contribution is the articulation of an ethics of care for meeting the “genuine needs” and “legitimate wants” of people with disabilities or chronic illnesses. We applaud Kittay, who is the mother of a woman with cerebral palsy who has multiple physical and intellectua…Read more
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30Sexual Intimacy, Social Justice, and Severe DisabilitiesJournal of Philosophy, Science and Law 14 4-15. 2014.The 2012 film The Sessions tells the story of a man with polio who loses his virginity by undergoing Surrogate Partner Therapy (SPT). In light of ensuing controversy surrounding the legal and moral status of SPT, this article uses Norman Daniels’ framework of fair equality of opportunity in health to argue that SPT is a legitimate form of treatment for sexual dysfunctions and should be evaluated alongside other such treatments. I begin by showing how sexual dysfunctions constitute deviations in …Read more
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Stanford UniversityGraduate student
Stanford, California, United States of America
Areas of Interest
Normative Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |