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4The Obligation of EngagementHastings Center Report 53 (1): 2-2. 2023.As many in the United States feel a need to take a side in the ongoing culture wars, the people who make up the field of bioethics have an obligation to directly engage with those who hold different political views. If bioethics is an academic field, it must also affirm the overall values of the academy to continually challenge central assumptions. If the field wishes to be a part of the development of public policy, it must be able to construct such policies that in some fundamental manner hono…Read more
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The angels and devils of representing ProzacIn Michael J. Hyde & James A. Herrick (eds.), After the genome: a language for our biotechnological future, Baylor University Press. 2013.
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6An All-Too-Human EnterpriseAmerican Journal of Bioethics 22 (7): 33-35. 2022.On reading “Algorithms for Ethical Decision-Making in the Clinical: A Proof of Concept,” I imagined that for some the fundamental problem with the authors' approach is the very...
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Review: Toward the Hypercase; A Right to Die?: The Case of Dax Cowart (Videodisc) (review)Theoretical Medicine 18 (3): 308-318. 1997.
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4Toward the Polyphonic CaseHastings Center Report 49 (6): 10-12. 2019.Can one publish a bioethics case ethically? I suspect that most in bioethics would feel comfortable publishing a case if the subject—the patient—gave explicit permission, the amount of biographical information revealed was under the control of the subject, and the subject fully understood the benefits and risks of publishing the case. Some might add that the subject should have a chance to approve the final representation. I think that the ethics of publishing cases needs to be rethought. And th…Read more
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8On Cute Monkeys and Repulsive MonstersHastings Center Report 48 (6): 12-14. 2018.When I heard that a laboratory in China had cloned two long‐tailed macaques, I thought of Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein. When academics write about the novel, many point out that the reason the creature becomes a “monster” is not that he has any inherently evil qualities but that Victor Frankenstein, the creature's “mother,” immediately rejects him. All later problems can be traced to the fact that Frankenstein does not take responsibility for his creation. While I do not disagree with this,…Read more
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21Of course I am a relativist and so should you beAmerican Journal of Bioethics: Ajob 1 (4). 2000.
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5Against “We,” or an Argument for a Pluralistic Definition of Personhood in BioethicsAmerican Journal of Bioethics Neuroscience 8 (3): 173-174. 2017.
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12Demythologizing Bioethics: The American Monomyth in Clinical Ethics ConsultationsAmerican Journal of Bioethics 18 (6): 57-58. 2018.
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9Telos versus Praxis in BioethicsHastings Center Report 46 (5): 41-42. 2016.The authors of “A Conceptual Model for the Translation of Bioethics Research and Scholarship” argue that bioethics must respond to institutional pressures by demonstrating that it is having an impact in the world. Any impact, the authors observe, must be “informed” by the goals of the discipline of bioethics. The concept of bioethics as a discipline is central to their argument. They begin by citing an essay that Daniel Callahan wrote in the first issue of Hastings Center Studies. Callahan argue…Read more
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8Searching for Narrative and Narrative Ethics in Narrative BioethicsHastings Center Report 44 (3): 3-4. 2014.A commentary on a special report, titled Narrative Ethics: The Role of Stories in Bioethics, that appeared with the January‐February 2014 issue.
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18No Nazis, no space aliens, no slippery slopes and other rules of thumb for clinical ethics teachingJournal of Medical Humanities 16 (3): 189-200. 1995.
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16Root Metaphor and BioethicsPerspectives in Biology and Medicine 59 (3): 311-325. 2016.It is pictures rather than propositions, metaphors rather than statements, which determine most of our philosophical convictions. Bioethics has been particularly attentive to the role of metaphors in the discourse on moral issues in medicine. In The Physician’s Covenant, William May discusses how the various metaphors of the physician influence the manner in which we analyze problems in clinical ethics. Meaghan O’Keefe and colleagues have argued that particular metaphors dominate and in turn med…Read more
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32The Fiction of Bioethics: A PrécisAmerican Journal of Bioethics 1 (1): 40-43. 2001.Recently, bioethics has become interested in engaging with narrative, but in this engagement, narrative is usually viewed as a mere helpmate to philosophy. In this precis to his book The Fiction of Bioethics, Tod Chambers argues that narrative theory should not be simply a helpful addition to medical ethics but instead should be thought of as being as vital and important to the discipline as moral theory itself. The reason we need to rethink the relationship of medical ethics to narrative is tha…Read more
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36Review: Toward the hypercase; a right to die?: The case of Dax Cowart (videodisc) (review)Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 18 (3): 308-318. 1997.
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15Good guys don't wear whiteAmerican Journal of Bioethics 8 (7). 2008.Professors of philosophy do from time to time seek to wear the clothes of relevanceAlasdair MacIntyre (1984, 36)I recall one of the first bioethics conferences I ever attended. During the question–...
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44Practicing Euthanasia: The Perspective of PhysiciansJournal of Clinical Ethics 15 (3): 223-231. 2004.
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44Theory and the organic bioethicistTheoretical Medicine and Bioethics 22 (2): 123-134. 2001.This article argues for the importance of theoreticalreflections that originate from patients' experiences.Traditionally academic philosophers have linked their ability totheorize about the moral basis of medical practice to their roleas outside observer. The author contends that recently a new typeof reflection has come from within particular patientpopulations. Drawing upon a distinction created by AntonioGramsci, it is argued that one can distinguish the theorygenerated by traditional bioethi…Read more
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66David Barnard, Anna Towers, Patricia boston, and yAnna lambrinidou, crossing over: Narratives of palliative careTheoretical Medicine and Bioethics 22 (4): 369-373. 2001.