In ethical discussions, we are often quick to lambast advertisements for the way in which they can subvert the consumer’s autonomy. It is certainly true, as other posts on this blog record, that some advertisements aim to intentionally deceive consumers, and to manipulate their preferences in a manner which can serve to undermine their autonomy.Read More »Advertising, Autonomy and Breastfeeding: Some Reflections.
CERN’s recent discovery of a particle consistent with the long sought-after Higgs boson has been hailed as a momentous achievement in physics. According to press releases, the finding provides substantial support for the standard model of the universe, since it explains why the particles proposed by the standard model should have mass. Although the complex physics underlying this explanation may be beyond non-physicists (such as myself), even we lay-people can understand that this finding represents a huge step forward in our understanding of the universe.Read More »Mind Over ‘Dark’ Matter – The Higgs-Boson & The Value of Theoretical Academic Enquiry
Yesterday, with the help of first lady Michelle Obama, the Walt Disney Company announced that from 2015, it will no longer allow the advertisement of junk food on its media outlets (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-18336478). This announcement has been lauded by those who are alarmed by the colossal statistics regarding childhood obesity in the USA. Mrs. Obama herself hailed the initiative as a “game changer”.
The USA (but not only the USA) is facing an epidemic of childhood obesity. 17% of all children and adolescents in the USA are clinically obese, triple the rate of what it was one generation ago (http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/childhood/index.html). This percentage might even be higher according to a recent study (http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0033308). Given the numerous health problems associated with obesity, this is clearly a cause for grave concern.Read More »Banning Junk Food Ads On Disney Media Outlets: A “Game-Changer”, or a Mickey Mouse Measure?
On Monday, the state of Kansas in the USA passed an anti-abortion bill which includes several morally controversial measures (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/04/kansas-abortion-bill_n_1478706.html). One measure receiving a great deal of media attention is the provision to prohibit tax deductions for abortion insurance coverage, thus making a women’s ability to have an abortion far more dependent on her socio-economic status. This is of course an important issue, but I shall address an aspect of the bill which I find even more disagreeable.Read More »The Kansas Anti-Abortion Bill: An Affront to Autonomy
