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Engineering a Consensus: Edit Embryos for Research, Not Reproduction
Written by Dr Chris Gyngell, Dr Tom Douglas and Professor Julian Savulescu A crucial international summit on gene editing continues today in Washington DC. Organised by the US National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the U.K.’s Royal Society, the summit promises to be a pivotal point in the history of
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The Ethics of Genetically Modified Mosquitoes and Gene-Drive Technology
Written by Jonathan Pugh This is an unedited version of a paper by Dr Pugh which was originally published on The Conversation: please see here to read the original article In a startling development in ‘gene-drive’ technology, a team of researchers at the University of California have succeeded in creating hundreds of genetically modified mosquitoes that
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Podcast: Justifications for Non-Consensual Medical Intervention: From Infectious Disease Control to Criminal Rehabilitation
Dr Jonathan Pugh’s St Cross Special Ethics Seminar on 12 November 2015 is now available at http://media.philosophy.ox.ac.uk/uehiro/MT15_STX_Pugh.mp3 Speaker: Dr Jonathan Pugh Although a central tenet of medical ethics holds that it is permissible to perform a medical intervention on a competent individual only if that individual has given informed consent to that intervention, there are
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How much would you pay to live an extra year?
Dominic Wilkinson, University of Oxford @Neonatalethics Medical science continues to push at the boundaries of life and death with new drugs and technologies that can extend life or improve health. But these advances come at a cost. And that inevitably raises difficult questions about whether public health systems should pay for such treatments – and,
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Loebel Lecture 3 of 3: What is the upshot?
Lecture 3 Audio [MP3] | YouTube link [MP4] Grove Auditorium, Magdalen College, Longwall Street, Oxford 5 November 2015, 6-8pm
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Lecture 2 of 3: Science is quietly, inexorably eroding many core assumptions underlying psychiatry
Lecture 2 Audio [MP3] | YouTube link [MP4] Grove Auditorium, Magdalen College, Longwall Street, Oxford 4 November 2015, 6-8pm
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Loebel Lectures and Workshop, Michaelmas Term 2015, Lecture 1 of 3: Neurobiological materialism collides with the experience of being human
The 2015 Loebel Lectures in Psychiatry and Philosophy were delivered by Professor Steven E. Hyman, director of the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard as well as Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology. Both the lecture series and the one-day workshop proved popular
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Doping: Russian Cheats or a Failed System?
A stunning report from a WADA Commission, led by former head of WADA Dick Pound has made a series of allegations against Russian athletes and authorities, including that 1400 samples were deliberately destroyed ahead of a visit by WADA. It recommends the suspension of all Russian athletes over the period including the Rio Olympics, and
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Announcement: Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics
Graduate and undergraduate students currently enrolled at the University of Oxford in any subject are invited to enter the Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics by submitting an essay of up to 2000 words on any topic relevant to practical ethics. Eligibility includes visiting students who are registered as recognized students, and paying fees, but
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Pre-marital cohabitation endangers your marriage
By Charles Foster Marriage is not well served by its defenders. The loudest and best reported of them are often fundamentalist bigots. It’s a shame, for marriage has a lot going for it. Even if you think that marriage is an anachronistic/bourgeois/theologically contaminated institution, you’ll probably agree that the breakdown of marriages is best avoided.