-
What is a pet worth?
by Russell Powell Imagine that you leave your sprightly canine companion to the vet for a routine teeth cleaning, only to learn that due to spectacular negligence on the part of the veterinary staff, he was confused for another terminally ill dog and was accidentally ‘euthanized.’ Imagine another even more horrific scenario, in which a
-
Why god isn’t really a teapot.
By Lisa Furberg Russell’s teapot is an analogy intended to refute the idea that the burden of proof lies upon the sceptic to disprove the existence of god. The argument roughly goes something like this: If I were to claim that there is a teapot revolving about the sun and then further suggest that…
-
Trolleyology
In the October edition of Prospect magazine, Practical ethics blogger David Edmonds provides an accessible and thoughtful insight into "Trolley problems"
-
Could a ban on homebirth be justified?
Agnes Gereb, a midwife in Hungary, has been imprisoned for performing home births http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/oct/22/hungary-midwife-agnes-gereb-home-birth. She faces various charges, including negligent malpractice and manslaughter (relating to a homebirth in which the baby died after a difficult labour). While home birth is theoretically legal in Hungary, in practice independent Hungarian midwives are not certified as being able
-
Inviting invasion: deep space advertisments and planetary security
The Register warns that Dixons risks future of humanity with Star Wars-themed ads: the electronics chain, not satisfied with merely human customers also as a publicity stunt broadcast its ads into deep space, presumably for aliens to receive. This is done using the firm Deep Space Communications Network, who offers to beam messages into space
-
Are some temperaments “better” than others?
by Alexandre Erler Jerome Kagan’s latest book, The Temperamental Thread, is – as usual with Kagan – a fascinating read. It draws on the three decades of research done by Kagan on the topic of human temperament. In a famous series of studies, Kagan examined the way infants reacted to unfamiliar or unexpected events. He
-
Is professional integrity a futile argument?
by Dominic Wilkinson In an earlier post this week I argued that there are only two substantive reasons for doctors not to provide treatment that they judge futile – either on the basis of a judgement that treatment would harm the patient (a form of paternalism), or on the basis that providing treatment would harm
-
Break my bones, but don’t let me die! Should doctors provide ‘futile’ CPR?
by Dominic Wilkinson Two recent cases in a Toronto hospital illustrate a dilemma that hospital doctors face all too frequently. What should they do if patients or their representatives insist on treatment that the doctor believes would be futile? Should they just go along with the patient despite their misgivings? Alternatively, should they unilaterally withhold
-
Counterfeit Placebos
Last week it was reported that police in Bangladesh had made a major bust at a factory that was producing counterfeit homeopathic drugs. The counterfeiters were attaching the labels of other drug producers to the remedies they were producing in their own factory. Dhaka’s Daily Star reported the bust with the rather ironic headline “Fake…
-
Is Low Libido a Brain Disorder?
by Julian Savulescu Update: The same misunderstandings are still in evidence, 2 years on (May 2012), for example: ‘Brain circuitry different for women with anorexia, obesity’ Having started to work in the field of neuroethics a couple of years ago, I have become staggered by the misunderstanding of what neuroscience can tell us. The best example is