Should ‘Ecocide’ Be a Crime?
Today, my colleague Michael Mansfield QC appears in a mock trial in the Supreme Court that considers the crime of ‘ecocide’. The project is the brainchild of lawyer Polly Higgins. Ecocide is defined as: ‘The extensive damage, destruction to or loss of ecosystems of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants of that territory has been severely diminished.’ To me, creating some type of crime like this seems a no-brainer, but I think making this a crime in any meaningful sense will be particularly difficult.
Is a child a blessing?
By Charles Foster
Three years ago Ana Mejia bore a son, Bryan Santana. To her surprise he had no arms and only one leg. I should have been warned about this, she recently told a Florida court. It was negligent not to warn me. Had I been warned, I would have had an abortion. She asked the court for $9 million compensation. The jury gave her $4.5 million.
The disability rights lobby is predictably outraged. Why, they say, should it be presumed (as it clearly is), that a disabled person’s life isn’t worth living?
If that is Ana Mejia’s presumption, then (at least in relation to a child as relatively mildly disabled as Bryan) it is plainly reprehensible. I don’t know her motivation, but I doubt that she saw it that way. Many parents in her situation (and this is a very common issue in medico-legal practice) don’t make their decisions on the basis of their child’s quality of life at all. A much commoner thought is: ‘A disabled child will disrupt my own life. One of the purposes of pre-natal screening is to enable me to decline to bring into the world a child who does not fit with my ideas about how I should be living my life.’ I will call this thought the ‘pre-natal screening default thought’ (PNSD). Continue reading
Why Pro-Life Counsellors Ought to Lie
Those who are pro-choice often get frustrated by anti-abortion advocates, who are seen as using underhanded and immoral tactics to decrease numbers of abortions. These include presenting misleading information about abortions at their advice centres.
For example, it is claimed that some abortion counsellors show pictures of late-stage abortions when discussing early-stage abortions, exaggerate the trauma felt by people who have had abortions and assert that foetuses feel pain earlier than scientists believe they do. A large part of the opposition to the amendment proposed by Nadine Dorries , which would have prevented bodies which carry out abortions from counselling women, was that this might mean that more women would be counselled by anti-abortion groups who cannot be trusted to provide accurate information about abortion. I’m going to suggest that it is a mistake to think that anti-abortion advisors are failing morally by providing misleading information about abortions. Indeed, they might be failing morally if they did not do so. Continue reading
Unpalatable Theories about Falling Crime
The US crime rate continues to fall. There is no consensus why this is so, but there are a range of diverse theories, ranging from gun control, higher incarceration rates, the collapse of the crack cocaine epidemic, and ‘zero tolerance’ policing. While the diverse theories are interesting, so too are the different reactions that the theories provoke. Despite the difficulties in objectively assessing the theories, all theories are not equal: some are particularly unpalatable.
“Focus Pocus” and Beyond: consumer brain computer interfaces for health, self-improvement and fun
In September 2011 ,the most advanced computer game to use a consumer brain computer interface (BCI) will go on sale. Its name is Focus Pocus (see video trailer here, its awesome) and it is aimed at children with ADHD so that they might use gamification to train their brains to improve focus and impulse control.
The game is based on neurofeedback enabled by the use of the Neurosky dry-electrode EEG (Electro-EncephaloGram) headset, which anyone can purchase for under $100 (or 100 Euros if in Europe) Earlier this week, BBC2 did a special on the headset. The basic Idea is that the single electrode on the Neurosky headset (placed on the forehead) is able to pick up a few simple and characteristic brainwaves (created by activity in populations of neurons), some that have been shown to be enriched when the subject is awake and attentive (ex. Beta-waves), and some when the subject is relaxed (ex. alpha waves). Neurosky has developed algorithms to funnel these and other brain waves into measures of “focus” and “meditation.” Look here for more details on how it works.
Creating Non-Human People
Last week, the Academy of Medical Sciences released a report calling for better regulation of experiments involving animals containing human tissues or genes. One specific claim made by the report is that experiments which entail “modifying non-human primates to create human-like awareness or behaviour” should be banned. Was it right to call for such a ban? Continue reading
Sequel to ‘Human Centipede’ Refused Certification
The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) has refused to certify the sequel to the film the Human Centipede. I haven’t seen either film, though I was intrigued enough by the title of the first film to read the description when I was browsing in my local DVD store, though I immediately wished I hadn’t – it is pretty disturbing. The original story is of a surgeon who becomes obsessed with creating a ‘human centipede’ by attaching his victims together, mouth to anus.
The Savage in Us All
Many since the nineteenth century, including Ghandi and Churchill, have said that a society should be judged by how it treats its weakest members. They must be right – although of course it’s not the only relevant measure.
The Panorama programme which uncovered the systematic abuse of highly vulnerable people by staff at the Winterbourne View unit in Bristol provides good evidence that our society may be doing quite badly. The abuse is vicious and shocking. But it should not be surprising.
In 1971, Professor Philip Zimbardo, at Stanford University, carried out an experiment to study the psychological effects on human beings of becoming prisoners or prison guards. Here’s the description from Wikipedia (I know, I know…):
‘Twenty-four students were selected out of 75 to play the prisoners and live in a mock prison in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. Roles were assigned randomly. The participants adapted to their roles well beyond what even Zimbardo himself expected, leading the “Officers” to display authoritarian measures and ultimately to subject some of the prisoners to torture. In turn, many of the prisoners developed passive attitudes and accepted physical abuse, and, at the request of the guards, readily inflicted punishment on other prisoners who attempted to stop it. The experiment even affected Zimbardo himself, who, in his capacity as “Prison Superintendent,” lost sight of his role as psychologist and permitted the abuse to continue as though it were a real prison. Five of the prisoners were upset enough by the process to quit the experiment early, and the entire experiment was abruptly stopped after only six days.’
The course of the Stanford experiment is, of course, not an aberration. Countless other experiments, and indeed much of history, provide clear evidence that, if you give one group of human beings power over another, abuse – sometimes on a huge scale – is not unlikely to be the result.
What to do? In the case of care homes, I think it can help to consider which safeguards you would want in place if you were to end up in one (as any of us might, of course). For me, one part of the answer is simple: continual video monitoring and recording in all public spaces and audio in private (with consent where appropriate, of course). Human beings cannot be trusted, and it is time those who regulate, own, and run care homes woke up to that unpalatable fact.
Should we be able to know how long we have to live?
A new test, soon to become available to the general public in the UK, can tell people how fast they are aging, thereby allowing them to estimate their life expectancy. The test, which should be available for €500 (£435), is based on an analysis of the telomeres, small protective caps at the extremities of a person’s chromosomes. Short telomeres are associated with a shorter lifespan and indicate a more advanced biological age (by contrast with the person’s chronological age). The test has been described as opening an “ethical Pandora’s box”. Concerns have been raised regarding people’s possible reaction to information about how long they still have to live. Some are also worried that the test might be used by organizations selling dubious “anti-aging” remedies to attract potential customers, and that insurance companies might demand to have access to such information before providing cover, requiring people with shorter telomeres to pay higher premiums. Should the prospect of the public availability of such a test concern us, and should we try and restrict it?
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