Guest Post: No, We Don’t Owe It To The Animals to Eat Them
Written by Adrian Kreutz, New College, University of Oxford
That eating animals constitutes a harm has by now largely leaked into public opinion. Only rarely do meat eaters deny that. Those who deny it usually do so on the grounds of an assumed variance in consciousness or ability to suffer between human and non-human animals. Hardly anyone, however, has the audacity to argue that killing animals actually does them good, and that therefore we must continue eating meat and consuming animal products. Hardly anyone apart from UCL philosopher Nick Zangwill, that is, who in a recent article published in Aeon argues that “eating animals’ benefits animals for they exist only because human beings eat them”. One’s modus ponens is another’s modus tollens, right? Let me unpack and debunk his argument. Continue reading
Cross Post: Pig’s Heart Transplant: Was David Bennett the Right Person to Receive Groundbreaking Surgery?
Dominic Wilkinson, University of Oxford
The recent world-first heart transplant from a genetically modified pig to a human generated both headlines and ethical questions.
Many of those questions related to the ethics of xenotransplantation. This is the technical term for organ transplants between species. There has been research into this for more than a century, but recent scientific developments involving genetic modifications of animals to stop the organ being rejected appear to make this much more feasible.
Typical questions about xenotransplantation relate to the risks (for example, of transmitting infection), treatment of the animals, and the ethics of genetic modification of animals for this purpose. Continue reading
Cross Post: Selective lockdowns can be ethically justifiable – here’s why
Written by: Jonathan Pugh, Dominic Wilkinson, and Julian Savulescu
Some countries already have vaccine passport schemes to travel or enter certain public spaces. The passports treat those who have had vaccines – or have evidence of recent infection – differently from those who have not had a vaccine. But the proposed selective lockdowns would radically increase the scope of restrictions for the unvaccinated.
Lockdowns can be ethically justified where they are necessary and proportionate to achieve an important public health benefit, even though they restrict individual freedoms. Whether selective lockdowns are justified, though, depends on what they are intended to achieve. Continue reading
Responsibility and Victim-Blaming
Written by Dr Rebecca Brown
The recent sentencing of Wayne Couzens for the murder of Sarah Everard, along with the murder of Sabina Nessa last month, has prompted discussion in the UK of the prevalence of violence against women and the shortcomings of the criminal justice system. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has himself criticised the police for failing to take cases of violence against women sufficiently seriously. In particular, there has been outrage at comments made by some regarding steps women can take to ‘keep themselves safe’. Continue reading
We Should Vaccinate Children in High-income Countries Against COVID-19, Too
Written by Lisa Forsberg, Anthony Skelton, Isra Black
In early September, children in England, Wales and Northern Ireland are set to return to school. (Scottish schoolchildren have already returned.) Most will not be vaccinated, and there will be few, if any, measures in place protecting them from COVID-19 infection. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) have belatedly changed their minds about vaccinating 16- and 17-year olds against COVID-19, but they still oppose recommending vaccination for 12-15 year olds. This is despite considerable criticism from public health experts (here, here, and here), and despite the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) declaring COVID-19 vaccines safe and effective for children aged 12 and up—Pfizer/BioNTech in the beginning of June, and Moderna the other week.
In Sweden, children returned to school in the middle of August. As in the UK, children under 16 will be unvaccinated, and there will be few or no protective measures, such as improved ventilation, systematic testing, isolation of confirmed cases, and masking. Like the JCVI in the UK, Sweden’s Folkhälsomyndigheten opposes vaccination against COVID-19 for the under-16s, despite Sweden’s medical regulatory authority, Läkemedelsverket, having approved the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines for children from the age of 12. The European Medicines Agency approved Pfizer and Moderna in May and July respectively, declaring that any risks of vaccine side-effects are outweighed by the benefits for this age group.
Judgebot.exe Has Encountered a Problem and Can No Longer Serve
Written by Stephen Rainey
Artificial intelligence (AI) is anticipated by many as having the potential to revolutionise traditional fields of knowledge and expertise. In some quarters, this has led to fears about the future of work, with machines muscling in on otherwise human work. Elon Musk is rattling cages again in this context with his imaginary ‘Teslabot’. Reports on the future of work have included these replacement fears for administrative jobs, service and care roles, manufacturing, medical imaging, and the law.
In the context of legal decision-making, a job well done includes reference to prior cases as well as statute. This is, in part, to ensure continuity and consistency in legal decision-making. The more that relevant cases can be drawn upon in any instance of legal decision-making, the better the possibility of good decision-making. But given the volume of legal documentation and the passage of time, there may be too much for legal practitioners to fully comprehend.
No jab, no job? Vaccination requirements for care home staff
Written by Lisa Forsberg and Isra Black
Last night the Guardian was first to report that staff working in older adult care homes will be required to get vaccinated against Covid-19. According to BBC News, ‘Care staff are expected to be given 16 weeks to have the jab—or face being redeployed away from frontline care or losing their jobs’. This announcement follows news reports over the last few months that the government have been considering making Covid-19 vaccination mandatory for staff working in older adult care homes in England. As part of this process, an open consultation on vaccination for older adult care home staff was held in April and May of this year, to which we responded.
While we think a vaccination requirement for older adult care home staff may be a necessary and proportionate measure, we nevertheless have concerns about the government’s proposed policy.
Imposter Syndrome And Environmental Sampling
Written by Rebecca Brown
Imposter syndrome has received recent, though still fairly limited, philosophical discussion. Scholars such as Katherine Hawley (and, drawing upon Hawley in a recent and excellent podcast, Rebecca Roache), amongst a handful of others have illuminated issues such as how we can develop a useful definition of imposter syndrome, the extent to which imposter syndrome may be adaptive, and the relationship between imposter syndrome beliefs and rationality. I want to pick up on this last question and suggest a further way in which people might rationally adopt ‘imposter attitudes’.
Imposter syndrome, as described by Hawley, involves believing that the external markers of esteem and success one receives are undeserved, and feeling at risk of being exposed as a fraud. Imposter attitudes refer to the negative attitudes one might hold regarding one’s own ability. Hawley challenges the common assumption that those suffering from imposter syndrome are simply too unconfident. She describes how people might justifiably (though mistakenly) hold imposter attitudes as a result of ‘hostile social environments’. This includes, for instance, people who are less likely to receive positive feedback in their work environment, or have reason to believe that any positive feedback they receive is insincere. For such people, although they have some evidence of their talent (e.g. publishing papers or winning awards), they have other evidence that this could be undeserved (e.g. lack of positive feedback from colleagues). Hawley is particularly concerned about minority groups who she suggests are more likely to experience hostile social environments and feel like impostors. Continue reading
Cross Post: COVID: Is it OK to manipulate people into getting vaccinated?
Written by Maximilian Kiener, University of Oxford
When the doctor realised that he wouldn’t be able to dissuade her of her beliefs, he decided to present her with another one:
Have you considered the possibility that anti-vaccine propaganda could be an attempt by the Russians or the Chinese to weaken the health of the United States population?
The doctor deliberately deceived the woman and probably reinforced her belief in conspiracy theories by pretending to find them plausible himself. But the tactic worked. The mother consented to have her child vaccinated.
Right now, vaccination is key to overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic and regaining safe individual freedom. Yet a minority of people, like the woman in our example, still refuse vaccination on mistaken beliefs. But how far can we go to change their minds?
Would the doctor be justified in using similar tactics to make the woman consent to her own COVID-19 vaccination? Continue reading
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