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Julian Savulescu

How Tony Nicklinson Already Has the Right to Die

According to a BBC report, Tony Nicklinson, 58, from Melksham, Wiltshire, has “locked-in syndrome” after a stroke in 2005 and “is unable to carry out his own suicide.” “He is seeking legal protection for any doctor who helps him end his life.”

In fact, it is not quite correct that Tony Nicklinson “is unable to carry out his own suicide.” He could at present refuse to eat food or drink fluids. Hunger strikers do this for political reasons. He could do it for personal reasons. People should not be force fed against their own autonomous wishes.

Now suppose that Tony did refuse to eat or drink, because he wanted to die because he found a life locked-in to be intolerable. He would die in weeks, perhaps less. Given that he will die, he should be given medical treatment to make his last weeks as comfortable as possible. He should be given sedation and analgesia. He could even be given such doses that render him unconscious.

Such a process already happens, int he UK, in a slightly different way. In the famous case of Tony Bland, law lords authorized the removal of a feeding tube that was keeping Tony Bland, who was permanently unconscious. They, his family and doctors all judged that continued life was not in his interests.

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Why Did the Journal Publish an Article Defending Infanticide?

[This is a revised version of the Editorial which appears on the JME home page. It will replace that version.] I am personally opposed to the legalisation of infanticide. However, as the Editor of the Journal I would like to explain why the Journal would publish an article defending infanticide. The ethical discussion of infanticide… Read More »Why Did the Journal Publish an Article Defending Infanticide?

Handling Editor Defends Decision: After – Birth Abortion

By: Prof. Kenneth Boyd, Revd Professor Emeritus of Medical Ethics, Associate Editor, JME

Coming up to me at a meeting the other day, an ethics colleague waved a paper at me. “Have you seen this ?”  she asked,  “It’s unbelievable!” The paper was ‘After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?” by two philosophers writing from Australia, Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva.

Well yes, I agreed, I had seen it: in fact I had been the editor responsible for deciding that it should be published in the Journal of Medical Ethics; and no, I didn’t think it was unbelievable, since I know that arguing strongly for a position with which many people will disagree and some even find offensive, is something that philosophers are often willing, and may even feel they have a duty, to do, in order that their arguments may be tested in the crucible of debate with other philosophers who are equally willing to argue strongly against them.  

Of course for that debate to take place in the Journal of Medical Ethics, many of whose readers, doctors and health care workers as well as philosophers, may well disagree, perhaps strongly, with the paper’s  arguments,  we needed first to make sure that the paper, like any other submitted to the Journal, was of sufficient academic quality for us to publish; and the normal way in which we determine this is to invite academics in relevant disciplines to review the paper critically for us, so that we can eventually make an informed decision about whether or not to publish it, either in its original or (as in this case) a form revised in the light of the reviewers’ reports.

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“Liberals Are Disgusting”: In Defence of the Publication of “After-Birth Abortion”

Editorial note: John Harris has responded to this post to clarify his position on infanticide. You can find the relevant post here.

The Journal of Medical Ethics prepublished electronically an article by Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva entitled “After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?”

This article has elicited personally abusive correspondence to the authors, threatening their lives and personal safety. The Journal has received a string abusive emails for its decision to publish this article. This abuse is typically anonymous.

I am not sure about the legality of publishing abusive threatening anonymous correspondence, so I won’t repeat it here. But fortunately there is plenty on the web to choose from. Here are some responses:

“These people are evil. Pure evil. That they feel safe in putting their twisted thoughts into words reveals how far we have fallen as a society.”

“Right now I think these two devils in human skin need to be delivered for immediate execution under their code of ‘after birth abortions’ they want to commit murder – that is all it is! MURDER!!!”

“I don‘t believe I’ve ever heard anything as vile as what these “people” are advocating. Truly, truly scary.”

“The fact that the Journal of Medical Ethics published this outrageous and immoral piece of work is even scarier”

(Comments selected from The Blaze, which features the article as a news item )

As Editor of the Journal, I would like to defend its publication. The arguments presented, in fact, are largely not new and have been presented repeatedly in the academic literature and public fora by the most eminent philosophers and bioethicists in the world, including Peter Singer, Michael Tooley and John Harris in defence of infanticide, which the authors call after-birth abortion.

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Vegetarians Have Moral Obligation to Eat “Frankenmeat”

The Daily Telegraph reports:

Prof Mark Post, of Maastricht University in the Netherlands, yesterday announced the world’s first test tube hamburger would be served up in October. Heston Blumenthal, the experimental chef, will cook the patty grown in a lab from a cow’s stem cells. Each portion will cost £220,000, but Prof Post hopes if the burger is a success he can develop the technology on an industrial scale.

“This is meat produced without the cruelty, carbon footprint or waste of resources,” said Alistair Currie, a spokesman for the vegan campaign group.
“It’s a hugely beneficial development for animals. We welcome this development, which shows this is a viable idea.”

He added the charity had no ethical objections to the fact that the test-tube patty will technically be a meat product.
He said: “Peta [People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals] has no objection to the eating of meat. Peta objects to the killing of animals and their exploitation. I personally don’t fancy eating this, but if other people do that’s fine.”

Even though Mr Currie doesn’t fancy eating Frankenmeat, he has a moral obligation to do so. It is not just other people who should eat this meat, vegans also have a moral obligation to eat it. Here is why.

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EVENT: Neuroethics Seminar: Two Lectures in Neuroethics

5.30 p.m. – 6.40 p.m. Monday 27 February Seminar Room 1, Oxford Martin School, 34 Broad St (http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/contact/) The session will comprise two brief lectures with q and a: Prof. Neil  Levy Resource depletion: the duration of impairment Neil Levy is Deputy Director (Research) of the Oxford Centre for Neuroethics, and Head of Neuroethics at… Read More »EVENT: Neuroethics Seminar: Two Lectures in Neuroethics

EVENT: Wellcome Lecture in Neuroethics: Neural chemical systems mediate social behaviour in the ‘Tragedy of the Commons’: implications for ethics and the clinic.

Prof. Robert Rogers, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, Senior Research Fellow, Jesus College Oxford 29 February, 5.30 p.m. Seminar Room 1, Oxford Martin School, 34 Broad Street (Map: http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/contact/) Recent research has highlighted the role of neurochemical systems, such as serotonin and oxytocin, in the expression of value-laden behaviours involving ‘trust’ or ‘fairness’, in dyadic exchanges… Read More »EVENT: Wellcome Lecture in Neuroethics: Neural chemical systems mediate social behaviour in the ‘Tragedy of the Commons’: implications for ethics and the clinic.

Contador’s Ban: The Death of Cycling?

Over 18 months after the race, Contador has been stripped of his 2010 Tour de France title, and banned for 2 years by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, making Andy Schleck the winner of the 2010 race.

The ban is punishment for the traces of clenbuterol, an anabolic steroid were found in his blood. Initially  cleared by the Royal Spanish Cycling Federation back in February 2011, Contador blamed the traces on contaminated meat brought in by a friend- indeed the traces were small- 40 times lower than the minimum rate WADA insists labs must be able to register to gain accredited status. However, it is possible that Contador was blood doping using blood taken during a training phase that had been insufficiently washed, leaving traces of steroids behind. Plasticizers were also found in his blood and can be a sign of IV usage, though the doctor who invented the test believes these tests may not yet be legally binding. Floyd Landis was also excluded with a similar pattern of steroid detected during the final stages of the race, probably as a result of contaminated blood doping.

Eddy Merckx said to Eurosport: “Sad for him and cycling. I think someone wants the death of cycling. We’re going too far”

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Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation: Fundamental enhancement for humanity?

The idea of a simple, cheap and widely available device that could boost brain function sounds too good to be true.

Yet promising results in the lab with emerging ‘brain stimulation’ techniques, though still very preliminary, have prompted Oxford neuroscientists to team up with leading ethicists at the University to consider the issues the new technology could raise.

Recent research in Oxford and elsewhere has shown that one type of brain stimulation in particular, called transcranial direct current stimulation or TDCS, can be used to improve language and maths abilities, memory, problem solving, attention, even movement.

Critically, this is not just helping to restore function in those with impaired abilities. TDCS can be used to enhance healthy people’s mental capacities. Indeed, most of the research so far has been carried out in healthy adults.

More details from Oxford Press Release

My Comment:

This research cuts to core of humanity: the capacity to learn. The capacity to learn varies across people, across ages and with illness. Enhancing the capacity to learn of children and adults, with impairments and without. The ability to learn is a basic human good. This kind of technology enables people to get more out of the work they put into learning something.
 
This is a first step down the path of maximizing human potential. It is a very exciting development. We need to control the release of the genie. Although this looks like a simple external device, it acts by affecting the brain. That could have very good effects, but unpredictable side effects. We should aim to do better than we have with the development of pharmaceuticals. We should learn from our mistakes over the last forty years.
 
Of course, as with any powerful technology, not only is there the possibility of great benefit, there is potential for misuse and abuse. This has been used in other experiments to improve ability to lie.

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Conjoined Twins: Who Should Live and Who Should Die?

A 23 – year old has given birth to conjoined twins in Brazil. The two boys have separate brains and spinal columns, but share other major organs, including heart, lungs and liver.
 
The twins, who have dicephalic parapagus, an extremely rare disorder, are in a stable condition, and there are no current plans to surgically separate them. Doctor Neila Dahas of Santa Casa de Misericordia Hospital, where they are currently under care and observation, said, “it is impossible to take a decision with relation to surgery, not only because of physical reasons, but ethical ones as well.”

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