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A third MRT-baby is on its way
Written by César Palacios-González It has been recently reported (link in Spanish) that a 32 year old Greek woman is 27 weeks pregnant with a child who was conceived after a mitochondrial replacement technique (MRT) – in this case Maternal Spindle Transfer (MST). If true this is really big news in terms of reproductive medicine and…
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Cross Post: Biased Algorithms: Here’s a More Radical Approach to Creating Fairness
Written by Dr Tom Douglas Our lives are increasingly affected by algorithms. People may be denied loans, jobs, insurance policies, or even parole on the basis of risk scores that they produce. Yet algorithms are notoriously prone to biases. For example, algorithms used to assess the risk of criminal recidivism often have higher error rates in…
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Cross Post: Philosophy Can Make the Previously Unthinkable Thinkable
Written by Dr Rebecca Brown In the mid-1990s, Joseph Overton, a researcher at the US think tank the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, proposed the idea of a ‘window’ of socially acceptable policies within any given domain. This came to be known as the Overton window of political possibilities. The job of think tanks, Overton…
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Is Addiction an Expression of One’s Deep Self?
By Doug McConnell Chandra Sripada (2016) has recently proposed a conative self-expression account of moral responsibility which claims that we are responsible for actions motivated by what we care for and not responsible for actions motivated solely by other desires. He claims that this account gives us the intuitively correct answers when used to assess…
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Reversibility, Colds, and Neurosurgery
By Jonny Pugh This blog was originally published on the Journal of Medical Ethics Blog Happy new year to readers of the blog! I always approach the new year with some trepidation. This is not just due to the terrible weather, or even my resolution to take more exercise (unfortunately in the aforementioned terrible…
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Human In Vitro Gametogenesis and the Same-Sex Marriage Debate
Written by César Palacios-González It seems that in the not-so-distant future, scientists will be able to create functional human gametes (i.e. eggs and sperm) in a laboratory setting. In other words, they will be able to create human gametes outside of the human body. And just as there is in vitro fertilization (IVF), there will…
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Abortion: a Law Unto Itself
By Charles Foster Wrongful life cases (typically where a birth has resulted from a failed sterilisation procedure), used to be big business. The parents would sue the negligent steriliser for the costs of bringing up the unwanted child. There was always something distasteful about parents unwishing their child, and this distaste found legal expression…
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Baby, It’s Cold Outside
By Mackenzie Graham In late November, a radio station in Cleveland Ohio announced it would be removing the song ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ from its holiday playlist, in response to listener complaints. Several other radio stations followed, including Canadian broadcasters Bell Media, CBC Radio and Rogers Media. These decisions proved divisive among listeners, however, with…
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Should we Believe in Santa Claus?
Written by Alberto Giubilini Oxford Martin School and Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities University of Oxford As we all know, Santa Claus is a good and benevolent old chap: he brings presents and tries the best he can to fulfil children’s wishes. But he is also fair: he only brings presents to those…