Do we have a right to drink? On Australian thugs and French hedonists
It has been an interesting week awaiting the announced reforms on the alcohol laws in New South Wales, Australia. After another incident with alcohol fuelled violence where a young boy died due to an unprovoked single punch, the family of t…
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Marathon mice, enhancement and the will to work out
In his article in the Pacific Standard last week, author Bruce Grierson discusses the emerging scientific evidence that the ‘will to work out’ might be genetically determined. Grierson describes a ‘marathon mouse’, the descendant of a long …
Read MoreThe Texan flautist and the fetus
Imagine that when you woke up this morning, you found yourself lying next to an unconscious stranger. The stranger has a rare life-threatening illness, and unbeknownst to you he was plugged in to your organs during the night. You are now st…
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The incoherence of Obama’s position on marijuana
U.S. President Barack Obama’s recent interview in the New Yorker was surprisingly interesting. While some have noted his disapproval towards a (hypothetical) son playing pro football out of concussion concerns, the more remarkab…
Read MoreDoctors: turn off your computer and listen to your gut
‘Between the NHS and social care, there must be total commitment to ensuring that interaction is paperless, and that, with a patient’s consent, their full medical history can follow them around the system seamlessly.‘ So said Je…
Read MoreComputer consciousness and ethics
Nature, the prestigious international science journal, often publishes short science fiction stories in a column called “Futures.” According to Nature, “Featuring short stories from established authors and those just beginning their writing…
Read MoreThree Arguments Against the Belgian Child Euthanasia Bill Criticised
By Luke J Davies. Follow Luke on Twitter. Last week the upper house of the Belgian Federal Parliament voted (50 to 17) that euthanasia should be legal for children suffering from a terminal illness that is causing severe physical pain. [1] …
Read MoreKissing Grandparents and Consent
It has been reported that the co-ordinator of the Sex Education Forum in the UK has advocated that parents ought to refrain from forcing their child to kiss a grandparent against their will, since this could lead to confusion over sexual co…
Read MoreCan you be too ethical?
In a recent column in The Guardian, Andrew Brown argues that there are several ways in which one might, in a sense, be ‘too ethical’: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/27/can-you-be-too-ethical
Read MoreOppressing smokers for fun and profit
According to an article in the New England Journal of Medicine (Prabhat & Peto 2014), Tripling tobacco tax globally would cut smoking by a third, and prevent 200 million premature deaths this century from lung cancer and other diseases…
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