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Religion, Tolerance and Intolerance Conference resources available online

Religion, Tolerance and Intolerance Conference resources available online

The AHRC-Funded 'Science and Religious Conflict' Project team here at Oxford (www.src.ox.ac.uk) is pleased to announce that resources from our recent conference on 'Religion, Tolerance and Intolerance', held at Oxford  17-19 May are now available online at http://www.bep.ox.ac.uk/archive_events_data/religion_and_tolerance_conference_may_2010 This includes audio files of all talks, and several PowerPoint presentations.The audio files are also available as podcasts from… Read More »Religion, Tolerance and Intolerance Conference resources available online

Whether to die, or when to die? The distinction between assisted suicide and ‘aid in dying’

Assisted suicide is illegal in the state of Connecticut. But two doctors have sought to circumvent the law by requesting that the administration of lethal agents to terminally ill patients be classed as “aid in dying” rather than assisted suicide. The doctors’ lawyers reportedly drew the distinction as follows:

"Suicide is a choice of whether to die or not. Aid in dying involves not whether a person will die, but when, and how much pain and suffering the patient must endure first."

The judge, Julia Aurigemma, rejected the request, arguing that the cases in question are precisely the sort of case to which the assisted suicide prohibition was intended to apply. But the question remains whether there is a meaningful distinction between assisted suicide and aid in dying, and if so, whether it is morally significant.

The distinction, as formulated by the lawyers, does seem clearly bogus. No-one yet faces choices about whether to die. All actions that might plausibly be classed as suicide are really decisions about the timing of death. But there does seem to be a genuine distinction lurking here somewhere.

Read More »Whether to die, or when to die? The distinction between assisted suicide and ‘aid in dying’

Oxford Debates — Performance-Enhancing Drugs Should be Allowed in Sport — Moderator’s Opening Statement

Oxford Online Debates

by Roger Crisp

Taking drugs to improve one’s sporting performance seems, on the face of it, a paradigmatic example of a wrong action. It combines two activities usually considered shameful: the use of banned substances, and cheating.

But on closer inspection the issue is more complicated. The use of some drugs, such as nicotine or caffeine (both of which might enhance performance in some cases), carries little or no stigma, and the charge of cheating would be inappropriate were the drugs in question explicitly permitted.

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Oxford Debates – Performance enhancing drugs should be allowed in sport – Opposer’s opening statement

Oxford Online Debates

by John William Devine

In just over two years the world’s elite athletes will descend on the U.K. for London 2012. Should these athletes be permitted to use performance enhancing drugs or should the fight to eliminate such drugs from sport continue? The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) maintains that the use of performance enhancing drugs (doping) is contrary to the ‘spirit of sport.' While WADA’s account of the spirit of sport is frustratingly underdeveloped, the idea that the purpose of sport provides reason to prohibit doping captures something important.

Read More »Oxford Debates – Performance enhancing drugs should be allowed in sport – Opposer’s opening statement

Oxford Debates – Performance enhancing drugs should be allowed in sport – Proposer’s opening statement

[This is the first post in the Trinity term Oxford University 
Online Debate. Feel free to comment on any of the debate either at this blog or over at the official debate website. Votes can be cast after the concluding statements – between 5th and 9th July]

by Julian Savulescu

Two great sporting events are about to commence. Le Tour de France and the Football World Cup. Doping will play a part in both of these. In every professional sport where doping could confer an advantage, there is doping. Even if it is not widespread and even if you don’t know about it.

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Torture, but do no harm

After the September 11 terrorist attacks, the Bush administration redefined acts that were previously recognised as torture and thus illegal as ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ (EITs). From then on subjecting detainees to, for example, forced nudity, sleep deprivation, waterboarding and exposure to extreme temperatures could be legal. The line between torture and EITs is a fine one: the classification depends on the level of pain experienced.  

A report issued by the advocacy group ‘Physicians for Human Rights’ has revealed that to ensure that the aggressive interrogation practices conducted by the CIA qualified as EITs they were monitored by doctors and other medical personnel who guaranteed that the legal threshold for  ‘severe physical and mental pain’ was not crossed (NY Times, 6 June 2010).

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The ethics of geoengineering – comments welcome

Should we encourage or avoid large scale environmental manipulation, for example in order to reduce climate change?

Measures such as carbon dioxide capture or ocean iron fertilisation have the potential to mitigate global warming, but what ethical issues are raised by these technologies? How should we take into account the potential risks of such measures, and how should they be weighed against the risks of inaction?

Read More »The ethics of geoengineering – comments welcome