Elizabeth Anderson’s Uehiro Lecture Summary: “Can We Talk – Communicating Moral Concern In An Era of Polarized Politics” – Lecture 1: What Has Gone Wrong?
It is something of an understatement to suggest that we are living through turbulent times. Society today is characterised not just by deep divisions about how to address key social challenges of our time, but also on the emphasis that shou…
Read MoreA Sad Victory
I recently watched the documentary AlphaGo, directed by Greg Kohs. The film tells the story of the refinement of AlphaGo—a computer Go program built by DeepMind—and tracks the match between AlphaGo and 18-time world champion in Go Lee Sedol…
Read MoreAn Ambitious Vision for Bioethics – Some Reflections on Professor Jing-Bao Nie’s St Cross Seminar
Written by Ben Davies Many readers of the Practical Ethics blog will remember the astounding announcement last November by Chinese researcher He Jiankui that he had used CRISPR-cas9 technology to edit into two healthy embryos a resistance t…
Read MoreDiet, Changing Desires, and Dementia
Written by Ben Davies Last week saw the launch of a campaign (run by the group Vegetarian For Life) that seeks to ensure that older people in care who have ethical commitments to a particular diet are not given food that violates those comm…
Read MoreTafida Raqeeb and Charlie’s Law
by Dominic Wilkinson Disputes between parents and doctors are back in the media. This morning, in the case of Tafida Raqeeb, the court concluded that her parents should be allowed to take her to Italy for continuing intensive care. In Tafid…
Read MorePress Release: Tafida Raqeeb: Right Outcome, Wrong Reasons
Written by Professor Julian Savulescu Dominic Wilkinson describes well the decision to allow a severely brain damaged girl, Tafida Raqeeb, to travel to Italy to continue to be kept alive with artificial ventilation. This is the right outcom…
Read MoreGuest Post: Introducing Charlie’s Law, Bambos Charalambous MP (Labour, Enfield Southgate)
Bambos Charalambous MP (Labour, Enfield Southgate) The tragic case of Charlie Gard, who sadly died in 2017 following a serious and protracted illness, attracted significant global attention because of the harrowing dilemmas that it highligh…
Read MorePress Release: Tafida Raqeeb
Professor Dominic Wilkinson, Professor of Medical Ethics, University of Oxford. Consultant Neonatologist This morning, the High Court judgement around medical treatment for five-year old Tafida Raqeeb was published. Tafida sustained …
Read MoreCross Post: Is Mandatory Vaccination the Best Way to Tackle Falling Rates of Childhood Immunisation?
Written by Dr Alberto Giubilini and Dr Samantha Vanderslott This article was originally published on the Oxford Martin School website. Following the publication of figures showing UK childhood vaccination rates have fallen for the fifth yea…
Read MoreThe Doctor-Knows-Best NHS Foundation Trust: a Business Proposal for the Health Secretary
By Charles Foster Informed consent, in practice, is a bad joke. It’s a notion created by lawyers, and like many such notions it bears little relationship to the concerns that real humans have when they’re left to themselves, but it creates …
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