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AbstractBioethics has dedicated itself to exploring and defending both reasons for and against certain aspects of clinical care, biomedical research and health policy, including what decisions must be made, who should make them, and how they should be made. In pediatrics, it’s widely acknowledged that parents’ reasons may matter pragmatically; attending to parents’ reasons is important if we want to work with families. Yet the conventional view in pediatric ethics is that parents’ reasons are irrelevant to whether a decision is permissible or impermissible according to accepted ethical standards. In this paper, we explore whether parents’ reasons matter ethically and, if so, in what way and for whom. First, we clarify what we mean by ‘reasons.’ Second, we provide an overview of how reasons are typically treated in medical decision-making and pediatric ethics. Third, we analyze a hypothetical pediatric case to illustrate how changing reasons can transform ethical analyses, including by contributing to where and how clinicians and ethicists draw the boundaries intrinsic to common pediatric ethical frameworks. We push back against the conventional view and argue that parents’ reasons matter ethically in several ways. We call for further research on the role of parents’ reasons in clinical ethics deliberation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the potential for bioethicists to leverage their unique institutional relationships to promote racial justice within healthcare systems and universities. Topics include the distinctive strengths and challenges of the bioethics field; the importance of self-education and long-term advocacy for marginalized populations; and the need for bioethicists to extend their influence beyond their discipline to effect meaningful change in broader medical and educational contexts.

The article examines the persistent ableist bias among bioethicists as revealed by the Views in Bioethics Survey, which shows a prevalent belief that blindness is inherently disadvantaging despite evidence to the contrary. Topics discussed include the discrepancy between bioethicists' views and the lived experiences of blind individuals, the persistent influence of the disability-as-deficit model, and the implications for addressing inequities in healthcare and telehealth accessibility.

The article examines the VIBeS project, which surveys the views and demographics of American bioethicists to understand their divergence from public opinions. Topics discussed include the implications of these divergences for bioethicists' practices, the philosophical debate on how to handle peer disagreement, and the potential need for bioethicists to adjust their views based on public sentiment.

The article highlights the disconnect between U.S. bioethicists' views and those of clinicians and the general public, noting that bioethicists are often less diverse and thus less representative of broader society. Topics discussed include the need for bioethicists to better align with public perspectives, the importance of increased diversity within the field, and the value of integrating real-world experiences into bioethical research.

The article compares two surveys on bioethicists' views, one focused on U.S. bioethicists, and another targeting a broader international audience. Topics discussed include the perception of disability (medical vs. social models), the ethics of abortion, and the differences in bioethical concerns between American and international scholars.

Experimental ethicists investigate traditional ethical questions with non-traditional means, namely with the methods of the empirical sciences. Studies in this area have made heavy use of philosophical thought experiments such as the well-known trolley cases. Yet, the specific function of these thought experiments within experimental ethics has received little consideration. In this paper we attempt to fill this gap. We begin by describing the function of ethical thought experiments, and show that these thought experiments should not only be classified according to their function but also according to their scope. On this basis we highlight several ways in which the use of thought experiments in experimental ethics can be philosophically relevant. We conclude by arguing that experimental philosophy currently only focuses on a small subcategory of ethical thought experiments and suggest a broadening of its research agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most jurisdictions that allow euthanasia and assisted suicide (AS) regulate it through the medical profession. However, the extent and nature of how medicine should be involved are debated. Swiss AS practice is unusual in that it is managed by lay AS organizations that rely on a law that permits AS when done for nonselfish reasons. Physicians are not mentioned in the law but are usually called upon to prescribe the lethal medications and perform capacity evaluations. We analyzed in-depth interviews of 23 Swiss AS experts including ethicists, lawyers, medical practitioners, and senior officials of AS organizations for their views on AS. Although there was agreement on some issues (e.g., need for better end-of-life care), the interviewees' preferred model for AS, and the nature of preferred medical involvement, varied, which we categorized into five types: preference for AS practice as it occurred prior to lay AS organizations; preference for the current lay model; preference for a modified lay model to increase autonomy protections while limiting medical AS normalization; preference for various types of more medicalized models of AS; and, ambivalence about any specific model of medical involvement. The rationales given for each type of model reflected varying opinions on how medicine's role would likely impact AS practice and demonstrated the experts' attitudes toward those impacts. The dynamics within the Swiss AS regime, as reflected in the varying views of Swiss AS experts, shed light on the dilemmas inherent to medical scope and involvement in AS, which may have implications for debates in other jurisdictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of personhood has been central to bioethics debates about abortion, the treatment of patients in a vegetative or minimally conscious states, as well as patients with advanced dementia. More recently, the concept has been employed to think about new questions related to human-brain organoids, artificial intelligence, uploaded minds, human-animal chimeras, and human embryos, to name a few. A common move has been to ask what these entities have in common with persons (in the normative sense), and then draw conclusions about what we do (or do not) owe them. This paper argues that at best the concept of "personhood" is unhelpful to much of bioethics today and at worst it is harmful and pernicious. I suggest that we (bioethicists) stop using the concept of personhood and instead ask normative questions more directly (e.g., how ought we to treat this being and why?) and use other philosophical concepts (e.g., interests, sentience, recognition respect) to help us answer them. It is time for bioethics to end talk about personhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The task of media ethicists is not only to shine a light on the dilemmas facing our field, but also to point out what the moral issues of the day are. Why is it that some cases and issues appear on our radar, in our textbooks, web sites and journals? Using the example of how the problematic nature of the Apu character in The Simpsons escaped the attention of this author and other media ethicists, this essay explores how media ethicists can be better aware of their own blind spots. Given our limited cognitive abilities and unconscious biases, I will argue that media ethicists could potentially benefit from the help of a theoretical media ethics moral machine (MeMorMach), especially in instances where they are unaware of the potential violation of an established norm. But when normative change occurs, such a device would be less useful in tracking this change and alerting them, especially to those adhering to a constructivist meta-ethical framework. The essay concludes with a call for media ethicists to pay attention to and assist so-called moral enquirers, advocates who, through personal engagement, enact normative change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the evolution of bioethics, emphasizing the need for a more diverse and inclusive field. Topics discussed include the historical diversity of early bioethicists, the current homogeneity of the profession, and the implications of this trend for the field's policies and public perception.

"The Humanist Movement in Modern Britain: A History of Ethicists, Rationalists and Humanists" by Callum G. Brown, David Nash, and Charlie Lynch is a comprehensive and accessible academic study that explores the significance of humanist ideas in Britain. The authors provide a coherent narrative of humanism as a social and political movement, rather than a history of ideas. The book covers the period from the late 19th century to the present day, examining the role of humanism in cultural, political, and social contexts. It also highlights the contributions of humanists to the development of modern human rights and ethical progress. [Extracted from the article]

The article presents the discussion on bioethicists should abandon the concept of personhood. Topics include encourages bioethicists to explore the broader philosophical literature on these and other concepts rather than holding to the philosophical idea of personhood; and concept of personhood is insufficient to justify the necessity of respect for patients in a vegetative state (VS).

The article examines whether it is ethically justifiable to compel tube feeding over the objection of a young adult with anorexia nervosa. Topics discussed include the proposal for ethics consultants to contribute practical knowledge and skills that may benefit patients and teams as they manage severe cases of disordered eating, the immediate problem leading toward death for clinicians like hospitalists, and practical and ethically justifiable strategies that ethicist should offer.

According to an appealing and common view, the moral status of an action – whether it is wrong, for example – is sometimes important in itself in terms of the moral status of other actions – especially those that respond to the original action. This view is especially influential with respect to the criminal law. It is accepted not only by legal moralists but also by adherents of the harm principle, for example. In this paper, I argue against this view. The main arguments emphasize the distinctions between the moral status of actions, consequences, and agents. I argue that what matters, in terms of other actions, is not the moral status of the original action but rather other factors that may be confused with it, such as the moral status of its consequences – whether they are good or bad – and the moral status of the agent – whether she is praiseworthy or blameworthy. The intuitive appeal of the common view is, I argue, at least partly due to a conflation of these factors. Most importantly, once we recall the distinctions between these factors, we can see more clearly that this view lacks a compelling rationale. Or, at least, that it is based on assumptions that, first, are much more controversial than their conclusion, and, second, do not support every aspect of this view – and thus do not offer a unified foundation for this view. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The forms of status quo critique that current approaches to realist political theory enable are unsatisfactory. They either formulate standards of constructive critique, but remain uncritical of a great range of political situations, or they offer means for criticising basically all political situations, but neglect constructive critique. As part of the endeavour to develop a status quo critique that is potentially radical and constructive, realists might consider possibilities to use non-standard social practices – social practices that function differently than stipulated by existing political forms – as resources for critique. The article shows how the capacity of non-standard social practices to serve as resources for critique might be exploited. It also defends the proposed procedure against the likely objection that it relies on moralist argumentation. The evaluation of the status quo and the selection of social practices need normative argumentation, but such argumentation can be grounded in the actual to an extent that safeguards its realist nature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt every society as SARs-CoV-2 variants surge among the populations. Health care providers are exhausted, becoming ill themselves, and in some instances have died. Indeed, hospitals are struggling to find staff to care for critically ill patients most in need. Previous work has reported on the unending work-related conditions that hospital staff are laboring under and their subsequent mental and physical health strains. Health care providers need support, but it is not clear where that support is to come from. While much research has reported on the COVID-19-related fears of nurses and physicians, fewer studies have focused on supportive features of the hospital work environment and how it may provide relief to front-line health care providers. This purpose of this study was to explore an often-overlooked resource within hospital systems across the United States—clinical ethicists—and examine their many roles during COVID-19 and the types of ethical issues they addressed with nurses, physicians, administrators, and others. This was a primary analysis of semi-structured, qualitative interviews with 23 clinical ethicists across the United States. The interviews were conducted from November 2020–April 2021 and were audiotaped, transcribed verbatim, and de-identified; both inductive and deductive analyses were used to identify qualitative themes. Five major themes were identified: ethical issues that were increasingly more complex, moral distress that was "endemic," shifting ethical paradigms from the focus on the individual to the population, fostering a supportive environment, and organizational ethics: variation in the value, roles, and policy input of clinical ethicists. Our findings report on the integral and expanded role of clinical ethicists at an unprecedented time in our nation, and how they stepped forward to support front-line clinicians in hospitals across the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on epistemic asset and liability served by the personal experience of patients in debate of assisted dying, and mentions analysis of global data and policy on legislative demand for assisted dying. Topics discussed include conflicts of interests generated by the patients' experience, practices for bioethics in policy settings with the help of paradox of experience, and euthanasia caused due to loss of dignity.

There is a regulatory option for conscientious objection in health care that has yet to be systematically examined by ethicists and policymakers: granting a liberty to request exemption from prescribed work tasks without a companion guarantee that the request is accommodated. For the right-holder, the liberty's value lies in the ability to seek exemption without duty-violation and a tangible prospect of reassignment. Arguing that such a liberty is too unreliable to qualify as a right to conscientious objection leads to the problem of consistently distinguishing its effects from those of a right to conscientious objection that is made conditional on an individual assessment of the objector's motivation. These properties require that we distinguish the liberty to request exemption from more restrictive policy choices, and that we subject it to greater scrutiny in the wider moral discourse as a possible variant of a right to conscientious objection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the 'expertise defence', experimental findings suggesting that intuitive judgments about hypothetical cases are influenced by philosophically irrelevant factors do not undermine their evidential use in (moral) philosophy. This defence assumes that philosophical experts are unlikely to be influenced by irrelevant factors. We discuss relevant findings from experimental metaphilosophy that largely tell against this assumption. To advance the debate, we present the most comprehensive experimental study of intuitive expertise in ethics to date, which tests five well-known biases of judgment and decision-making among expert ethicists and laypeople. We found that even expert ethicists are affected by some of these biases, but also that they enjoy a slight advantage over laypeople in some cases. We discuss the implications of these results for the expertise defence, and conclude that they still do not support the defence as it is typically presented in (moral) philosophy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

'Politics comes first'. This commitment to an approach to normative theorizing that avoids controversial moralistic assumptions lies at the heart of Richard Bellamy's defence of republican intergovernmentalism. However, a closer analysis of his argument for the primacy of politics reveals a tension in his account: In seeking to avoid a moralist approach, he seems to be torn between a Kantian Republicanism and a Williamsian Realism – while still holding on to some moralist intuitions. I show how this creates ambiguities on each of the three steps of his core argument, the distinction between legitimacy and justice, the defence of non-domination as the standard of legitimacy and the institutional proposal of a republican intergovernmentalism. And I propose to solve them by strengthening the Kantian Republicanism side of his approach, which, or so I will argue, can walk the fine line between moralism and realism. While – on my reading – this Kantian Republicanism already forms the heart of Bellamy's account, it would require adjusting the realist conceptual framework on which he relies. And so my proposal is meant as an invitation to engage the underlying and intriguing question that Bellamy's account raises: in what sense and to what extent is republicanism – whether of a Kantian or any other kind – a political political theory? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both Constant and Spencer are moralists who want to encourage individual human perfection. But for Constant, politics has moral value even in a laissez-faire state, whereas for Spencer political participation has no moral value in itself. For Constant, from a moral perspective the historical change from an ancient to a modern conception of liberty is not absolute, and he wishes to retain, in a subordinate role, certain aspects of ancient liberty in modern societies. For Spencer, the historical evolution from militant to industrial society involves the complete separation of politics from any positive moral good. In an industrial society, altruism has no connection with politics, and attempt to bring altruism into politics are not only doomed to failure but iare unjust and therefore immoral. Spencer is a leading figure in the separation of classical liberal thought from perfectionist morality that flourishes in the twentieth century. The separation between classical and modern liberalism that takes place in the fin de siècle is not just a matter of economics – as is shown by the fact that both Spencer and Constant are ardent apostles of laissez-faire – it is above all a question of different attitudes to morality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To design effective strategies to improve ethics consultation (EC) practices, it is important to understand the views of ethics practitioners. Previous U.S. studies of ethics practitioners have overrepresented the views of academic bioethicists. To help inform EC improvement efforts, we surveyed a random stratified sample of U.S. hospitals, examining ethics practitioners' opinions on EC in general, on their own EC service, on strategies to improve EC, and on ASBH practice standards. Respondents across all categories of hospitals had very positive perceptions of their own ethics consultation service (ECS) and few concerns about quality. Our findings suggest that the ethics-related needs of small, rural, non-teaching hospitals may be very different from those of academic medical centers, and therefore, different approaches to addressing ethical issues might be warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subject of this paper is the place of Hume in Nicholas Phillipson's account of the Scottish Enlightenment. I begin with Phillipson's reading of Hume as 'civic moralist'. I then turn to his account of Hume the author of The History of England. And from there I proceed to the place of Hume in his intellectual biography of Adam Smith. I conclude with a brief description of Phillipson's understanding of Hume's place in the history of the Scottish Enlightenment as it mutated in the late eighteenth century and came to an end in the early nineteenth. I show how just as Phillipson's Hume cannot be understood apart from the Scottish Enlightenment, so also Phillipson's Scottish Enlightenment cannot be understood without Hume. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article shows how some early-modern British travellers found in the idea of travelling among and writing about Arabs an opportunity to reflect on a changing society at home. In Enlightenment Britain, many philosophers and writers thought of economic achievements as the roadmap to civility, humanity and progress. Many conservative moralists and clergymen of the period, however, protested this ideology and associated excessive materialism with moral decline, but they were not the dominant force in society. British travel writings about Arabs during the period confirmed and unsettled this dominant discourse. In these accounts, the images of primitive and polite Arabs appeared as screens upon which British anxieties about improvement were projected. This paper concludes with the contention that British travel writers appeared more concerned about their own society than about those about whom they wrote. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why is the ethics of punishment an important academic field? The standard answer given by philosophers, legal scholars, and other theorists is that academic engagement in the ethics of punishment is justified by the importance of informing and guiding penal practice. In this article, this view is referred to as the Impact Assumption. The purpose of the article is to consider what this assumption implies for the way research within this field should be conducted. First, I argue that the way research is currently being disseminated, the nature of the research itself, and the lack of interest among legislators and other decision-makers, constitute serious challenges to the satisfaction of the Impact Assumption. Second, I suggest that these challenges can be overcome, but that this will require a significant expansion and reorientation of the entire field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I unpack a realistic conception of politics by tightly defining its constitutive features: conflict and order. A conflict emerges when an actor is disposed to impose his/her views against the resistance of others. Conflicts are more problematic than moralists realize because they emerge unilaterally, are potentially violent, impermeable to content-based reason, and unavoidable. Order is then defined as an institutional framework that provides binding collective decisions. Order is deemed necessary because individuals need to cooperate to survive, but groups cannot spontaneously secure collective decisions and are prone to conflicts. Particularly, the fact that potentially violent conflicts emerge unilaterally means that order requires coercion. I conclude that mischaracterizing conflict and order leads to undesirable normative principles, and that this criticism can be leveraged not only against Rawlsian liberals who moralize conflicts away, but also against some agonists who underestimate the need for order and some communitarians who underplay both circumstances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that Hannah Arendt's thought can offer significant insights on political judgement for realism in political theory. We identify a realist position which emphasises the need to account for how humans judge politically, contra moralist tendencies to limit its exercise to rational standards, but which fails to provide a sufficient conception of its structure and potential. Limited appeals to political judgement render the realist defence of the political elusive and compromise the endeavour to offer a meaningful alternative to the moralist tendency to displace politics. The potential and limitations of realist discussions on judgement are made visible in relation to proto-realists Judith Shklar and Isaiah Berlin. In seeking to enrich the realist conception of the political, the article introduces the displacement critique found in the neglected Arendtian 'realism'. It also provides the foundations for a distinctly realist account of political judgement which, we argue, requires elaboration along two dimensions: the social coding of political judgement and the political capacities that help judgement build a suitable political sphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-range familial searches in recreational DNA databases have been the subject of intense interest since the high-profile case of the Golden State Killer. This technique has raised considerable media attention and has sparked immediate criticism from forensic geneticists and other professionals, regulators, policy advisors, and ethicists. However, the literature on this topic does not capture the complexities resulting from the commodification of genetic data and the marketization of science. In this article, I explore how long-range familial searches conducted in recreational DNA databases reframe the trajectory of forensic genetics. Arguing that the advent and consolidation of long-range familial searches in recreational DNA databases represent the fourth wave of forensic genetics, I detail its implications, namely, the expansion of affected populations, the participatory turn, and the co-production of biovalue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author comments on researcher Abram Brummett's moral authoritarianism approach in presenting his argument for moral-metaphysical proceduralism in secular clinical ethics in an article published within the issue. He mentions the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities' stand on authoritarian approaches to ethics consultation. He also criticizes Brummett's imposition of his own ideological commitments as requirements for clinical ethicists in performing their jobs.

Secular clinical ethics has responded to the problem of moral pluralism with a procedural approach. However, defining this term stirs debate: H. Tristram Engelhardt Jr. has championed a contentless proceduralism (P1), while others, conversely, argue for a proceduralism that permits some content in the form of moral claims (P2). This paper argues that the content P2 permits ought to be expanded to include some metaphysical commitments, in an approach referred to as P2+. The need for P2+ is demonstrated by analyzing and rejecting three standards (the best interest or harm principle, internal reasonability, and the child's right to an open future) used by P2 to justify overriding religiously motivated refusals of treatment for children. These approaches fail because each maintains a neutral stance regarding the truth of religious belief. This paper drives at the broader thesis that the proceduralism of secular clinical ethics requires some moral and metaphysical commitments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Difficulties experienced in obtaining energy services have been represented as unjust because of how they can prevent people from realising primary human capabilities. Capabilities are relational, being embedded within complex interdependencies between people and socio-material systems. These complexities can cause problems for approaches to energy justice that are based on concepts of welfare rights. We argue that the ethics of care, with its emphasis on relationality as the ground of obligation, and particularly on how social relationships are bound up with power and responsibility, can provide firmer foundations for thinking about energy injustice. Care ethicists distinguish between different forms of dependency, some necessary, others oppressive. Using qualitative longitudinal methods to explore people's experiences of energy challenges and energy vulnerability can show how power and responsibility within dependency relationships can change over time. With data from a longitudinal study in South Wales, we explore how everyday energy-using practices can become entangled with harmful forms of dependency. We show how the everyday ethical evaluation of these relationship undertaken by participants harmonises with the ethics of care. Our data show the utility of understanding relationships of dependence within the energy system in terms of responsibility and irresponsibility, in order to better understand energy injustice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author comments on C. Meyers' article on deception by the clinical ethicists. He argues that a physician telling lies to one's patients dishonors them and indicates a breach of the Hippocratic Oath. He discusses Meyers' view of the role of the clinical ethics consultant (CEC) in bedside deception, noting that the author could have better clarified the clinical status of the CEC. He examines the authority of the consulting ethicist and whether he has a delineation of clinical privileges.

In this article, I defend a discomfiting thesis: The clinical ethicist should sometimes be an active participant in the deception of patients and families. The case for this conclusion builds off Sissela Bok's seminal analysis of lying, from which I emphasize that, despite some common intuitions to the contrary, there is prima facie no morally relevant difference between lies of omission and commission. I then discuss deception's prevalence in medical encounters, noting that the ethicist is often embedded in corresponding decisions, and explicate the realities that underlie these tough cases. Among those realities is the fallacy that deception can always be avoided through better communication. I conclude with an elaboration of ethicists' role-model status and argue that they can turn the deception into a powerful teaching moment about the complexity of ethics reasoning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay considers how Ruth Grant's understanding of hypocrisy and integrity might be applied to Martin Luther King Jr. Putting Grant and King in conversation, I argue, helps democratic citizens and theorists think about political ethics in contexts of extreme inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the discussion on predicting personalized risks for patients considering left-ventricular assist device (LVAD) therapy for heart failure. Topics include raising serious ethical concerns and serving as an unanticipated obstacle for exploratory research in health care ML; and implementing into clinical practice due to the advances in medical and mechanical therapies for heart failure.

Community engagement is increasingly recognized as a critical element of medical research, recommended by ethicists, required by research funders and advocated in ethics guidelines. The benefits of community engagement are often stressed in instrumental terms, particularly with regard to promoting recruitment and retention in studies. Less emphasis has been placed on the value of community engagement with regard to ethical good practice, with goals often implied rather than clearly articulated. This article outlines explicitly how community engagement can contribute to ethical global health research by complementing existing established requirements such as informed consent and independent ethics review. The overarching and interlinked areas are (1) respecting individuals, communities and stakeholders; (2) building trust and social relationships; (3) determining appropriate benefits; minimizing risks, burdens and exploitation; (4) supporting the consent process; (5) understanding vulnerabilities and researcher obligations; (6) gaining permissions, approvals and building legitimacy and (7) achieving recruitment and retention targets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A significant part of the literature on innovative practice in medicine relates to seizing opportunities and curbing harms for patients in desperate situations. Unfortunately, the term innovation has multiple meanings and a rich rhetorical flourish that adds confusion and misunderstanding to an already difficult debate. This paper aims to enhance the current definition of innovative practice for medicine. First, we replace the term 'innovation' with the more literal 'new non-validated practice'. To identify this meaning, we analyse the traditional research ethics' distinction between research, validated practice, and innovation in the Belmont Report. Second, we propose the following explicit definition of new non-validated practice: the first or recent use of diagnostic, therapeutic or preventive interventions that introduce a significant change, with an insufficient level of evidence of safety or efficacy for regular healthcare, and with the main aim to benefit individual patients. This definition is a promising conceptual tool to inform empirical research, ethicists, and the harmonisation of regulation and legislation (e.g. right-to-try laws). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eric Schwitzgebel, Fiery Cushman, and Joshua Rust have conducted a series of studies of the thought and behavior of professional ethicists. They have found no evidence that ethical reflection yields distinctive improvements in behavior. This work has been done on English-speaking ethicists. Philipp Schönegger and Johannes Wagner (2019) replicated one study with German-speaking professors. Their results are almost the same, except for the finding that German-speaking ethicists were more likely to be vegetarian than non-ethicists. The present paper devises and evaluates eleven psychological hypotheses (along with one from Schönegger and Wagner) aimed at explaining why ethical reflection might have motivational influence for this topic but not for others. Three hypotheses are judged to be plausible at this initial stage: generic emotional support, perception of cost as a source of emotional obstacles, and social categorization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Irene McMullin's Existential Flourishing (Cambridge University Press, 2018) weaves together virtue ethics and existential phenomenology: the influence of Heidegger and Levinas, in particular, is clear throughout. This paper provides a summary of McMullin's elegantly argued position and raises a number of possible concerns, particularly regarding the interaction of Aristotelian and Phenomenological assumptions. I focus specifically on the role of the 2nd-person perspective, on the links between exemplars and socialisation, and on the problem of those who, as Nietzsche put it, "are both evil and happy – a species on which the moralists are silent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent developments in philosophy and in criminology indicate that there are significant respects in which the two disciplines can be mutually informing. Many philosophers are increasingly interested in exploring empirical aspects of philosophical claims, and criminologists are finding their way past the alleged fact/value distinction and are rediscovering the moral significance of facts, especially regarding punishment and desistance. In some recent criminological studies there are implicit links to the British moralists such as David Hume and Adam Smith, and to Aristotle as well. This paper explicates those links and some of the possibilities for philosophy and criminology to be mutually informing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on perspective of Elizabeth Kübler-Ross as a clinical ethicist. Topics discussed include Kübler-Ross' appointment as a teacher at a university to teach the course "Death and Religion", Kübler-Ross' work which influences hospices and palliative care programs to emerge as a stable feature of the healthcare topography.

In this article, the authors discuss the role of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross as an astrophysicist. Topics include exploration of connection between physician burnout and end-of-life care sentiments; replacement of one patient with another by medical technology; and an evidence that supports increased incidence of: self-reported error, job turnover by increased mortality rates in hospitalized patients.

I analyze the insights present in Elisabeth Kübler-Ross's seminal work, On Death and Dying that have laid the foundation for contemporary clinical bioethics as it is practiced by clinical ethics consultants. I highlight the landmark insight of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross that listening to dying patients reveals their needs and enables them to enjoy a better death. But more important for contemporary clinical ethics is that the text highlights three tensions that the clinical ethicist must navigate but can never truly resolve. Clinical ethicists must balance: (1) the need to hear the patient's voice with the temptation to overly medicalize the case, (2) helping the patient achieve a better death with enabling the patient to die in the way he or she chooses, and (3) keeping professional distance with engaging the patient in a way that respects the intimacy of the patient's disclosures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a case where a mother's faith-based request for the life-saving treatments for her premature baby with severe encephalopathy and injured brainstem has led to ethical tension among the members of the healthcare team. Topics mentioned include the metaphysical commitments involved in the mother's request, the application of moral-metaphysical proceduralism to approach the dispute, and the suggestions for clinical ethics consultants on dealing with metaphysical issues.