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Assume that neuro-doping is safe and efficient. This means that the use of it, and similar future safe methods of enhancement in sport, may help those who are naturally weak to catch up with those who are naturally strong and sometimes even defeat them. The rationale behind anti-doping measures seem to presuppose that this is unfair. But the idea that those who are naturally strong should defeat those who are naturally weak rests on a fascistoid ideology that sport had better leave behind. Neuro-doping may be seen as a means to undermine the fascistoid notion of fairness. The conjecture is that, given that society adopts what will be characterized as a policy of biological egalitarianism, this will happen. Then people will compete in society in general and in sport in particular on more equal biological terms. The fascination with natural strength, and the cheering for the winners, can then go away. Instead we see a liberated sport where we take part in it for the sheer fun of doing so. Neuro-doping, and similar techniques, may be a means that helps to liberate elite sport from its perverse view of fairness.

(1998). Is Our Admiration for Sports Heroes Fascistoid? Journal of the Philosophy of Sport: Vol. 25, No. 1, pp. 23-34.

There exist existential global problems we cannot solve unless we resort to a world government. It is desirable that such a government can be held responsible by a democratically elected world parliament. Hence, global democracy is desirable. However, the road to global democracy is blocked by similar problems that render it necessary in the first place: collective decision problems of a different but related sort. And time is short. In particular we face an emergent need to tend to problems to do with global warming. This means that we have to investigate the possibility and desirability of a last resort to global despotism.

The COVID-19 pandemic has engendered unprecedented drastic and costly measures to obviate the threat. Will something similar happen in relation to global heating? No, this is not likely. Mainly this has to do with a difference in the nature of collective action. Nation states protect their respective populations against the virus. With regard to global heating, we are facing the tragedy of the commons. No global government assumes responsibility for our common future. However, there may be another and further explanation lurking behind political inaction: many people, including our politicians, think that it does not matter if humanity goes extinct. It does matter, however. Strangely enough, the view that it matters is questioned by many important philosophers in the past and in the present, and it is hence controversial. Yet, it should be our common-sense stance to the problem. It is of the utmost importance that there will be sentient happy life on the globe for an indefinite time. Theoretically speaking, in order to recognize this, we need to accept some “total” view, implying what has been called the repugnant conclusion. Practically speaking, we should go to great length to rescue our human civilisation, even if this means that, for a while, we must endure all sorts of hardships such as a global enlightened despotism, or worse—a situation of life boat ethics.

A simple hedonistic theory allowing for interpersonal comparisons of happiness is taken for granted in this article. The hedonistic theory is used to compare utilitarianism, urging us to maximize the sum total of happiness, with prioritarianism, urging us to maximize a sum total of weighed happiness. It is argued with reference to a few thought experiments that utilitarianism is, intuitively speaking, more plausible than prioritarianism. The problem with prioritarianism surfaces when prudence and morality come apart.

Many moral theories incorporate the idea that when an action is wrong, it is wrong because there was something else that the agent could and should have done instead. Most notable among these are consequentialist theories. Relatively little attention has been given to the question of how to understand the meaning of 'could have' in this specific context. However, without an answer to this question, consequentialist theories fail to yield determinate verdicts about the deontic status of actions in real scenarios. It is here argued that a conditional analysis provides the required answer and gives us the most plausible version of consequentialism. Such a conditional analysis has been universally rejected as an analysis of the general meaning of 'could have,' but we show that in the specific context of specifying the meaning of 'could have' in a criterion of right and wrong action, all the stan­dard objections to it fail.

Aims The aim of this study was to examine if it is plausible to interpret the appearance of shame in a Swedish healthcare setting as a reaction to having one9s honour wronged. Methods Using a questionnaire, we studied answers from a sample of long-term sick-listed patients who had experienced negative encounters (n=1628) and of these 64% also felt wronged. We used feeling wronged to examine emotional reactions such as feeling ashamed and made the assumption that feeling shame could be associated with having one9s honour wronged. In statistical analyses relative risks (RRs) were computed, adjusting for age, sex, disease-labelling, educational levels, as well as their 95% CI. Results Approximately half of those who had been wronged stated that they also felt shame and of those who felt shame, 93% (CI 91 to 95) felt that they had been wronged. The RR was 4.5 (CI 3.0 to 6.8) for shame when wronged. This can be compared with the other emotional reactions where the RRs were between 1.1 (CI 0.9 to 1.3)–1.4 (CI 1.2 to 1.7). We found no association between country of birth and feeling shame after having experienced negative encounters. Conclusions We found that the RR of feeling shame when wronged was significantly higher compared with other feelings. Along with theoretical considerations, and the specific types of negative encounters associated with shame, the results indicate that our research hypothesis might be plausible. We think that the results deserve to be used as point of departure for future research.

Why should we respect the privacy of donors of biological material? The question is answered in the present article in general philosophical terms from the point of view of an ethics of honour, a libertarian theory of rights, a view of respect for privacy based on the idea that autonomy is of value in itself, and utilitarianism respectively. For different reasons the ethics of honour and the idea of the value of autonomy are set to one side. It surfaces that the moral rights theory and utilitarianism present conflicting answers to the question. The main thrust of the argument is that there is no way of finding an overlapping consensus, so politicians have to take decisions that are bound to be controversial in that they can be questioned on reasonable philosophical grounds. TissEU. Tiss.EU stands for ‘Evaluation of Legislation and Related Guidelines on the Procurement, Storage and Transfer of Human Tissues and Cells in the European Union—an Evidence- Based Impact Analysis.’ The project has been funded by the European Commission as part of the 7th Framework Programme

Ought we to enhance our cognitive capacities beyond the normal human range? There is no denying that it might be a good idea to level out differences between people with respect to cognitive capacities, and there is no denying that some persons' reaching beyond normal capacities may have some good side-effects on society at large (but also bad side-effects, of course). But is there any direct gain to be made by having ones cognitive capacities enhanced? Will this as such make our lives go better? No, I argue, or, at least, there doesn't seem to exist any evidence suggesting that it would. And it doesn't matter whether we consider the question from a narrow hedonistic perspective, from a more refined hedonistic perspective, from a desire-satisfaction view, or if we adopt some reasonable objective list view of what makes a life go well. Only on an extremely perfectionist — and implausible —view of what makes our lives go well could any direct value in cognitive enhancement find support. Finally, there are no good reasons to do with our sense of identity to enhance even our capacity to remember. So, cognitive enhancement as such would not make our lives go any better.

Peter Unger, Living High and Letting Die. Our Illusion of Innocence (Oxford and New York Oxford University Press, 1996

The expressivist theory of truth (TETT) is stated and defended. According to TETT, to state such things as that it is true that snow is white is to express one's assent to the proposition that snow is white. In contexts where we refer to propositions with the aid of definite descriptions (“What Peter said”) or quantify over them (“Everything Peter says”), in order to say that they are “true”, the word “true” is essential, however. But it does not stand for any genuine property. According to TETT, as here understood, it expresses our readiness or willingness to assent to these propositions. It is argued that TETT, even if still more of a reseach program than a full-fledged theory, means an improvement over more elaborate minimalist theories of truth put forward by Crispin Wright and Paul Horwich.

In morality, as in science, we seek understanding through explanation. While old fashioned non-naturalistic moral realism renders such explanation available to us, neither moral irrealism nor moral naturalism does. This does not prove any of these theories wrong, of course. It does indicate, however, that, if we feel that we have to resort to them, there is a high intellectual price to be paid.

Collectivities, just like individuals, exist, can act, bear responsibility for their acts and omissions, and be guilty. It sometimes makes sense to hold them responsible for what they do, or don't do, and to punish them for their misdeeds. With respect to many collectivities there is no practical purpose in holding them responsible, since there is no way that we can bring them to justice. But there are exceptions from this rule. In particular it is plausible to assume that sanctions against entire nations or peoples or populations living in open and democratic states may be an effective means to setting them straight where, collectively, they act wrongly. The best present example of this seems to be the Israelis.

Adherents of different moral views hold conflicting views on the permissibility of embryonic stem cell research. Pace Ronald Dworkin, no liberal compromise is possible. Whichever way the decision goes, some people will be deeply hurt and feel that basic moral principles are being flouted. And yet, when a majority exists in defence of such research, it should not hesitate to allow it.

According to the gunman theory, many revolutions do not take place, in spite of the fact that the majority stands to gain if they can put an end to the oppression exercised over it, since a gunman can see to it that egoistic individuals have no incentive to take part in revolution. Champions of the idea that there is a paradox of revolution go further: Even if individuals care about the common good, they will not take action. This is wrong. If they care about the common good, revolution will take place. This is good news. The bad news is, however, that those conditions we find in social psychological literature, which are helpful to the revolutionary cause, tend to be undermined by the oppressive system when it is well-functioning.

According to a recent convention on human rights and biomedicine, coercive treatment of psychiatric patients may only be given if, without such treatment, serious harm is likely to result to the health of the patient; it must not be given in the interest of other people. In the present article a discussion is undertaken about the implication of this stipulation for the use of coercion in psychiatry in general and in forensic psychiatry in particular.

This article discusses under what circumstances patients who are suffering from senile dementia or mental retardation should be submitted to coercive care, who should decide about this kind of coercion, and in what legal framework it should take place. A distinction is drawn between modest (i.e. of moderate degree) and meddlesome coercion. The use of modest coercion is defended. It is argued that medical personnel ought to decide exclusively about the use of modest coercion. However, no law should render legitimate the use of even modest coercion. It is conceded that to prohibit the use of a kind of coercion that is expected to take place is hypocrisy. It is argued that this is, however, an acceptable form of hypocrisy.

Lecture critique de l'ouvrage de F. Jackson intitule «From metaphysics to ethics» (1998) qui traite du physicalisme et du realisme concernant les phenomenes psychologiques, d'une part, et qui applique le descriptivisme au domaine de l'ethique, d'autre part. Examinant la definition relationnelle de la survenance et la definition des couleurs en termes de qualite primaire, l'A. etudie le probleme de la localisation des phenomenes ethiques dans le cadre du cognitivisme ethique, ainsi que le probleme du non-cognitivisme qui apparait comme une branche de l'eliminativisme

Western medicine is increasingly interested in the problem of euthanasia. There are two main reasons for this. One is related to the fact that modern medicine has prolonged not only our lives but also our period of dying. Modern medicine supports hastening death through withholding life supporting treatment or giving high doses of pain relief to those who are dying. Is this morally different from euthanasia? The second reason is the increased emphasis on respect for the patient's autonomy. Doctors have to abide by all sorts of requests from their patients. It is only natural, therefore, to wonder whether we have good reasons to decline a patient's request for euthanasia. Public support for a system of euthanasia is high in Western countries. In surveys I conducted, as many as 63% of Norwegians, 79% of Swedes, and 68% of Germans thought that if a patient has an incurable disease and doesn't want to go on living, he or she should be allowed to receive a lethal injection (unpublished data). And yet, most doctors and politicians in most Western countries are strongly opposed to legalised euthanasia. Is there any plausible moral rationale behind their opposition?

Objectives To investigate the preferred actions of healthcare staff, as well as their reasoning and attitudes about young females’ requests for a virginity certificate or hymen restoration. Method A qualitative study, consisting of semi-structured interviews of healthcare providers from different parts of Sweden and from different medical specialties and professions, who had experience of women who asked for a virginity certificate or a hymen repair. Results Using content analysis, ten themes emerged regarding healthcare personnel's attitudes and reasoning about young female patients and their requests for demonstration of virginity. The themes logically were categorised as values, beliefs, and cultural affiliation. Conclusions Responders had a more pragmatic and permissive view than the restrictive, official Swedish policy opposing hymenoplasties within the public healthcare system. There were degrees of willingness to accommodate such requests, due, for example, to different moral beliefs and medical concerns. Responders expressed frustration over the difficulty of following up patients, a situation likely due to the restrictive policy. The patient-centred approach adopted by a Dutch team of health professionals would probably better enable quality assurance.

Particularism is in vogue in ethics today. Particularism is sometimes described as the idea that what is a sufficient moral reason in one situation need not be a sufficient moral reason in another situation. Indeed, it has been held, on particularism, what is a reason for an action in one situation might be a reason against the same type of action, or might not be a reason at all, in another situation. However, this description is insufficient. Even a generalist, such as a utilitarian, may admit that, what is in one situation a sufficient reason for the rightness of an action may, in another situation, be a sufficient reason for its wrongness. For example, the fact that if I shoot at a certain person, I kill him, may, in one situation, be a sufficient reason not to shoot at him. It is sufficient for the wrongness of shooting at him if, in the situation, shooting at him suffices to guarantee that welfare does not get maximized. He is killed, say, and deprived of future pleasure, with no positive ‘side-effects’ whatever.

On what model should a modern multi‐cultural democracy work? Spinosa et al. have argued that the political order should be sustained by a set of common values instilled in the citizens, without, however, any common rank order among these values. I argue that the multi‐cultural state should rather conform to what I call the Secular Model, according to which the citizens need not share any basic values at all. On the Secular Model, people individually stick to the existing constitution (only) as long as they each feel that they have good reasons to do so. To be sure, each citizen of a multi‐cultural state does need a feeling of community identity, a ‘we’ ideology, but it is desirable that each individual can have more than one such identity. It is also important that each individual can shift as he or she pleases, from one such identity to another. So this kind of identity should not be moulded by the state, but by various different free associations, independent of the state.

The paper is a record of a debate which took place between a group of clinicians and the author concerning a clinical trial of a drug supposed to postpone the time when HIV-patients develop AIDS. A problem with the trial was that on available (inconclusive) evidence it appeared that one patient out of 500 was killed by the drug. The question raised was whether, in view of this evidence, it was morally defensible to go on with the trial. The discussion came to involve general topics such as the appropriate role of the ideal of autonomy as well as more particular topics of quantitative and qualitative risk assessments. The main thrust of the argument is that different conceptions of rationality may provide rationales of conflicting clinical decisions. Philosophy matters to medicine.

It is obvious that Henry Sidgwick is a philosopher who shares my view that, besides Humean reasons, there exist also objective and categorical moral reasons, transcending the existing conventional common sense morality. He doesn’t use the term exactly as I do, of course, but he believes there are objective moral obligations, existing independently of our beliefs about them, and he does believe they could be explained - with reference to hedonistic utilitarianism (the principle of Rational Benevolence). However, it also seems as though Sidgwick believes that, beside these two types of practical reasons, there also exists a third one, which may come to conflict with our Humean and moral reasons for action. He speaks here of reasons of ‘rationality’, but I think we could just as well use the phrase ‘prudence’. In a similar vein, some philosophers have suggested that besides objective and categorical moral reasons there are also reasons to do with justice, aesthetics, epistemology or axiology, which must be fit into a full picture of all the obligations that exist. In this chapter I will first examine the idea that rationality or prudence may be a proper source of obligation, and in chapters to come I go on to discuss whether justice, aesthetics, epistemology or axiology, could provide us with such an additional sui generis source of normativity.

On the ‘Humean’ notion of practical reasons, practical reasons are beliefs and desires a person has when acting, which could cause the action; the fact that the person has them, if they cause the action, can both rationalise his or her action (by her own lights), and explain it. I have practical reasons of the Humean kind to write this book. I have a feeling that I have a point to make, I want to make it, and I believe the most efficient way of making it would be to write this book. This is why I write it.

What are the social implications of utilitarianism with respect to disability? In this chapter I give a rough answer to this question: the implications are well in accordance with our common sense thinking, once various prejudices in relation to disability have been exposed. In order to be able to establish this claim, there are some obvious preliminaries that must be sorted out. Before I can develop my argument, I must say something about what I mean by “utilitarianism” and “disability,” and also about how, in the present context, I conceive of a “social” implication. I turn first to the notion of disability, then move on to utilitarianism, and finally to various possible social responses to disability.

It has turned out in this anthology to be a controversial question how the Sanctity-of-Life Doctrine is best interpreted with respect to the active/passive distinction. Of course, there are two aspects to this question, one descriptive and one methodological. The former deals with how the adherents of the doctrine are to be understood, when they defend it. Do they rely on the active/passive distinction or not? The second has to do with normative plausibility. Will the Sanctity-of-Life Doctrine be more or less plausible, if it is taken to rely on the active/passive distinction? It is to the latter question I turn here.

Looking forward at the beginning of a new millennium to the coming Olympic Games in Sydney, I try to recollect what happened last time, down in Atlanta. How did I react? I realise that once again I was swept away with enthusiasm and admiration for those heroic athletes, who had stretched the limits of what is physically possible for humans to achieve. Some have run faster than anyone has done before; this is true of Michael Johnson. Others have excelled and shown that, contrary to what should have been expected, they are – still – invincible. This is true of the greatest of them all, Carl Lewis. My query is this: is my enthusiasm for Johnson, Lewis and all the other athletic heroes respectable? Upon closer examination, my answer is no, my enthusiasm is not respectable. On the contrary, it is of a fascistoid1nature. So the problem is really what to do about it. The problem is pressing, for my attitude towards the Games is not exceptional: I share it with a great many other people who walk this planet. This is why the Games are so widely broadcast.

Part I. Elitism 1. Is Our Admiration or Sports Heroes Fascistoid? Torbjorn Tannsjo 2. Sports, Fascism and the Market Claudio Tamburrini 3. The Logic of Progress and the Art of Moderation in Competitive Sports Sigmund Loland Part II. Nationalism 4. Sports as the Moral Discourse of Nations William J. Morgan 5. A Justification of Moderate Patriotism in Sport Nicholas Dixon 6. Patriotism in Sports and in War Paul Gomberg Part III. Gender Equality 7. Against Sexual Discrimination in Sports Torbjorn Tannsjo 8. Gender Verification in Competitive Sport: Turning from Research to Action Berit Skirstad 9. On the Definition of 'Woman' in the Sport Context - with an Appendix on Tannsjo's Radical Proposal Angela J. Schneider Part IV. The Rules of the Game 10. Against Chance: A Casual Theory of Winning in Sports Gunnar Breivik 11. Justice and Game Advantage in Sporting Games Sigmund Loland 12. Spoiling: An Indirect Reflection of Sport's Moral Imperative Graham McFee Part V. The Scientific Manufacturing of Winners 13. A Philosophical Overview of the Arguments on Banning Doping in Sport Angela J. Schneider and Robert B. Butcher 14. What is Wrong With Doping? Claudio Tamburrini 15. Selected Champions Christian Munthe

In the Fall of 1997 the leading Swedish newspaper, Dagens Nyheter, created a media hype over the Swedish policy of compulsory sterilisation that had been in operation between 1935 and 1975. In the discussion that followed, the moral condemnation of our medical past was unanimous. However, the reasons for rejecting what had gone on were varied and mutually inconsistent. Three strands of criticism were common: the argument from autonomy, the argument from caution, and the argument from biological scepticism. In the paper it is argued that what point of departure you choose in your criticism of the past should be of consequence also for your ideas about present and future medical practice. In particular, if you rely on the argument from autonomy, you should be prepared to accept a liberal (present and future) use of reproductive techniques.

In a talk to this conference2 Lars Bergstrom has put forward the somewhat surprising thesis that, in a conventional sense, the more “useful” a given field of research is considered to be, the more dangerous it is, and the less money should be invested in it. At least this is a reasonable “rule of thumb”, according to Bergstrom. The rationale of this thesis is a thoroughgoing scepticism concerning the (positive) value of science, considered both in terms of its possible intrinsic value (according to Bergstrom, knowledge as such does not have any value) and in terms of instrumental, extrinsic, value (probably, according to Bergstrom who quotes Wittgenstein and Michael Dummett for support, on balance, science does more harm than good). In this paper I want to question the thesis put forward by Bergstrom. However, for the sake of argument, I will accept many of the premisses upon which his argument is based. My disagreement with Bergstrom concerns a difficult problem within ethics. It might be of some interest to learn that, even among people who share a common view of the facts of the matter, rather subtle differences of ethical outlook may engender very different evaluations of a phenomenon such as science.

I conclude that the explanatory view of consequences is a fruitful one. This view accounts for our common sense view that actions are, in some sense, ‘sufficient’ for their consequences. It shows in a concrete and illuminating manner that we are or may be responsible for a vast number of events no matter how ‘innocently’ our actions may be described. It allows for the fact that individuals lack responsibility for consequences of collective actions, thereby explaining a generally felt ‘double effect’ built into our social morality. It brings into light and explains the fact that some degree of determinism seems to be presupposed if people are ever morally responsible for any events whatsoever. Finally, the explanatory view of consequences yields precise and attractive interpretations of the open and the closed views of responsibility.

This paper states a common western ideal of freedom of expression. Such an ideal is tenable, it is argued, only if its implementation makes possible a ‘sound mass communication’. A communication is sound if and only if it prepares the way for growth in knowledge, pluralism, and equality of access to mass media. In today's world, with centralized ownership of mass media, the implementation of the common western ideal of freedom of expression does not prepare the way for knowledge, pluralism, and equality. Hence this ideal of freedom of expression is not tenable. Only if freedom of expression is severely restrained by democratic planning does ‘a sound mass communication’ evolve.