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On biomedical ethics

Contents

  1. 1 The right not to know
  2. 2 Natural versus assisted reproduction
  3. 3 Forcing treatment
  4. 4 Perfection within reach

The right not to know

In August 2011 I wrote a guest post on the Wellcome Trust blog, summarising the results of my research on the application of the right not to know to psychiatric disorders (both in the context of genetic testing and diagnosis). The post is based on an article I co-authored with Heather Widdows and published in the Journal of Medical Ethics.


Natural versus assisted reproduction

In December 2010 a paper by Daniela Cutas and myself on reproductive ethics caused quite a stir in blogs worldwide. In the paper we argue that in most countries current legislation unjustifiably privileges natural parenthood (becoming parents by sexual intercourse) over assisted parenthood (becoming parents via IVF, adoption etc.). Whilst natural parenthood often goes unchallenged and unregulated, assisted parenthood is subject to heavy scrutiny. We also support parental education for all - a more detailed argument for that can be found here.

But on the Australian blog BioEdge we were misrepresented as endorsing compulsory contraception and confiscation of children from incompetent parents, and now, based on that article, some blogs in French have taken issue with the position Daniela and I allegedly defended. Le blog de Jeanne Smits equates our views with a return of eugenics and a radical departure from human rights, and Le Salon Beige tags the article on our paper with the phrases "culture of death" and "eugenism". Also this Lutheran blog, Bioethike, cited the post on BioEdge.  

It is of course a positive outcome of this unexpected publicity that people are discussing contemporary conceptions of reproduction and parenting that are often uncritically assumed. But if you were to take a stance on someone's views wouldn't you go first to the original source and try to understand what they actually wrote? I guess commonsense doesn't make the news, and it's much easier to attack someone for endorsing compulsory contraception and confiscation of children than for providing a reasoned challenge to inconsistencies in the regulation of reproduction and parenting.

 

Forcing treatment

In May 2010 the press asked whether medical treatment for cancer can be forced on people following the case of a 55-year-old woman who refused surgery and hospitalisation. A court ruling decided that it was justified to sedate her and bring her to hospital by force so that she could undergo surgery, because she would have died otherwise and she was incapacitated to make a decision.
 
I commented on the case for the Telegraph and there's a short quote by me in this front-page article.

 

Perfection within reach

In 2009 I contributed to two interesting debates. I wrote a short piece for BBC Focus Magazine, the June issue, where I argue that reproductive cloning may not be bad, given that all the arguments against that practice seem to rely on features of reproduction that are not unique to cloning and are not obviously morally bad.
 
In September I was interviewed by John Elder for the Sunday Age (Melbourne) about the strive for perfection.  Here is an extract:

''In the past we worked with a very sharp divide between normality and abnormality, and abnormality was defined by the most extreme cases of mental illness,'' says Dr Lisa Bortolotti, senior lecturer in philosophy at the University of Birmingham. ''Now we are working with the model where normality and abnormality are less sharply divided and situated on a continuum. So even the behaviour of people who are never diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder is described in terms of obsessions, paranoia, phobias. One positive outcome of this is that people with mental illness are less stigmatised and their conditions better understood, even by laypeople. But a less positive effect is that the definition of 'normal' has narrowed. So now everything that defies expectations, or stands out, is explained in terms of a deviation from an ideal, and may be pathologised''.