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Full-Text Articles in Philosophy
Tinkering With The Survival Lottery During A Public Health Crisis, Chris Herrera
Tinkering With The Survival Lottery During A Public Health Crisis, Chris Herrera
Department of Philosophy Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works
A well-known thought experiment has us ponder a lottery system that selects one person as the source of transplantable organs for two others. The organs are forcibly harvested and the "donor" dies, whereas the other two patients live. The Survival Lottery is supposed to get at the distinction between killing and letting die, but it is also a challenge to beliefs about moral duties: what are my obligations if my life could be used to save yours and another person's as well? A less extreme version of this thought experiment might have us imagining that officials of the public healthcare …
The Other Human-Subject Experiments, Chris Herrera
The Other Human-Subject Experiments, Chris Herrera
Department of Philosophy Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works
Although deceptive psychology experiments receive less attention than some forms of medical research, they pose similar moral challenges. These challenges mainly concern the use of human subjects and intentional deception. Psychologists provide an argument to justify this deception. But what is an essentially utilitarian argument too often includes faulty comparisons and dubious accounts of risks and benefits. Commentators in other areas of human-subject research might examine this argument and the assumptions behind it. Bioethics commentators seem especially well-positioned for this task.