Love, sex, and physical intimacy are some of the most desired goods in life and they are increasingly being sought on dating apps such as Tinder, Bumble, and Badoo. For those who want a leg up in the chase for other people’s attention, almost all of these apps now offer the option of paying a fee to boost one’s visibility for a certain amount of time, which may range from 30 min to a few hours. In this article, I argue (...) that there are strong moral grounds and, in countries with laws against unconscionable contracts, legal ones for thinking that the sale of such visibility boosts should be regulated, if not banned altogether. To do so, I raise two objections against their unfettered sale, namely that it exploits the impaired autonomy of certain users and that it creates socio-economic injustices. (shrink)

It is commonly assumed that many, if not most, adult children have moral duties to visit their parents when they can do so at reasonable cost. However, whether such duties persist when the parents lose the ability to recognise their children, usually due to dementia, is more controversial. Over 40% of respondents in a public survey from the British Alzheimer’s Society said that it was “pointless” to keep up contact at this stage. Insofar as one cannot be morally required to (...) do pointless things, this would suggest that children are relieved of any duties to visit their parents. In what appears to be the only scholarly treatment of this issue, Claudia Mills has defended this view, arguing that our duties to visit our parents require a type of relationship that is lost when parents no longer remember who their children are. This article challenges Mills’ argument. Not only can children be duty-bound to visit parents who have lost the ability to recognise them, I argue that many children do in fact have such duties. As I show, these duties are grounded in any special interests that their parents have in their company; the fact that visiting their parents might allow them to comply with generic duties of sociability; and/or the fact that such visits allow them to express any gratitude that they owe their parents. (shrink)

Many individuals on the autism spectrum are hypersensitive to certain sensory stimuli. For this group, as well as for non-autistic individuals with sensory processing disorders, being exposed to e.g. fluorescent lights, perfume odours, and various sounds and noises can be real torment. In this article, I consider the normative implications of such offence for the design of office spaces, which is a topic that has not received any attention from philosophers. After identifying different ways in which the senses of hypersensitive (...) workers might be protected within these spaces, I show that many of such accommodations can be made at reasonable cost, before arguing that doing so ought to be a legal requirement. (shrink)

Many political theorists are multiculturalists. They believe that states ought to support and accommodate minority cultures, even if they disagree about when such support and accommodations are due and what forms they should take. In this contribution, I argue that multiculturalists have failed to notice an important objection against a wide range of multiculturalism policies. This objection is predicated on the notion that when states support and accommodate minority cultures, they should support and accommodate many subcultures and individualistic conceptions of (...) the good as well. However, since a significant proportion of multiculturalism policies imposes financial costs on society, it will often be prohibitively expensive for states to support and accommodate citizens’ subcultures and individualistic conceptions of the good on an equal basis. The result is that implementing such policies is likely to end up discriminating against certain groups, which might include e.g. fervent football fans, globe-trotters, mountain climbers, motor bikers, Hippies, and artists. I conclude by considering six reasons for giving preferential treatment to minority cultures that would allow multiculturalists to avoid this implication, which invoke, inter alia, the depth, duration, and involuntariness of cultural commitments; the role of culture in allowing people to live autonomously; and cultural rights to political self-determination. None are found to be convincing. (shrink)

Many liberal democracies have legal restrictions on nudism. This article argues that when public nudity does not pose a health threat, such restrictions are unjust. To vindicate this claim, I start by showing that there are two weighty interests served by the freedom to be naked in public. First, it promotes individual well-being; not only can nudist activities have great recreational value, recent studies have found that exposure to non-idealised naked bodies has a positive impact on body image, and, ultimately, (...) on life satisfaction. Second, public nudity has expressive value; apart from being a constitutive element of various spiritual and religious worldviews, public nudity is frequently used to protest social and political evils. As I go on to argue, the reasons for abolishing current anti-nudist laws that stem from these interests are not overridden, let alone cancelled, by the offence that public nudity might cause. Indeed, whereas my principal aim is to defend the freedom to be publicly naked when this poses no health threat, I will contend that states should recognise this liberty as a distinct legal right rather than try to subsume it under existing rights or secure it simply by excluding non-sexual, non-exhibitionist public nudity from existing laws against public indecency, sexual exhibition, and disorderly conduct. (shrink)

Many higher-income countries are struggling to make decent and affordable care available to their older populations. In response, some Germans are sending their ageing relatives to relatively high-end care homes within Eastern Europe and South-East Asia where the care tends to be more comprehensive and a lot cheaper. At the same time, this practice has caused much controversy within Germany, with some commentators calling it “inhumane” and “shameful.” The aim of this article is to show that such criticisms are exaggerated. (...) Whereas sending people to care homes in lower-income countries can be immoral, I argue that the most promising objections against it do not always apply and, to the extent that they do, do not always provide decisive reasons against sending people abroad. These objections maintain that such expatriations harm three different groups of individuals, namely the emigrants themselves; their friends and relatives; and vulnerable members of the receiving societies. (shrink)

Many people want to live in liberal democracies because they are liberal and democratic. Yet it would be mistaken, indeed naive, to assume that this applies to all would-be residents. Just as some inhabitants of liberal democracies oppose one or more fundamental liberal-democratic values and principles, so there are foreign would-be residents who do so, who might include individuals with e.g. Jihadist, Neo-Nazi, and radical anarchist views. Proceeding on the assumption that there exists no unconditional moral right to immigrate, this (...) article asks whether it is ever morally permissible for liberal democracies to deny residence to nonnationals based on evidence that theypersonallyhold extremist views. I argue that this is sometimes the case. Specifically, my contention is that even if we adopt a cosmopolitan perspective on which states are not allowed to prioritise the interests of their own citizens and residents over those of foreign nonresidents, there are two conditions under which such exclusions are justified even when refugees are being refused admission. (shrink)

In a bid to boost fertility levels, Iran and Japan have recently launched their own dating apps, with more countries likely to follow. The aim of this article is to consider whether state-run dating apps are morally desirable, which is a question that has not received any scholarly attention. It finds that such apps have at least two benefits that collectively, if not individually, render their introduction to be welcomed provided certain conditions are met. These benefits are that they are (...) better placed than commercial dating apps such as Tinder, Bumble, and Badoo to (i) help people find lasting love and to (ii) protect individuals from spending too much money and/or time on online dating. Several objections are discussed and shown to be unconvincing as arguments against state-run dating apps tout court, including the objection that for states to offer their own dating apps is unduly expensive; the objection that it gives them too much power; and the objection that they should invest in creating offline opportunities for meeting potential partners instead. (shrink)

Being the victim of a microaggression, that is, a relatively minor act of hostility that targets someone's (marginalized) social identity, can be distressing, but so can merely being in doubt over whether one has been the victim of such aggression. To address this last problem, Regina Rini has proposed a novel understanding of microaggressions that is meant to eliminate such doubts. On her “Ambiguous Experience Account,” whenever members of marginalized groups believe they might have been subjected to a microaggression, a (...) microaggression will have been committed even if the would‐be perpetrator was not motivated by prejudiced aggression. This article challenges this account on grounds of being incompatible with people's lived experiences, including those of the would‐be victims, and argues that we should instead accept the conventional account on which microaggressive acts must be consciously or unconsciously motivated by prejudiced aggression. At the same time, it shows that those falsely suspected of having committed microaggressions will still merit blame sometimes for having failed to signal that their behavior was respectful of others, which lessens the concerns that Rini's conceptual engineering seeks to address. I conclude by drawing out some implications for the debate on microaggressions and attributional ambiguity. (shrink)

Some philosophers believe that swearing is morally innocent insofar as it is non‐abusive and vulgarities are being used, such as when people exclaim “s**t!” or “f**k!” This article shows this view to be mistaken. I start by arguing that taking offense at non‐abusive vulgar swearing is not irrational, before arguing that, even if it were, such swearing would still not always be justified. The fact that many of us find it hard to overcome profanity‐induced offense, along with the fact that (...) its existence is necessary for swearing to be possible, is sufficient to render even non‐abusive vulgar swearing sometimes wrong. I go on to assess the opposite view, according to which swearing, including non‐abusive vulgar swearing, is never justified, whereby two objections to this activity are addressed. According to the instrumentalization objection, the fact that swearing is possible only if at least some people are sometimes offended by the words that are used means that swearers treat those who are offended by their profanity as mere means. And according to the Ersatz objection, the fact that we can use inoffensive words to raise the emotional content of our speech renders swearing gratuitously offensive. Neither objection is found to be convincing. (shrink)

_Many people who stand to pee raise the toilet seat so that they have a larger target to aim at. However, if the seat is left in this position, any subsequent toilet user who defecates or pees sitting down will need to lower the seat. Some of us believe that this inconvenience should not be visited on those who pee sitting down, while others deny that there is anything wrong with leaving the toilet seat in the position that you used (...) it. This article offers the first scholarly defense of the seat-down norm. In so doing, it shows that recent claims that this norm would be unfair and inefficient are unwarranted_. _Keywords: _Toilet seats; Toilets; Bathrooms; Gender Inequality; Urination; Defecation; Expensive tastes; Stehpinkler; Sitzpinkler. (shrink)

In recent years, several theorists have defended a form of neutrality that seeks to equalise the benefits that state policies bestow upon citizens’ conceptions of the good life. For example, when state policies confer special benefits upon a conception that revolves around a particular culture, religion or type of sports, other cultures, religions or types of sports might be due compensation. This article argues that this kind of neutrality – which I refer to as ‘hands-on neutrality’ – cannot be vindicated, (...) whether it takes a resourcist form or welfarist form. After explaining why states cannot simply avoid bestowing unequal advantages upon citizens’ conceptions of the good life, I identify several versions of hands-on neutrality and show that all of them fail to respect the moral equality of citizens. (In so doing, however, I do find that a different form of neutrality is appropriately applied under a more limited set of conditions, which is lottery-based.) I conclude by showing that in cases where theories of hands-on neutrality have intuitive force, more plausible rival principles can account for our intuitions. (shrink)

A large share of countries is struggling to provide adequate care to their older populations. To deal with this challenge, philosopher Ingrid Robeyns has advocated legislation that requires citizens to spend 1 year of their life providing dependency care. My aim of this contribution is to strengthen the case for this proposal, which I will refer to as a ‘universal care conscription’. I do so by defending this type of conscription against various alternative ways of addressing care-deficits that have been (...) proposed. As I show, not only is it doubtful whether pursuing these alternatives will always, or even generally, suffice to prevent and/or alleviate care-deficits at reasonable financial and moral cost, a universal care conscription has significant civic benefits in an age of polarization that count strongly in its favour. (shrink)

This dissertation seeks to answer the following question: does a commitment to liberalism require state remediation of illiberal practices of illiberal minority cultures that only affect their own members? Put differently, it asks: should the state deny illiberal minority cultures such as those of the Amish, Ultra-Orthodox Jews, Pueblo Indians, et cetera the freedom to be internally illiberal from a liberal viewpoint? The answer proposed by this dissertation is a qualified ‘no’. Assuming that liberalism is fundamentally committed to the protection (...) of individual freedom, I argue that states should allow illiberal minority cultures to be internally illiberal in order to respect the individual freedom of citizens with illiberal conceptions of the good. At the same time, I propose limits to this toleration in order to protect the individual freedom of progressive-minded citizens, as well as to guard children from severely harmful cultural practices. Whether the state should tolerate illiberal practices of illiberal minority cultures that only affect their own members, I claim, should depend on whether the following conditions are met: Their adult members are guaranteed substantive exit rights, i.e. rights to a realistic ability to change cultural affiliations. The cultural communities in question do not engage in illiberal practices that inflict severe harm on children. To realise condition, which forms the core of this dissertation’s ‘substantive exit rights strategy’, I argue that the state should take five measures. These include making an autonomy-facilitating education compulsorily for children, providing particular groups of defectors with financial assistance, and ensuring that the liberal majority culture is open to ex-members of illiberal minority cultures. By contrast, condition is not considered to be central to this dissertation’s substantive exit rights strategy, the reason being that it is dubious whether liberalism’s core commitment to the protection of individual freedom alone can justify a ban on cultural practices that severely harm children. Even so, it will become clear that adding this condition renders this approach more plausible. My central claim is that this dissertation’s substantive exit rights strategy better protects the individual freedom of members of illiberal minority cultures than the main rival liberal strategies, as proposed by Will Kymlicka and Chandran Kukathas. Whereas Kymlicka gives members of these groups too little liberty to engage in illiberal practices, I argue that Kukathas makes the opposite mistake of granting them too much liberty. In both cases, we will see that the individual freedom of some members of illiberal minority cultures is not appropriately protected. This holds true, I conclude, regardless of whether individual freedom is construed as personal autonomy or in a less demanding way, namely as ability to live in accordance with one’s conception of the good. (shrink)

While several scholars have argued that the rise of the internet has allowed an autistic culture to emerge over the past two decades, the question of whether people with autism or, as some members of this group refer to themselves, ‘autists’, are legally entitled to their own cultural rights has not been investigated. This article fills part of this lacuna by considering whether such entitlements exist from the perspective of human rights law. I start by showing that, insofar as autists (...) have their own culture, they are likely to be entitled to cultural rights under existing human rights treaties, before arguing that the absence of evidence that their beliefs, values, and behaviors are significantly shaped by distinct social norms renders it unclear whether they do in fact have their own culture. However, I end by arguing that, in terms of autists’ entitlements from a human rights perspective, little seems to depend on this. (shrink)

Many people move house at some point during their childhood and not rarely more than once. While relocations are not always harmful for under-aged children, they can, and frequently do, cause great disruption to their lives by severing their social ties as well as any attachments that they might have to their neighbourhood, town, or wider geographical region, with long-lasting psychological effects in some cases. Since it is increasingly recognised within normative philosophy as well as within Western societies that older (...) minors should have the final say over certain issues that significantly affect their lives (think, for instance, of custody disputes, decisions about whether to get specific vaccinations or use contraceptives), this raises the question: Can it be morally incumbent upon parents to give their minor children a veto over family relocation? This article argues that the answer is affirmative. Specifically, it suggests that such duties exist if and only if (i) parents are not morally required to either relocate their families or stay put, (ii) the stakes of the decision about a family relocation are fairly low, and (iii) the children have the competence to make these decisions, as many older minors do. (shrink)

Faced with relatively old and ageing populations, a growing number of higher-income countries are struggling to provide affordable and decent care to their older citizens. This contribution proposes a new policy for dealing with this challenge. Under certain conditions, I argue that states should pay their citizens to move to foreign care homes in order to ease the pressure on domestic care institutions. This is the case if—but not necessarily only if— a significant proportion of resident citizens do not currently (...) have access to adequate aged and nursing care; the care in the foreign care homes is not worse than the one that is available in domestic care homes; sending states conduct regular checks to ascertain that the level of care abroad is not worse or delegate this task to reliable local monitoring bodies; appropriate measures have been taken to ensure that this type of migration does not harm local residents; and the public money spent on the payments is not better spent on other ways of easing the pressure on domestic care institutions. I end by defending the proposed payments against the objection that they create morally problematic inequalities by exerting greater pressure on members of lower socioeconomic classes to migrate than on their more affluent compatriots. (shrink)

In recent years, a proportion of older Germans has been sent to relatively high‐end care homes within lower‐income countries where the care tends to be cheaper and more extensive than that in German care homes. Destination countries are found predominantly within Eastern Europe (e.g. Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic), but to a lesser extent also within South‐East Asia (e.g. Thailand). At the same time, these expatriations have caused much controversy, with some German commentators calling them ‘inhumane’ and ‘shameful’. In this article, (...) I argue that such criticisms are overdrawn. Although sending an older individual to a care home within a lower‐income country can be morally impermissible, I find that there are at least three sets of conditions under which it is not. (shrink)

One consequence of the lockdowns that many countries have introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic is that people have become more vulnerable to loneliness. In this contribution, I argue that even if this does not render lockdowns unjustified, it is morally incumbent upon states to make reasonable efforts to protect their residents from loneliness for as long as their social confinement measures remain in place. Without attempting to provide an exhaustive list of ways in which this might be done, (...) I identify four broad measures that I believe many, if not most, states ought to take. These require states to (i) help ensure that people have affordable access to the internet, as well as opportunities for learning how to use this medium so as that they can digitally connect to others; (ii) help people to have harmonious and rewarding intimate relationships; and try to make (iii) non-human companionship as well as (iv) various non-social solutions to loneliness widely available. (shrink)

In more than 20% of countries, a single religion is recognized in the constitution. This article argues that there are good reasons for opposing such ‘mono-recognition’ as it fails to show due concern to members of constitutionally unrecognized religions. Yet rather than opting for disestablishment as Sweden did in 2000, I show that there may be a better alternative in many cases: To constitutionally recognize a variety of religions. After distinguishing synchronic forms of plural recognition whereby multiple religions are constitutionally (...) recognized simultaneously from diachronic forms whereby state religions are rotated, I defend the latter option. On this approach, a multi-religious state might have Catholicism as the state religion during the first part of the year, then Islam, then Judaism, and so on, whereby I argue that there ought to be differences in the amount of time that religions are recognized depending on differences in the strength of their claims to constitutional recognition. Besides being fairer than mono-recognition and synchronic plural recognition, I show that when some religious groups are marginalized, diachronic plural recognition has significant advantages over non-recognition of any religion as constitutionally recognizing these groups’ religions sends valuable signals that their members belong to society. (shrink)

Many liberal democracies have legal restrictions on nudism. This article argues that when public nudity does not pose a health threat, such restrictions are unjust. To vindicate this claim, I start by showing that there are two weighty interests served by the freedom to be naked in public. First, it promotes individual well-being; not only can nudist activities have great recreational value, recent studies have found that exposure to non-idealised naked bodies has a positive impact on body image, and, ultimately, (...) on life satisfaction. Second, public nudity has expressive value; apart from being a constitutive element of various spiritual and religious worldviews, public nudity is frequently used to protest social and political evils. As I go on to argue, the reasons for abolishing current anti-nudist laws that stem from these interests are not overridden, let alone cancelled, by the offence that public nudity might cause. Indeed, whereas my principal aim is to defend the freedom to be publicly naked when this poses no health threat, I will contend that states should recognise this liberty as a distinct legal right rather than try to subsume it under existing rights or secure it simply by excluding non-sexual, non-exhibitionist public nudity from existing laws against public indecency, sexual exhibition, and disorderly conduct. (shrink)

Over the past decade, countries such as France, Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Latvia, and Bulgaria have banned face-coverings from public spaces. These bans are popularly known as ‘burqa bans’ as they seem to have been drafted with the aim of preventing people from wearing burqas and niqabs specifically. The scholarly response to these bans has been overwhelmingly negative, with several lawyers and philosophers arguing that they violate the human right to freedom of religion. While this article shares some of the concerns (...) that have been raised, it argues that banning face-coverings in public is morally justified under certain conditions with the exception of facemasks that are necessary for the containment of infectious diseases, such as COVID-19. The reason for this is that those who publicly cover their face make it very difficult for other members of society to socially interact with them, especially for those who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, which is problematic in an age where many people are chronically lonely or at risk of becoming chronically lonely. As such, this article can be understood as a more elaborate, and arguably more sophisticated, defence of the justification that France offered for its face-covering ban before the European Court of Human Rights, namely that covering one’s face undermines the conditions for ‘living together’. (shrink)

Introduction: ‘Illiberal’ is an adjective that is commonly used within contemporary legal, political, and philosophical scholarship. For example, authors might speak of ‘illiberal cultures’,1 ‘illiberal groups’,2 ‘illiberal states’,3 ‘illiberal democracies’,4 ‘illiberal beliefs’,5 and ‘illiberal practices’.6 Yet despite its widespread usage, no in-depth discussions exist of exactly what it means for someone or something to be illiberal, or might mean. This article fills this lacuna by providing a conceptual analysis of the term ‘illiberal practices’, which I argue is basic in that (...) other bearers of the property of being illiberal can be understood by reference to it. Specifically, I identify five ways in which a practice can be illiberal based on the different ways in which this term is employed within both scholarly and political discourses. The main value of this disaggregation lies in the fact that it helps to prevent confusions that arise when people use the adjective ‘illiberal’ in different ways, as is not uncommon. (shrink)

As people grow old, many risk becoming chronically lonely which is associated with e.g. depression, dementia, and increased mortality. Whoever else should help to protect them from this risk, various philosophers have argued that any children that they might have will often be among them. Proceeding on this assumption, this article considers what filial duties to protect ageing parents from loneliness consist of, or might consist of. I develop my answer by showing that a view that may be intuitively plausible, (...) namely that they simply require children to visit their ageing parents regularly when they can do so at reasonable cost and call, text, and/or email them from time to time, is defective in three respects. First, it ignores children’s potential responsibilities to encourage and/or facilitate social interaction between their parents and third parties. Second, it ignores their potential responsibilities to help provide their parents with non-human companionship. Third, it elides over their duties to coordinate their efforts to offer loneliness protection with others. What I end up proposing instead, then, is an approach for protecting ageing parents from loneliness that is multi-faceted. (shrink)

The introduction of genomics and biobanking methodologies to the African research context has also introduced novel ways of doing science, based on values of sharing and reuse of data and samples. This shift raises ethical challenges that need to be considered when research is reviewed by ethics committees, relating for instance to broad consent, the feedback of individual genetic findings, and regulation of secondary sample access and use. Yet existing ethics guidelines and regulations in Africa do not successfully regulate research (...) based on sharing, causing confusion about what is allowed, where and when. In order to understand better the ethics regulatory landscape around genomic research and biobanking, we conducted a comprehensive analysis of existing ethics guidelines, policies and other similar sources. We sourced 30 ethics regulatory documents from 22 African countries. We used software that assists with qualitative data analysis to conduct a thematic analysis of these documents. Surprisingly considering how contentious broad consent is in Africa, we found that most countries allow the use of this consent model, with its use banned in only three of the countries we investigated. In a likely response to fears about exploitation, the export of samples outside of the continent is strictly regulated, sometimes in conjunction with regulations around international collaboration. We also found that whilst an essential and critical component of ensuring ethical best practice in genomics research relates to the governance framework that accompanies sample and data sharing, this was most sparingly covered in the guidelines. There is a need for ethics guidelines in African countries to be adapted to the changing science policy landscape, which increasingly supports principles of openness, storage, sharing and secondary use. Current guidelines are not pertinent to the ethical challenges that such a new orientation raises, and therefore fail to provide accurate guidance to ethics committees and researchers. (shrink)

Teaching about technology, at all levels of education, can only be done properly when those who teach have a clear idea about what it is that they teach. In other words: they should be able to give a decent answer to the question: what is technology? In the philosophy of technology that question is explored. Therefore the philosophy of technology is a discipline with a high relevance for those who teach about technology. Literature in this field, though, is not always (...) easy to access for non-philosophers. This book provides an introduction to the philosophy of technology for such people. It offers a survey of the current state-of-affairs in the philosophy of technology, and also discusses the relevance of that for teaching about technology. The book can be used in introductory courses on the philosophy of technology in teacher education programs, engineering education programs, and by individual educators that are interested in the intriguing phenomenon of technology that is so important in our contemporary society. (shrink)

If religion once seemed to have played out its role in the intellectual and political history of Western secular modernity, it has now returned with a vengeance. In this engaging study, Hent de Vries argues that a turn to religion discernible in recent philosophy anticipates and accompanies this development in the contemporary world. Though the book reaches back to Immanuel Kant, Martin Heidegger, and earlier, it takes its inspiration from the tradition of French phenomenology, notably Emmanuel Levinas, Jean-Luc Marion, (...) and, especially, Jacques Derrida. Tracing how Derrida probes the discourse on religion, its metaphysical presuppositions, and its transformations, de Vries shows how this author consistently foregrounds the unexpected alliances between a radical interrogation of the history of Western philosophy and the religious inheritance from which that philosophy has increasingly sought to set itself apart. De Vries goes beyond formal analogies between the textual practices of deconstruction and so-called negative theology to address the necessity for a philosophical thinking that situates itself at once close to and at the farthest remove from traditional manifestations of the religious and the theological. This paradox is captured in the phrase adieu ( à dieu ), borrowed from Levinas, which signals at once a turn toward and a leave-taking from God -- and which also gestures toward and departs from the other of this divine other, the possibility of radical evil. Only by confronting such uncanny and difficult figures, de Vries claims, can one begin to think and act upon the ethical and political imperatives of our day. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In ethics, the use of empirical data has become more and more popular, leading to a distinct form of applied ethics, namely empirical ethics. This ‘empirical turn’ is especially visible in bioethics. There are various ways of combining empirical research and ethical reflection. In this paper we discuss the use of empirical data in a special form of Reflective Equilibrium (RE), namely the Network Model with Third Person Moral Experiences. In this model, the empirical data consist of the moral (...) experiences of people in a practice. Although inclusion of these moral experiences in this specific model of RE can be well defended, their use in the application of the model still raises important questions. What precisely are moral experiences? How to determine relevance of experiences, in other words: should there be a selection of the moral experiences that are eventually used in the RE? How much weight should the empirical data have in the RE? And the key question: can the use of RE by empirical ethicists really produce answers to practical moral questions? In this paper we start to answer the above questions by giving examples taken from our research project on understanding the norm of informed consent in the field of pediatric oncology. We especially emphasize that incorporation of empirical data in a network model can reduce the risk of self‐justification and bias and can increase the credibility of the RE reached. (shrink)

In ethics, the use of empirical data has become more and more popular, leading to a distinct form of applied ethics, namely empirical ethics. This ‘empirical turn’ is especially visible in bioethics. There are various ways of combining empirical research and ethical reflection. In this paper we discuss the use of empirical data in a special form of Reflective Equilibrium (RE), namely the Network Model with Third Person Moral Experiences. In this model, the empirical data consist of the moral experiences (...) of people in a practice. Although inclusion of these moral experiences in this specific model of RE can be well defended, their use in the application of the model still raises important questions. What precisely are moral experiences? How to determine relevance of experiences, in other words: should there be a selection of the moral experiences that are eventually used in the RE? How much weight should the empirical data have in the RE? And the key question: can the use of RE by empirical ethicists really produce answers to practical moral questions?In this paper we start to answer the above questions by giving examples taken from our research project on understanding the norm of informed consent in the field of pediatric oncology. We especially emphasize that incorporation of empirical data in a network model can reduce the risk of self‐justification and bias and can increase the credibility of the RE reached. (shrink)

Unearthing the radical potential at the heart of canonical political thought, this book uses the work of Foucault and Deleuze to re-imagine theory in a way that embraces difference and resistance.

Concepts for sustainable bioeconomy systems are gradually replacing the ones on linear product chains. The reason is that continuously expanding linear chain activities are considered to contribute to climate change, reduced biodiversity, over-exploitation of resources, food insecurity, and the double burden of disease. Are sustainable bioeconomy systems a guarantee for a healthy planet? If yes, why, when, and how? In literature, different sustainability indicators have been presented to shed light on this complicated question. Due to high degrees of complexity and (...) interactions of actors in bioeconomy systems, trade-offs and non-linear outcomes became apparent. This fueled the debates about the normative dimensions of the bioeconomy. In particular, the behavior of actors and the utilization of products do not seem to be harmonized according to the environmental, social, and economic pillars of sustainability. Potential conflicts require a new conceptual framework that is here introduced. It consists of a ‘sustainability’ cylinder captured between an inner-cylinder, representing order, and an outer-cylinder for chaos, based on the laws of physics and complex adaptive systems. Such a framework permits (bioeconomy) systems to propagate in the sustainability zone only if they follow helical pathways serving as the new norms. Helices are a combination of two sinusoidal patterns. The first represents here the sustainable behavior of interacting actors and the second the balanced usage of resources and products. The latter counteracts current growth discourses. The applicability of the conceptual cylinder framework is positively verified via 9 cases in Europe, which encompass social-organizational and product-technological innovations. –. (shrink)

Modern bioethics was born in the West and thus reflects, not surprisingly, the traditions of Western moral philosophy and political and social theory. When the work of bioethics was confined to the West, this background of socio-political theory and moral tradition posed few problems, but as bioethics has moved into other cultures – inside and outside of the Western world – it has become an agent of moral imperialism. We describe the moral imperialism of bioethics, discuss its dangers, and suggest (...) that global bioethics will succeed only to the extent that it is local. (shrink)

An account of the Rosicrucian manifestos, and in particular their call for a general reformation, in relation to medieval and early modern traditions and reform programs.

Okay, Professor Turner is not Rodney King. He is not responding to bioethicists and social scientists running amuck, setting automobiles aflame, and pelting each other with rocks and broken bottles. He does not come right out and ask, “Why can't we all just get along?” But in its academic way, Turner's essay is an effort to negotiate a truce in the interdisciplinary squabbles that plague bioethics, a plea to move bioethics beyond the “misleading” and “unhelpful” “demarcation of disciplinary goals” that (...) leads to “dichotomous thinking” and “polemical accusations.”. (shrink)

The field of bioethics continues to struggle with the problem of cultural diversity: can universal principles guide ethical decision making, regardless of the culture in which those decisions take place? Or should bioethical principles be derived from the moral traditions of local cultures? Ten Have and Gordijn and Bracanovic defend the universalist position, arguing that respect for cultural diversity in matters ethical will lead to a dangerous cultural relativity where vulnerable patients and research subjects will be harmed. We challenge the (...) premises of moral universalism, showing how this approach imports and imposes moral notions of Western society and leads to harm in non-western cultures. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on care homes in the United Kingdom, particularly for those residents living with dementia. The impetus for this article comes from a recent review conducted by the authors. That review, a qualitative media analysis of news and academic articles published during the first few months of the outbreak, identified ethical care as a key theme warranting further investigation within the context of the crisis. To explore ethical care further, a set of salient (...) ethical values for delivering care to care home residents living with dementia during the pandemic was derived from a synthesis of relevant ethical standards, codes and philosophical approaches. The ethical values identified were caring, non-maleficence, beneficence, procedural justice, dignity in death and dying, well-being, safety, and personhood. Using these ethical values as a framework, alongside examples from contemporaneous media and academic sources, this article discusses the delivery of ethical care to care home residents with dementia within the context of COVID-19. The analysis identifies positive examples of ethical values displayed by care home staff, care sector organisations, healthcare professionals and third sector advocacy organisations. However, concerns relating to the death rates, dignity, safety, well-being and personhood – of residents and staff – are also evident. These shortcomings are attributable to negligent government strategy, which resulted in delayed guidance, lack of resources and Personal Protective Equipment, unclear data, and inconsistent testing. Consequently, this review demonstrates the ways in which care homes are underfunded, under resourced and undervalued. (shrink)

How do bioethics gatekeepers located in wealthy nations treat bioethics workers from developing countries? Can the policies of leading international bioethics journals—based on a concern for profit that effectively restricts access for most researchers from developing countries—be ethically justified? We examined these policies focusing on the way they influence the ability of researchers in resource-poor countries to participate in the development of the field of bioethics. Eight of the fourteen leading bioethics journals are published by three transnational publishing houses, all (...) of which are based in wealthy nations. None of these eight journals participates in the Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative of the World Health Organization, a program that provides free or very low-cost online access to the major journals by researchers in developing countries. Lack of access to these essential resources makes it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for bioethicists in developing countries to learn from, and engage in, the global bioethics dialogue. Thus, exclusionary practices of leading bioethics journals sustain the hegemony of Western bioethics, raising serious questions about professed aspirations to create a truly “global” bioethics. This phenomenon indicates lack of empathy and moral imagination of bioethicists in developed countries, raises serious questions about the ethics of bioethics, and highlights the urgent need for creative solutions to remedy this social injustice. (shrink)

The silencing of the epistemologies, theories, principles, values, concepts and experiences of the global South constitutes a particularly egregious epistemic injustice in bioethics. Our shared responsibility to rectify that injustice should be at the top of the ethics agenda. That it is not, or only is in part, is deeply problematic and endangers the credibility of the entire field. As a first step towards reorienting the field, this paper offers a comprehensive account of epistemic justice for global health ethics. We (...) first introduce several different conceptions of justice and decolonisation in relation to knowledge, purposefully drawing on work emanating from the global South as well as the global North. We then apply those conceptions to the global health ethics context to generate a tripartite account of the layers of epistemic justice in the field: who is producing ethics knowledge; what theories and concepts are being applied to produce ethics knowledge; and whose voices are sought, recorded and used to generate ethics knowledge. These layers reflect that the field spans conceptual and empirical research. We conclude by proposing that, going forward, three avenues are key to achieve greater epistemic justice at each layer and to help decolonise global health ethics: namely, understanding the problem, dialogue and structural change. (shrink)

Cell line immortalisation is a growing component of African genomics research and biobanking. However, little is known about the factors influencing consent to cell line creation and immortalisation in African research settings. We contribute to addressing this gap by exploring three questions in a sample of Xhosa participants recruited for a South African psychiatric genomics study: First, what proportion of participants consented to cell line storage? Second, what were predictors of this consent? Third, what questions were raised by participants during (...) this consent process? 760 Xhose people with schizophrenia and 760 controls were matched to sex, age, level of education and recruitment region. We used descriptive statistics to determine the proportion of participants who consented to cell line creation and immortalization. Logistic regression methods were used to examine the predictors of consent. Reflections from study recruiters were elicited and discussed to identify key questions raised by participants about consent. Approximately 40% of participants consented to cell line storage. The recruiter who sought consent was a strong predictor of participant’s consent. Participants recruited from the South African Eastern Cape, and older participants, were more likely to consent; both these groups were more likely to hold traditional Xhosa values. Neither illness nor education were significant predictors of consent. Key questions raised by participants included two broad themes: clarification of what cell immortalisation means, and issues around individual and community benefit. These findings provide guidance on the proportion of participants likely to consent to cell line immortalisation in genomics research in Africa, and reinforce the important and influential role that study recruiters play during seeking of this consent. Our results reinforce the cultural and contextual factors underpinning consent choices, particularly around sharing and reciprocity. Finally, these results provide support for the growing literature challenging the stigmatizing perception that people with severe mental illness are overly vulnerable as a target group for heath research and specifically genomics studies. (shrink)

Community engagement is gaining prominence in global health research. So far, a philosophical rationale for why researchers should perform community engagement during such research has not been provided by ethics scholars. Its absence means that conducting community engagement is still often viewed as no more than a ‘good idea’ or ‘good practice’ rather than ethically required. In this article, we argue that shared health governance can establish grounds for requiring the engagement of low‐ and middle‐income country (LMIC) community members in (...) global health research, where such research aims to help reduce health disparities. This philosophical basis has important implications for the ethical goals ascribed to engagement and the approach adopted to undertake it. We suggest the ethical goals of engagement in equity‐oriented global health research should include: (a) generating research topics and questions that reflect the key problems disadvantaged groups face in accessing healthcare, services and broader social determinants of health and (b) promoting the translation of research findings into policy and practice in ways that benefit the health of disadvantaged groups. We propose engagement practice should have the following features: deliberation with LMIC community members to make a range of project decisions, beginning with setting research topics and questions; inclusion of members of disadvantaged groups and those with the power to change policy and practice to benefit them; and purposeful structuring of deliberations to minimize the impact of power disparities between LMIC community members. Finally, we reflect on how these features differ from those typical of much current community engagement practice in LMICs. (shrink)