30 found
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  1.  49
    Gene editing, identity and benefit.Thomas Douglas & Katrien Devolder - 2022 - Philosophical Quarterly 72 (2):305-325.
    Some suggest that gene editing human embryos to prevent genetic disorders will be in one respect morally preferable to using genetic selection for the same purpose: gene editing will benefit particular future persons, while genetic selection would merely replace them. We first construct the most plausible defence of this suggestion—the benefit argument—and defend it against a possible objection. We then advance another objection: the benefit argument succeeds only when restricted to cases in which the gene-edited child would have been brought (...)
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  2.  90
    Procreative Altruism: Beyond Individualism in Reproductive Selection.Thomas Douglas & Katrien Devolder - 2013 - Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 38 (4):400-419.
    Existing debate on procreative selection focuses on the well-being of the future child. However, selection decisions can also have significant effects on the well-being of others. Moreover, these effects may run in opposing directions; some traits conducive to the well-being of the selected child may be harmful to others, whereas other traits that limit the child’s well-being may preserve or increase that of others. Prominent selection principles defended to date instruct parents to select a child, of the possible children they (...)
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  3. Coercion, Incarceration, and Chemical Castration: An Argument From Autonomy.Thomas Douglas, Pieter Bonte, Farah Focquaert, Katrien Devolder & Sigrid Sterckx - 2013 - Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 10 (3):393-405.
    In several jurisdictions, sex offenders may be offered chemical castration as an alternative to further incarceration. In some, agreement to chemical castration may be made a formal condition of parole or release. In others, refusal to undergo chemical castration can increase the likelihood of further incarceration though no formal link is made between the two. Offering chemical castration as an alternative to further incarceration is often said to be partially coercive, thus rendering the offender’s consent invalid. The dominant response to (...)
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  4. A conception of genetic parenthood.Thomas Douglas & Katrien Devolder - 2018 - Bioethics 33 (1):54-59.
    We seek to develop a plausible conception of genetic parenthood, taking a recent discussion by Heidi Mertes as our point of departure. Mertes considers two conceptions of genetic parenthood—one invoking genetic resemblance, and the other genetic inheritance—and presents counter-examples to both conceptions. We revise Mertes’ second conception so as to avoid these and related counter-examples.
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  5. The ambiguity of the embryo: Ethical inconsistency in the human embryonic stem cell debate.Katrien Devolder & John Harris - 2007 - Metaphilosophy 38 (2-3):153–169.
    We argue in this essay that (1) the embryo is an irredeemably ambiguous entity and its ambiguity casts serious doubt on the arguments claiming its full protection or, at least, its protection against its use as a means fo research, (2) those who claim the embryo should be protected as "one of us" are committed to a position even they do not uphold in their practices, (3) views that defend the protection of the embryo in virtue of its potentiality to (...)
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  6.  47
    Genome Editing in Livestock, Complicity, and the Technological Fix Objection.Katrien Devolder - 2021 - Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 34 (3):1-17.
    Genome editing in livestock could potentially be used in ways that help resolve some of the most urgent and serious global problems pertaining to livestock, including animal suffering, pollution, antimicrobial resistance, and the spread of infectious disease. But despite this potential, some may object to pursuing it, not because genome editing is wrong in and of itself, but because it is the wrong kind of solution to the problems it addresses: it is merely a ‘technological fix’ to a complex societal (...)
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  7. The epistemic costs of compromise in bioethics.Katrien Devolder & Thomas Douglas - 2017 - Bioethics 32 (2):111-118.
    Bioethicists sometimes defend compromise positions, particularly when they enter debates on applied topics that have traditionally been highly polarised, such as those regarding abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem cell research. However, defending compromise positions is often regarded with a degree of disdain. Many are intuitively attracted to the view that it is almost always problematic to defend compromise positions, in the sense that we have a significant moral reason not to do so. In this paper, we consider whether this common (...)
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  8.  9
    NIPT for adult‐onset conditions: Australian NIPT users' views.India R. Marks, Katrien Devolder, Hilary Bowman-Smart, Molly Johnston & Catherine Mills - 2024 - Bioethics 38 (6):566-575.
    Noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) has become widely available in recent years. While initially used to screen for trisomies 21, 18, and 13, the test has expanded to include a range of other conditions and will likely expand further. This paper addresses the ethical issues that arise from one particularly controversial potential use of NIPT: screening for adult‐onset conditions (AOCs). We report data from our quantitative survey of Australian NIPT users' views on the ethical issues raised by NIPT for AOCs. The (...)
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  9.  77
    U.S. Complicity and Japan's Wartime Medical Atrocities: Time for a Response.Katrien Devolder - 2015 - American Journal of Bioethics 15 (6):40-49.
    Shortly before and during the Second World War, Japanese doctors and medical researchers conducted large-scale human experiments in occupied China that were at least as gruesome as those conducted by Nazi doctors. Japan never officially acknowledged the occurrence of the experiments, never tried any of the perpetrators, and never provided compensation to the victims or issued an apology. Building on work by Jing-Bao Nie, this article argues that the U.S. government is heavily complicit in this grave injustice, and should respond (...)
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  10.  22
    Unconditional access to non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) for adult-onset conditions: a defence.India R. Marks, Catherine Mills & Katrien Devolder - 2024 - Journal of Medical Ethics 50 (2):102-107.
    Over the past decade, non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) has been adopted into routine obstetric care to screen for fetal sex, trisomies 21, 18 and 13, sex chromosome aneuploidies and fetal sex determination. It is predicted that the scope of NIPT will be expanded in the future, including screening for adult-onset conditions (AOCs). Some ethicists have proposed that using NIPT to detect severe autosomal AOCs that cannot be prevented or treated, such as Huntington’s disease, should only be offered to prospective parents (...)
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  11.  58
    Regulating Genome Editing: For an Enlightened Democratic Governance.Giulia Cavaliere, Katrien Devolder & Alberto Giubilini - 2019 - Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 28 (1):76-88.
    How should we regulate genome editing in the face of persistent substantive disagreement about the moral status of this technology and its applications? In this paper, we aim to contribute to resolving this question. We first present two diametrically opposed possible approaches to the regulation of genome editing. A first approach, which we refer to as “elitist,” is inspired by Joshua Greene’s work in moral psychology. It aims to derive at an abstract theoretical level what preferences people would have if (...)
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  12.  38
    Palliative Farming.Ole Martin Moen & Katrien Devolder - 2022 - The Journal of Ethics 26 (4):543-561.
    Billions of animals live and die under deplorable conditions in factory farms. Despite significant efforts to reduce human consumption of animal products and to encourage more humane farming practices, the number of factory-farmed animals is nevertheless on an upward trajectory. In this paper, we suggest that the high levels of suffering combined with short life-expectancies make the situation of many factory-farmed animals relevantly similar to that of palliative patients. Building on this, we discuss the radical option of seeking to reduce (...)
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  13.  61
    Human embryonic stem cell research: Why the discarded-created-distinction cannot be based on the potentiality argument.Katrien Devolder - 2005 - Bioethics 19 (2):167-186.
    Discussions about the use and derivation of pluripotent human embryonic stem cells are a stumbling block in developing public policy on stem cell research. On the one hand there is a broad consensus on the benefits of these cells for science and biomedicine; on the other hand there is the controversial issue of killing human embryos. I will focus on the compromise position that accepts research on spare embryos, but not on research embryos ('discarded-created-distinction', from now on d-c-d). I will (...)
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  14.  36
    The Ethics of Embryonic Stem Cell Research.Katrien Devolder - 2015 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.
    Embryonic stem cell research holds great promise for biomedical research, but involves the destruction of human embryos. Katrien Devolder explores the tension between the view that embryos should never be deliberately harmed, and the view that such research must go forward. She provides an in-depth analysis of major attempts to resolve the problem.
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  15.  38
    The Moral Imperative to Conduct Embryonic Stem Cell and Cloning Research.Katrien Devolder & Julian Savulescu - 2006 - Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 15 (1):7-21.
    On March 8, 2005, the General Assembly adopted the United Nations Declaration on Human Cloning in which Member States are called upon toa) protect adequately human life in the application of life sciencesb) prohibit all forms of human cloning inasmuch as they are incompatible with human dignity and the protection of human lifec) prohibit the application of genetic engineering techniques that may be contrary to human dignityd) prevent the exploitation of women in the application of life sciencese) adopt and implement (...)
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  16.  68
    Embryo deaths in reproduction and embryo research: a reply to Murphy's double effect argument.Katrien Devolder - 2013 - Journal of Medical Ethics 39 (8):533-536.
    The majority of embryos created in natural reproduction die spontaneously within a few weeks of conception. Some have argued that, therefore, if one believes the embryo is a person (in the normative sense) one should find ‘natural’ reproduction morally problematic. An extension of this argument holds that, if one accepts embryo deaths in natural reproduction, consistency requires that one also accepts embryo deaths that occur in (i) assisted reproduction via in vitro fertilisation (IVF) and (ii) embryo research. In a recent (...)
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  17. Resisting Sparrow's Sexy Reductio : Selection Principles and the Social Good.Simon Rippon, Pablo Stafforini, Katrien Devolder, Russell Powell & Thomas Douglas - 2010 - American Journal of Bioethics 10 (7):16-18.
    Principles of procreative beneficence (PPBs) hold that parents have good reasons to select the child with the best life prospects. Sparrow (2010) claims that PPBs imply that we should select only female children, unlesswe attach normative significance to “normal” human capacities. We argue that this claim fails on both empirical and logical grounds. Empirically, Sparrow’s argument for greater female wellbeing rests on a selective reading of the evidence and the incorrect assumption that an advantage for females would persist even when (...)
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  18.  22
    Euthanasia for Detainees in Belgium.Katrien Devolder - 2016 - Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 25 (3):384-394.
    In 2011, Frank Van Den Bleeken became the first detainee to request euthanasia under Belgium’s Euthanasia Act of 2002. This article investigates whether it would be lawful and morally permissible for a doctor to accede to this request. Though Van Den Bleeken has not been held accountable for the crimes he committed, he has been detained in an ordinary prison, without appropriate psychiatric care, for more than 30 years. It is first established that VDB’s euthanasia request plausibly meets the relevant (...)
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  19. Compromise and moral complicity in the embryonic stem cell debate.Katrien Devolder & John Harris - 2005 - In Nafsika Athanassoulis (ed.), Philosophical reflections on medical ethics. New York: Palgrave-Macmillan.
     
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  20. Lifespan extension and the doctrine of double effect.Laura Capitaine, Katrien Devolder & Guido Pennings - 2013 - Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 34 (3):207-226.
    Recent developments in biogerontology—the study of the biology of ageing—suggest that it may eventually be possible to intervene in the human ageing process. This, in turn, offers the prospect of significantly postponing the onset of age-related diseases. The biogerontological project, however, has met with strong resistance, especially by deontologists. They consider the act of intervening in the ageing process impermissible on the grounds that it would (most probably) bring about an extended maximum lifespan—a state of affairs that they deem intrinsically (...)
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  21.  18
    Discriminatory Conscientious Objections in Healthcare: A Response to Ancell and Sinnott-Armstrong.Katrien Devolder - 2019 - Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 28 (2):316-326.
    Aaron Ancell and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong (A&SA) propose a pragmatic approach to problems arising from conscientious objections in healthcare. Their primary focus is on private healthcare systems like that in the United States. A&SA defend three claims: (i) many conscientious objections in healthcare are morally permissible and should be lawful, (ii) conscientious objections that involve invidious discrimination are morally impermissible, but (iii) even invidiously-discriminatory conscientious objections should not always be unlawful, as there is a better way to protect patient rights. Pursuant (...)
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  22.  31
    Cloning.Katrien Devolder - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
    Many countries or jurisdictions have legally banned human cloning or are in the process of doing so. In some countries, including France and Singapore, reproductive cloning of humans is a criminal offence. In 2005, the United Nations adopted a ‘Declaration on Human Cloning’, which calls for a universal ban on human cloning. The debate on human reproductive cloning seems to have drawn to a close. However, since reproductive cloning of mammals has become routine in several countries, there is reason to (...)
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  23.  36
    Intra-Family Gamete Donation: A Solution to Concerns Regarding Gamete Donation in China?Juhong Liao & Katrien Devolder - 2016 - Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 13 (3):431-438.
    Gamete donation from third parties is controversial in China as it severs blood ties, which are considered of utmost importance in Confucian tradition. In recent years, infertile couples are increasingly demonstrating a preference for the use of gametes donated by family members to conceive children—known as “intra-family gamete donation.” The main advantage of intra-family gamete donation is that it maintains blood ties between children and both parents. To date there is no practice of intra-family gamete donation in China. In this (...)
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  24.  67
    Were it physically safe, reproductive human cloning would be acceptable.Katrien Devolder - 2014 - In Arthur L. Caplan & Robert Arp (eds.), Contemporary debates in bioethics. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 79--88.
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  25.  41
    A reply to Levick's' were it physically safe, reproductive human cloning would not be acceptable'.Katrien Devolder - 2014 - In Arthur L. Caplan & Robert Arp (eds.), Contemporary debates in bioethics. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 98--100.
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  26. Embryo research.Katrien Devolder - 2019 - In David Edmonds (ed.), Ethics and the Contemporary World. New York: Routledge.
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  27.  48
    Killing Discarded Embryos and the Nothing‐is‐Lost Principle.Katrien Devolder - 2013 - Journal of Applied Philosophy 30 (4):289-303.
    A widely held view holds that it is permissible to conduct destructive research on embryos discarded following fertility treatment, but not on embryos especially created for research. One argument in support of this view appeals to the nothing-is-lost principle. It holds that because discarded embryos will die soon in any case, and something good is expected to come out of using them for research, it is presumptively permissible to do so. It is then claimed that no equivalent justification can be (...)
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  28.  70
    Rescuing human embryonic stem cell research: The possibility of embryo reconstitution after stem cell derivation.Katrien Devolder & Christopher M. Ward - 2007 - Metaphilosophy 38 (2-3):245–263.
    We discuss in this essay the alternative techniques proposed for the isolation of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) that attempt to satisfy moral issues surrounding killing embryos but show that these techniques are either redundant or do not achieve their intended aim. We discuss the difficulties associated with defining a human embryo and how the lack of clarity on this issue antagonises the ethical debate and impedes hESC research. We present scientific evidence showing that isolation of hESCs does not necessarily (...)
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  29.  9
    Reply to Levick's ‘Were it physically safe, reproductive human cloning would not be acceptable.Katrien Devolder - 2014 - In Arthur L. Caplan & Robert Arp (eds.), Contemporary debates in bioethics. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 98-101.
    In the previous chapter, Stephen Levick presents several reasons for thinking that human reproductive cloning would be unacceptable even if it were safe. His main concern is that it is likely to have adverse psychological and social consequences. Levick takes an interesting approach. He discusses five existing situations that are analogous in some respect to human reproductive cloning. In each case he argues that human reproductive cloning is likely to involve either the same or more serious adverse consequences than those (...)
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  30.  26
    Review of Kerry Lynn Macintosh, Illegal Beings. Human Clones and the Law.1. [REVIEW]Katrien Devolder - 2007 - American Journal of Bioethics 7 (2):97-98.