Thesis (M.A.)--York University, 2004. Graduate Programme in Interdisciplinary Studies. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 87-95). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url%5Fver=Z39.88-2004&res%5Fdat=xri:pqdiss&rft%5Fval%5Ffmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft%5Fdat=xri:pqdiss:MQ99380

This dissertation will support full ethical endorsement of terminal sedation for those most urgently in crisis and need of beneficence, those who are dying and in the final hours or days and suffering. To clarify the practice I first detail ethical differences between euthanasia, physician assisted suicide and terminal sedation. Moreover, I identify new areas where harms and benefits need to be evaluated as affecting not only patients, but also families and caregivers. I evaluate the current practice to allow the development of ethical guidelines and greater consensus on deciding the hard cases. This work may also serve to assist those looking to enlarge the practice in the future with ETS for those with debilitating diseases or disability, but they are not my primary goal. Below is the standard I propose for moral allowability for the use of terminal sedation. I will refer to it often in the pages that follow simply as my standard . Terminal sedation is the appropriate and intentional use of medications (benzodiazepines and/or narcotics) to produce ongoing, deep unconsciousness upon 1) a terminal patient’s (or surrogates) request due to 2) suffering intractable pain or other distressing clinical symptoms intolerable to the patient when 3) death is expected within hours or days (less than two weeks) due to the terminal illness, injury, or disease. I offer two versions of initial guidelines for development of hospital policy. The first version outlines minimal guidelines that ought to be utilized to allow TS for patients who fit my standard. The minimal guideline is based upon the recommendations of the American Medical Association with some modifications. The guideline is admittedly restrictive in hopes of gaining wider societal support for a currently controversial practice. Secondly, I offer more moderate guidelines for policy that could become a standard in the future. It maintains the restrictive focus of the minimal guidelines and offers additional education and support to others which has yet to be broadly provided. The moderate guidelines would mark an important step forward for allowing more choices in dying and offering additional supports to those involved with dying patients.

The emerging technologies of prenatal human genetic enhancement give to third parties the unprecedented power to design newborn genetic traits such as eye and skin color, intelligence, and emotional profile. The literature has not provided any answers to the question as to why these genetic enhancement technologies are prohibited by the European Biomedicine Convention. This thesis will demonstrate, by way of legal theory, that the prohibition on prenatal genetic enhancement is thoroughly justified on grounds that it violates the human right to dignity, as expressed in Kantian philosophy. In light of Kant’s Philosophy, genetic interventions for designing identity-related characteristics treat human beings instrumentally, to satisfy the desires of others, as mere means and not as ends in themselves. This thesis offers a deeper understanding of the law and policy regarding the prohibition on human genetic enhancement in order to safeguard future generations in the wake of a brave new world.

The emerging technologies of prenatal human genetic enhancement give to third parties the unprecedented power to design newborn genetic traits such as eye and skin color, intelligence, and emotional profile. The literature has not provided any answers to the question as to why these genetic enhancement technologies are prohibited by the European Biomedicine Convention. This thesis will demonstrate, by way of legal theory, that the prohibition on prenatal genetic enhancement is thoroughly justified on grounds that it violates the human right to dignity, as expressed in Kantian philosophy. In light of Kant’s Philosophy, genetic interventions for designing identity-related characteristics treat human beings instrumentally, to satisfy the desires of others, as mere means and not as ends in themselves. This thesis offers a deeper understanding of the law and policy regarding the prohibition on human genetic enhancement in order to safeguard future generations in the wake of a brave new world.

In an attempt to promote in-depth dialogue amongst bioethicists coming from distinct disciplinary and religious backgrounds this thesis offers an overview of the current state of bioethics and a critical analysis of a number of the leading methods of addressing pluralism in bioethics. Exploring the critiques and methodological proposals coming from the social sciences, the contract theorists, and the pragmatists, this study describes the problems which arise when confronting moral and religious diversity in a bioethical context and examines the ability of these various methodologies to adequately resolve these matters. Finally, after a discussion of the benefits and the potential problems of each of the aforementioned schools, a methodological model labelled “Pragmatic Perspectivism” is set forth as a potential conceptual framework through which a bioethical theory for a secular yet religiously pluralistic society may be forged.

There is no overlapping criterion providing a basis for attaining balance between individual and population oriented ethical concerns generated in the pandemic and the epidemic interventions. The shortfall leads to competing individual and population interests that hamper the effective management of pandemics and epidemics. The libertarian model focuses on advancing individual rights. The epidemiological model focuses upon population health. The social justice model focuses on a broader perspective than individual rights and population health to include universal human rights. <br>This dissertation suggests a Mixed Interests Ethics Model (MIEM) to ethically negotiate a balance between the individual and population interests in pandemics and epidemics. MIEM involves a combination of models (libertarian, epidemiological, and social justice) that shed light on substantive ethical principles of each model (e.g. autonomy, solidarity, and common good); which in turn require procedural standards (i.e. necessity, reasonableness, proportionality, and harm avoidance) to negotiate between the principles when they conflict. <br>The UNESCO Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights provides a hermeneutical context for applying MIEM in so far as it places MIEM within the context of promoting rights (individual and human) by considering the general ethical tension between individual and universal rights as explained by the UNESCO Declaration. / McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts; / Health Care Ethics / PhD; / Dissertation;

This thesis focuses on the evolution and framing of xenotransplantation (XTP) policy debate in New Zealand from 1998 to 2011. Its aim is providing a better understanding of both the science-society interface and the importance of issue framing policy debate in understanding of the scientific debate in New Zealand and its relationship with the public. A qualitative study, this thesis draws upon a variety of public science commentary and debate and poses the research question: How did xenotransplantation’s introduction and explanation to the New Zealand public inform its current status as a Restricted Procedure under New Zealand law; and what ethical implications arise from this public policy debate for public participation in bio-medical research in New Zealand?

Research misconduct has been generally considered a limited issue, occurring in a small percentage of research studies. Studies of the number of article retractions use retraction percentages to perpetuate the idea that research misconduct is not a common event, and use information in the retraction notice to quantify types of research misconduct and types or research error. However, retractions appear to be the wrong variable with which to assess misconduct rates and characteristics. Using final misconduct findings in hard science research from the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) for investigations closed from 1993 through 2013, the number of publications and subsequent retractions or corrections per final ORI finding was analyzed. Out of 167 subjects who received ORI sanctions, 84 (50.3%) had no publications associated with their misconduct. Of the remaining 83 subjects, only 72 had at least one retraction associated with their misconduct, i.e., only 43.1% of the all study subjects sanctioned for misconduct had at least one retraction from misconduct. Of the 231 retractions and corrections arising from the sanctioned misconduct, only 94 notices (40.6%) gave research misconduct as a cause for the retraction or correction. Thus, the study demonstrates that research misconduct occurs at a greater rate than retractions for misconduct are published, and retraction and correction notices cannot be relied upon to convey the presence of fraudulent data within the publication.

The idea about human’s merit, his worth, unique and oneness comparing him with things or other living creatures – that’s the phylosophy of human dignity in bioethics and biolaw. The aspect of principle of human dignity in bioethics and biolaw is analyzed invoking characters of human and his free will. Solving bioethical and biolaw problems, concepts of the beginning and the end of the life help us to reveal the importance of human dignity principle. In Bioethics and biolaw the principle of human dignity is read as a position which requires recognition of personality and free self-determination. / -.

Whether philosophy can contribute decisively towards alleviating humanity’s pressing environmental predicament I here argue in the affirmative. There are many considerations that challenge my case. Specifically, I show that environmental ethics, the subdiscipline of moral philosophy which was founded on the presumption of this possibility, has faltered. The field threatens to divide between “impractical theoretical” discourses within the academy, and “pragmatic” and largely atheoretical “practical” engagements with environmental science, policy and management. To help environmental ethics advance beyond this dysfunctional division, I explore methodological comparisons with bioethics, the “most successful field of applied ethics”. My deliberations apply in novel ways Bartha’s model for evaluating the plausibility of scientific hypotheses that incorporate analogies. In an initial test application of Bartha’s model, I evaluate the relevance to environmental ethics of the failure of the “top-down” applied ethics approach in bioethics. I present good reasons to conclude that environmental ethics can indeed learn from this failure. I also conclude that my trial application of Bartha’s model is promising. I then evaluate two proposals for reforms towards the greater practical effectiveness of environmental ethics. First I evaluate the plausibility of the proposal of Minteer and Collins for a new field of “ecological ethics”. They argue for the adoption of the broadly pragmatic methodological commitments now prevailing in bioethics. Because they focus primarily on supporting individual rather than collaborative processes of ethical judgment, I argue they risk facilitating an ethically pernicious “ecological paternalism” on analogy with the widely condemned practice of medical paternalism. Second I evaluate Norton’s proposal to incorporate environmental ethics within the adaptive ecosystem management paradigm. By arguing that the tasks of seeking cultural and biophysical sustainability within spatiotemporally defined communities must be integrated, Norton offers a potentially vital interface for intelligent and just interaction between culture and wider nature. I also argue this interface may be of more general relevance to bioethics and moral and political philosophy. However, a significant theoretical challenge for Norton’s sustainability model is identified. I argue that his model provides a thought experiment which illustrates the conceptual and practical incoherence of the primary liberal mechanisms for managing ethical conflict once these are applied to the sustainability challenge. Those mechanisms are the separation of public and private spheres and the simultaneous pursuit within private spaces of mutually exclusive conceptions of the good (and biophysically sustainable) life. I argue that rectifying this failure defines a vital, albeit daunting, theoretical and practical challenge for environmental ethics. That is to reconceptualise ethical conflict and to help design and facilitate practical processes to achieve sufficient common ethical agreement. Addressing this challenge is beyond the scope of this dissertation. However, some promising work and possibilities for further research are outlined. I conclude that I have successfully defended the value of analogical comparison with bioethics for enhancing the unity and effectiveness of theory and practice in environmental ethics. I therefore further conclude that I am correct to affirm that philosophy can, and I believe indeed should, contribute more effectively toward alleviating humanity’s pressing environmental predicament.