Faculty Bibliography

Advances in medicine's ability to assist reproduction in those afflicted with infertility raise numerous ethical questions both for potential recipients of the techniques and for society as a whole. Society must decide what level of resources should be committed to the treatment of infertility in light of the fact that many children are not readily placed in adoptive or foster homes and the increasing competition that exists for scarce health care resources. The ethical uncertainty about the moral status of embryos and the moral acceptability of nonstandard techniques of in vitro fertilization raise further troubling questions about the adequacy of consent, committee review, and other protections for the welfare of families. Although it may not yet be appropriate to call for legislation or regulation in this area, there is a very real need to increase professional and public discussion of the ethical and policy questions raised by assisted reproduction.

The contributions that the philosophy of medicine can make to both the philosophy of science and the practice of science have been obscured in recent years by an overemphasis on personalities rather than critical themes. Two themes have dominated general discussion within contemporary philosophy of science: methodological essentialism and dynamic gradualism. These themes are defined and considered in light of Kenneth Schaffner's argument that theories in biomedicine have a structure and logic unlike that found in theories of the natural sciences. Schaffner's arguments are suggestive but not definitive as a refutation of methodological essentialism. I argue that a primary reason for differences in the logic and structure of theories in biomedicine is not, as some philosophers have suggested, a product of ontological differences, but rather a product of the practical and pragmatic concerns of scientific theorizing in many areas of science, such as medicine.

There is a quaint term in English for describing the science of the care and production of domestic animals--animal husbandry. While not particularly useful as a description of the scientific methods by which such production is achieved, the term does capture what I believe is the moral ethos which ought to govern the scientific treatment of animals in the context of scientific experimentation. While great attention has been given to the claims of some philosophers and animal welfare advocates that animals have rights, less attention has been paid either to alternative foundations for conferring moral standing on animals, or, on the nature of the duties and responsibilities that would arise if it were true that animals could be said to have moral rights. I will argue that animals, or most animals, cannot reasonably be said to have moral rights. And even if one decides to stretch this term to include all animals, it cannot be done without conflating what I believe to be important differences in the moral standing of humans and animals. Rather than attempt to motivate humane treatment and reduction in animal use on the basis of animal rights I argue that scientists have an obligation, based upon their duty to care for the helpless and the powerless who can nonetheless be wronged, to act as stewards toward animals. Husbandry carries the connotation of care for a household and I believe this is the ethos that should pervade the animal laboratory or storage facility.