Moral status of embryonic stem cells: perspective of an African villager

One of the most important as well as most awesome achievements of modern biotechnology is the possibility of cloning human embryonic stem cells, if not human beings themselves. The possible revolutionary role of such stem cells in curative, preventive and enhancement medicine has been voiced and chorused around the globe. However, the question of the moral status of embryonic stem cells has not been clearly and unequivocally answered. Taking inspiration from the African adage that 'the hand that reaches beneath the incubating hen is not guiltless', I attempt answering this question, from the background of traditional African moral sensibility and sensitivity. I reach the following conclusions. Stem cells in themselves do not have human status and therefore lack moral worth/value. Embryos do have human status and a morally significant line cannot be drawn between human embryos and other human beings. What is morally at stake in stem cell research is therefore the question of the source of derivation or generation of the cells, not of the cells as such.     

The Substance View: A Critique (Part 2)

In my initial critique of the substance view, I raised reductio‐style objections to the substance view's conclusion that the standard human fetus has the same intrinsic value and moral standing as the standard adult human being, among others. In this follow‐up critique, I raise objections to some of the premises invoked in support of this conclusion. I begin by briefly presenting the substance view as well as its defense. (For a more thorough presentation, see the first part of my critique.) I then raise objections to three claims involved in the substance view's defense: the claim that the standard human fetus's intrinsic value and moral standing is a function of its potentiality; the claim that the standard human fetus's intrinsic value and moral standing is a function of its essential properties; and the claim that it is the possession of the basic potential for rational moral agency that best accounts for the wrongness of killing the standard human fetus, among others.     

Social Responsibility and the State's Duty to provide Healthcare: An Islamic Ethico‐Legal Perspective

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO) Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights asserts that governments are morally obliged to promote health and to provide access to quality healthcare, essential medicines and adequate nutrition and water to all members of society. According to UNESCO, this obligation is grounded in a moral commitment to promoting fundamental human rights and emerges from the principle of social responsibility. Yet in an era of ethical pluralism and contentions over the universality of human rights conventions, the extent to which the UNESCO Declaration can motivate behaviors and policies rests, at least in part, upon accepting the moral arguments it makes. In this essay I reflect on a state's moral obligation to provide healthcare from the perspective of Islamic moral theology and law. I examine how Islamic ethico‐legal conceptual analogues for human rights and communal responsibility, ?uqūq al‐’ibād and far? al‐kifāyah and other related constructs might be used to advance a moral argument for healthcare provision by the state. Moving from theory to application, I next illustrate how notions of human rights and social responsibility were used by Muslim stakeholders to buttress moral arguments to support American healthcare reform. In this way, the paper advance discourses on a universal bioethics and common morality by bringing into view the concordances and discordances between Islamic ethico‐legal constructs and moral arguments advanced by transnational health policy advocates. It also provides insight into applied Islamic bioethics by demonstrating how Islamic ethico‐legal values might inform the discursive outputs of Muslim organizations.     

Speciesism Predicts Prejudice Against Low-Status and Hierarchy-Attenuating Human Groups

A growing body of evidence demonstrates that attitudes toward nonhuman animals correlate with attitudes toward disadvantaged human groups. It has been suggested that the connection rests in the ideology of social dominance. Endorsement of social hierarchy and intergroup domination is thought to extend to both human intergroup and human– animal contexts. The present research tested this reasoning by examining the scope and basis of the relation between speciesism and human inter-group attitudes. It was hypothesized that speciesism would predict less positive attitudes toward low-status groups (e.g., disadvantaged ethnic minorities) and those who support social change (e.g., feminists) but that it would be uncorrelated with attitudes toward stigmatized groups that are unmarked by social status (e.g., atheists). Two studies (Study 1, n = 98; Study 2, n = 82) tested this prediction using survey measures of speciesism, social dominance orientation, and attitudes toward 31 human groups including those noted above. Participants were first- and second-year university students in a mid-sized university in Ontario, Canada. As hypothesized, in both studies speciesism predicted less positive attitudes primarily toward low-status groups and groups that support social change. Further, relations between speciesism and intergroup attitudes were explained by their shared connection with social dominance orientation. These data contribute to the growing body of evidence showing links between speciesism and prejudice by illustrating that their shared emphasis on support for social hierarchy gives rise to a specific pattern of intergroup attitudes—one that supports inequality.     

Moral Bioenhancement: Much Ado About Nothing?

Recently, some have proposed moral bioenhancement as a solution to the serious moral evils that humans face. Seemingly disillusioned with traditional methods of moral education, proponents of bioenhancement believe that we should pursue and apply biotechnological means to morally enhance human beings. Such proposal has generated a lively debate about the permissibility of moral bioenhancement. We argue here that such debate is specious. The claim that moral bioenhancement is a solution – whether permissible or not – to the serious moral problems that affect human beings is based on several problematic framing assumptions. We evaluate here three of such assumptions: the first rests on a contested understanding of morality, the second consist in a mistaken conception of human moral problems, and the third relates to problematic presuppositions grounding the interpretation of existent scientific evidence presented to defend moral bioenhancement. Once these framing assumptions are identified and critically evaluated, it becomes clear that the moral bioenhancement debate is misguided.     

A moral argument for frozen human embryo adoption

Some people (e.g., Drs. Paul and Susan Lim) and, with them, organizations (e.g., the National Embryo Donation Center) believe that, morally speaking, the death of a frozen human embryo is a very bad thing. With such people and organizations in mind, the question to be addressed here is as follows: if one believes that the death of a frozen embryo is a very bad thing, ought, morally speaking, one prevent the death of at least one frozen embryo via embryo adoption? By way of a three-premise argument, one of which is a moral principle first introduced by Peter Singer, my answer to this question is: at least some of those who believe this ought to. (Just who the “some” are is identified in the paper.) If this is correct, then, for said people, preventing the death of a frozen embryo via embryo adoption is not a morally neutral matter; it is, instead, a morally laden one. Specifically, their intentional refusal to prevent the death of a frozen embryo via embryo adoption is, at a minimum, morally criticizable and, arguably, morally forbidden. Either way, it is, to one extent or another, a moral failing.     

NO ETHICAL BYPASS OF MORAL STATUS IN STEM CELL RESEARCH

Recent advances in reprogramming technology do not bypass the ethical challenge of embryo sacrifice. Induced pluripotent stem cell (iPS) research has been and almost certainly will continue to be conducted within the context of embryo sacrifice. If human embryos have moral status as human beings, then participation in iPS research renders one morally complicit in their destruction; if human embryos have moral status as mere precursors of human beings, then advocacy of iPS research policy that is inhibited by embryo sacrifice concerns renders one morally complicit in avoidable harms to persons. Steps may be taken to address these complicity concerns, but in the final analysis there is no alternative to achieving clarity with respect to the moral status of the human embryo.     

Exploitations and their complications: the necessity of identifying the multiple forms of exploitation in pharmaceutical trials

Human subject trials of pharmaceuticals in low and middle income countries (LMICs) have been associated with the moral wrong of exploitation on two grounds. First, these trials may include a placebo control arm even when proven treatments for a condition are in use in other (usually wealthier) parts of the world. Second, the trial researchers or sponsors may fail to make a successful treatment developed through the trial available to either the trial participants or the host community following the trial. Many commentators have argued that a single form of exploitation takes place during human subject research in LMICs. These commentators do not, however, agree as to what kind of moral wrong exploitation is or when exploitation is morally impermissible. In this paper, I have two primary goals. First, I will argue for a taxonomy of exploitation that identifies three distinct forms of exploitation. While each of these forms of exploitation has its critics, I will argue that they can each be developed into plausible accounts of exploitation tied to different vulnerabilities and different forms of wrongdoing. Second, I will argue that each of these forms of exploitation can coexist in single situations, including human subject trials of pharmaceuticals. This lesson is important, since different forms of exploitation in a single relationship can influence, among other things, whether the relationship is morally permissible.     

Embryos,The Principle of Proportionality,and the Shaky Ground of Moral Respect

The debate concerning the moral permissibility of using human embryos in human embryonic stem cell (hESC) research has long centred on the question of the embryo's supposed right to life. However, in focussing only on this question, many opponents to hESC research have escaped rigorous scrutiny by making vague and unfounded appeals to the concept of moral respect in order to justify their opposition to certain hESC practices. In this paper, I offer a critical analysis of the concept of moral respect, and its use to support the intuitively appealing principle of proportionality in hESC research. I argue that if proponents of this principle are to justify its adoption by appealing to the concept of moral respect, they must explain two things concerning the nature of the moral respect owed to embryos. First, they must explain which particular aspect of the embryo is morally relevant, and why. Second, they must explain why some uses of embryos in research fail to acknowledge what is morally relevant about the embryo, and thereby involve a violation of the moral respect that they are due. I shall show that providing such explanations may be more difficult than it first appears.     

Moral Perception and Global Visions

Because moral perception plays an essential role in guiding morally responsible behaviour, agents have a responsibility to develop their capacities in this area. There are several strategies agents can (and should) pursue in order to improve their skills at moral perception. I appeal to insights derived from the work of feminist epistomologists and philosophers of science to argue that feminist approaches to multiculturalism are particularly valuable tools for improving moral perception.     

Benefiting from 'evil': an incipient moral problem in human stem cell research

When does benefiting from others’ wrongdoing effectively make one a moral accomplice in their evil deeds? If stem cell research lives up to its therapeutic promise, this question (which has previously cropped up in debates over fetal tissue research or the use of Nazi research data) is likely to become a central one for opponents of embryo destruction. I argue that benefiting from wrongdoing is prima facie morally wrong under any of three conditions: (1) when the wrongdoer is one’s agent; (2) when acceptance of benefit directly encourages the repetition of the wrongful deed (even though no agency relationship is involved); and (3) when acceptance of a benefit legitimates a wrongful practice. I conclude by showing that, because of the ways in which most embryonic stem cell lines come into being, people who oppose embryo destruction may use human embryonic stem cells without incurring moral blame.     

How to Understand a Woman’s Obligations to the Fetus in Unwanted Pregnancies

Some have challenged Thomson’s case of the famous unconscious violinist (UV) by arguing that in cases of consensual sex a woman is partially morally responsible for the existence of a needy fetus; since she is partially responsible she ought to assist the fetus, and so abortion is morally wrong. Call this the Responsibility Objection (RO) to UV. In this paper, I briefly criticize one of the most widely discussed objections to RO and then suggest a new way to challenge RO. In so doing, I investigate the plausibility of the moral principle that appears to be driving RO: If a woman is partially morally responsible for the existence of a needy fetus, she has a moral obligation to assist the fetus. I argue that this principle is false. I suggest modified versions of this principle but argue that, even on the most plausible version, RO does not persuade.     

Medicalization as a moral problem for preventative medicine

Preventive medicine is sometimes criticised as it contributes to medicalization of normal life. The concept ‘medicalization’ has been introduced by Zola to refer to processes in which the labels ‘healthy’ and ‘ill’ are made relevant for more and more aspects of human life. If preventive medicine contributes to medicalization, would that be morally problematic? My thesis is that such a contribution is indeed morally problematic. The concept is sometimes used to express moral intuitions regarding the practice of prevention and health promotion. Through analysis of these intuitions as well as some other moral concerns, I give an explication of the moral problems of medicalization within the context of preventive medicine.     

Emergency Contraceptives and the Beginning of Human Animals

Emergency contraceptives may sometimes prevent implantation, thereby causing the death of the embryo. According to some positions contrary to abortion, because the embryo is a human animal, there are usually decisive moral reasons not to use them. In this article, I will show that objecting to the use of emergency contraceptives on those grounds is unjustified. If organisms are real existents, then according to the most plausible conception of what is required for a group of cells to compose one, the embryo cannot qualify as a single organism. On the other hand, if organisms are virtual objects, then whether or not the embryo qualifies as one is morally irrelevant. I conclude that even if those positions are right about the morality of abortion, they are not entitled to oppose the use of emergency contraceptives.     

Covert moral bioenhancement,public health,and autonomy

In a recent article in this journal, Parker Crutchfield argues that if moral bioenhancement ought to be compulsory, as some authors claim, then it ought to be covert, i.e., performed without the knowledge of the population that is being morally enhanced. Crutchfield argues that since the aim of compulsory moral bioenhancement is to prevent ultimate harm to the population, compulsory moral bioenhancement is best categorized as a public health issue, and should therefore be governed by the norms and values that apply in public health settings. In this article, I argue for two related claims. First, I question the extent to which compulsory moral enhancement should be considered a public health issue that ought to be governed by the norms and values that apply in public health settings. Second, I argue that Crutchfield's argument that covert moral bioenhancement would better respect people's autonomy than an overt program overlooks two important autonomy‐based reasons that, in fact, favor an overt moral enhancement program over a covert one.     

Evolutionary naturalistic justifications of morality: A matter of faith and works

Robert Richards has presented a detailed defense of evolutionary ethics, a revised version of Darwin's views and a major modification of E. O. Wilson's. He contends that humans have evolved to seek the community welfare by acting altruistically. And since the community welfare is the highest moral good, humans ought to act altruistically. Richards asks us to take his empirical premises on faith and aims to show how they can justify an ethical conclusion. He identifies two necessary conditions for a naturalistic justification of morality (NJ): its premises (1) must be empirical and (2) concerned with morally relevant causal factors. I argue that these two conditions are insufficient. An NJ must also appeal to teleogical or teleonomic laws which identify proper effects and reliable causes of these effects. So I supplement biological faith with an NJ that I believe has a better chance of working since faith without works is dead.     

Compulsory moral bioenhancement should be covert

Some theorists argue that moral bioenhancement ought to be compulsory. I take this argument one step further, arguing that if moral bioenhancement ought to be compulsory, then its administration ought to be covert rather than overt. This is to say that it is morally preferable for compulsory moral bioenhancement to be administered without the recipients knowing that they are receiving the enhancement. My argument for this is that if moral bioenhancement ought to be compulsory, then its administration is a matter of public health, and for this reason should be governed by public health ethics. I argue that the covert administration of a compulsory moral bioenhancement program better conforms to public health ethics than does an overt compulsory program. In particular, a covert compulsory program promotes values such as liberty, utility, equality, and autonomy better than an overt program does. Thus, a covert compulsory moral bioenhancement program is morally preferable to an overt moral bioenhancement program.     

Moral Enhancement and Those Left Behind

Opponents to genetic or biomedical human enhancement often claim that the availability of these technologies would have negative consequences for those who either choose not to utilize these resources or lack access to them. However, Thomas Douglas has argued that this objection has no force against the use of technologies that aim to bring about morally desirable character traits, as the unenhanced would benefit from being surrounded by such people. I will argue that things are not as straightforward as Douglas makes out. The widespread use of moral enhancement would raise the standards for praise and blame worthiness, making it much harder for the unenhanced to perform praiseworthy actions or avoid performing blameworthy actions. This shows that supporters of moral enhancement cannot avoid this challenge in the way that Douglas suggests.