Study Guide for Thursday's Exam

Feb. 18/16 Case Against Perfection CH-3

1. Sandel's deepest moral objection to enhancement is its alleged disfigurement of what relation?

2. Why is it a mistake to think of health in instrumental terms?

3. Designing parents are more likely to do what, or to neglect what parental duty?

4. Does Sandel consider genetic engineering similar in spirit to expensive private schools & tutors, piano lessons, SAT prep, etc.?

5. "Parents of college students are out of control." 54 How so?

6. How do Ritalin, Adderall etc differ from recreational drugs of the past?

Feb. 16/16 Case Against Perfection CH-2

1. As athletic enhancement increases, what fades?

2. Does Sandel think the main problem with enhancement is that it undermines effort and erodes human agency?

3. What do genetically altered athletes corrupt?

4. Sandel thinks Lasik surgery to correct normal vision would be an acceptable enhancement for a golfer under what condition?

5. Does Sandel allege an ethical problem with mega-calorie diets?

6. What is "far-fetched" about the view that the rules of a game are arbitrary?

Feb. 11/16 Case Against Perfection CH-1

1. "We do not view what we did as very different from what many straight couples do..." What did they do?

2. How much did Genetic Savings & Clone plan to charge for cloned canines?

3. According to what objection is genetic engineering objectionable because "designer children" are not fully free? OR, Why does Sandel not find this objection persuasive?

4. What questions do we need to confront, to grapple with the ethics of enhancement?

5. (T/F) Sandel says it may soon be possible to take a drug that prevents horrific events from being deeply registered in memory.

6. What does Sandel mean by a" hormonal arms race" with respect to height?

BONUS: Michael Sandel served on what high-profile council, OR teaches a hugely popular MOOC course at Harvard on what subject?

Feb. 9/16 Bioethics: The Basics CH-6

1. What are the two major spheres of justice discussed by Campbell? 

2. (T/F) Vaccination/immunization and restricted mobility are two of the measures used by preventive medicine to counter the spread of disease. 

3. Another name for the micro-allocation of health care, concerned with prioritizing access to given treatments, is what? (HINT: This was hotly debated and widely misrepresented ("death panels" etc.) in the early months of the Obama administration.)   

4. What "perverse incentive" to health care practitioners and institutions do reimbursement systems foster, as illustrated by excessive use of MRIs?

5. How are Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALYs) supposed to address and solve the problem of who should receive (for instance) a transplant?   

6. Who propounded a theory of justice that invokes a "veil of ignorance"?   

BONUS 1: What is the inverse care law?   

BONUS 2: What is meant by the term "heartsick patients"? 

Feb. 4/16 Bioethics: The Basics CH-5

1. Name one of the basic requirements agreed upon by all codes devised to protect individuals from malicious research.

2. What decree states that consent must be gained in all experimentation with human beings?

3. Name one of four areas of research discussed in the book.

4. Which famous contemporary philosopher coined the term speciesism?

5. Name one of four R's used in international legislation pertaining to animal rights in research?

6. What is the term for altering the numbers in a calculation to make the hypothesis more convincing, with no justification form the research findings for such members?

BONUS: What is the "10/90 Gap"?

Feb. 2/16 Bioethics: The Basics CH-4

1. (T/F) Dignity, respect, and confidentiality are among the aspects of the clinical relationship which emphasize the importance of trust. 

2. What (according to most recognized oaths and conventions) must always be the deciding factor guiding professional decisions? 

3. The idea that the doctor always knows best is called what? 

4. Is a diagnosis of mental illness grounds for establishing a patient's lack of capacity to render competent consent to treatment? 

5. What general principle allows breach of confidentiality? 

6. What term expresses the central ethical concern about "designer babies"? What poet implicitly expressed it?

Jan. 28/16 Bioethics: The Basics CH-3

1. Chapter 3 begins by asking if our bioethical perspective ("vision") is skewed by _____... (a) cultural assumptions, (b) gender bias, (c) religious faith, (d) all of the above

2. What's the leading global cause of death among women of reproductive age?

3. (T/F) The "feminist critique" says bioethics has been dominated by culturally masculine thinking.

4. What ethical perspective did Nel Noddings (supported by Carol Gilligan's research) describe as the "feminine approach"?

5. What's a furor therapeuticus?

6. Does Campbell consider the outlawing of female genital mutilation culturally insensitive?

BONUS QUESTIONS:

What role do feminist bioethicists see themselves as performing, with respect to the victims of gender discrimination? What perspective do they wish to "re-assert"? and what classic (Cartesian) metaphysical/philosophical perspective do they oppose?

What's allegedly distinctive about "Asian bioethics"?

Jan. 26/16 Bioethics: The Basics CH-2

1. (T/F) In the Mayor's Dilemma, one of the possible actions considered is to set an example of defiance.

2. Which theory has been dominant in bioethics and often used by many health professionals?

3. In deontological theory, what is the difference between hypothetical and categorical imperatives?

4. What ethical principle (and whose), in the name of rational consistency, absolute dutifulness, and mutual respect, "requires unconditional obedience and overrides our preferences and desires" with respect to things like lying, for example?

5.  What would Kant say about Tuskegee, or about the murderer "at our door"?

6. What more do we want from a moral theory than Kant gives us?

BONUS QUESTIONS
7. What is the distinctive question in virtue ethics?

8. What Greek philosopher was one of the earliest exponents of virtue ethics?

9. Paraphrase the Harm Principle. Who was its author?

10. Name one of the Four Principles in Beauchamp and Childress's theories on biomedical ethics?

Jan. 21/16 Bioethics: The Basics CH-1

1.(T/F) Campbell's examples of bioethical questions include whether health care professionals must meet higher standards than businesspeople, the ethics of longevity via pharmacology, designer babies, human/animal hybrids, state paternalism, euthanasia, and environmental ethics.

2. Bioethics just means _______.

3. The _________ required that 'The health of my patient must be my first consideration.' (Hippocratic Oath, Geneva Code, British Medical Association, International Association of Bioethics)

4. What 40-year U.S. study denied information and treatment to its subjects?

5. What did Ivan Ilich warn about in Medical Nemesis?

6. Bioethics has expanded its focus from an originally narrower interest in what relationship?

Some BONUS QUESTIONS:

• Bioethics has broken free of what mentality?
• (T/F) Campbell thinks caveat emptor is a good principle for governing the contractual clinical encounter between doctor and patient. 
• Do descriptive claims settle evaluative issues?
• Name a bioethical website Campbell recommends.