In Tyranny of the Gene: Personalized Medicine and Its Threat to Public Health (Knopf, 2023), James Tabery traces the ascendance of personalized or precision medicine in America, arguing that America's emphasis on genetics offers more hype than transformational power. In his examination of the power struggles, social relationships, and technological advances that centered the gene in American health policy, Tabery demonstrates how an intensive focus on genetics draws attention away from both the fundamental causes of health disparities and more‐effective changes (...) that could be made to developmental, physical, and social environments. American policy‐makers, health care institutions, funders, and bioethicists should not let the technological shine and attractive politics of personalized medicine continue to replace the hard but necessary work of addressing sociopolitical causes of disease and illness. (shrink)

The common “human in the loop” narrative in artificial intelligence (AI) implementation is in critical need of analysis and explanation, as Salloch and Eriksen (2024) rightfully argue. Researchers...

In biomedicine, practitioners often treat risk of disease as an illness in itself—suitable for monitoring and intervention. In some cases, increased diagnostics improve health outcomes by detecting problems early. Recently, however, science and technology studies scholars and medical practitioners have noted that the treatment of risk can also lead to unnecessary intervention and possible harm. Despite these findings, it is often hard to see changes in practice. Childbirth serves as an illuminating case because two models of health risk operate simultaneously—in (...) addition to the model valuing frequent intervention, there is another that seeks to mitigate risk by refusing medical surveillance. Based on interviews with birth providers and an analysis of professional documents, this article uses the case of fetal heart rate monitoring in American childbirth to demonstrate how some health providers are framing “intentional non-knowing” as a moral imperative to reduce medical risk. Studying the success and limitations of this “risk counterculture” illuminates how risk societies are changing in response to data suggesting that more information can have hurtful effects. This case integrates well-developed theories of knowledge production with less-developed theories of knowledge nonproduction, leading to a more fruitful discussion of the boundaries of responsible knowledge in risk management. (shrink)

A large body of scientific careers literature explores the experiences of underrepresented minorities in STEM fields and why they exit the academic pipeline at various stages. These studies commonly address how to improve racial diversity in science but provide little discussion of why that diversity is important for science research. Feminist science studies scholars, on the other hand, have theorized about the importance of diversity in knowledge production for decades but provide little empirical work on how to address current disparities. (...) My research bridges these literatures by examining how diversity programs in the sciences justify their continued funding, and how these justifications map onto contemporary theories of knowledge production. Do diversity program directors seek to increase diversity in science because of political motives, like equality and justice for racial minorities, or because they believe that racially diverse workforces will produce better science? Based on interviews with federally-funded diversity program directors at universities and archival data from these programs, I find that program directors’ responses can be classified into three categories: diversity is important politically, diversity is important pragmatically, and diversity is important epistemically. About half of the respondents found diversity to be important for the content of scientific knowledge. I argue that studying diversity in scientific knowledge production is different than studying the impacts of diversity in other fields due to current conceptions of scientific objectivity. Scholarship on scientific knowledge production can help diversity program directors and science careers scholars better articulate the need for diversity programming in STEM fields. (shrink)

In modern medicine, health risks are often managed through the collection of health data and subsequent intervention. One of the goals of clinical genetics, for example, is to identify genetic predisposition to disease so that individuals can intervene to prevent potential harms. But recently, some clinicians have suggested that patients should undergo less testing and monitoring in an effort to reduce overdiagnosis and overtreatment. In this paper, I explore how clinicians navigate the tension between identifying real disease risks for their (...) patients with concerns about overdiagnosis and overtreatment. I focus on clinicians ordering genetic testing for inherited cardiovascular diseases. Of the genes determined to be “clinically actionable” by the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ACMG), half are related to cardiovascular diseases. But, due in part to high levels of uncertainty surrounding cardiovascular genetics, there is still disagreement within the field about how to order and interpret these tests. Based on semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 20 clinicians who order genetic testing for cardiovascular diseases, I find that there is considerable variability in the ways that clinicians determine which types of genetic tests are appropriate for their patients and how they interpret test results. Most importantly, I find that many providers do not presume that more genetic data will lead to better care. Instead, increased genetic data can lead to confusion and inappropriate treatment. This re-valuation of the utility of medical data is crucial for bioethicists to explore, especially as medical fields are sorting through increasing amounts of data. (shrink)

Harms and risks to groups and third-parties can be significant in the context of research, particularly in data-centric studies involving genomic, artificial intelligence, and/or machine learning technologies. This article explores whether and how United States federal regulations should be adapted to better align with current ethical thinking and protect group interests. Three aspects of the Common Rule deserve attention and reconsideration with respect to group interests: institutional review board (IRB) assessment of the risks/benefits of research; disclosure requirements in the informed (...) consent process; and criteria for waivers of informed consent. In accordance with respect for persons and communities, investigators and IRBs should systematically consider potential group harm when designing and reviewing protocols, respectively. Research participants should be informed about any potential group harm in the consent process. We call for additional public discussion, empirical research, and normative analysis on these issues to determine the right regulatory and policy path forward. (shrink)

Harms and risks to groups and third-parties can be significant in the context of research, particularly in data-centric studies involving genomic, artificial intelligence, and/or machine learning technologies. This article explores whether and how United States federal regulations should be adapted to better align with current ethical thinking and protect group interests. Three aspects of the Common Rule deserve attention and reconsideration with respect to group interests: institutional review board (IRB) assessment of the risks/benefits of research; disclosure requirements in the informed (...) consent process; and criteria for waivers of informed consent. In accordance with respect for persons and communities, investigators and IRBs should systematically consider potential group harm when designing and reviewing protocols, respectively. Research participants should be informed about any potential group harm in the consent process. We call for additional public discussion, empirical research, and normative analysis on these issues to determine the right regulatory and policy path forward. (shrink)

Harms and risks to groups and third-parties can be significant in the context of research, particularly in data-centric studies involving genomic, artificial intelligence, and/or machine learning technologies. This article explores whether and how United States federal regulations should be adapted to better align with current ethical thinking and protect group interests. Three aspects of the Common Rule deserve attention and reconsideration with respect to group interests: institutional review board (IRB) assessment of the risks/benefits of research; disclosure requirements in the informed (...) consent process; and criteria for waivers of informed consent. In accordance with respect for persons and communities, investigators and IRBs should systematically consider potential group harm when designing and reviewing protocols, respectively. Research participants should be informed about any potential group harm in the consent process. We call for additional public discussion, empirical research, and normative analysis on these issues to determine the right regulatory and policy path forward. (shrink)

We are very grateful for the thoughtful and constructive open peer commentaries and editorial on our recent Target Article, “Consideration and Disclosure of Group Risks in Genomics and Other Data-C...

Volume 24, Issue 10, October 2024, Page 107-109.

In this article I revisit A. C. Bradley's account of form/content unity through the lens of both Peter Kivy's and Peter Lamarque's recent work on Bradley's lecture “Poetry for Poetry's Sake.” I argue that Lamarque gives a superior account of Bradley's argument. However, Lamarque claims that form/content unity should be understood as an imposition applied by the reader to poetry. Working with the counterexample of modernist poetry, I throw doubt on both this claim and some associated presuppositions found in Lamarque's (...) account. Modernist poetry appears to intermittently fail to exhibit form/content unity; its unique value also appears bound up with this intermittent failure. However—against the moderates, like Kivy and Kelly Dean Jolley, who this counterexample may seem to support—I claim Lamarque is nonetheless correct that form/content unity is intrinsic in response to poetic value. I argue form/content unity should be seen as a demand, which poems can intentionally frustrate. (shrink)

Nietzsche has the reputation of being a virulent misogynist, so why are feminists interested in his philosophy? The essays in this volume provide answers to this question from a variety of feminist perspectives. The organization of the volume into two sets of essays, "Nietzsche's Use of Woman" and "Feminists' Use of Nietzsche," reflects the two general approaches taken to the issue of Nietzsche and woman. First, many debates have focused on how to interpret Nietzsche's remarks about women and femininity. Are (...) all of Nietzsche's comments to be read literally, or is he being ironic, perhaps even parodying and subverting stereotypes about women? Second, is his philosophy useful to feminist theory? Can we separate his philosophy from his seemingly derogatory remarks about women? Can feminists use his criticisms of truth, objectivity, reason, and the autonomous subject to challenge the exclusion of women from the history of philosophy? Some view his critiques of dualism and essentialism as well as his perspectivism and social constructivism as adumbrating later feminist positions. Others find troubling his privileging of masculinity and paradigms of domination; they see Nietzsche's sexual dualism as countering otherwise transgressive themes. Contributors are Debra Bergoffen, Maudmarie Clark, Daniel Conway, Jacques Derrida, Jean Graybeal, Kathleen Higgins, Luce Irigaray, Sarah Kofman, Tamsin Lorraine, Kelly Oliver, David Owen, Marilyn Pearsall, Ofelia Schutte, Linda Singer, Lynne Tirrell, and Kathleen Wininger. (shrink)

Dramatic modern advances in emergency and resuscitation medicine, starting perhaps with the development of effective mechanical ventilators in the mid-20th century, have created a large class of persons who in earlier times would almost certainly have died, but who can now go on existing, suspended at least temporarily in a state somewhere between death and the conscious life they formerly pursued. A very wide range of brain injuries lead first to coma, in which the patient shows no sign of conscious (...) awareness, or even of wakefulness, in which eye openings and closings indicate the presence of a sleep/wake cycle unconsciously mediated by structures in the brain stem. Following emergence from coma, which may take days to months or more if it happens at all, patients typically show signs of wakefulness without conscious awareness – they are then in a so-called vegetative state (VS). For many this state becomes permanent, but some go on to a more recently described condition called the minimally conscious state (MCS), in which signs of conscious awareness can be detected by careful neurological examination (see Laureys & Tononi, 2009, chapter 14). A very few such persons ultimately progress to more or less full recovery, but another and particularly horrifying possible outcome is the “locked-in” state, in which a patient is fully conscious but has extremely little or no capacity for voluntary motor action. A famous modern example is that of Jean-Dominique Bauby, author of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, who suffered a stroke to his upper brainstem and awakened 20 days later to find himself fully conscious but capable only of blinking his left eye. A tiny fraction of surgical patients find themselves in similarly terrifying conditions caused by the combination of muscle relaxants with insufficient levels of anesthetic agents (Kelly et al., 2007, p. 387 n. 18). (shrink)

Despite Kant’s lasting influence on philosophical accounts of moral motivation, many details of his own position remain elusive. In the Critique of Practical Reason, for example, Kant argues that our recognition of the moral law’s authority must elicit both painful and pleasurable feelings in us. On reflection, however, it is unclear how these effects could motivate us to act from duty. As a result, Kant’s theory of moral sensibility comes under a skeptical threat: the possibility of a morally motivating feeling (...) seems incoherent. My aim in this paper is to reconstruct Kant’s theory in a way that overcomes this threat. By way of conclusion, I show how my reconstruction brings a new perspective to a long-standing dispute over intellectualist and affectivist views of moral motivation. (shrink)

The concept of respect for persons is often rejected as a basis for understanding forgiveness. As many have argued, to hold your offender responsible for her actions is to respect her as a person; but this kind of respect is more likely to sustain, rather than dissolve, your resentment toward her (Garrard & McNaughton 2003; 2011; Allais 2008). I seek to defend an alternative view in this paper. To forgive, on my account, involves ceasing to identify your offender with her (...) wrongdoing, and this requires a corresponding affective change on your behalf. While there are different ways this may happen, I argue that respect for your offender as a person can play a significant role in the process. (shrink)

Recent developments in genomic science hold out the tantalizing prospect of soon being able to treat and prevent a wide variety of medical conditions through gene therapy. In time, it may be possible to use similar techniques not simply to combat disease but also to enhance, or improve on, normal human functioning.

This chapter presents a reflective, critical position toward the author’s own addiction and toward himself as an addict. It presents the question of whether addressing addiction as a disease is useful; the idea of addiction as a disease seems less useful in describing “what it is like” for the author than to say that his being was physically, psychologically, and relationally disordered. Despite his desires, he could not find a way to regain order and harmony within himself. It was only (...) the phenomenological possibility of feeling and being better that kept hope alive. The solution to addiction is social; other people who cared for the author personally, together with those with professional knowledge, assisted him in regaining some control that he alone had either lost or could not find. (shrink)

Aristotle’s account of epistēmē is foundationalist. In contrast, the web of dialectical argumentation that constitutes justification for scientific principles is coherentist. Aristotle’s account of explanation is structurally parallel to the argument for a foundationalist account of justification. He accepts the first argument but his coherentist accounts of justification indicate that he would not accept the second. Where is the disanalogy? For Aristotle, the intelligibility of a demonstrative premise is the cause of the intelligibility of a demonstrated conclusion and causation is (...) asymmetric. Within the Posterior Analytics itself, Aristotle does not account for this, but elsewhere he develops the resources for doing so: the cause is what acts on a substrate to actualize a potential in that substrate, resulting in the effect. On the other hand, it may well happen that two propositions entail each other, in which case one may as well justify the one on the basis of the other as vice versa. (shrink)

It is commonly held that Kant ventured to derive morality from freedom in Groundwork III. It is also believed that he reversed this strategy in the second Critique, attempting to derive freedom from morality instead. In this paper, I set out to challenge these familiar assumptions: Kant’s argument in Groundwork III rests on a moral conception of the intelligible world, one that plays a similar role as the ‘fact of reason’ in the second Critique. Accordingly, I argue, there is no (...) reversal in the proof-structure of Kant’s two works. (shrink)

This paper addresses republican conditions of legitimacy for the constitution of the civic statuses of migrants. It identifies two legitimacy tests to which any civic status is subject, namely, that it does not make its bearers more vulnerable to the arbitrary exercise of private or public power and that the constitution of the person as bearer of this status is not itself the product of an arbitrary exercise of public power . It is argued that R1 puts significant constraints on (...) what can be legitimate migrant statuses and R2 links republicanism to cosmopolitanism in terms of a basic norm in respect of the production and allocation of civic statuses in that those who are subject to such a regime should have the effective power to ‘shape and contest’ the rules of this regime. (shrink)

This paper offers a new interpretation of Kant's relationship with skepticism in the Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals. My position differs from commonly held views in the literature in two ways. On the one hand, I argue that Kant's relationship with skepticism is active and systematic (contrary to Hill, Wood, Rawls, Timmermann, and Allison). On the other hand, I argue that the kind of skepticism Kant is interested in does not speak to the philosophical tradition in any straightforward sense (...) (contrary to Forster and Guyer). On my reading, Kant takes up a skeptical method in the Groundwork as a way of exposing certain obstacles in our ordinary and philosophical thinking about morality. The central obstacle he is interested in is practical in character, arising from a natural tendency we have to rationalize against the moral law. In attempting to resolve this tendency, I argue, the Groundwork turns out to have a profoundly educative task. (shrink)

Tom Beauchamp and James Childress have always maintained that their four principles approach (otherwise known as principlism) is a globally applicable framework for biomedical ethics. This claim is grounded in their belief that the principles of respect for autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence and justice form part of a 'common morality', or collection of very general norms to which everyone who is committed to morality subscribes. The difficulty, however, has always been how to demonstrate, at least in the absence of a full-blooded (...) analysis of the concept of morality, whether the four principles are foundational, and so globally applicable, in this way. In the recently published sixth edition of Principles of Biomedical Ethics, an imaginative and non-question-begging empirical method of determining the common morality's norms is suggested. In this paper, I outline this method, before arguing that it is difficult to see how it might be thought to achieve its purpose. (shrink)

There is a debate about the nature of addiction, whether it is a result of brain damage, brain dysfunction, or normal brain changes that result from habit acquisition, and about whether it is a disease. I argue that the debate about whether addiction is a disease is much ado about nothing, since all parties agree it is “unquestionably destructive.” Furthermore, the term ‘addiction’ has disappeared from recent DSM’s in favor of a spectrum of ‘abuse’ disorders. This may be a good (...) thing indicating more nuance in typing the heterogeneous phenomena we used to call ‘addiction’. (shrink)

I argue that Beall and Restall's logical pluralism fails. Beall–Restall pluralism is the claim that there are different, equally correct logical consequence relations in a single language. Their position fails for two, related, reasons: first, it relies on an unmotivated conception of the ‘settled core’ of consequence: they believe that truth-preservation, necessity, formality and normativity are ‘settled’ features of logical consequence and that any relation satisfying these criteria is a logical consequence relation. I consider historical evidence and argue that their (...) position relies on an unmotivated conception of the settled features of logical consequence. There are many features that are just as settled but which are inconsistent with pluralism. Second, I argue that Beall–Restall pluralism fails to hold in a single language with a single selection of logical constants, which they require for the position to be distinct from Carnap's. I consider various ways in which Beall and Restall can resist this meaning variance, particularly for negation, but argue that the strongest way relies on an unmotivated conception of the settled features of the logical constants. (shrink)

The phenomena of call-outs and call-ins are fiercely debated. Are they mere instances of virtue signaling? Or can they actually perform social justice work? This paper gains purchase on these questions by focusing on how language users negotiate norms in speech. The authors contend that norm-enacting speech not only makes a norm salient in a context but also creates conversational conditions that motivate adherence to that norm. Recognizing this allows us to define call-outs and call-ins: the act of calling-out brings (...) with it the presupposition that its target's behavior is norm-violating, whereas the act of calling-in simply presupposes its target's willingness to revise their belief. With these definitions at hand, we evaluate whether call-outs and call-ins are suitable tools for combating social injustice. (shrink)

Josiah Royce (1855-1916) was the leading American proponent of absolute idealism, the metaphysical view (also maintained by G. W. F. Hegel and F. H. Bradley) that all aspects of reality, including those we experience as disconnected or contradictory, are ultimately unified in the thought of a single all-encompassing consciousness. Royce also made original contributions in ethics, philosophy of community, philosophy of religion and logic. His major works include The Religious Aspect of Philosophy (1885), The World and the Individual (1899-1901), The (...) Philosophy of Loyalty (1908), and The Problem of Christianity (1913). Royce's friendly but longstanding dispute with William James, known as "The Battle of the Absolute," deeply influenced both philosophers' thought. In his later works, Royce reconceived his metaphysics as an "absolute pragmatism" grounded in semiotics. This view dispenses with the Absolute Mind of previous idealism and instead characterizes reality as a universe of ideas or signs which occur in a process of being interpreted by an infinite community of minds. These minds, and the community they constitute, may themselves be understood as signs. Royce's ethics, philosophy of community, philosophy of religion, and logic reflect this metaphysical position. (shrink)

This book outlines and circumvents two serious problems that appear to attach to Kant’s moral philosophy, or more precisely to the model of rational agency that underlies that moral philosophy: the problem of experiential incongruence and the problem of misdirected moral attention. The book’s central contention is that both these problems can be sidestepped. In order to demonstrate this, it argues for an entirely novel reading of Kant’s views on action and moral motivation. In addressing the two main problems in (...) Kant’s moral philosophy, the book explains how the first problem arises because the central elements of Kant’s theory of action seem not to square with our lived experience of agency, and moral agency in particular. For example, the idea that moral deliberation invariably takes the form of testing personal policies against the Categorical Imperative seems at odds with the phenomenology of such reasoning, as does the claim that all our actions proceed from explicitly adopted general policies, or maxims. It then goes on to discuss the second problem showing how it is a result of Kant’s apparent claim that when an agent acts from duty, her reason for doing so is that her maxim is lawlike. This seems to put the moral agent’s attention in the wrong place: on the nature of her own maxims, rather than on the world of other people and morally salient situations. The book shows how its proposed novel reading of Kant’s views ultimately paints an unfamiliar but appealing picture of the Kantian good-willed agent as much more embedded in and engaged with the world than has traditionally been supposed. (shrink)

Neural correlates of consciousness (for brevity NCC) are foundational to the scientific study of consciousness. Chalmers (2000) has provided the most informative and influential definition of NCC, according to which neural correlates are minimally sufficient for consciousness. However, the sense of sufficiency needs further clarification since there are several relevant senses with different entailments. In section one of this article, we give an overview of the desiderata for a good definition of NCC and Chalmers’s definition. The second section analyses the (...) merit of understanding the sufficiency of neural correlates for corresponding consciousness according to three relevant types of sufficiency: logical, metaphysical, and physical. In section three, a theoretical approach to consciousness studies is suggested in light of the sense in which NCC are sufficient for consciousness. Section four addresses a concern some might have about this approach. By the end, it will become apparent that our conception of NCC has important implications for research methodology, neuroethics, and the vitality of the search for NCC. (shrink)

Hastings Center Report, Volume 52, Issue 2, Page 49-57, March‐April 2022.

Serena Olsaretti brings together new essays by leading moral and political philosophers on the nature of desert and justice, their relations with each other and with other values.

The isomorphism invariance criterion of logical nature has much to commend it. It can be philosophically motivated by the thought that logic is distinctively general or topic neutral. It is capable of precise set-theoretic formulation. And it delivers an extension of ‘logical constant’ which respects the intuitively clear cases. Despite its attractions, the criterion has recently come under attack. Critics such as Feferman, MacFarlane and Bonnay argue that the criterion overgenerates by incorrectly judging mathematical notions as logical. We consider five (...) possible precisifications of the overgeneration argument and find them all unconvincing. (shrink)

In the Transcendental Aesthetic, Kant famously makes the following startling claim, which we can call the transcendental ideality thesis concerning the nature of space, or, for ease of reference in what follows, simply “TI”: Der Raum stellt gar keine Eigenschaft irgend einiger Dinge an sich, oder sie in ihrem Verhältniß auf einander vor, d.i. keine Bestimmung derselben, die an Gegenständen selbst haftete, und welche bliebe, wenn man auch von allen subjectiven Bedingungen der Anschauung abstrahirte.

Many writers often generalise about mysticism without a sufficiently close analysis of texts. Consequently the generalisations are often invalid. My present aim is to analyse one text and, in the light of this analysis, to offer some observations concerning mysticism in general and Christian mysticism in particular.

At Metaphysics A 5 986a22-b2, Aristotle refers to a Pythagorean table, with two columns of paired opposites. I argue that 1) although Burkert and Zhmud have argued otherwise, there is sufficient textual evidence to indicate that the table, or one much like it, is indeed of Pythagorean origin; 2) research in structural anthropology indicates that the tables are a formalization of arrays of “symbolic classification” which express a pre-scientific world view with social and ethical implications, according to which the presence (...) of a principle on one column of the table will carry with it another principle within the same column; 3) a close analysis of Aristotle's arguments shows that he thought that the table expresses real causal relationships; and 4) Aristotle faults the table of opposites with positing its principles as having universal application and with not distinguishing between those principles that are causally prior and those that are posterior. Aristotle's account of scientific explanation and his own explanations that he developed in accordance with this account are in part the result of his critical encounter with this prescientific Pythagorean table. (shrink)

This paper offers an overview of consciousness and personal identity in eighteenth-century philosophy. Locke introduces the concept of persons as subjects of consciousness who also simultaneously recognize themselves as such subjects. Hume, however, argues that minds are nothing but bundles of perceptions, lacking intrinsic unity at a time or across time. Yet Hume thinks our emotional responses to one another mean that persons in everyday life are defined by their virtues, vices, bodily qualities, property, riches, and the like. Rousseau also (...) takes persons to be fundamentally determined by our socially-mediated emotional responses to one another, though unlike Hume or Locke, he has little interest in placing this account of persons alongside a larger discussion of the human mind and its operations. Developing this idea further, Kant argues that our moral commitments require that we must take ourselves to be free. The fundamental equality that Rousseau sought in the political order is, for Kant, a requirement that reason puts on all of us. (shrink)

The now standard definition of logical consequence is model-theoretic. Many writers have tried to justify, or to criticise, the model-theoretic definition by arguing that it extensionally captures, or fails to capture, our intuitions about logical consequence, such as its modal character or its being truth-preservation in virtue of form. One popular means of comparing the extension of model-theoretic consequence with some intuitive notion proceeds by adapting Kreisel's squeezing argument. But these attempts get Kreisel wrong, and try to achieve more than (...) he ever intended. This suggests that the model-theoretic definition should be viewed quite differently as an explication of our intuitions about logical consequence. I introduce Kreisel's squeezing argument in Section 1. Then in Section 2, I show how it is adapted by two prominent writers on logical consequence, Etchemendy (1990) and Shapiro (2005). Finally, in Section 3, I argue that these adaptations fail. (shrink)

The argument of this paper is part of a general defence of the claim that Bentham's moral theory embodies a utilitarian theory of distributive justice, which is developed in his Civil Law writings. Whereas it is a commonplace of recent revisionist scholarship to argue that J. S. Mill had a developed utilitarian theory of justice, few scholars regard Bentham as having a theory of justice, let alone one that rivals in sophistication that of Mill. Indeed, Gerald J. Postema in his (...) book Bentham and the Common Law Tradition, argues that Bentham had no substantial concern with the concept of justice, and that what analysis of the concept there is in Bentham's thought is unlike the utilitarian theory of justice to be found in chapter five of J. S. Mill's Utilitarianism Although Postema's interpretation is not the only one that will be addressed in this paper, it serves as an important starting point for any rival interpretation of Bentham's ethical theory for two reasons. Firstly, it is the most comprehensive and most penetrating discussion of Bentham's utilitarian theory, drawing as it does on a wide variety of published and unpublished materials written throughout Bentham's career. Secondly, it is interesting in this particular context because the contrast that Postema draws between Bentham's and Mill's theories of justice depends upon a particular reading of Mill's theory of justice and utility which is derived from recent scholarship and which is by no means uncontroversial. As part of the defence of the claim that Bentham had a sophisticated theory of distributive justice, it will be argued in this paper that the contrast drawn between Bentham and Mill does not stand up to careful scrutiny, for insofar as Mill's theory of justice can be consistently defended it is not significantly different from the utilitarian strategy that Bentham employed for incorporating considerations of distributive justice within his theory. This is not to claim that there are not significant differences between the theories of justice of Bentham and J. S. Mill, but it is to claim that whatever technical differences exist between their theories, both writers saw the need to incorporate the concept of justice within utilitarianism. Therefore, rather than showing that Mill is an interesting thinker to the extent that he abandons his early Benthamism, by demonstrating how close Mill's theory of utility and justice is to that of Bentham, it will be possible to argue that Bentham employed a sophisticated and subtle utilitarian theory that was responsive to the sort of problems which occupied Mill a generation later. (shrink)

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 came into force in England and Wales in 2007. Its primary purpose is to provide “a statutory framework to empower and protect people who may lack capacity to make some decisions for themselves.” Examples of such people are those with dementia, learning disabilities, mental health problems, and so on. The Act also gives those who currently have capacity a legal framework within which they can make arrangements for a time when they may come to lack (...) it. Toward this end, it allows for them to make advance decisions or to appoint proxy decision makers with lasting powers of attorney. (shrink)