Practical Ethics

How much should we care about MPs' expense claims?

Few people in the UK could have missed the furious storm about MPs’ expense claims that has dominated the news headlines for the past several weeks.  A steady flow of stories has revealed not only which MPs bent the rules on expenses, but also that many of the rules are themselves objectionable and arguably facilitate a misuse of taxpayers’ money.

Of course, few of us enjoy paying tax, but most of us grudgingly accept that it is necessary if we want certain social goods like decent healthcare and a fair justice system.  None of us likes to think of our money instead being directed towards those who already enjoy a higher income and better job perks than we do.  What is most striking about the current focus on MPs’ expense claims, however, is the fact that we are in the middle of a serious recession.  And the amount of taxpayers’ money used to finance MPs' bogus mortgage payments, luxury goods, and furniture is but a drop in the ocean compared to the financial losses suffered by homeowners due to falling property prices, by the half-million workers who have lost their jobs in the past nine months, and by those still employed whose tax payments must help support the newly jobless.  Given that the impact of a recession on ordinary people is at least partly the result of government decision-making, why does the recession consistently take second place in the headlines to the relatively trivial matter of MPs’ expense claims?

Is doodling a form of cheating?

The public often complains about the fluctuating and conflicting attitudes of scientists.  So often do things heralded as good for us one week turn out to be deadly the next (consider, for example, this recent report about vitamin pills) that there seems little point in trying to follow the advice of scientists.  

Some recent news stories raise the question of whether the public is inclined to dismiss the conflicting views of ethicists, too.  Ethical concerns about pharmacological cognitive enhancement have regularly been reported in the press (see, for example, here, here, and here); whilst at the same time—as Dominic Wilkinson has noted on this blog—the public has embraced non-pharmacological cognitive enhancement in the form of software designed to improve brain power, and the media currently abounds with docile, non-panicky reports of how instant messaging, texting, taking short naps, taking long naps, listening to The Beatles, and doodling can all enhance cognition in various ways.  So far, there have been no reports of ethical concerns about these activities: nobody is suggesting that students who doodle during lectures are cheating.  It seems that, despite the concerns of some, the public is willing to embrace cognitive enhancement in a variety of forms.

The Ethics of Keeping a Child from its Parents

Two of our regular authors, Rebecca Roache and Barbro Bjorkman, have written an opinion piece on the ethics of keeping a child from its parents for BBC Magazine Online, discussing the issues surrounding the case of the Webster family, who recently lost their bid to overturn the adoption of their children. Although the court accepted that there may have been a miscarriage of justice when their children were taken from them, it decided that in any case the adoption should be considered final.

Animal experimentation: morally acceptable, or just the way things always have been?

Following the announcement last week that Oxford University’s controversial Biomedical Sciences building is now complete and will be open for business in mid-2009, the ethical issues surrounding the use of animals for scientific experimentation have been revisited in the media—see, for example, here , here, and here.

The number of animals used per year in scientific experiments worldwide has been estimated at 200 million—well in excess of the population of Brazil and over three times that of the United Kingdom. If we take the importance of an ethical issue to depend in part on how many subjects it affects, then, the ethics of animal experimentation at the very least warrants consideration alongside some of the most important issues in this country today, and arguably exceeds them in importance. So, what is being done to address this issue?

Why the cheating objection to smart drugs doesn't work

The BBC reports today that increasing numbers of people are using prescription drugs like Ritalin—intended as a treatment for children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)—to boost alertness and brain power.  Reports of the increasing popularity of ‘smart drugs’ are synonymous with concerns about cheating (see here,  here, and here): surely, the worry runs, taking drugs that help you do well at college is equivalent to bribing your examiners into awarding you high marks? Those who take cognitive enhancement drugs, just like those who bribe their examiners, are better placed to beat their peers in the competition for the best educational qualifications and jobs, and so cognitive enhancement is unfair. In this case, shouldn’t cognitive enhancement be banned in schools and colleges?

Knowledge may be power, but is it healing?

The explosion of medical information on the internet is a good thing, right?  Patients worried that their condition is not being taken seriously, those who want a second opinion but are worried about upsetting their GP by asking for it, and those with symptoms too trifling or embarrassing to take to a doctor—all these people who, fifteen years ago, may have felt at a dead end with the medical profession can now use the internet to research their conditions from the comfort of their own homes.

Philosophers' Carnival LXXVIII

Welcome to the 78th Philosophers' Carnival!

The Philosophers' Carnival this week goes practical.  We tried to find the best philosophical blog posts from the last couple of weeks, with the emphasis on accessibility to a wide audience.  Thanks to everyone who nominated.  The pick of the bunch is below.

Applied Ethics

David Hunter argues that open-mindedness, not ‘tolerance’ is the appropriate attitude towards different methodologies in bioethics. In the comments (worth reading), Mark Cutter argues that moral philosophy should not have primacy in bioethical discourse.

Does the United States really not engage in torture?  As Jessica Wolfendale argues, it depends what you mean by 'torture'.

Moral Philosophy

Enigman asks whether lying is always wrong, citing the familiar paradox of the placebo effect.

Does the focus on the economy in political debate lead to a fragmentation of citizenry? Joseph Orosco draws on Singer, and Aristotle to question whether money makes us mean and lonely.

Kant famously objected to actions that arise from inclination rather than duty. Aaron Weingott argues that this is a form of psychological egoism.

Richard Chappell considers whether society ought to compensate people for turning them evil.

Political philosophy

Aaron Kenna questions whether there is such a thing as ‘society’, or are all groups merely collections of individuals?

Kevin Schutte gives a thoughtful commentary on Thomas Nagel’s recent paper on the place of Intelligent Design in the classroom, arguing that Nagel’s definition of evolution and of science are idiosyncratic.

Sage Canada reflects on the consequences of economic rationalism and the banality of evil.

Psychology

Over at one of our affiliated blogs, Robin Hanson and his respondents consider the hidden agendas in politics and elsewhere.

The next carnival takes place here on 6th October.

 

Compiled by Dominic Wilkinson and Rebecca Roache

'Anyone who thinks the Large Hadron Collider will destroy the world is a t**t.'

This week is Big Bang Week at the BBC, with various programmes devoted to the switch-on of CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) on Wednesday morning.  Many of these programmes are covered in this week’s issue of the Radio Times—the BBC’s listings magazine—which also features a short interview with Professor Brian Cox, chair of particle physics at the University of Manchester.  Asked about concerns that the LHC could destroy the earth, he replies:

‘The nonsense you find on the web about “doomsday scenarios” is conspiracy theory rubbish generated by a small group of nutters, primarily on the other side of the Atlantic.  These people also think that the Theory of Relativity is a Jewish conspiracy and that America didn’t land on the Moon.  Both are more likely, by the way, than the LHC destroying the world.  I’m slightly irritated, because this non-story is symptomatic of a larger mistrust in science, particularly in the US, which includes things like intelligent design. [… A]nyone who thinks the LHC will destroy the world is a t**t.’ (Final word censored by Radio Times.) [1]

Practical Ethics News to host Philosophers' Carnival

Practical Ethics News will host the next Philosophers' Carnival on 22nd September.  If you know of a particularly good philosophy blog post, please consider nominating it for inclusion via this link.  Posts need not be on the topic of practical ethics, although they should be accessible to a popular audience.  Posts relating to current affairs are especially welcome.

Would you rather be invisible or be able to fly? (Or: are you a sneaky superhero?)

If, like me, you were one of the kids whose preferred superpower was invisibility, you may soon be in luck. The BBC reports today that US scientists have created a material that could one day be used to make people and objects invisible. The material, which has so far been created only on a microscopic scale, neither absorbs nor reflects light, meaning that anyone looking at an object covered in it would see what lies behind the object rather than the object itself. It’s likely that such technology will be snapped up first by the military, but perhaps, in years to come, invisibility cloaks will be available to all.

For some, the idea of being invisible is distasteful. Being invisible means being able to get away with anything - and why bother to act morally when you can be sure that you’ll never be caught out? In this case, would a world full of people who can turn invisible at the drop of a hat be a world full of thieves, cheats, and sneaks?