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Ancient Societies

Posted by Yolanda on Tuesday, March 15, 2011 8:59:36 AM

Ancient Hebrew religious literature contained an ambiguous vision of old age. It commanded the young to honor their parents and respect the old for their wisdom, yet it also described the old as “apelike … and childlike,” loathed by their children and household (Isenberg, p. 149). Despite the special place Jewish biblical culture reserved for the old, the ancient Hebrews acknowledged that not all old people would be wise, nor would all children support their elders in time of need. The Book of Job specifically challenges the view that old age brings wisdom and asks why God grants long life to the wicked. Later rabbinic law translated the Biblical injunction to honor one’s parents as requiring children to provide care, a task that belonged primarily to women. Greco-Roman literature on old age shares three common themes: the “relationship between wisdom and age; the social and political authority of the elderly; and the care of the aged” (Falkner and de Luce, pp. 4–5). While the Greeks of the classical era generally portrayed old people more harshly than did the Romans, they also viewed old age as one of life’s great mysteries. Plato considered virtue a possibility, rather than a necessary by-product, of old age. Aristotle saw middle age as the peak of human life and considered old men unfit for political office. Weakness and poor judgment rendered them objects of pity or scorn.

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Cortical activity

Posted by Yolanda on Monday, January 10, 2011 7:59:35 AM
Brody’s is a significantly looser cognitive
criterion than Boonin’s “organized cortical activity”
criterion because it makes fetal humanity dependent on the
presence of early brain function which is not sufficiently
organized to support consciousness. A difficulty for Brody’s
theory is that determining when brain death has occurred
may be nearly as difficult as determining when personhood
begins. Brain death has proved notoriously difficult to
ascertain because detectable electrical activity can continue
in a brain that has ceased meaningful functioning. One
study shows that at least 20 percent of “brain dead” patients
continued to exhibit electrical activity on electroencephalograms,
some of it compatible with function (Truog, p. 161).
The symmetry Brody appeals to is thus elusive—it may be
no easier to define when personhood ends than it is to define
when it begins.
Both proponents and opponents of abortion believe
that settling the abortion controversy requires settling the
question of personhood. While there is room for agreement
in positions like Boonin’s, Brody’s, and even Marquis’s, at
either extreme standards of personhood like Noonan’s and
Warren’s are incommensurable, leading some to question
the utility of defining personhood as a route to resolving the
abortion conflict. So long as the fetus’s moral standing is
believed to depend on fetal personhood, however, the
question of personhood will not disappear from the abortion
debate.
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JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN CONCEPTUALIZATIONS

Posted by Yolanda on Saturday, December 26, 2009 2:34:54 PM
In sharp contrast to the Jewish kabbalistic elaboration of engenderment as life, the Christian gnostic tradition elaborates it as death (Mopsik). Gnosticism sees the corporeal form as the creation of monstrous demiurges or archons, foremost among whom is Ialdabaoth, the equivalent of Jehovah. The human condition is symbolized in the gnostic tale of the archons’ rape of Eve, who escapes with her psychic body while her “shadow” or material body is defiled (Williams). The latter is a prison or garment, beastly because humans are created by beasts. Sexuality is an aspect of this beastliness, and hence cannot be part of an embodied sacred process, while the upright posture that distinguishes us from animals is attributed to a separate spark from the authentically spiritual Human (Williams). From a more mainstream Christian perspective, the profound cultural implications of Feher’s question of the kind of body people endow themselves with in order to come into relation with the sacred (Feher) can be seen by considering the Eucharist. That the consumption of bread and wine transubstantiated into the body and blood of Christ is essentially a form of ritual cannibalism is emphasized by the story of a miracle in which a priest who doubted the divine reality of the Eucharist was forced to experience the bloody flesh, so that he could come to appreciate God’s graciousness in presenting it in the tamer appearance of bread and wine (Camporesi; see also Bynum, 1989). In earlier periods of Christianity the spiritual power of the Eucharist extended to the nourishment of the body, and this, not through ingestion but by means of its aroma (Camporesi). Unlike ordinary food, however, it does not become us, but we become it through its sanctifying power (Camporesi).
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Religious Conceptualizations

Posted by Yolanda on Saturday, December 26, 2009 2:25:56 PM
Perhaps the most vivid example from the domain of religion that the body is a cultural phenomenon subject to cultural transformations is given in the classic work on New Caledonia by Maurice Leenhardt, the anthropologist and missionary. Leenhardt recounts his discovery of the impact of Christianity on the cosmocentric world of the New Caledonian Canaques via a conversation with an aged indigenous philosopher. Leenhardt suggested that the Europeans had introduced the notion of “spirit” to the indigenous way of
thinking. His interlocutor contradicted him, pointed out that his people had “always acted in accord with the spirit. What you’ve brought us is the body” (Leenhardt, p. 164). In brief, the indigenous worldview held that the person was not individuated but was diffused with other persons and things in a unitary sociomythic domain: [The body] had no existence of its own, nor specific name to distinguish it. It was only a support. But henceforth the circumscription of the physical being is completed, making possible its objectification. The idea of a human body becomes explicit. This discovery leads forthwith to a discrimination between the body and the mythic world. (Leenhardt, p. 164)
There could be no more powerful evidence that the body is a cultural and historical phenomenon. Insofar as the objectification of the body has the consequences of individuation of the psychological self and the instantiation of dualism in the conceptualization of human being, it has implications for defining a very different regime of ethical relationships and responsibilities.
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CULTURAL AND RELIGIOUS PERSPECTIVES

Posted by Yolanda on Saturday, December 26, 2009 2:22:44 PM
More recently, the number of bioethical issues with religious overtones has multiplied. The legality of and right of access by women to abortion have been defined not only as issues of civil rights and feminist politics, but also as religious and moral issues. Surrogate motherhood and donorship of sperm and eggs raise ethical dilemmas regarding the biological, legal, and spiritual connections between
parent and child. There is also concern about the apparently godlike ability of biotechnology to determine the genetic makeup of the human species; some see this approaching with the increasing sophistication of genetic engineering and the massive Human Genome Project, which will catalogue all possible human genetic characteristics. At the other end of the life course, the problems of euthanasia, technological prolongation of vital functions by means of life-support machines, and physician-assisted death raise moral and
spiritual questions about the prerogative to end the life of oneself or of another. Legal and ethical acceptance of the definition of death as “brain death” has particular significance in that the brain dead individual’s other organs are still viable for transplantation to other persons. In the United States the bioethical dilemma is whether the brain-dead person can morally be considered dead until all other vital functions have ceased, or whether removing those organs constitutes killing the patient. In Japan an added dilemma is that a person’s spiritual destiny as a deceased ancestor depends in part on maintaining an intact physical body.
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Common Factors Leading to the Necesity of Bioethics Education

Posted by Yolanda on Sunday, December 20, 2009 7:08:07 AM
At least three major factors have led to the need for bioethics teaching, with its focus on thoughtful deliberation about
complex ethical issues.  The issue of professional autonomy in relation to physicians is the crucial distinguishing feature of bioethics
education in the groups being discussed. Their predicament is shared with nurses, and nursing ethics has provided valuable insights into the dilemma that is created. Such groups must gain understanding of their peculiar situation:
having moral authority without ultimate decision-making authority. In some states, groups such as physician assistants, physical therapists, and social workers have legal license to evaluate or practice independently. But this does not resolve the thorny questions of how to coordinate care for patients in a system largely centered on physician autonomy. The different levels of progress toward full professional status  among the groups compound the issue. 
Citing French colleagues:

"Le plan visant à enrayer la baisse de fortunes de la Mecque jeu du New Jersey comprendra également tenir ses revenus de jeu dans la ville plutôt que de payer dans les caisses de l'Etat, la prise en charge congrès de la ville et du Bureau des visiteurs, et prenant le contrôle de Boardwalk Hall, casino en ligne, un divertissement le lieu."

A second factor distinguishing bioethics education for the groups under discussion is that many claim, as the rationale for their very existence, the mastery of a particular technology. Reliance on technology may drastically alter the complexion of the traditional health professional–patient relationship. First, technology may create a detrimental distance between health professionals and patients. Patients and health professionals alike may place unrealistic expectations on technologies to bring about “miracles,” creating dissent and distrust when they fail to do so. And the high cost of many technologies may add undue burdens on patients and families.
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Common Themes in Content and Pedagogy

Posted by Yolanda on Sunday, December 20, 2009 7:03:11 AM
A set of guidelines for professional conduct has been one of the first types of documents produced when a new health field emerges. Up until the 1960s the documents often were called codes of ethics, but focused on dress codes and the importance of good manners and a cheerful disposition. They also emphasized the importance of keeping one’s proper place in the bureaucracy, so that all documentsexcept those for dentistry stressed deference to the physician’sauthority. Dedication to one’s profession was considered essential. This list served as a foundation for teaching “ethics” to students in that field. The predictable result was that early ethics education was a presentation of a list of “dos and don’ts” that detailed a professional etiquette and morality punctuated by loyalty to one’s group. The educational emphasis has changed, as a result of changes in the focus of ethics documents and developments in the field of bioethics. There is also a growing consensus about the pedagogical methods that should be employed for bioethics education. Late twentieth century codes of ethics reflect basic ethical principles and virtues relevant to professional practice.
For instance, the Code of Ethics of the National Association of Social Workers is designed around the central notion of ethical responsibility. The American Academy of Physician Assistants followed the model of several others by delineating its major types of interactions and specifying principles for each. Many groups provide accompanying guides for professional conduct that attempt to elaborate behaviors consistent with those principles and virtues. For example, the American Dental Association includes “advisory opinions” for most of its principles, and the American Physical Therapy Association issues a separate guide detailing each of its eight principles. Faculty have adopted these documents as a basis for education, with the predictable result that there is less focus on simply indoctrinating students into behaviors and attitudes and more on urging them to think about the ethical principles and virtues that underpin professional roles and responsibilities.
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