Study Guide

1. What is the connection between freewill and morality? What is the principle of autonomy? What are the 5 conditions for making a truly autonomous decision? What is the harm principle? What is the offense principle? What is the principle of paternalism? Explain the difference between the strong and weak versions of this principle. What is the principle of legal moralism? What is the welfare principle?
2. Be able to explain the following models of the physician-patient relationship: paternalism, partnership, contract, friendship, technical assistance, and negotiations. Be able to explain at least one problem with each theory. Why is truth-telling important in medicine? What are 3 arguments that doctors may sometimes lie to their patients? Be able to explain at least one reply to each argument. Why is confidentiality important in medicine? In what circumstances may confidentiality be violated?
3. What is the Nuremberg Code? How did it emerge? What happened during the Tuskegee Syphilis Study? What is informed consent? Be able to explain both the “informed” and “consent” parts of this concept. Beyond consent, what are some other problems with medical research? What is the difference between medical research and medical therapy?
4. What are the 3 positions on the issue of animal ethics? What is speciesism? What is Singer’s utilitarian argument for animal ethics? What is Singer’s marginal cases argument for animal ethics? What were Cohen’s objections to Singer? What 3 qualities did Steinbock maintain humans have but non-human animals lack? What is Steinbock’s negative reply to Singer? What is the difference between positive and negative rights? What is Regan’s argument for animals rights?
5. What is a biomedical enhancement? What are some examples? What is cosmetic surgery? What are the 4 goals of the internal morality of medicine? What are the 4 guidelines of physician integrity? What are the 3 parts of natural law theory? What is cosmetic psychopharmacology? What is the thesis of Kramer’s Listening To Prozac? What is Freedman’s argument in response to Kramer? What is apotemnophilia? What is the principle of totality and how does it apply to this issue? What is Michael Levin’s argument against homosexuality? How can it be applied to the issue of apotemnophilia, or other healthcare issues, such as gender reassignment?
6. Explain the principle of natural selection and Mendelian genetics (briefly!). What is “social Darwinism?” Know the following people: Herbert Spencer, Thomas Huxley, and Sir Francis Galton. What is the difference between positive and negative eugenics? What is a genetic disease? What are the different causes of genetic diseases? What is genetic intervention? What are the 3 approaches to it? Know at least 3 moral justifications for both positive and negative eugenics, and at least 2 moral objections to them. Know at least one biological problem with both positive and negative eugenics.
7. Who was the first adult mammal to be cloned? What was her significance? What was wrong with her telomeres? Know at least one argument for and one argument against cloning. What were Leon Kass’s 4 objections to cloning?
8. Know how to define In Vitro Fertilization. What is an abortion? What are the 3 positions on abortion? What was the decision of the Roe v. Wade case of 1973? What does the “ontological status” of the fetus refer to? What are Warren’s 5 criteria for personhood? What is the most extreme conservative argument against abortion? What is one objection to it? What are the 4 parts of the principle of double effect? How does this principle apply to abortion? What is Don Marquis’s argument that abortion is wrong? What is Thomson’s argument that abortion is wrong? Be able to explain her analogies and their implications for the permissibility of abortion. Know some other pro-life and pro-choice considerations.
9. What is the meaning of “euthanasia?” Know the difference between active voluntary, passive voluntary, active non-voluntary, passive non-voluntary, active involuntary, and passive involuntary forms of euthanasia. What are the 4 concepts of death? What is the AMA’s conventional doctrine on euthanasia? What is Rachels’s argument against the distinction between active and passive euthanasia? What is Nesbitt’s reply to Rachels? Know at least one additional argument for and against physician-assisted suicide.