Every week I read "The Ethicist" in "The New York Times" and it almost always pisses me off. Not that I disagree with some of his conclusions or advice (although it's almost always cutesy and a bit random: "Return the ball but keep the bat" or some nonsense like that.) But it does make me wonder: how does someone practice ethics for a living? What qualifies someone as a professional in the ethics department?
When I was in grad school, it was a requirement that we take a bioethics course. It was taught by that media whore Arthur Caplan. (Oh, you know who he is; you've seen him giving his opinion on CNN, MSNBC, all those places. I'm sure you have. I don't think he ever turns down an opportunity to flap his gums.) This was a 3-day course and all I can say is that there's three days of my life I'll never get back. Here's what I learned: (1) Nazis: not ethical (2) Tuskegee Study: also not ethical. Hey, thanks Caplan!
Seriously, if, for one split second, you think Mengele was conducting research in an ethical fashion, a few days with Arthur Caplan will not be changing you. I guess that's the question: can a course change your ethics? Can a few talks keep you from submerging kids in ice water? "Oh, now I get it! That's wrong! I'll stop that now."
(Although the course was held in the beautiful auditorium of the Archeology and Anthropology Museum, which almost did make it worth the three days. It is seriously stunning and the seats were comfortable.)
The thing that pissed me off the most was that there are some real ethical issues to discuss. The ethics of who owns research (I'm looking at you Watson and Crick, and how you screwed Rosalind Franklin), the ethics of not allowing a grad student to graduate because you want another year of his/her work in your lab, how to determine which data is just "outlier" information, etc. These are the interesting questions. These are questions that a lot of folks have to deal with, not the obvious abuses of human life.
But, back to the original question, what makes someone an expert on ethics? Seriously, I want that job. I want to be the person who dictates, yes, this is good; this, not so much. Of course, since I'm a scientist, I have shady ethics (as anyone familiar with Frankenstein knows.) (An aside that pisses me off: IRB boards are required to have a "non-scientist," as if that "non-scientist" raises that ethics bar. [And, seriously, what makes someone a "non-scientist?" I would argue that an MD is a non-scientist.] Do publishing houses run books past scientists to be sure that they are doing that job right?) But, I think I'm ethical; can I be a bioethicist? Can I go on CNN and tell the world that this or that genetic engineering is right or wrong? Because I really think I could handle the job.
Now I'm off to inject children with mysterious chemicals.
1 comment:
I get squicked out and have to turn off the radio every time Caplan comes on to talk about gray areas and slippery slopes and shit. Because of course I sat in that same class, the one where he discovered his calling.
I sit here now thinking you get to be an Ethicist by picking a polarizing philosopher who "moves your soul" or "speaks to the ages" (code for "caters to touchy-feely old farts and vitalists"), and you lead people to think that's all there evert was.
In other words, you try to subsume science and engineering into some stupid kind of Great Books of the Western World program. With sad old John Dewey sittin' out in the cold....
Thank goodness we don't need to make political scientists or artists sit in Political Science Ethics or Art Ethics workshops.
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