Biomedical Ethics for Engineers

by Vallero

• ISBN13: 9780750682275
• ISBN10: 0750682272
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2007-03-30
• Publisher: Elsevier Science

Summary

When is an engineering action morally permissible and what kinds of behavior are morally obligatory? What must a professional do to be trusted? What is the role of values in bioethical decisions? Is research using human pluripotent stem cells ethical? When is human enhancement ethically right and ethically wrong? What is the moral standing of non-human species? What are the bounds on the engineer's right of conscience? What does it mean to be a good engineer?

Author Biography

Dr. Daniel Vallero has led the establishment of the Engineering Ethics program at Duke University

Table of Contents

Preface	p. xi
Done Is Good	p. xiv
Structure and Pedagogy	p. xvi
Notes and Commentary	p. xix
Acknowledgments	p. xxi
Bioethics Questions Posed in Text	p. xxiii
Prologue: Bioethics - Discovery through Design
A Different Approach to Bioethics	p. 3
Arguments for and Against Case Analysis	p. 4
Driver's Education Analogy	p. 5
Example Case: Priming the Pump	p. 6
Case Analysis	p. 7
Notes and Commentary	p. 8
Bioethics: A Creative Approach
Thought Experiments	p. 10
Teachable Moment: Trust	p. 12
The Principle of Double Effect	p. 12
Teachable Moment: The Engineer as Agent versus Judge	p. 12
Amy the Engineer	p. 15
Teachable Moment: Who Was Van Rensselaer Potter?	p. 18
Credat Emptor	p. 18
Teachable Moment: Capital Punishment, Abortion, and the Definition of Human Life	p. 20
The Good Engineer	p. 21
Feedback and Enhancement of Design	p. 22
Teachable Moment: The Good Engineer	p. 24
The Profession of Engineering	p. 25
Engineering Bioethics and Morality	p. 26
Discussion Box: Ethics and the Butterfly Effect	p. 27
"Small" Error and Devastating Outcomes	p. 28
Technology, Engineering, and Economics	p. 28
Teachable Moment: The Dismal Scientist versus the Technological Optimist	p. 31
Engineering Competence	p. 39
Engineering: Both Integrated and specialized	p. 39
Who Is a Professional?	p. 40
What Is Technical?	p. 41
Systematics: Incorporating Ethics into the Design Process	p. 42
Notes and Commentary	p. 43
Bioethics and the Engineer
Major Bioethical Areas	p. 51
Cloning and Stem Cell Research	p. 52
Teachable Moment: Nanog	p. 56
Human Enhancement	p. 57
Patenting Life	p. 57
Teachable Moment: Patenting Germplasm	p. 58
Neuroethics	p. 59
Organ Transplantation	p. 60
Responsible Conduct of Human Research	p. 60
Animal Testing	p. 61
Is the Research Worth It?	p. 63
Systematic Reality Check	p. 66
Genetically Modified Organisms	p. 67
Transgenic Species	p. 68
Food	p. 68
Environmental Health: The Ethics of Scale and the Scale of Ethics	p. 70
Temporal Aspects of Bioethical Decisions: Environmental Case Studies	p. 70
Agent Orange	p. 71
Japanese Metal Industries	p. 74
Minamata Mercury Case	p. 74
Cadmium and Itai Itai Disease	p. 75
Scale Is More than Size	p. 77
Love Canal	p. 78
Times Beach	p. 79
Teachable Moment: The Whole Is Greater than the Sum of Its Parts	p. 80
Active Engineering	p. 81
Ethical Theories: A Primer	p. 83
Truth	p. 84
Psychological Aspects of Ethics	p. 86
Teachable Moment: The Physiome Project: The Macroethics of Engineering toward Health	p. 89
Fairness	p. 94
Value as a Bioethical and Engineering Concept	p. 95
Technical Optimism versus Dismal Science	p. 96
Notes and Commentary	p. 98
An Engineered Future: Human Enhancement
Professional Zeitgeist: How Engineers Think	p. 106
Improvement versus Enhancement	p. 109
Engineering Intuition	p. 111
Engineers versus Economists	p. 112
Intuiting Value	p. 113
Deductive and Inductive Reasoning: Precursors to Intuition	p. 114
Creativity	p. 116
Moral Coherence	p. 120
Creativity and Bioethics	p. 122
The Ethical Quandary of Enhancement	p. 124
Scientific Dissent	p. 126
Notes and Commentary	p. 134
The Bioethical Engineer
Professional Trust	p. 139
Codes of Ethics: Words to Live By	p. 142
Discussion Box: The Code of Hammurabi	p. 143
Limitations of Codes of Ethics	p. 147
Risk Shifting: Organochlorine Pesticides	p. 147
Right of Professional Conscience	p. 152
Groupthink and the Right of Conscience	p. 156
Animals and Engineers	p. 158
Teachable Moment: Confined Animal Feeding Operations and the Moral Standing of Animals	p. 159
Making Ethical Decisions in Engineering	p. 160
Discussion Box: Four Persons Who Changed the Way We Think about Nature	p. 162
John Muir	p. 162
Rachel Carson	p. 162
Christopher Stone	p. 163
Gaylord Nelson	p. 164
Notes and Commentary	p. 164
Bioethical Research and Technological Development
Beyond Regulation	p. 169
Integrity	p. 169
Teachable Moment: The Therapeutic Misconception	p. 173
The Experiment	p. 173
The Hypothetico-Deductive Method	p. 174
Research Conflict of Interest	p. 175
Teachable Moment: Truth and Turtles	p. 176
Professionalism	p. 178
Technology: Friend and Foe	p. 178
Teachable Moment: Medical Device Risk	p. 179
Risk Homeostasis and the Theory of Offsetting Behavior	p. 180
Artifacts	p. 182
Automation and Mechanization of Medicine	p. 183
Professional Consideration: Do Engineers Have Patients?	p. 184
Technological Reliability	p. 185
Low Tech Engineering	p. 189
Information Technology	p. 190
The Ethics of Nanotechnology	p. 193
Notes and Commentary	p. 195
Bioethical Success and Failure
Teachable Moment: Engineering Measurement	p. 201
Measurements of Success and Failure	p. 203
Technological Success and Failure	p. 203
Risk as a Bioethical Concept	p. 205
Safety, Risk, and Reliability in Design	p. 206
Probability: The Mathematics of Risk and Reliability	p. 206
Discussion Box: Choose Your Risk	p. 210
Reliability: An Ethics Metric	p. 214
Reducing Risks	p. 217
Risk as an Ethical Concept	p. 220
Risk-Based Ethics: The Syllogism Revisited	p. 223
Causation	p. 225
Biographical Box: Sir Bradford Hill	p. 226
Notes and Commentary	p. 228
Analyzing Bioethical Success and Failure
Medical Device Failure: Human Factors Engineering	p. 232
Teachable Moment: How to Analyse a Medical Device	p. 233
Utility as a Measure of Success	p. 234
Mistakes and Miscalculations	p. 236
Extraordinary Natural Circumstances	p. 236
Critical Path	p. 237
Negligence	p. 243
Lack of Imagination	p. 244
Bioterrorism: The Engineer's Response	p. 244
Dual Use and Primacy of Science	p. 246
Social Response of Engineering to Terrorism	p. 248
Success Paradigms	p. 248
Characterizing Success and Failure	p. 249
Accountability	p. 249
Value	p. 250
Case Analysis	p. 250
Notes and Commentary	p. 258
Justice and Fairness as Biomedical and Biosystem Engineering Concepts
Fairness and Distributive Justice	p. 263
Discussion Box: Harm and the Hippocratic Oath	p. 271
Teachable Moment: Disposal of a Slightly Hazardous Waste	p. 272
Solution and Discussion	p. 272
Though Experiment: Who Is More Ethical?	p. 274
Professional Virtue and Empathy	p. 277
Teachable Moment: Albert Schweitzer and the Reverence for Life	p. 277
Reason	p. 279
Teachable Moment: Abortion, Fairness, and Justice	p. 280
Utility	p. 281
Teachable Moment: Utility and Futility	p. 283
Precaution as a Bioethical Concept	p. 285
Discussion Box: The Tragedy of the Commons	p. 286
Notes and Commentary	p. 287
Sustainable Bioethics
Green Is Good	p. 291
Sustainability	p. 292
Teachable Moment: Rational Ethics and Thermodynamics	p. 293
Life Cycles and Concurrent Engineering	p. 300
Case Study Box: SIDS, A Concurrent Engineering Failure	p. 301
Discussion Box: The Coffee Cup Debate	p. 305
The Bioethics of Combustion	p. 307
Systematic Bioethics	p. 317
Seveso Plant Disaster	p. 318
Poverty and Pollution	p. 320
Interdependence	p. 322
Notes and Commentary	p. 323
Engineering Wisdom
Ethics and Chaos	p. 329
Macroethics and Microethics	p. 330
Future Directions	p. 331
The Humble Engineer	p. 338
Notes and Commentary	p. 340
Epilogue: Practical Bioethics
Shutting Down the Pump	p. 343
Objectivity and Finding Truth	p. 344
Moral Courage	p. 346
Bioethics Resources for the Engineer	p. 347
Suggested Readings	p. 348
Ethics of Emerging Technologies	p. 348
Ethical Analysis, Reasoning, and Decision Making	p. 349
Macroethics and Societal Risk	p. 349
Teaching Engineering Macroethics	p. 351
Teaching Engineering Microethics	p. 353
Useful Websites	p. 354
Notes and Commentary	p. 356
	p. 357
	p. 363
Glossary of Terms Likely to Be Encountered in Bioethical Decision Making	p. 365
Name Index	p. 395
Subject Index	p. 397
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