PHIL 324 Bioethics
This course examines a variety of ethical issues that arise in the practice of medicine, including the right to refuse medical treatment, euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, decision-making for patients in incompetent states, organ transplantation, and abortion. Among the questions we may investigate are: Is it always wrong to administer life-sustaining treatment to patients who refuse it? Is it ethical for doctors to euthanize terminally ill patients or to assist them in committing suicide? How should we make medical decisions for patients in permanent states of unconsciousness? What standards should we use to determine when patients are dead or when they may be removed from life-support? When is it appropriate to use a person's organs for purposes of organ transplantation? Under what circumstances is it ethical to abort a pregnancy?