Currently viewing the category:
"Bioethics"
Zombies are a strange source of ethical inspiration, but as I mentioned to io9′s Lauren Davis, if academic ethicists get to spend all day talking about trolleys, I see no reason we can’t banter about the ethics of the undead.
Lauren posed the following query: When is it ok to kill a zombie? Should zombies be [...]
Are Exoskeletons “Ableist?”
By Kyle Munkittrick On January 22, 2012 · Leave a Comment · In Bioethics, Body, Medicine, Prosthetics, Rights
In a word, no.
Over at Cyborgology (a blog I am amazed I didn’t discover sooner, given its sister site is Sociological Images) Jenny Davis attempts to figure out if the assistive devices built by Ekso Bionics are “ableist” or if they represent genuine progress. She makes a pretty good [...]
Carolyn Abraham pens an exhaustive and balanced article on embryo selection. If you are honest with yourself about trying to understand the situation new parents will be facing in the coming decades, you’ll read this article.
Eddy Nahmias explains why if you’re going to argue free will doesn’t exist, we better make damn sure we’re all talking about the same thing:
The sciences of the mind do give us good reasons to think that our minds are made of matter. But to conclude that consciousness or free will is thereby [...]
The Soviet Human-Chimp Crossbreed Experiment
By Kyle Munkittrick On November 14, 2011 · Leave a Comment · In Animal, Bioethics, Reproduction, Uplift
You can’t make this stuff up. In Scientific American, Eric Michael Johnson tells the sad story of Russian physiologist Il’ya Ivanov’s efforts to cross-breed humans with anthropoid apes. Ivanov was not planning to make super-soldiers, nor was he up to any comic book scale medical mischief. As is so often the case, Ivanov just wanted [...]
The Today show manages to be balanced. Ann Curry does an awesome job calling out the protection of the privacy of individuals and families. She’s brave enough to question genetic fetishism. Also, it’s worth noting that Nanette Ulster affiliates with rather conservative bioethics organizations.
I’m trying to decide what I think on this one. [...]
Wesley J. Smith, a man who has perfected the art of not thinking and is a paragon of intellectual poltroons, has decided to taunt me a second time. His article “The Trouble with Transhumanism” attempts to take me to task. I suggest you read it in full, because rarely does one have such a [...]
As a professional nerd, I’ve got to keep expanding my knowledge base. My current projects:
An Australian man who had sex with a sixteen year old and was convicted as a sex offender is being denied the opportunity to use IVF treatment to reproduce. Here is the thing: sex offender laws are wildly disproportionate to the crime committed. Let me be clear: rape and harassment are traumatic and horrific behaviors. [...]
About
Pop Bioethics, written by Kyle Munkittrick, is an effort to study the ethics of the continuing evolution of the human species via the lens of pop culture and be somewhat entertaining in the process.
Kyle's writing can also be found at Discover's The Crux, Slate's Future Tense, and at the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. For questions or comments: comments [at] popbioethics [dot] com
All opinions, ideas, and words either explicit or implicit found within this website are my own and represent no other person, organization, or group.Categories
