This may be of interest to readers…

MANCEPT Workshops in Political Theory – Ninth Annual Conference
Manchester Centre for Political Theory (MANCEPT), University of Manchester
5th – 7th September 2012

Workshop on Well-being and Public Policy: Call for Abstracts

David Cameron, in a recent speech on introducing national measures of well-being to inform public policy, claimed that the UK government is aiming to measure the progress of the nation, “not just by how our economy is growing, but by how our lives are improving; not just by our standard of living, but by our quality of life.” In short, the UK government is looking to measure the nation’s well-being in order to “help make a better life for people.” Other governments and international organizations are also increasingly focusing upon well-being as a policy goal.

This workshop will focus on whether, and how, public policy can and should be informed, in some way, by considerations of the public’s well-being. There will be up to 12 speakers in total, who will be invited to give a 30 minute presentation, followed by a discussion. Potential areas of interest include (but are not limited to):

• The role of well-being in public policy
• The limits of political utilitarianism
• Paternalism and well-being
• The implications of different theories of well-being for public policy
• The interaction between different measures of well-being and public policy

If you are interested to present during this workshop, please send to one or both of us an abstract of no more than 500 words with your full name and institutional affiliation before May 15th.

Convenors:
Sam Wren-Lewis (University of Leeds): samwrenlewis@gmail.com
Tim Taylor (visiting research fellow, University of Leeds): phltet@leeds.ac.uk

Further details about the conference available at
http://manceptworkshops2012.wordpress.com/.

Posted on behalf of Sorcha Uí Chonnachtaigh.

All are welcome to our multi-disciplinary workshop on the regulation of human breast milk and the ethics and politics of breastfeeding! Please circulate the programme and information below to anyone who may be interested.

more…

Richard Huxtable has asked me to publicise this:

The EACME (European Association of Centres of Medical Ethics) annual conference will be hosted by the Centre for Ethics in Medicine at the University of Bristol, between 20 and 22 September 2012:
http://www.eacme2012.org/welcome/

This conference will mark the 25th anniversary of the Association, which provides an ideal opportunity to reflect on the many contributions made in and to European bioethics to date.  The conference theme, “Other voices, other rooms: Bioethics, then and now” is borrowed from Truman Capote’s novel, which deals with issues of coming of age, including embracing one’s identity, understanding others, caring and being cared for, as well as searching for oneself and for those to whom one is relationally bound.

In keeping with these themes and the aims of the Association, we therefore invite speakers to reflect on the identity of European medical ethics, and the many places and people with whom it is intimately bound.  As such, we’re keen to hear from across the different disciplines which encounter bioethical issues, including (but not limited to) medical sciences, nursing, allied health, law, social sciences, philosophy, classics and drama. The deadline for abstracts is 1 March 2012.a

It’s a very tight turnaround to submit an abstract – but the conference as a whole could be very interesting, and touches on some of the worries I’ve articulated over the years here concerning what bioethics is.

The BMJ Group journals Sexually Transmitted Infections and Journal of Medical Ethics, in conjunction with academics at the Centre for Social Ethics and Policy (University of Manchester) and the Health Ethics and Law Network (University of Southampton), would like to publish a collection of articles on the criminalization of disease and sexually transmitted infections. We invite article contributions to be published as part of this themed collection.

Funding has also been sought from the ESRC for a seminar series on the same theme and, if successful, authors contributing to this collection may also be invited to present their papers at one of the seminars (which will take place in winter 2012/13 and summer 2013 in Southampton, and winter 2013/14 and summer 2014 in Manchester).

Themes

The use of criminal law to respond to infectious disease transmission has far-reaching implications for law, policy and practice. It presupposes co-operation between clinicians and criminal justice professionals, and that people who infect others can be effectively and fairly identified and brought to justice. There is a potentially difficult relationship between criminal justice and public health bodies, whose priorities do not necessarily coincide. We are interested in receiving papers of broad interest to an international readership of medical ethics scholars and practicing clinicians on any of the following topics:

·      Legislative and policy reform on disease and sexually transmitted infections

·      Health services and the police: privacy, state interference and human rights

·      Evidence and ethics: prosecuting ‘infectious’ personal behaviours

·      Clinicians and the courts: the role of health professionals and criminal justice

·      The aims of criminalization and public health: a compatibility problem?

·      International comparative studies on disease and criminalization: policy, practice and legal issues

More details below the fold. more…

Via the Centre for Medical Humanities blog:

Royal Institute of Philosophy Public Lecture

Mary Midgley – Newcastle University

Death and the Human Animal

Wednesday 19th October 2011, 5pm – 7pm (freshments available from 5pm)
The Henry Dyson room, the college of St Hild and St Bede, Durham.

The abstract’s below the fold. more…

We are happy to announce a symposium on Public Health and Political Philosophy hosted by the Centre for Professional Ethics at Keele and funded by the Wellcome Trust.

The symposium will run from 10 – 5 on the 17th of June and is at Keele University. (Directions to Keele can be found here:
http://www.keele-conference.com/21/directions )

Public health raises issues that are familiar in political philosophy,
such as when is it permissible for the state to force people to do
something either for their or others good, how we ought to distribute
scarce resources, decision making in situations of fundamental
uncertainty and the limits of common moral concepts such as
responsibilities in the face of disasters.

The focus of the symposium will be on topics in public health where
ideas from political philosophy are relevant. We are particularly
interested in the interplay between public health ethics and political
philosophy, and what these two areas can learn from each other.

Speakers include:
Dr James Wilson, UCL
Dr Martin O’Neill, York
Dr Simon Clark, Nottingham
Dr Stephen John, Cambridge
Mr Adrian Viens, Queen Mary

Attendance is free however places are strictly limited so please contact David Hunter at d.hunter@peak.keele.ac.uk to book a place.

There will be a limited number of travel subsidies up to the value of
£50 available for students who wish to attend the workshop available on a first come, first served basis please indicate if you would like to be considered for such a bursary when you book your place.

This workshop looks potentially interesting.

Public Dialogue Wednesday 9 March

Lindisfarne Centre, St Aidan’s College, Durham University

5pm Wednesday March 9th

Programme

5.15 pm Introduction to the Meeting – Dr Patrick Steel (Durham University)

5.20 – 6.45 pm A series of short talks from experts in the field providing a personalised view of synthetic biology and its future impact:

Dr Ray Elliott, Syngenta Ltd, “What Synthetic biology can do for agriculture”
Prof Mark Harvey, Centre for Research in Economic Sociology and Innovation, University of Essex, “Energy, food, materials and climate change: the 21st century challenge to biological science and technology”
Prof John Ward, Institute of Structural and Molecular Biology, University College London, “What synthetic biology can offer for bioengineering”
Prof Robert Song, Department of Theology Durham University, “Synthetic Biology: Some ethical issues”

6.45-7.00 Refreshments

7.00-8.30 pm Open Discussion Between Panels and Audience Chaired by:

Prof Robert Edwards, Chief Scientific Officer for the Food Environment Research Agency
Prof Phil Macnaghten, Institute of Hazard Risk and Resilience, Durham University

8.30 Buffet – free for all registered participants

SPPI-NET is a BBSRC funded network which has the objective of promoting interdisciplinary collaborative ventures, involving both academics and industrialists, to explore the potential for producing synthetic plant products for industrial applications.  The IAS (Institute of Advanced Study) is Durham University’s ideas-based Institute which brings together some of the world’s finest researchers from every discipline to examine themes of major intellectual, scientific, political and practical significance.

pace my earlier post about theological ethics, I’m assured by people whose opinion is sound that Song is a decent ethicist; I’ll suspend my grumbles in his case.

Organ donation: the cost of not giving: A public debate

Thursday 17 March 2011, 6.30-8.00
Watershed, Bristol, BS1 5TX

This public event will bring together people involved in organ donation and transplantation to discuss the current situation in the UK.  You will have a chance to hear about the complexity of transplant coordination, the harrowing experience of waiting for and going through a transplant,  as well as philosophical and moral issues surrounding organ donation.  Speakers include an organ recipient, family members, and health professionals.

Panel members:
Paul Arnold (family member)
Gill Hollis (transplant recipient)
Lynne Holt (Transplant Coordinator, Freeman Hospital, Newcastle)
David Nix (MBE) (Chairman, Donor Family Network)
Dr John Troyer (Deputy Director of the Centre for Death and Society, University of Bath)

Chair:
Dr Julian Baggini, editor-in-chief , The Philosophers’ Magazine

The event is free of charge but booking is essential. To book a place email Havi Carel.

Guest post by Sorcha Uí Chonnachtaigh

On Thursday, 9 December, the Centre for Professional Ethics at Keele hosted a Wellcome funded seminar entitled “Consent and Organ Donation” to coincide with the final lecture in a series on organ donation by visiting Leverhulme Professor Martin Wilkinson.

Martin’s lecture on Wednesday evening (8 December), “Reforms for the UK? ‘Presumed Consent’ and Organ Sales”, provided an excellent starting point for our discussions on consent the following day.  Martin criticised two possible policy responses to the scarcity of organs for donation: moving to a “presumed consent” (or opt-out) system and a state regulated system of paid donations.  The latter does not appear to be of direct relevance for consent but both proposals have been made in response to the de facto “family veto” (about which Martin has written elsewhere). more…