There’s a report in the Montreal Gazette from last Thursday concerning proposals to legalise euthanasia. And, assuming that the report is accurate, some of the things being said about those proposals are painfully, painfully, painfully daft. Margaret Somerville’s objection to euthanasia seems to be that it is killing, and that killing remains morally wrong “even […]
Category: In the News
Can you Insure the DNA Dozen?
There’s an interesting piece that’s been floating around some of the newspapers (Telegraph coverage here; The Australian here) over the last few days about the “DNA Dozen” – 11 scientists and one lawyer who’re having their genome published online in order to demystify the process and tame some of the public’s perception. Fair dos to […]
The Nobel Prize and the Holy See
Robert Edwrds was this week awarded a Nobel Prize for his pioneering work on IVF. It’s true, of course, that IVF made possible a range of procedures that generate important ethical questions – Arthur Caplan mentions some of them here (although the article in which he’s quoted is a little lightweight, and gives altogether too much […]
Spineless in Saudi?
A little while ago, Richard Ashcroft alerted me to this story: a judge in Saudi Arabia was considering surgical paralysis as the sentence for a man who had caused a similar injury to someone else in a fight. The BBC’s story came via a report on Amnesty’s website, which you can find here. The story […]
Bless my cotton socks, I’m in the news…
Footage of the oral evidence given to the Scottish Parliamentary Committee investigating the End of Life Assistance Bill. Starring… um… me. […]
Videotape, Sex and Danger
Muireann Quigley has pointed me in the direction of this story, concerning the risks of HIV faced by those working in the porn industry. An Aids activist group has filed a workplace safety complaint against Larry Flynt, accusing the porn king of creating an unsafe environment for his stable of sex stars by not requiring they […]
Killing Time – or Wasting It?
It was reported a couple of days ago that Ray Gosling was to face charges of wasting police time after having made certain statements on a TV programme about the death of a partner – statements that the police subsequently investigated and that led to his arrest for murder in February. The charge of wasting […]
Does the Taliban have a Mexican Wing?
The Mexican state of Guanajuato has some very strict abortion laws: terminating a pregnancy attracts a three-year prison sentence. However, it would appear that prosecutors occasionally up the ante by bringing a charge of homicide, which brings a much more severe sentence; thus six women have been given 25-30 year sentences for having an abortion. According to […]
Sporting Chances and the Justification of Surgery
There’s an interesting story on the front page of the Manchester Evening News about an 11-year-old who has asked that her right leg be removed so that she has a better chance of becoming a paralympian. […]
Ooooh, Matron!
Right: so I understand that hospitals sometimes feel the need to raise revenue, and I understand the idea that resources shouldn’t be left idle – an unused ward represents wasted money. I also fully understand that hospital wards have provided a rich source of smut over the years, some of which has been almost entertaining. […]