Not everything wrong is illegal; nor should it be. Adultery may be wrong, and eating foie gras may be problematic – but it doesn’t follow that eating foie gras with your mistress ought to be against the law. So what about abortion? Granted that some people think it wrong, what do they think the legal […]
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Clinical Ethicist Job at Stony Brook
Sort-of-fresh in my inbox this morning was a notification that SUNY Stony Brook is advertising for an assistant/ associate professorial level job as a clinical ethicist. I’ve blogged about this kind of role before, and I have to say that the wording of the advert sort of confirms my suspicions about clinical ethics consultancy. The primary responsibilities […]
MP Not at all Dyslexic
Graham Stringer, the Labour MP for Blackley, has dismissed dyslexia as a myth invented to cover up for poor teaching. His claim brings to mind a claim reported a few years ago along the same lines made by Durham’s Julian Elliott. I’m not sure if it’s just a matter of the way in which the […]
Steven Pinker and his Genes
The psychologist gives a brief essay on genetic analysis and the possibility of consumer genomics in the New York Times. He makes a number of interesting points about such analysis, concerning everything from Brussels sprouts to Jewishness to hair. But a couple of the points he makes about health markers are worth noting. First, in […]
Soran Reader on Euthanasia
Soran Reader (Philosophy, Durham) provides an insight into her own experience of being diagnosed with a brain tumour, and the availability or otherwise of euthanasia in the UK, in this week’s Times Higher Education. It’s powerful stuff. [T]he possibility that really threatens to break me is that I may be unable to remember my children. […]
When Transplantation goes Odd
A man who donated his kidney to his wife, who subsequently cheated on him and filed for divorce, says he wants it back. His chances are described as slim. Ronseal. […]
Measles! Get your Measles!
Britain, some would have us believe, is one of the worst places in the world for measles. In 2006-7, there were 12000 cases in Europe, many of them in the UK, according to a study in The Lancet (subscription required) and reported by the Beeb. This has not a little to do with the MMR […]
Chip off the Old Block
It would appear that games like Tetris may help in the treatment of PTSD – there’s apparently a six-hour period in which traumatic memories become consolidated, so something like Tetris, in effect, allows the brain to be distracted for a time, thus reducing the consolidation. Hence [p]laying “Tetris” after viewing traumatic material reduces unwanted, involuntary […]
Naked Scientists Performing Autopsies!
The headline get your attention? There’s recently been an appeal put out that more people should donate their organs – brains in particular – to science. In a similar sort of vein, it’s apparently National Pathology Week (I’ve booked my autopsy for Thursday morning: it’ll be ACE!), and there’s a series of podcasts to go with it. […]
A Bad Day to Detox… and a Diversion to Mill
Sense about Science are truly wonderful people, but, I fear, are engaged in a somewhat futile attempt to rid the world of gobbledygook. Nevertheless, with Stakhanovite determination, they’re putting the boot into the detox industry. Again. On a similar theme, Ben Goldacre showed his mettle on Today and elsewhere. I wish them luck, but I […]