Ethics and the Human Genome

 

PAPER 2
Due April 16 (Rewrite due April 30)
Typed, double-spaced, stapled, and with pages numbered
2 copies

Length is flexible, but aim for about 5 pages.

Please attach a completed Writer Response form to the copy for your fellow.

Background

·        Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story The Birthmark, describes a scientist-husband’s zeal to perfect his wife by removing a birthmark from her cheek. He succeeds in developing a potion to remove the birthmark, but she dies as a result. His wife knows what will happen, yet speaks of “his honorable love.”

 

Her heart exulted, while it trembled, at his honorable love--so pure and lofty that it would accept nothing less than perfection nor miserably make itself

contented with an earthlier nature than he had dreamed of.

 

Your Task

 

  • Imaginary scenario. Alymer, the husband, has been transported forward in time, to 2009. He finds himself sitting at the front of a large room facing a sea of solemn faces. He recognizes some as other eminent scientists of his day. Apparently he is part of a hearing on the ethics of medical genomics. A sign announces a “National Institutes of Health (NIH) Investigation into the Science and Practice of Medical Genomics.” The “birthmark” case is featured because it famous, indeed, infamous. NIH wants to know whether Alymer represents a one-of-kind aberration, or a more general kind of risk it should worry about, because it funds lots of genomic studies.
  • Your role in the scenario: You, too, are in that room, also seated at the front. The name plate in front of you identifies you as “Chief Ethicist, NIH.” It is your job, as Chief Ethicist, to question Alymer on the ethics of what he has done. He is not on trial, but you want to understand what ethical system he thought he was following. After all, it was his own beloved wife who died and he is a renowned scientist, so it is widely assumed he had good motives. You go in with an open mind. You must use your knowledge of normative ethics to design good questions.
  • Your paper: It will be your report on the hearing. Specifically, it will include a transcript of the most important questions and answers in your interrogation of Alymer, your summary conclusions, and any recommendations you wish to make to the NIH on the ethical standards it should encourage in medical genomics.

 

 

Evaluation criteria

 

Develops a clear thesis, based on an informative line of questions and answers

Shows knowledge of the varieties of ethical systems

  • NOTE: Do NOT give “lectures” about them. The NIH does not want or need that. It depends on you to know and use them as appropriate, to get to the bottom of Alymer’s thought and action, not to give it a course in ethical philosophy.

Is thoughtful, insightful, intellectually probing

The Q&A draws from relevant passages in Hawthorne’s essay 

Writes with focus, clarity, and precision.

 

Advice

 

Reread this assignment after you have written your paper. Did you actually address it, fully?

Creativity is welcome! (But it cannot substitute for intellectual rigor.)

Do your best on the first version; it is not just a “draft.”