The 2015 Varsity Medical Ethics debate convened upon the motion: “This house believes nootropic drugs should be available under prescription”. This annual debate between students from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, now in its seventh year, provided the starting point for arguments on the subject. The present article brings together and extends many of the arguments put forward during the debate. We explore the current usage of nootropic drugs, their safety and whether it would be beneficial to individuals and (...) society as a whole for them to be available under prescription. The Varsity Medical Debate was first held in 2008 with the aim of allowing students to engage in discussion about ethics and policy within healthcare. The event is held annually and it is hoped that this will allow future leaders to voice a perspective on the arguments behind topics that will feature heavily in future healthcare and science policy. This year the Oxford University Medical Society at the Oxford Union hosted the debate. (shrink)

Tradition has been disparaged as a conceptual category that should be jettisoned in the development process. It is thought to be capable of hindering the use of reason which is thought to be the primary mover of development. This thinking has its root in the Enlightenment rationalisations, especially as championed by the philosophes, Rene Descartes, and Immanuel Kant. Conservatives, such as Edmund Burke, contrarily, are of the opinion that tradition is a valuable resource for society because they regard tradition as (...) the accumulated wisdom of the past. This paper argues that, even though the Enlightenment and conservative thinkers differ in their conceptions of the value of tradition, they misconceived what tradition entails because they failed to pay attention to its dynamics and consequently could not put its values in proper focus. The paper considers tradition as a relevant imperative in development attempts and, therefore, suggests a conception of tradition that makes it a dynamic and useful phenomenon. (shrink)