Ethics and Science: An Introduction

Front Cover
Cambridge University Press, Oct 25, 2012 - Business & Economics - 370 pages
Who owns your genes? What does climate science imply for policy? Do corporations conduct honest research? Should we teach intelligent design? Humans are creating a new world through science. The kind of world we are creating will not simply be decided by expanding scientific knowledge, but will depend on views about good and bad, right and wrong. These visions, in turn, depend on critical thinking, cogent argument and informed judgement. In this book, Adam Briggle and Carl Mitcham help readers to cultivate these skills. They first introduce ethics and the normative structure of science and then consider the 'society of science' and its norms for the responsible conduct of research and the treatment of human and animal research subjects. Later chapters examine 'science in society' - exploring ethical issues at the interfaces of science, policy, religion, culture and technology. Each chapter features case studies and research questions to stimulate further reflection.
 

Contents

Introduction and overview
1
Ethical concepts and theories
23
Science and its norms
66
responsible conduct
87
Influential cases
95
anticipating research
103
disseminating research
113
Summary
120
Questions for research and discussion
154
Summary
170
The naturalistic fallacy
185
The goals of teaching and learning
199
science for policy
237
Science and ideational culture
268
ethics and engineering
290
Looking back leaning forward the moral character of scientists
319

How clinical trials work
128
free and informed consent
134
autonomy beneficence and justice
141
disseminating
150
Bibliography
328
Index
347
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About the author (2012)

Adam Briggle is Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religion Studies at the University of North Texas. He is the author of A Rich Bioethics: Public Policy, Biotechnology, and the Kass Council (2010). Carl Mitcham is a philosopher of science and technology in the Division of Liberal Arts and International Studies at Colorado School of Mines (CSM). He is the author of several books including Thinking through Technology (1994) and co-author of Humanitarian Engineering (with David Muñoz, 2010). Mitcham is co-editor (with Stephen Cutcliffe) of Visions of STS: Counterpoints in Science, Technology and Society Studies (2001) and editor of the four-volume Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics (2005).

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