Medical Ethics Essay Research Paper Medical EthicsMedical

Medical Ethics Essay, Research Paper

Medical EthicsMedical ethics, the implementation of ethics towards medicine is a necessary tool for enumerating the various ethical and moral propositions and clarifying their positions. “… Medical ethics is simply ethics applied to a particular area of our lives… medicine… “(Clouser pp 384). Medical ethics has two roles, one is that of sensitizing. “… It is a consciousness-raising enterprise, alerting us from grossest injustice to subtlest nuance..”(Clouser pp 385) The other of which is structuring of the medical issues. “… This is the second item I would isolate in describint what medical ethics is up to. I call this structuring the issues. The morally relevant strands of a complex situation are based out.”(Clouser pp 385) The advice of the expert, the medical doctor, and the ethicists have a synergistic effect on the moral agent; they allow the agent to make a desision.that is informed and ethical. The medical ethicists has the foundations established by Emanuel Kant, A.J. Ayres, and Socrates to allow him to delineate the many facets of a situation in terms of the Twins philophicalal traditions. The two traditions beget points of view which are ethical and easy to comprehend. “… A medical ethicist cannot be appealing to speacial theories and remote lines of reasonning and simply delivering his conclusions to us, which we must accept because he is the expert.. Rationale people must be able to see, follow, and judge the points made.”(Clouser pp 386). The medical ethicists must frame all issues terms of the twin philosphical traditions. The twins philosphical traditions, absolute truth and situational ethics, applies not only to medical ethics but infiltrates every strata of our existance, from politics to education. Absolute truth is the notion of fixed immutable principles that exists outside the human condition, unchanging with geography and causality. Situational ethics, on the other hand, is the belief that all of ethics are within the human condition; the only reality is the process and change is the only absolute. These principles oppose each other and appear to act as state functions rather than as a continum. However there exists a bridge that connects the two tradtions and represents the mid-point within the ethical continuim. That is, there exists fix immutable truths which exists inside the human condition a priori, within the mind. These truths of fixed immutable origins can be applied using deductive reasonning to situations.The catholic nature of absolute truth, as established by the early greek philosphers like Socrates view the absolute as being outside the human condition. These ideals include justice, self-control, and holiness. “…is there such a thing as justice… I think so… virtue resembles knowledge or justice…”( Plato s The Protagoras pp 55). Since virtue, knowledge, justice, and courage resemble holiness and vice versa, as with holiness, virtue, knowledge, and justice must exist outside the human condition. “… (to) be a good man – which is what you were speaking of, Pittacus – is impossible and super-human. This is the previlege of a god alone…”(Plato s The Protagoras pp 79) Humans cannot be noble, just, and couragous but must strive to become these, that is, to live grounded within the rules of absolute truth. “… To live pleasurably is good, to live painfully bad… knowledge is a fine thing quite capable of ruling a man, and that if he can distinguish good from evil, nothing will force him to act otherwise…”( Plato s The Protagoras pp 89). According to the philosphers of this genra, the sancity of life is also an absolute. ” I swear by Apollo, the physician, and Aslepius…I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel…”(The Oath of Hippocrates). Plato premised that knowledge and wisdom are the highest states of being(352 C. D. Menno). Plato had also reasoned that knowledge was virtue and being like virtue knowledge is an absolute principle. The mode to acquiring knowledge is existance, life and thus life must be protected as an absolute. In accordance to this philosphical tradtion, a medical ethicist, viewing a situation through absolute truth, would have to tailor his point of view through immutable truths, such as the sanctity of life. A situational ethicist, viewing the world through sensibility would argue that the general principles for viewing ethical points of view are grounded in human experience and the only absolute truth is change itself. A. J. Ayres, the philosphical father of situational ethics, would argue that the criteria for an ethical course of action are logic, validity of data, and the consequnces. “… We have to know what the situation is in which we are likely to be. If, for example, we think it right to try to maximize human happiness, a scientific approach to the practical problems may instruct us how best to set about it…”(A. J. Ayres The Central Quenstions of Philosophy pp. 226). Unlike the believers in catholic truth, A. J. Ayre does not believe that their exists only one moral stand-point which is superior to all others. “…In the end, it is a matter of finding principles which one is prepared to stand by and when they conflict… of giving more weight to one or the another according to the circumstances of the particular case…”(A. J. Ayres The Central Questions of Philosophy pp 266) However, this does not mean that all moral standpoints are to regarded as equal to one