Suggested readings, 21 February 2021

Here are some interesting articles I've read over the past week I think are worth checking out.

Julian Savulescu and Abie Rohrig, “Covid-19 human challenge trials will play a crucial role in vaccinating the developing world.” 12 Feb, Daily Telegraph.

"In the war on Covid-19, we should allow altruistic competent adults to volunteer for life-saving research which poses risks to them that are on par with those we already take on in everyday life."

Sarah Lynch and Kanneboyina Nagaraju, “6 important truths about COVID-19 vaccines.” 18 Feb, The Conversation.

"We are an immunologist and pharmacist. Here are some of the facts behind some of the common myths that we have heard about the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines from patients, friends and family members."

Jemima Kelly, “How ‘fact-checking’ can be used as censorship.” 18 Feb, Financial Times.

"Used correctly, fact-checking contests falsehoods in ways that complement free speech. But free speech is about letting people be wrong as well as right. We must limit the checking to facts, which is tricky enough, and not opinions that the checkers don’t happen to like."

Adam Vaughan, “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster review: Bill Gates's call to arms.” 13 Feb, New Scientist.

Gates may not be the perfect messenger, but he has written a fine primer on how to get ourselves out of this mess."

Nick Bostrom and Matthew van der Merwe, “How vulnerable is the world?” 12 Feb, Aeon.

Sooner or later a technology capable of wiping out human civilisation might be invented. How far would we go to stop it?

Matt McManus, “Reading Edmund Burke Shows That Conservatism Is All About Defending Traditional Hierarchies.” 14 Feb, Jacobin.

"The fundamental problem with Burkean arguments...is that their hostility to so-called rationalist abstraction and appeals to affect and the profound unknown are only sustainable for those who already feel the way they do. This is why Burkeanism has been described as less a philosophy than an outlook or attitude."

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Should We Use Neuroenhancement Drugs to Improve Relationships?

A version of this article was printed in Humanism Ireland , July-August, Vol. 147 (2014) L ove, it is fair to say, is probably the strongest emotion we can experience. It can come in many different forms: love of one’s parent, sibling, or child. Though most people consider romantic relationships—which include companionship, sexual passion, intimacy, warmth, procreation and child-rearing—as the most significant component of one’s life; and it is probably the thing we find discussed more than anything else in novels, films and music. Committed romantic relationships tend to occur within the institution of marriage—something that is ubiquitous to most, if not all, cultures. Indeed, relationships today, which are primarily love-driven, are not just confined to marriages, as many couples sustain relationships outside of wedlock. Being in a love-driven relationship is considered important for most people, as it contributes to happiness—something we a...

Is Adult Incest Wrong?

An version of this article was printed in Humanism Ireland , March-April, Vol. 151 (2015) Incest is something most people find morally objectionable and it's one of the most common of all cultural taboos. The British Medical Association’s Complete Family Health Encyclopaedia (1990) defines incest as “ intercourse between close relatives,” that usually includes “intercourse with a parent, a son or daughter, a brother or sister, an uncle or aunt, a nephew or niece, a grandparent or grandchild.” The Oxford English Dictionary ’s definition is a little broader: it doesn’t confine incest to just intercourse, but to “sexual relations between people classified as being too closely related to marry each other.” Most countries have some kind of law against incest—though consensual adult incest is not a crime in France, Spain, Russia the Netherlands, and a host of countries in South America. In England and Wales, however, t he Sexual Offences Act 2003 ...

A Critique of Abortion and Infanticide

Not many ethical issues are as vigorously fought over as abortion these days. Unsurprisingly, the standpoint of the different sides—put simply, those who are in favour of abortion and those that are against it—have not achieved much in shifting the beliefs of their opponents. Abortion was illegal in almost all western states until the late 1960s; in 1967 Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales) changed its laws to permit abortion on broad social grounds. In the Row v Wade 1973 case, the United States Supreme Court held that women have a constitutional right to abortion in the first six months of pregnancy. Many other western nations like France and Italy have subsequently liberated their abortion laws. Ireland and Northern Ireland, however, have held out in opposition to this movement. Abortion in Ireland remains illegal under the 1861 Offences against the Person Act and in 1983 an amendment to Ireland's constitution states that an embryo, from the p...

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