Summer 2010
2010 Lecturers and Their Topics
Deane Aikins, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Yale School of Medicine and Director, Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, National Center for PTSD
CAPTAIN AMERICA, Vagal Tone, and the Neuroethics of Combat Resilience
Jonathan Borak, Clinical Professor of Epidemiology & Public Health and Clinical Professor of Medicine, Yale School of Medicine
Introduction to Risk Assessment and its Ethical Underpinnings
R. Douglas Bruce, Assistant Professor of Medicine (AIDS), Yale School of Medicine
The Ethics of Harm Reduction: Improving Health Outcomes for Drug Users and the Ethical Crossfire
Daniel Callahan, Senior Research Scholar and President Emeritus, The Hastings Center
Creating a Sustainable, Affordable Health Care System
Margaret Drickamer, Professor of Medicine, Program in Geriatric Medicine, Yale School of Medicine
Decisional Capacity
Thomas Duffy, Professor of Medicine and Director of the Program for Humanities in Medicine at Yale School of Medicine
Reflections on Portraits of an Illness
Sam Garner, Health Science Policy Analyst (contractor) for the Clinical Research Policy Analysis and Coordination Program (CRpac) in the Office of Biotechnology Activities at NIH
Bioethics and Incapacitating Agents
John Grim, Senior Lecturer and Research Scholar at Yale University; Co-Coordinator, The Forum on Religion and Ecology
Native American Religions: Toward an Environmental Ethic
Jacob Hacker, Stanley Resor Professor of Political Science, Yale University and Resident Fellow, Institution for Social and Policy Studies
How Health Care Reform Happened and Where It Leads
John Hughes, Professor of Medicine, Yale School of Medicine
Society and Health Care: Obligations, Fairness, and Limits
Willis Jenkins, Margaret Farley Assistant Professor of Social Ethics, Yale Divinity School
Medical Ethics and Environmental Ethics: Connections, Problems, and Possibilities
Shelly Kagan, Professor of Philosophy, Yale University
Applied Ethics and the Distinction between Killing and Letting Die
Dan Kahan, Elizabeth K. Dollard Professor of Law, Yale University
The Cultural Cognition of Risk: Implications for Science Communication
Diane Krause, Professor of Laboratory Medicine, Pathology and Cell Biology, Yale University
Embryonic and adult stem cells and their potential clinical use
Stephen Latham, Deputy Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
The Year in Bioethics
Robert Levine, Senior Scholar in Research Ethics, Interdisciplinary Bioethics Center; Professor of Internal Medicine, Lecturer in Pharmacology, Yale School of Medicine
Origins of the ethical norms and principles for research involving human subjects
Scott Long, Senior Physician, Connecticut Hospice; Associate Clinical Professor of Internal Medicine, Yale School of Medicine
Evolution of Hospice in the United States
Maurice Mahoney, Professor of Genetics, Pediatrics, and Obstetrics & Gynecology and Executive Chair, Yale University Institutional Review Boards, Yale School of Medicine Influencing ("Designing" "Choosing") Characteristics of Your Children When They Are Embryos or Fetuses
Mark Mercurio, Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Director, Yale Pediatric Ethics Program, Yale School of Medicine
Ethical Issues in Extreme Prematurity
Tim Nelson, Professor of Molecular, Cellular & Developmental Biology, Yale University
Agricultural biotechnology: potential for synergy between traditional and biotech methods in agriculture and food production
Sherwin Nuland, Clinical Professor of Surgery Emeritus, Yale School of Medicine
The Goodness of the Physician: From Hippocrates to High-Tech and On to the Future
Wayne Pacelle, President and CEO, Humane Society of the United States
Animal Protection: A Universal Value and a Global Concern
Erik Parens, Senior Research Scholar at The Hastings Center
The Ethics of Children and Psychotropic Drugs
Pasquale Patrizio, Director, Yale Fertility Center, Yale School of Medicine
Postponement and Preservation of Fertility: Ethical and Social Implications
Peter Rabinowitz, Associate Professor of Medicine, Director of Clinical Services, Yale Occupational and Environmental Medicine Program
One Health: Why human, animal, and environmental health professionals need to work together to save the planet
Aron Rose, Associate Clinical Professor, Yale School of Medicine Dept of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences and Associate Clinical Professor, Yale School of Nursing Graduate Entry Prespecialty in Nursing
The Ethics Of Overseas Surgical Volunteerism
Julie Rosenbaum, Assistant Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, Primary Care Residency, Yale School of Medicine
The Truth about Death Panels: The Current State of End-of-Life Communication
Sally Satel, Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute; Lecturer, Psychiatry, Yale School of Medicine
Organ Donation and Organ Trafficking: Is Donor Compensation the Solution?
David Smith, Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
Neuroethics and Dementia
Emilie Townes, Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Andrew W. Mellon Professor of African American Studies and Religion at Yale Divinity School
Lament: Developing an Ethic of Care in Community
Mary Evelyn Tucker, Senior Lecturer and Research Scholar at Yale University; Co-Coordinator, The Forum on Religion and Ecology
The Emerging Alliance of Religion and Ecology
Wendell Wallach, Scholar, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
Navigating the Future: Moral Machines, Techno Sapiens, and the Singularity
Robert Wyman, Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, Yale University
The History, Demography, Biology and Theology of Abortion
Basic Issues in Bioethics
Instructor: David Smith, Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
This seminar will cover some core issues in bioethics: some that have been present at the beginning and other that have recently emerged. These will include research on human subjects, new technologies for reproduction, problems in genetic counseling, getting and distributing organs in transplantation, care for the dying, and the just distribution of health care. Readings will be articles or book chapters available on a campus internet resource. Participants will be expected to make a short and informal comment on the reading at least every other meeting.
Bioethics & the Law
Instructors: Steve Latham, Deputy Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
Christian Krautkramer, MPH, JD Candidate, University of Minnesota
This seminar will examine the basic treatment by American law of some major issues in contemporary biomedical ethics. Readings will include standard legal materials such as cases and regulations, a number of quasi-legal sources such as government commission reports and institutional guidelines, and some academic articles. No familiarity with legal materials is assumed; indeed, this seminar is designed for students with no background in American law. For each of the topics listed below, the instructor will offer a very broad and necessarily cursory overview of the area, and then will focus seminar discussion on one or two sub-issues to be addressed in detail. While the focus will be American law, some comparative-law readings will be supplied in order to bring possible alternative approaches to light.
Topics: Basics of the US legal system; abortion; end-of-life care and aid-in-dying; assisted reproduction; stem-cell research; organ donation; research on human subjects; and health care reform.
Public Health Ethics
Instructor: Julius Landwirth, Associate Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
This seminar series will examine the ethical implications of some of the major areas of public health practice and policy. Seminars will be co-facilitated by Dr. Landwirth and a guest expert in the particular topic under discussion. The format will be interactive. Each session will open with a brief presentation by one of the interns of the group reading assignment for that session followed by comments from the facilitators and open discussion. Topics to be covered include: analytical framework for public health ethics, ethical aspects of preparedness planning for public health emergencies, the genome and public health, mandatory vaccination of children and health care workers, environment and public health ethics, public health and socioeconomic health disparities.
Topics in Veterinary Ethics and Animal Welfare
Instructor: Susan Kopp, Professor and Director of Veterinary Technology Program, Laguardia Community College (CUNY)
As human, animal, and environmental issues become greater global concerns, there is urgent need for interdisciplinary collaboration. This seminar series will focus on several key areas of veterinary medical ethics and animal welfare. After a preliminary introduction to the areas of veterinary medical ethics and animal welfare, sessions will cover: the veterinarian – owner -- patient relationship and the status of animals; food animal medicine and public health; use of animals in research; animal euthanasia; and current ethical dilemmas in companion animal medicine. The format will be interactive and include an overview of the focus topic for that class, brief presentations by two or three interns on group reading assignments, and open discussion.
Living with Disability
Instructor: Moira O’Neill, Doctoral candidate, School of Nursing
The social value of people with disabilities is often reflected in bioethical discussions ranging from birth to end of life decisions. This seminar series will strive to understand what it means to live a life viewed as de-valued and misunderstood by society. Through the use of select readings, video, lectures and personal accounts, students will examine a variety of topics including: disability law and deinstitutionalization; the gullibility that characterizes developmental disability; complications of sexual expression when residing in a congregate setting; issues of dignity in the promotion of curative research; and perceptions of suffering in consideration of assisted suicide.
Childhood: Rights, Rongs and Responsibilities
Instructor: Faith Vos Winkel, M.S.W., Assistant Child Advocate, Office of the Child Advocate, State of Connecticut
The evolution of public policy regarding the health and welfare of children has encountered tensions in the rights and responsibilities of children, their parents and the state. This seminar series will consider the child’s perspective as students are asked to engage in discussions regarding the status of children, systems they collide with, and issues that impact their lives. In the context of so-called rights, the discussion will explore child welfare, juvenile justice and education systems followed by sessions focusing on concerns of the day including medical decision making and response to bullying.
Bioethics & the Media
Instructor: Jeff Stryker, Essayist, Columnist, and Consultant
This seminar offers a chance to reflect upon, and contribute to, coverage of bioethical issues in the popular press. The class will examine bioethics news coverage and commentary in terms of fairness, accuracy and salience. We will look at the competing demands of narrative, balance, explanation and empiricism in reporting on bioethics. The class will examine how questions of values are parsed and addressed in popular accounts of bioethics topics. Are scientific uncertainties represented fairly? Are potential biases or conflicts of interest identified? Do the experts quoted have any expertise? The seminar will also consider the purveyors of bioethical reportage as well as its content and audience. What are the best news sources for keeping up on bioethics topics? Where does the press turn when looking for experts in “bioethics?” What ethical demands of journalism as a profession have an impact on coverage of bioethical topics?
Journalism is storytelling. The class will examine some storied cases in bioethics and consider how they came to garner front-page headlines and what impact media klieg lights have had on individuals and families involved. The seminar will also consider how bioethics coverage is changing in light of the rapidly morphing media landscape, where anyone who has fingers and a keyboard can be a reporter or pundit and anyone with an Internet connection can be a publisher. Approximately a third of class time will be devoted to student presentations.
Conscience and Constraints
Instructor: Aileen Walsh, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Health and Social Care, Anglia Ruskin University
In this seminar we will begin by sketching a basic map of the major influences in the field of Western ethics and give some consideration to questions such as: What is it to be moral? Is there such a thing as moral truth and if so how does one find it? Do individuals matter? Do duties matter or are outcomes more important? Having considered these questions we will move on to define what it is to have a conscience and what it is that we ought to do be able to do with it, in a democratic society. We will discuss the answers to more questions such as: How far ought we to allow people to go in expressing the ‘lights’ of their own conscience? What laws are there in place to protect these rights and what laws impinge upon them? What ought we to tolerate in others? Can conscience be relied upon as a reliable guide to moral truth and if not, how can this be identified? When, if ever, can one’s own conscience be followed, to the extent that it begins to affect another’s liberty, or harm others? Do we have a duty to obey our conscience even when it might result in harm to ourselves? Can conscience be a force only for good or can it also be a force for evil?
The sessions will be interactive and students will be invited to contribute their own ideas, experiences and academic work to the classes. A variety of sources will be used to explore the issues, including case histories, one or two films, and academic papers. Although the tutor is a nurse and has experience in health care, we will also look at the expression of conscience and conscientious objection in relation to the military, freedom of religious expression and any other areas that are of interest to students who attend the seminars. In the last week students will present a piece of their own work on an area of their own interest, which will be done either singly or in pairs.
Law, Policy & Ethics in Health and the Biosciences
Instructor: Christian Krautkramer, MPH, JD Candidate, University of Minnesota
Policymaking is perhaps the most powerful way for bioethics to move from theory to practice. But the practical realities of making policy, including politics, economics, and the law, often trump bioethical considerations. This seminar will survey a variety of issues related to how law and ethics influence policy-making in the fields of health care, medicine, public health, and biomedical research, and how one learns to craft policy in light of bioethical dilemmas. Students will be engaged through a variety of teaching methods, including student-led journal discussions, Socratic teaching, and collaborative in-class group projects. Topics discussed will include: Federal and State Policy in Health and Bioscience; Legal and Political Issues in Public Health; Genetics and Genomics Policy; Religious Issues in Health Policy; Drugs, Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology; and Health Care Policy and Economics. Because the seminar will include a significant amount of law-related content, students are highly encouraged to take the "Law and Bioethics" seminar in June.
Conversations about Bioethics
Instructor: Philip Rubin, CEO and senior scientist at Haskins Laboratories; Adjunct Professor of Surgery, Yale School of Medicine
This symposium will focus on issues in the areas of research ethics, data privacy, and technology and ethics. Philip Rubin, CEO and senior scientist at Haskins Laboratories, adjunct professor in surgery at Yale School of Medicine, and former director of the division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences at the NSF, will engage in a conversation with the group on topics in these areas and include background information based on his experience as a researcher, research participant, regulator, administrator, and institutional official. Topics include: historical, regulatory, and laboratory perspectives on research ethics; issues related to enhancing human performance; and emerging technologies from nanotech to neuroethics.
Environmental Ethics
Instructor: Cintra Agee, Doctoral candidate, Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies
This seminar explores selected topics in the expanding field of environmental ethics. Spiritual and religious sources of thought and action from multiple traditions will be a focus. The seminar is designed to widen our exposure to comparative and alternative ways of thinking about and living in our environment. The goal is to be reflexive about our conceptions of the relationships between human and non-human elements of the environment and how that informs our behavior. Sessions will be comprised of limited lectures, with emphasis on discussion of the day’s topics, study questions, and short readings. As part of demonstrating the immediacy between ethics and real-world impacts, two sessions will be visits to local field sites to tour and participate in community tree-planting programs launched by the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies’ Urban Resources Institute’s partnership with the City of New Haven, Solar Youth, Inc., and the Interfaith Reforestation Project.
End of Life Issues
Coordinator: Carol Pollard, Associate Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
Instructors: Various
This seminar series develops themes involved in each speaker's particular areas of interest. Some leaders of this seminar will be giving morning lectures to all the interns prior to giving more focused talks to seminar participants; therefore, some of the sessions will build upon these morning lectures. Topics include: cultural dimensions of end-of-life issues; prognostication; what constitutes a "good death"; palliative sedation; so-called "death panels"; issues particular to infant deaths; and religious issues at end-of-life." The instructors and discussants include: Thomas Duffy, Professor of Medicine, Yale School of Medicine, Director of the Program for Humanities in Medicine at Yale; Rabbi Claudio J. Kogan, Medical Doctor and Rabbi, Temple Beth Tikvah, Madison, CT; Evie Lindemann, Assistant Professor, Albertus Magnus College (Course on Death, Dying and Multicultural Dimensions); Graduate Art Therapy Program; Scott Long, Senior Physician, Connecticut Hospice; Associate Clinical Professor of Internal Medicine, Yale School of Medicine; Mark Mercurio, Associate Professor of Pediatrics; Director, Yale Pediatric Ethics Program, Yale School of Medicine; Carol Pollard, Associate Director, Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics; David Ross-Russell, Medical Director, MidState VNA and Hospice; Julie Rothstein Rosenbaum, Assistant Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, Primary Care Residency, Yale School of Medicine; Shamshad Sheikh, immediate past Yale University Chaplain; Ruth McCorkle, Professor, Yale School of Nursing; Director, Center for Chronic Illness Care, School of Nursing, and Professor, Yale School of Public Health; Rabbi James Ponet, Jewish Chaplain; Director, Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale
Medical Ethical Debates in Popular Culture
Instructor: Adam Schecter, Coordinator for Systems, Compliance, and Education in the Human Research Protection Program at Yale
This course seeks to evaluate medical ethical issues from the perspective of modern popular culture. Many of the topics covered in other seminars this summer (including, but not limited to, general ethical principles, ethics in law, rights-based ethics, ethics at the end of life, research ethics, and ethics in film and literature) will be discussed in this class, but with the particular lens of their treatment within a pop culture reference. This seminar is intended to be interactive: while students will be asked to read various selections from literature and academia in advance of the class, the ultimate purpose of the readings will be to provide a background from which to begin class discussion. To this end, selections from contemporary films and television programs will be shown in class in order to further stimulate the interactive exchange. The diversity of student backgrounds (including academic discipline) should prove useful as we consider the various intuitions expressed in class. Students will be asked to submit one final paper, the subject of which should speak to one of the topics discussed in class, and the remainder of the evaluation will rely on informed discussion in class. No prior medical ethical or philosophical background is required—just a general desire to read, watch, and discuss!
Yvonne Abbey
Medicine & Surgery
Keele University School of Medicine, UK
Erin Adams
Neuroscience & Behavior
Columbia University
Sarah Axelrath
Gender, Sexuality, & Feminist Studies
Oberlin College
Shawna Benston
Masters in Classics, 2009
University of St. Andrews, Scotland
Carolyn Braza
Philosophy
Cornell University
Ashley Carter
Philosophy
Yale University
Sharon Chan
LLB Degree Candidate
London School of Economics & Political Science, UK
Aviva Dworkin
Biology
Union College
Bryan Evans
Master's Degree Candidate in Religious Studies
John Carroll University
Laura Leigh French
Biology
Houghton College
Agnieszka Glazewska
Medicine & Surgery
Keele University School of Medicine, UK
Madeline Goldberg
Psychology & Philosophy
Colgate University
Gabriela Gorny
Biotechnology
Jagiellonian University, Poland
Agata Grudzien
Health Sciences - Public Health
Jagiellonian University School of Medicine, Poland
Sophia House
Economics
New York University
Kimberly Johnson
Doctoral candidate in Social Science
Syracuse University
Theodora Kwok Hui Xuan
Master’s Degree Candidate in Bioethics
Monash University, Australia
Magda Listowska
Doctoral candidate in Experimental Biology
University of Gdansk
Alma Massaro
Philosophy & Bioethics
University of Genoa, Italy
Cameron McCulloch
Undeclared Major
Yale University
Remy Miller
Psychology
Transylvania University
Marissa Palmor
Human Biology
Brown University
Mallory Parker
Philosophy
Purdue University
Anna Price
Medicine & Surgery
Keele University School of Medicine, UK
Sei Young Pyo
Political Science
Yale University
Ruth Retassie
Philosophy & Natural Science
Indiana University of Pennsylvania
Elise Roumeas
Political Theory
Sciences Po Paris, France
Yukie Saburi
Journalist
Kyodo News, Japan
Viktoria Safarian
Philosophy
Transylvania University
Jakub Szlachetko
Law, Administration
University of Gdansk
Lauren Taylor
Global Health
Yale School of Public Health, 2009
Vlad Titerlea
Master’s Degree Candidate in Ethics
University of Strasbourg, France
Alexandra Ulkus
Biobehavioral Health
Pennsylvania State University
Arpitha Upendra
Law
Indian Law Society Law College, Pune, India
Kimberly Van Wormer
Law
Mississippi College School of Law
and
Master of Science in Bioethics Candidate
Union Graduate College - Mt. Sinai School of Medicine
Elizabeth Watts
Lawyer in Training
Hempsons Law Firm
Allison Whelan
Philosophy, Politics, and Law
State University of New York, Binghamton
Nicolai Wohns
Medicine
Pennsylvania State University School of Medicine
Nichole Wyndham
Psychology
Middlebury College
Bo-Shan Xiang
Philosophy & Biology
Wake Forest University
Dalia Yacob
Medicine & Surgery
Keele University School of Medicine
