Modern Science and Politics
Reexamine the purpose of science, and the relationship between science, technology, and politics.
The steady advances in the field of biotechnology have opened a new frontier of ethical and political questions. Without doubt, gratitude is the most appropriate response for the many developments in biotechnology that have done much to alleviate human suffering. At the same time, however, we find ourselves on the threshold of an unprecedented power to shape the character of human life itself—a “brave new world” that brings with it a number of fundamental questions that warrant serious and sustained examination. Indeed, many have argued that the explicit and implicit questions of value raised by the biotechnology revolution constitute the most far-reaching set of challenges for our time, currently at the center of American politics.
In this seminar, students will examine classic texts in the history of political thought that bear on biotechnology and politics. They will also read contemporary authors who address the underlying ethical issues imbedded in the biotechnological revolution. They will grapple with questions about what it means to be human, as well as the relationship among the competing authorities of science, politics and religion in the modern world.
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Diana Schaub on bioethics and the Constitution
Faculty
Diana Schaub
Diana Schaub is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where her work is focused on American political thought and history, particularly Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, African American political thought, Montesquieu, and the relevance of core American ideals to contemporary challenges and debates. Concurrently, she is Professor Emerita of Political Science at Loyola University Maryland, where she taught for almost three decades.
Diana Schaub
Diana Schaub is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where her work is focused on American political thought and history, particularly Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, African American political thought, Montesquieu, and the relevance of core American ideals to contemporary challenges and debates. Concurrently, she is Professor Emerita of Political Science at Loyola University Maryland, where she taught for almost three decades.
An expert in political philosophy, Dr. Schaub has lectured on a variety of topics and participated in conferences around the country. She has contributed chapters to multiple books on Shakespeare, liberal education, women, and religion, and she is the author of three books: His Greatest Speeches: How Lincoln Moved the Nation (St. Martin’s Press, 2021); What So Proudly We Hail: The American Soul in Story, Speech, and Song, coedited with Amy and Leon Kass (ISI Books, 2011); and Erotic Liberalism: Women and Revolution in Montesquieu’s “Persian Letters” (Rowman & Littlefield, 1995). Her monograph Emancipating the Mind: Lincoln, the Founders, and Scientific Progress (AEI, 2018) is based on her remarks at the 2018 Walter Berns Constitution Day Lecture.
Dr. Schaub has also been published in the popular press, including in the Baltimore Sun, the Claremont Review of Books, Commentary, and the Wall Street Journal.
Dr. Schaub has a PhD and an MA in political science from the University of Chicago. Her BA in political science is from Kenyon College.
Carter Snead
Carter Snead is internationally recognized as a leading expert in public bioethics. His research explores issues relating to neuroethics, enhancement, stem cell research, abortion, and end-of-life decision-making. He is also the editor of two book series for the University of Notre Dame Press – “Catholic Ideas for a Secular World,” and “Notre Dame Studies in Medical Ethics.”
Carter Snead
Carter Snead is the William P. and Hazel B. White Director of the Center for Ethics and Culture, Professor of Law in the Law School, and Concurrent Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. He is internationally recognized as a leading expert in public bioethics – the governance of science, medicine, and biotechnology in the name of ethical goods.
His research explores issues relating to neuroethics, enhancement, stem cell research, abortion, and end-of-life decision-making. He has authored more than 40 journal articles, book chapters, and essays. His scholarly works appear in such publications as the New York University Law Review, the Harvard Law Review Forum, the Vanderbilt Law Review, Constitutional Commentary, Quaderni Costituzionali (Italy’s premier journal of constitutional law), the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law and Ethics, the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, and Political Science Quarterly.
He is also the editor of two book series for the University of Notre Dame Press – “Catholic Ideas for a Secular World,” and “Notre Dame Studies in Medical Ethics.” Snead teaches Law & Bioethics, Health Law, Torts, and Constitutional Criminal Procedure.
Snead received his J.D., magna cum laude, from Georgetown University, where he was elected to the Order of the Coif, and his bachelor of arts from St. John’s College in Annapolis, Md. He clerked for Judge Paul J. Kelly, Jr., of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit.
Download the Full Syllabus
Preview the Syllabus by Week/Session
Overview of Bioethics and Governance
Readings:
- Selections from Bacon and Descartes
- Nathaniel Hawthorne, “The Birthmark”
- Leon R. Kass, “The Problem of Technology in a Liberal Democracy,” in Life, Liberty and Defense of Dignity
- Carter Snead, “Science, Public Bioethics, and the Problem of Integration,” University of California, Davis Law Review
Discussion Questions:
- The premises and methods of modern science contrast starkly with those that normally animate ethical and political reasoning. What challenges might these tensions pose for the governance of the practice of medicine, scientific research, and the uses of biotechnology? How should citizens and public officials respond to these tensions?
Abortion
Readings:
Scientific Dimensions
Normative Dimensions
- Judith Jarvis Thompson, “A Defense of Abortion,” Philos Public Aff, Vol. 1, No. 1, p. 47 (1971)
- Hadley Arkes, “The Question of Abortion and the Discipline of Moral Reasoning,” First Things
Legal Dimensions
Discussion Questions:
- Is it necessary first to identify the boundaries of the moral and legal community (i.e., to designate who is and is not entitled to moral care and legal protection) before one can think about the appropriate law and policy for abortion? If so, who should decide this question of membership, and according to what criteria?
Stem Cell Research/Cloning for Biomedical Research
Readings:
Discussion Questions:
- The dominant public question in this debate has been about whether or not federal funding should be provided for research involving the use and destruction of living human embryos. How does this issue differ (if at all) from question of whether embryonic stem cell research should be pursued in the first instance?
Organ Donation and Transplantation
Readings:
- Richard Selzer, “Wither Thou Goest”
- Gilbert Meilaender, “Organ Procurement: What are the Questions?”
- Benjamin Hippen, “The Case for Kidney Markets,” The New Atlantis, Fall 2006
- Alan Rubenstein, “On the Body and Transplantation: Philosophical and Legal Context”
- Michael Finkel, “Complications,” NYT Magazine, May 27, 2001
Discussion Questions:
- Do you own your body? What does “ownership” or “property” mean in this context?
- What do you make of the concern that organ markets would lead to a uniquely pernicious form of exploitation of the poor?
End of Life Care
Readings:
General Reflections
Decisions Regarding Life-Sustaining Measures
- Carter Snead, The (Surprising) Truth about Schiavo: A Defeat for the Cause of Autonomy, 22 Constitutional Commentary 101 (2005)
- Angela Fagerlin and Carl E. Schneider, “Enough: The Failure of the Living Will,” Hastings Center Report 34, No. 2 (2004): 30-42
- The President’s Council on Bioethics, Taking Care: Ethical Caregiving in Our Aging Society (2005), Ch. 3
Physician-Assisted Suicide
- 1996 WL 708956 (Appellate Brief) FOR RONALD DWORKIN, THOMAS NAGEL, ROBERT NOZICK, JOHN RAWLS, THOMAS SCANLON, AND JUDITH JARVIS THOMSON AS AMICI CURIAE IN SUPPORT OF RESPONDENTS (Dec. 10, 1996)
- Leon Kass, “Why Doctors Must Not Kill” (presented as the American College of Surgeons Lecture on Ethics and Philosophy, which was inaugurated on October 23, 1991)
Discussion Questions:
- How do the interests of incompetent patients differ (if at all) from those who are competent, in the context of end-of-life decision-making?
- Should it matter, morally or legally, why a person declines or withdraws life-sustaining measures?
- Is it possible to distinguish the administration of a lethal drug (in the context of assisted suicide or euthanasia) and withdrawing life sustaining measures? Is there a moral difference? Should the law treat these differently?
