{"title":"Defending explicability as a principle for the ethics of artificial intelligence in medicine.","authors":"Jonathan Adams","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10175-7","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10175-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The difficulty of explaining the outputs of artificial intelligence (AI) models and what has led to them is a notorious ethical problem wherever these technologies are applied, including in the medical domain, and one that has no obvious solution. This paper examines the proposal, made by Luciano Floridi and colleagues, to include a new 'principle of explicability' alongside the traditional four principles of bioethics that make up the theory of 'principlism'. It specifically responds to a recent set of criticisms that challenge the supposed need for such a principle to perform an enabling role in relation to the traditional four principles and therefore suggest that these four are sufficient without the addition of explicability. The paper challenges the critics' premise that explicability cannot be an ethical principle like the classic four because it is explicitly subordinate to them. It argues instead that principlism in its original formulation locates the justification for ethical principles in a midlevel position such that they mediate between the most general moral norms and the contextual requirements of medicine. This conception of an ethical principle then provides a mold for an approach to explicability on which it functions as an enabling principle that unifies technical/epistemic demands on AI and the requirements of high-level ethical theories. The paper finishes by anticipating an objection that decision-making by clinicians and AI fall equally, but implausibly, under the principle of explicability's scope, which it rejects on the grounds that human decisions, unlike AI's, can be explained by their social environments.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"615-623"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10725847/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"10167149","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Gregory E Kaebnick, David Christopher Magnus, Audiey Kao, Mohammad Hosseini, David Resnik, Veljko Dubljević, Christy Rentmeester, Bert Gordijn, Mark J Cherry
{"title":"Editors' statement on the responsible use of generative AI technologies in scholarly journal publishing.","authors":"Gregory E Kaebnick, David Christopher Magnus, Audiey Kao, Mohammad Hosseini, David Resnik, Veljko Dubljević, Christy Rentmeester, Bert Gordijn, Mark J Cherry","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10176-6","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10176-6","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Generative artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to transform many aspects of scholarly publishing. Authors, peer reviewers, and editors might use AI in a variety of ways, and those uses might augment their existing work or might instead be intended to replace it. We are editors of bioethics and humanities journals who have been contemplating the implications of this ongoing transformation. We believe that generative AI may pose a threat to the goals that animate our work but could also be valuable for achieving those goals. In the interests of fostering a wider conversation about how generative AI may be used, we have developed a preliminary set of recommendations for its use in scholarly publishing. We hope that the recommendations and rationales set out here will help the scholarly community navigate toward a deeper understanding of the strengths, limits, and challenges of AI for responsible scholarly work.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"499-503"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10725843/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49683541","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Justifying a morally permissible breach of contract: kantian ethics, nozickian justice, and vaccine patents.","authors":"Luís Cordeiro-Rodrigues","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10165-9","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10165-9","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Although some have argued that COVID-19 vaccine patents are morally justified, a broader argument on the morality of breaching contracts is necessary. This article explores the ethics of breaching unfair contracts and argues that it is morally justified to breach contracts with pharmaceutical companies concerning vaccine patents. I offer two arguments to support this view. Firstly, contracts may be breachable in some situations. The ones I point out are that contracts can be broken when the costs of not violating vaccine patents are too high or when the process for agreement is not fair, or when an urgent ethical issue needs to be addressed and it is possible to compensate the other party for their loss. Secondly, I argue that because the contracts with the pharmaceutical companies do not treat people as ends in themselves, there is no moral obligation to respect them.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"573-581"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"9851394","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Popperian methodology and the Semmelweis case<sup />.","authors":"Zuzana Parusniková","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10167-7","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10167-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Semmelweis' discovery of the etiology of childbed fever has long attracted the attention of historians of medicine and biographers. In recent years it has also become of increasing interest to philosophers. In this paper I discuss the interpretation of Semmelweis' methodology from the viewpoint of the inference to the best explanation and argue that Popperian methodology is better at capturing the dynamics of the growth of knowledge. Furthermore, I criticize the attempts to explain the failure of Semmelweis to have his discovery accepted on the basis of the Kuhnian concept of paradigms, and warn that this view may endorse dogmatism as the norm The Kuhnian position also raises the problem of the authoritarian nature of scientific institutions which defend a paradigm against unorthodox, rebellious views, such as in the case of Semmelweis. Popperian philosophy is seen as a challenge to promote a link between an open society and open science with its main aim being to cherish a free critical spirit.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"529-537"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"10007026","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The epistemic harms of direct-to-consumer genetic tests.","authors":"Yasmin Haddad","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10164-w","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10164-w","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In this paper, I provide an epistemic evaluation of the harms that result from the widespread marketing of direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic tests. While genetic tests are a valuable accessory diagnostic tool when ordered by a medical practitioner, there are different implications when they are sold directly to consumers. I aim to show that there are both epistemic and non-epistemic harms associated with the widespread commoditization of DTC genetic tests. I argue that the epistemic harms produced by DTC genetic tests have been disregarded in discussions on the topic. Drawing on the notion of contributory epistemic injustices, I highlight two pertinent epistemic harms: (1) a failure to uptake an individual's articulations about their identity and (2) the presiding reductionist framework dismisses useful hermeneutical resources. I then propose ways to mitigate these harms.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"559-571"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"9863066","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"\"Green informed consent\" in the classroom, clinic, and consultation room.","authors":"Cristina Richie","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10163-x","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10163-x","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The carbon emissions of global health care activities make up 4-5% of total world emissions, placing it on par with the food sector. Carbon emissions are particularly relevant for health care because of climate change health hazards. Doctors and health care professionals must connect their health care delivery with carbon emissions and minimize resource use when possible as a part of their obligation to do no harm. Given that reducing carbon is a global ethical priority, the informed consent process in health care delivery must change. I argue that the expanded role of bioethicists in this climate crisis is to promote and support \"green informed consent:\" the sharing of climate information with patients, offering options for lower-carbon health care, and accepting the patient's right to decline treatments which are deemed too carbon intensive for their values.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"507-515"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10725850/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"10381669","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Sarah Potthoff, Christin Hempeler, Jakov Gather, Astrid Gieselmann, Jochen Vollmann, Matthé Scholten
{"title":"Research ethics in practice: An analysis of ethical issues encountered in qualitative health research with mental health service users and relatives.","authors":"Sarah Potthoff, Christin Hempeler, Jakov Gather, Astrid Gieselmann, Jochen Vollmann, Matthé Scholten","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10169-5","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10169-5","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The ethics review of qualitative health research poses various challenges that are due to a mismatch between the current practice of ethics review and the nature of qualitative methodology. The process of obtaining ethics approval for a study by a research ethics committee before the start of a research study has been described as \"procedural ethics\" and the identification and handling of ethical issues by researchers during the research process as \"ethics in practice.\" While some authors dispute and other authors defend the use of procedural ethics in relation to qualitative health research, there is general agreement that it needs to be supplemented with ethics in practice. This article aims to provide an illustration of research ethics in practice by reflecting on the ways in which we identified and addressed ethical and methodological issues that arose in the context of an interview study with mental health service users and relatives. We describe the challenges we faced and the solutions we found in relation to the potential vulnerability of research participants, the voluntariness of consent, the increase of participant access and the heterogeneity of the sample, the protection of privacy and internal confidentiality, and the consideration of personal and contextual factors.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"517-527"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10725844/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"10088239","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Eva De Clercq, Andrea Martani, Nicolas Vulliemoz, Bernice S Elger, Tenzin Wangmo
{"title":"Rethinking advanced motherhood: a new ethical narrative.","authors":"Eva De Clercq, Andrea Martani, Nicolas Vulliemoz, Bernice S Elger, Tenzin Wangmo","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10172-w","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10172-w","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The aim of the study is to rethink the ethics of advanced motherhood. In the literature, delayed childbearing is usually discussed in the context of reproductive justice, and in relationship to ethical issues associated with the use and risk of assisted reproductive technologies. We aim to go beyond these more \"traditional\" ways in which reproductive ethics is framed by revisiting ethics itself through the lens of the figure of the so-called \"older\" mother. For this purpose, we start by exploring some of the deep seated socio-cultural discourses in the context of procreation: ageism, ableism and the widespread bias towards geneticism and pronatalism. Afterwards, we provide a critical overview of the key arguments against or in support of advanced motherhood. We then briefly discuss how entrenchment by both sides has produced an impasse in the debate on the ethics of advanced motherhood and proceed by arguing that it is fundamental to bring about a change in this narrative. For this purpose, we will revisit the feminist usage of the concept of vulnerability which will allow us both to criticize culturally prescribed norms about motherhood and to address the painful reality of age-related fertility decline. In the last section, we argue that instead of defining \"older\" motherhood as an ethical problem, we should problematize the fact that female reproductive ageing is an understudied and ill-sourced topic. We believe that allocating resources to research to better understand female reproductive ageing is not only ethically permissible, but might even be ethically desirable.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"591-603"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10725848/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"10140511","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"First-person disavowals of digital phenotyping and epistemic injustice in psychiatry.","authors":"Stephanie K Slack, Linda Barclay","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10174-8","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10174-8","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Digital phenotyping will potentially enable earlier detection and prediction of mental illness by monitoring human interaction with and through digital devices. Notwithstanding its promises, it is certain that a person's digital phenotype will at times be at odds with their first-person testimony of their psychological states. In this paper, we argue that there are features of digital phenotyping in the context of psychiatry which have the potential to exacerbate the tendency to dismiss patients' testimony and treatment preferences, which can be instances of epistemic injustice. We first explain what epistemic injustice is, and why it is argued to be an extensive problem in health and disability settings. We then explain why epistemic injustice is more likely to apply with even greater force in psychiatric contexts, and especially where digital phenotyping may be involved. Finally, we offer some tentative suggestions of how epistemic injustice can be minimised in digital psychiatry.</p>","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"605-614"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10725846/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41167730","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Green bioethics.","authors":"Henk Ten Have, Bert Gordijn","doi":"10.1007/s11019-023-10182-8","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11019-023-10182-8","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47449,"journal":{"name":"Medicine Health Care and Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":"497-498"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1,"publicationDate":"2023-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49683542","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}