DAY 64 May 12 Ashley Article

Step 1: As usual we'll start with the card game of fun and your discussions about the ideas from some great minds of the past.

Step 2: Quick review of the Golden Mean Thought Experiment from yesterday.

Step 3: In your Green Philosophy Bites folder please choose ONE option from each category for your future unborn child and explain to yourself why you chose that option.  One minute for each choice, total of five minutes!

Physical Features
Make my child beautiful
Make my child athletic
Make my child tall
       
Health
Remove all genes for inherited diseases
Add a gene strengthening my child's immune system
       
Intelligence
Make my child shrewd in business
Make my child a musical prodigy
Make my child an artistic genius
       
Emotions
Remove the gene for feeling emotional pain
Remove the genes for lying, cheating, and stealing
Add a gene for honesty
   
Social Skills 
Make my child the life of the party
Make my child compassionate
Make my child confident


Step 4: Please read the Ashley Article handout.  For further information on Ashley and her family's journey check out their family blog: Ashley Treatment.  And check out the family's suggestion for the ethical treatment of patients in Ashley's condition, Ashley Treatment Summary.

Please answer these Ashley Article Questions fully in your notebook:

1.  Who is the moral agent who exhibited the virtues or extremes of behaviour?

2.  Describe the moral agent's behaviour.

3.  Do you think the moral agent's actions were morally right or morally wrong?  Why?

4.  Draw a continuum similar to the one show in Fig 12.2 on p. 245 of your text.  Label it with a virtue exhibited (or not exhibited) by the moral agent and add the extremes at either end.  Locate the moral agent on the continuum .  Please comment on what you've drawn.

5.  Were the actions of the moral agent good?  Were they right?  Explain the difference.

6.  Please comment, using quotes, on what two different philosophers might say about the situation in which Ashley and her family find themselves.

We'll take these up tomorrow.