Self-study
Ethicist: In general it is wrong to use medical treatments and procedures of an experimental nature without the patient's consent, because the patient has a right to reject or accept a treatment on the basis of full information about all the available options. ███ █████████ ██ ███ ████ █████████ ███ █████████ ██████████ ███ ██ ██████ ████ ██ ███████ ██ ████████████ █████████ ██ █████████ ████████ ██ ███████ ████████████ ██ ████ ██████████ █████████████ ███████ ████████ ██████ ██ ████████
Summary
The ethicist concludes that some nonconsensual medical research should be allowed, even though patients have a right to informed consent. His reasoning is that knowledge of the best treatment for emergency conditions can be gained only if some nonconsensual treatment is conducted.
Notable Assumptions
The ethicist uses the potential of gains in knowledge to justify sometimes ignoring patient consent. But how do we know that gaining knowledge outweighs treating patients ethically? If you think that informed consent is an absolute moral value, you won’t care if obeying it prevents some gain of knowledge.
Consequently, the ethicist must assume that gaining knowledge is more important than obtaining patient consent, at least in some cases.
24.
Which one of the following ██ ██ ██████████ ████████ ██ ███ ██████████ █████████
a
Doctors often do ███ ████ ████ ██ ████ ███ █████ ███ ████████ ██ █████████ ███████████
It is not necessary for the ethicist to assume that doctors often do not know what is best for their patients. As long as they at least sometimes have gaps in their knowledge, his argument still stands.
b
If patients knew ████ ████████████ ██████████ ████ █████ ████ ██ ███████ ████████████ ██ █████ █████████ ██████ ███ ███████ ██ ████ █████████
Try negating this: patients’ knowledge that experimental treatments are being used couldn’t adversely affect the outcome of research. Patients might still refuse, or be incapable of consenting to, experimental treatments in the first place, though. In that case, the ethicist’s argument still stands. So (B) isn’t necessary for him to assume.
c
Nonconsensual medical research ██████ ██ ███████ ████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ██████ ██████ ██ █████ ███████ ████ ████ ███████ ███ ████████
The ethicist is arguing in favor of nonconsensual research, and this provides a limitation on nonconsensual research. So this can’t be a necessary assumption of the argument.
d
In cases where ███ ████ █████████ ██████ ██ ████████ █ ███████ ██████ ██ ████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ███ █████████ ████ ███ ███ █████████████
This is too strong to be necessary, even assuming that these are the cases the ethicist is talking about. He doesn’t have to assume that patients lose their rights in all such cases; only that they sometimes do. Furthermore, his main concern is ignoring patients’ consent, which is not identical to denying them knowledge.
e
The right of ████████ ██ ████████ ███████ ██ ██████████ ██ ██ █████ ████ ███████ ███████████ ██ ███ ████████ ████████ ██ ████████ █████████ ███████ █████ ████████
Negated, this is: the right of patients to informed consent in medical emergencies is never outweighed by the possible benefits of nonconsensual research. If so, the author’s argument for nonconsensual research collapses. Consequently, he must assume that (E) is true.