How ought you to evaluate your options if you're uncertain about what's fundamentally valuable? A prominent response is Expected Value Maximisation (EVM)—the view that under axiological uncertainty, an option is better than another if and only if it has the greater expected value across axiologies. But the expected value of an option depends on quantitative probability and value facts, and in particular on value comparisons across axiologies. We need to explain what it is for such facts to hold. Also, EVM (...) is by no means self-evident. We need an argument to defend that it’s true. This book introduces an axiomatic approach to answer these worries. It provides an explication of what EVM means by use of representation theorems: intertheoretic comparisons can be understood in terms of facts about which options are better than which, and mutatis mutandis for intratheoretic comparisons and axiological probabilities. And it provides a systematic argument to the effect that EVM is true: the theory can be vindicated through simple axioms. The result is a formally cogent and philosophically compelling extension of standard decision theory, and original take on the problem of axiological or normative uncertainty. (shrink)

In 2008, researchers created human three-dimensional neural tissue – known as the pioneering work of “brain organoids.” In recent years, some researchers have transplanted human brain organoids into animal brains for applicational purposes. With these experiments have come many ethical concerns. It is thus an urgent task to clarify what is ethically permissible and impermissible in brain organoid research. This paper seeks (1) to sort out the ethical issues related to brain organoid research and application and (2) to propose future (...) directions for additional ethical consideration and policy debates in the field. Toward (1), this paper first outlines the current state of brain organoid research, and then briefly responds to previously raised related ethical concerns. Looking next at anticipated scientific developments in brain organoid research, we will discuss (i) ethical issues related to in vitro brain organoids, (ii) ethical issues raised when brain organoids form complexes or have relationships with other entities, and (iii) ethical issues of research ethics and governance. Finally, in pursuit of (2), we propose research policies that are mindful of the ethics of brain organoid research and application and also suggest the need for an international framework for research and application of brain organoids. (shrink)

Human neural organoid research is advancing rapidly. As Greely notes in the target article, this progress presents an “onrushing ethical dilemma.” We can’t rule out the possibility that suff...

Mary Shelley’sFrankensteinhas captured the public imagination ever since it was first published over 200 years ago. While the narrative reflected 19th-century anxieties about the emerging scientific revolution, it also suggested some clear moral lessons that remain relevant today. In a sense,Frankensteinwas a work of bioethics written a century and a half before the discipline came to exist. This paper revisits the lessons ofFrankensteinregarding the creation and manipulation of life in the light of recent developments in stem cell and neurobiological research. (...) It argues that these lessons are becoming more relevant than ever. (shrink)

New discoveries are improving the odds of human cells surviving in host animals, prompting regulatory and funding agencies to issue calls for additional layers of ethical oversight for certain types of human–animal chimeras. Of interest are research proposals involving chimeric animals with humanized brains. But what is motivating the demand for additional oversight? I locate two, not obviously compatible, motivations, each of which provides the justificatory basis for paying special attention to different sets of human–animal chimeras. Surprisingly, the sets of (...) animals that actually get flagged for special scrutiny by research and funding guidelines do not correlate with either of the sets of animals that arise when we think about what is motivating additional oversight. What this shows is that existing research policies and funding guidelines are disconnected from their motivation: the rationale for flagging certain types of human–animal chimeras as requiring special oversight is ignored in execution. (shrink)

Etycy nie poświęcali dotąd wiele uwagi niepewności, koncentrując się często na skrajnie wyidealizowanych hipotetycznych sytuacjach, w których zarówno kwestie empiryczne (np. stan świata, spektrum możliwych decyzji oraz ich konsekwencje, związki przyczynowe między zdarzeniami), jak i normatywne (np. treść norm, skale wartości) były jasno określone i znane podmiotowi. W poniższym artykule – który jest rezultatem projektu dotyczącego różnych typów decyzji w sytuacjach niepewności związanej z postępem w naukach i technologiach biomedycznych – przedstawię analizę sytuacji niepewności normatywnej, czyli takich, w których podmiot (...) musi podjąć decyzję, nie mając pewności co do tego, jaka norma postępowania jest właściwa, np. dlatego, że ma sprzeczne intuicje normatywne na temat dopuszczalności danej decyzji. Stanowisko, które określa się niekiedy mianem komparatywizmu, głosi, że w tego typu sytuacjach należy uwzględniać nie tylko stopnie przekonań podmiotu w kwestii różnych norm, ale także to, na ile możliwe decyzje warte są podjęcia wedle tych norm. Przedstawię tu analizę kilku przypadków niepewności normatywnej, a także charakterystyczny argument przeciwko dotychczasowym wersjom komparatywizmu, wskazujący, że nie uwzględniają one różnych nastawień do ryzyka w sytuacjach niepewności normatywnej, choć dopuszczają jednocześnie różne nastawienia do ryzyka w sytuacjach niepewności empirycznej. Pokażę też, że zasada ostrożności dotycząca statusu moralnego w upraszczający sposób przedstawia sytuacje niepewności normatywnej. (shrink)

Although in certain contexts judged to be over-rated,1 consistency is generally held to be a virtue in arguments about medical ethics. In everyday life, to be told that you are acting hypocritically, in a manner that is inconsistent with values you profess, is at least embarrassing, and depending on the circumstances can have more serious consequences, not least for politicians. How far complete consistency in thought and action is humanly possible or even desirable is a more doubtful however. In terms (...) of inconsistency over time, certainly, the maxim ‘When the facts change, I change my mind’ can be a reasonable defence: but in order to avoid less defensible forms of inconsistency, changing your mind about one thing may require changing it about others also. To take seriously just such a possibility is the ethical challenge of this month’s feature article: ‘Moral Uncertainty and the Farming of Human-Pig Chimeras’ by Julian Koplin and Dominic Wilkinson (see page 440).2 In this case, the facts that have or could soon have changed surround the emerging possibility of generating, within human-pig chimeras, human organs for transplantation into patients who need them and (although as yet the theoretical possibility) of avoiding the need for immunosuppression by generating the organs using stem cells from the patients themselves. The potential benefits of this possible answer to the worldwide shortage of transplantable organs clearly are immense. But, Koplin and Wilkinson point out, there are also serious potential harms. If human-pig chimeras with ‘partly humanised brains’ were to ‘develop morally relevant cognitive capacities’, such as dawning self-awareness, their moral status would make farming and killing them ‘a serious moral wrong’. Yet having said that, the real difficulty is that we cannot be certain, philosophically, ‘precisely what capacities confer what …. (shrink)

Research on human-animal chimeras have elicited alarms and prompted debates. Those involving the generation of chimeric brains, in which human brain cells become anatomically and functionally intertwined with their animal counterparts in varying ratios, either via xenografts or embryonic co-development, have been considered the most problematic. The moral issues stem from a potential for “humanization” of the animal brain, as well as speculative changes to the host animals’ consciousness or sentience, with consequential alteration in the animal hosts’ moral status. However, (...) critical background knowledge appears to be missing to resolve these debates. Firstly, there is no consensus on animal sentience vis-à-vis that of humans, and no established methodology that would allow a wholesome and objective assessment of changes in animal sentience resulting from the introduction of human brain cells. Knowledge in interspecies comparative neuropsychology that could allow effective demarcation of a state of “humanization” is also lacking. Secondly, moral status as a philosophical construct has no scientific and objective points of reference. Either changes in sentience or humanization effects would remain unclear unless there are some neuroscientific research grounding. For a bioethical stance based on moral status of human-animal brain chimera to make meaningful contributions to regulatory policies, it might first need to be adequately informed by, and with its arguments constructed, in a manner that are factually in line with the science. In may be prudent for approved research projects involving the generation of human-animal brain chimera to have a mandatory component of assessing plausible changes in sentience. (shrink)

My paper builds on the conceptual tools from three interrelated philosophical debates that—as I believe—may help structure important if chaotic discussions about surrogates for living human brains and resolve some practical issues related to regulatory matters. In particular, I refer to the discussions about the “moral precautionary principle” in research ethics (Koplin and Wilkinson 2019); about normative uncertainty in ethics (MacAskill, Bykvist, and Ord 2020), and about the inductive risk problem for animal welfare scientists (Birch 2018). I elucidate upon the (...) possible meanings of the phrase “a too good human brain surrogate” used by Henry T. Greely (2021), and I demonstrate that the evaluation of the practical and regulatory implications of the “goodness” of such surrogates created for research purposes should be sensitive to the possible consequences of two types of errors: the under-attribution and over-attribution of moral status to such beings. Many authors writing about this topic (including Greely 2021, but see also, e.g., Koplin and Savulescu 2019) concentrate only on the first type of error, neglecting the negative consequences of the second type, i.e., over-attribution. (shrink)

Creating simulations of the world can be a valuable way to test new ideas, predict the future, and broaden our understanding of a given topic. Presumably, the more similar the simulation is to the real world, the more transferable the knowledge generated in the simulation will be and, therefore, the more useful. As such, there is an incentive to create more advanced and representative simulations of the real world. Simultaneously, there are ethical and practical limitation to what can be done (...) in human and animal research, so creating simulated beings to stand in their place could be a way of advancing research while avoiding some of these issues. However, the value of representativeness implies that there will be an incentive to create simulated beings as similar to real-world humans as possible to better transfer the knowledge gained from that research. This raises important ethical questions related to how we ought to treat advanced simulated beings and consider if they might have autonomy and wellbeing concerns that ought to be respected. As such, the uncertainty and potential of this line of research should be carefully considered before the simulation begins. (shrink)

The burgeoning field of biomedical research involving the mixture of human and animal materials has attracted significant ethical controversy. Due to the many dimensions of potential ethical conflict involved in this type of research, and the wide variety of research projects under discussion, it is difficult to obtain an overview of the ethical debate. This paper attempts to remedy this by providing a systematic review of ethical reasons in academic publications on human-animal chimera research. We conducted a systematic review of (...) the ethical literature concerning human-animal chimeras based on the research question: “What ethical reasons have been given for or against conducting human-animal chimera research, and how have these reasons been treated in the ongoing debate?” Our search extends until the end of the year 2017, including MEDLINE, Embase, PhilPapers and EthxWeb databases, restricted to peer-reviewed journal publications in English. Papers containing ethical reasons were analyzed, and the reasons were coded according to whether they were endorsed, mentioned or rejected. Four hundred and thirty-one articles were retrieved by our search, and 88 were ultimately included and analyzed. Within these articles, we found 464 passages containing reasons for and against conducting human-animal chimera research. We classified these reasons into five categories and, within these, identified 12 broad and 31 narrow reason types.15% of the retrieved passages contained reasons in favor of conducting chimera research, while 85% of the passages contained reasons against it. The reasons against conducting chimera research fell into four further categories: reasons concerning the creation of a chimera, its treatment, reasons referring to metaphysical or social issues resulting from its existence and to potential downstream effects of chimera research. A significant proportion of identified passages fell under Category C. We hope that our results, in revealing the conceptual and argumentative structure of the debate and highlighting some its most notable tendencies and prominent positions, will facilitate continued discussion and provide a basis for the development of relevant policy and legislation. (shrink)

Setting aside some complexities, Koplin and Wilkinson1 argue: 1. Moral status is uncertain if there is a non-zero chance that an entity has, or would develop, full moral status. 2. If its moral status is uncertain, then moral caution is warranted towards that entity. 3. The moral status of both non-chimeric pigs and human-pig chimaeras is uncertain. (Conclusion 1) Therefore, consistency demands that moral caution is warranted towards both non-chimeric pigs and human-pig chimaeras. 4. The commonly held view is that (...) moral caution is warranted towards human-pig chimaeras, but not non-chimeric pigs. (Conclusion 2) Therefore, the commonly held view is inconsistent. This is a valid argument. The authors claim that the inconsistency they expose in conclusion 2 could be resolved in favour of either commonly held view, or by revising both to equivalency. However, it is clear from conclusion 1, and the paper more generally, that the authors are arguing for moral caution to be applied to the treatment of pigs of both types. I will focus on evaluating premises 1 and 2, and the generalisability of the argument in light of this. In doing so, I will attempt to show that the argument has implausible logical implications, and that the moral caution warranted towards human-pig chimaeras of uncertain moral status does not require confidence that they lack full moral status, as the authors claim. According to premise 1, if an entity might currently have moral …. (shrink)

Anthropocentrism—the idea that humans are the most important beings there are—comes in many guises. One version of anthropocentrism states that only humans have full moral status. Those who argue for such a position (beyond merely assuming it) usually refer to some trait that confers moral status and that only humans have. Suggestions include linguistic ability, self-awareness or rationality. However, regardless of what trait one picks it will not track the line between Homo sapiens and other species. You will always be (...) able to find some non-human animal that possesses the trait to a greater degree than some human does— even potentially. Koplin and Wilkinson1 adopt a broadly sentientist position: moral status is conferred by some mental or cognitive function. They discuss two sources of moral uncertainty related to this. In cases of moral uncertainty of the first type, it is uncertain whether Property X confers (full) moral status. In cases of uncertainty of the second type, we assume it to be true that moral status is conferred by X, but it is uncertain whether a particular entity (such as a pig) possesses the property. There are reasons to believe …. (shrink)

Non-human animal chimeras, containing human neurological cells, have been created in the laboratory. Despite a great deal of debate, the status of such beings has not been resolved. Under normal definitions, such a being could either be unconventionally human or abnormally animal. Practical investigations in animal sentience, artificial intelligence, and now chimera research, suggest that such beings may be assumed to have no legal rights, so philosophy could provide a different answer. In this vein, therefore, we can ask: What would (...) a chimera, if it could think, think about? Thinking is used to capture the phenomena of a novel, chimeric being perceiving its terrible predicament as no more than a laboratory experiment. The creation of a thinking chimera therefore forces us to reconsider our assumptions about what makes human beings (potentially) unique (and other sentient animals different), because, as such, a chimera’s existence bridges our social and legal expectations about definitions of human and animal. Society has often evolved new social norms based on different kinds of (ir)rational contrivances; the imperative of non-contradiction, which is defended here, therefore requires a specific philosophical response to the rights of a thinking chimeric being. (shrink)

Bioethicists often defend novel practices by drawing analogies with practices that we are already familiar with and currently tolerate. If some novel practice is less bad than some widely-accepted practice, then (it is argued) we cannot rightly reject it. Using the bioethics literature on xenotransplantation and interspecies blastocyst complementation as a case study, I show how this style of argument can go awry. The key problem is that our moral intuitions about familiar practices can be distorted by their seeming normality. (...) When considering the ethics of emerging technologies and novel practices, we should remain open to the possibility that our moral views about familiar practices are mistaken. (shrink)

Brain organoid research raises ethical challenges not seen in other forms of stem cell research. Given that brain organoids partially recapitulate the development of the human brain, it is plausible that brain organoids could one day attain consciousness and perhaps even higher cognitive abilities. Brain organoid research therefore raises difficult questions about these organoids' moral status – questions that currently fall outside the scope of existing regulations and guidelines. This paper shows how these gaps can be addressed. We outline a (...) moral framework for brain organoid research that can address the relevant ethical concerns without unduly impeding this important area of research. (shrink)

Many controversies in bioethics turn on questions of moral status. Some moral status issues have received extensive bioethical attention, including those raised by abortion, embryo experimentation, and animal research. Beyond these established debates lie a less familiar set of moral status issues, many of which are tied to recent scientific breakthroughs. This review article surveys some key developments that raise moral status issues, including the development of in vitro brains, part-human animals, “synthetic” embryos, and artificial womb technologies. It introduces the (...) papers in this Special Issue, contextualises their contributions to the moral status literature, and highlights some enduring challenges of determining the moral status of novel types of beings. (shrink)

In their feature article, ‘Moral uncertainty and the farming of human-pig chimeras,’ Koplin and Wilkinson argue that there is a tension between (1) thinking that creating pig-human chimaeras with partly humanised brains as a source of organs for transplantation as morally problematic because of the uncertainty of their moral status and (2) thinking that the raising normal pigs for food is not morally problematic because of the certainty concerning their moral status.1 Koplin and Wilkson claim that the reasons that we (...) are uncertain about the moral status of human-pig chimaeras with partly humanised brains also apply to normal pigs. Our moral uncertainty derives from (1) philosophical uncertainty concerning the characteristics that convey moral status and (2) epistemological uncertainty concerning the extent to which pigs with partly humanised brains or normal pigs possess such characteristics. If we think it is morally problematic to create pigs with humanised brains for organ transplantation, we should also think it is morally problematic to raise normal pigs for food, given our uncertainty about the moral status of both kinds of animals. Their view implies that it would be inconsistent to have moral qualms about creating pigs with humanised brains for organ transplantation but to no such misgivings about raising pigs for food. While I find Koplin and Wilkson’s arguments …. (shrink)