Aesthetics is a vexed topic in philosophy, with a long history. For my purposes, an aesthetic experience is a foundational affective response to an object, to which terms such as “ugly”, “beautiful”, “pretty” or “harmonious” are applied. These terms are derived from a Discourse of aesthetics; some remain constant, others change from generation to generation. Aesthetics and ethics have been linked in Western thought since the days of Plato and Aristotle. This essay examines what is happening to that link in (...) contemporary experience. It emphasises the ways in which the popular media exploit aesthetic appeal to penetrate their market, and to exploit and frame intuitive responses to current and past events. Production values, the artfulness of editors and the financial interests of producers and directors thus do much to determine contemporary aesthetic and ethical judgements. That which is beautifully presented invites the ethical involvement of the audience. Events whose images are beautifully presented constitute “hyperevidence”, a pre-judged, reinforced and amplified illusion of reality and participation. Understanding how aesthetic excellence draws audiences into ethical relationship with what is presented becomes an important part of education in ethics, including bioethics. (shrink)

Although Theravada Buddhism and Roman Catholicism agree on the moral justification for palliative sedation, they differ on the premises underlying the justification. While Catholicism justifies palliative sedation on the ground of the Principle of Double Effect, Buddhism does so on the basis of the Third Noble Truth. Despite their theological differences, Buddhism and Catholicism both value the moral significance of the physician’s intent to reduce suffering and both respect the sanctity of life. This blurs the demarcation line between Buddhism and (...) Catholicism regarding the moral justification of palliative sedation. -/- . (shrink)

Practitioners of palliative care often argue for more resources to be provided by the state in order to lessen its reliance on charitable funding and to enable the services currently provided to some of those with terminal illnesses to be provided to all who would benefit from it. However, this is hard to justify on grounds of cost-effectiveness, since it is in the nature of palliative care that the benefits it brings to its patients are of short duration. In particular, (...) palliative care fares badly under a policy of QALY-maximisation, since procedures which prevent premature death (provided the life is of reasonable quality) or improve quality of life for those with longer life expectancy will produce more QALYs. This paper examines various responses to this problem and argues that in order to justify increased resources for palliative care its advocates must reject the ‘atomistic’ view of the value of life implicit in the QALY approach in favour of a ‘holistic’ or ‘narrative’ account. This, however, has implications which advocates of palliative care may be reluctant to embrace. (shrink)