The fifth edition of Beauchamp and Childress’s Principles of Biomedical Ethics is distinguished by its emphatic embrace of common morality as the ultimate source of moral norms. This essay critically evaluates the fifth edition’s discussion of common morality and, to a lesser extent, its treatment of coherence (both the model of ethical justification and the associated concept). It is argued th...

World Trade Organization member states are preparing for the upcoming renegotiation of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights. One of the important elements of that renegotiation is the ethical considerations regarding the patenting of higher life forms and their component parts (e.g. DNA and cell-lines). The interface between the genetic revolution, patentabilit...

Introduction Over the past several years little has been reported regarding the ethics of biomedical research among prisoners. It appears that, following a spate of reports about egregious transgressions of canons of ethics by clinicians engaged in research in prisons, regulations put in place may have solved the problems. However, the dictum of a Persian Prince who is credited with advising a ...