Empirical ethics and its alleged meta-ethical fallacies

Bioethics

Volumn 23, Issue 4, 2009, Pages 193-201

  De Vries, Rob ^a   Gordijn, Bert ^b  

^a RADBOUD UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER   (Netherlands)

^b DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY   (Ireland)

Author keywords

Empirical ethics; Fact value distinction; Is ought problem; Naturalistic fallacy

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; EMPIRICAL RESEARCH; EMPIRICISM; EPIDEMIOLOGY; ETHICAL THEORY; ETHICS; HUMAN; LOGIC; MEDICAL ETHICS; MORALITY;

BIAS (EPIDEMIOLOGY); EMPIRICAL RESEARCH; EMPIRICISM; ETHICAL ANALYSIS; ETHICAL RELATIVISM; ETHICAL THEORY; ETHICS, MEDICAL; HUMANS; LOGIC; MORALS; PRINCIPLE-BASED ETHICS;

EID: 63449115138     PISSN: 02699702     EISSN: 14678519     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8519.2009.01710.x     Document Type: Article

References (49)

1. cf. D.P. Sulmasy & J. Sugarman. 2001. The Many Methods of Medical Ethics (Or, Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird). In Methods of Medical Ethics. D.P. Sulmasy & J. Sugarman, eds. Georgetown: Georgetown University Press: 3-18;
2. S. Holm & M.F. Jonas, eds. 2004. Engaging the World: The Use of Empirical Research in Bioethics and the Regulation of Biotechnology. Amsterdam: IOS Press;
3. P. Borry, P. Schotsmans & K. Dierickx. What is the Role of Empirical Research in Bioethical Reflection and Decision-making? An Ethical Analysis. Med Health Care Philos 2004; 7: 41-53;
4. P. Borry, P. Schotsmans & K. Dierickx. The Birth of the Empirical Turn in Bioethics. Bioethics 2005; 19: 49-71;
5. A.W. Musschenga. Empirical Ethics, Context-Sensitivity, and Contextualism. J Med Philos 2005; 30: 467-490.
6. P. Borry, P. Schotsmans & K. Dierickx. Editorial. Med Health Care Philos 2004; 7: 1-3.
7. Borry et al. 2005, op. cit. note 1, p. 60; see also, for example, B. Brody. Assessing Empirical Research in Bioethics. Theor Med 1993; 14: 211-219;
8. E.D. Pellegrino. The Limitation of Empirical Research in Ethics. J Clin Ethics 1995; 6: 161-162.
9. The goals we distinguish are mainly based on the analyses of Sulmasy & Sugarman, op. cit. note 1 and Musschenga, op. cit. note 1.
10. Sulmasy & Sugarman, op. cit. note 1.
11. G.J.M.W. van Thiel & J.J.M. van Delden. Dealing with Patient Autonomy in Dutch Nursing Homes. Health Care in Later Life 1997; 2: 177-186.
12. C.H. Braddock. The Role of Empirical Research in Medical Ethics: Asking Questions or Answering Them? J Clin Ethics 1994; 5: 144-147.
13. cf. Holm & Jonas, op. cit. note 1.
14. M. Schermer. 2001. The Different Faces of Autonomy. A Study on Patient Autonomy in Ethical Theory and Hospital Practice. PhD Thesis University of Amsterdam, pp. 178-182.
15. D. Birnbacher. Ethics and Social Science: Which Kind of Co-operation? Ethical Theory Moral Pract 1999; 2: 319-336.
16. Cf. Musschenga, op. cit. note 1.
17. J.J.M. van Delden & G.J.M.W. van Thiel. 1998. Reflective Equilibrium as a Normative-Empirical Model in Bioethics. In Reflective Equilibrium. W. van der Burg & T. van Willigenburg, eds. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers: 251-259.
18. Cf. van Thiel & van Delden, op. cit. note 6.
19. Birnbacher, op. cit. note 10.
20. A.W. Musschenga. 1999. Empirical Science and Ethical Theory: the Case of Informed Consent. In Reasoning in Ethics and Law. A.W. Musschenga & W.J. van der Steen, eds. Ashgate: Aldershot: 183-204.
21. Sulmasy & Sugarman, op. cit. note 1.
22. D.I. Shalowitz, E. Garrett-Mayer & D. Wendler. The Accuracy of Surrogate Decision Makers. A Systematic Review. Arch Intern Med 2006; 166: 493-497.
23. A.C. Molewijk. 2006. Risky Business. Individualised Evidence-Based Decision Support and the Ideal of Patient Autonomy. An Integrated Empirical Ethics Study. PhD Thesis Leiden University: 150-174. Other authors working in this tradition are, for example, Guy Widdershoven, Lieke van der Scheer and Annemarie Mol.
24. See for example the quotation from Borry et al. in the introduction.
25. Cf. J. Dodd & S. Stern-Gillet. The Is/Ought Gap, the Fact/Value Distinction and the Naturalistic Fallacy. Dialogue 1995; 34: 727-745.
26. David Hume. 1740/1978. A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by L.A. Selby-Bigge (1888). Second edition, revised by P.H. Nidditch. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
27. R.M. Hare. 1952. The Language of Morals. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
28. P.H. Nowell-Smith. 1954. Ethics. Baltimore: Penguin Books.
29. Calling the principle 'Hume's Law' might be somewhat unfortunate, given that several authors have argued that the standard interpretation cannot be correct because it is incompatible with the context of the is-ought passage (see, for example, Part One of W.D. Hudson, ed. 1969. The Is-Ought Question. London: MacMillan).
30. The validity of (this version of) Hume's Law has been hotly debated. Searle, for instance, pointed out that certain 'social facts', like the fact that I made a promise to do something, seem to entail normative conclusions, in this case that I ought to do what I promised to do (J. Searle. How to Derive 'Ought' from 'Is'. Philosophical Review 1964; 73:43-58).
31. Similarly, MacIntyre argued that certain facts about the role and purpose of something or someone, e.g. that something is a knife or that someone is a soldier, also seem to entail normative conclusions, in this case that the object ought to be sharp or that the person ought to be brave (A. MacIntyre. 1984. After Virtue. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press). The counterargument most often brought forward against Searle and MacIntyre is that social facts and human purposes are already implicitly normative and that therefore derivations of normative conclusions from these types of 'facts' do not truly violate Hume's Law (cf. J.L. Mackie. 1980. Hume's Moral Theory. London: Routledge).
32. W.K. Frankena. The Naturalistic Fallacy. Mind 1939; 48: 464-477, p. 467.
33. G.E. Moore. 1903. Principia Ethica. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
34. Ibid: 10.
35. See, for example, Frankena, op. cit. note 26.
36. Cf. A.N. Prior. 1949. Logic and the Basis of Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press;
37. David Gauthier. Moore's Naturalistic Fallacy. Am Philos Q 1967; 4: 315-320.
38. G.E. Moore. 1921/1993. Preface to the Second Edition. In Principia Ethica Revised edition, edited by Thomas Baldwin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 2-27.
39. Cf. Thomas Baldwin. 1990. G.E. Moore. London: Routledge: ch. III.
40. Cf. Dodd & Stern-Gillet, op. cit. note 20;
41. L. Bergström. Putnam on the Fact-Value Dichotomy. Croatian J Philos 2002; 2: 117-129.
42. W. van der Steen. 1995. Facts, Values, and Methodology. Amsterdam/Atlanta: Rodopi: 15-35.
43. This is an important respect in which empirical ethics differs from earlier approaches to ethics that were accused of committing the is-ought fallacy. Unlike naturalistic approaches to ethics, such as evolutionary ethics, or transcendental approaches, empirical ethics does not intend to provide a general foundation of morality. As explained by Musschenga (pp. cit. note 1), its main aim is to make general moral principles, whatever the origin of their justification, more context-sensitive.
44. Van Delden & van Thiel, op. cit. note 12.
45. To give an admittedly simplified example: the inference 'The majority of the Dutch people believe that euthanasia is not morally wrong; therefore, euthanasia is not morally wrong' violates Hume's Law. But if the premise 'Morally wrong is what the majority of the Dutch people believe to be morally wrong' is added, the problem is gone. That the extra premise is implausible or false is irrelevant. After all, to say that an argument is valid is to say that if the premises are true, the conclusion is necessarily also true; the requirement of validity does not entail anything about the actual truth of the premises.
46. A.C. Molewijk et al. Empirical Data and Moral Theory. A Plea for Integrated Empirical Ethics. Med Health Care Philos 2004; 7: 55-69, p. 55;
47. see also: Lieke van der Scheer & Guy Widdershoven. Integrated empirical ethics: Loss of normativity? Med Health Care Philos 2004; 7: 71-79.
48. Cf. Schermer, op. cit. note 9.
49. Cf. Musschenga 2005, op. cit. note 1.