Chapter 6 of Beauchamp and Childress's Sixth Edition of Principles of Biomedical Ethics is entitled "Beneficence". The LIBERTARIAN BIOETHICS BLOGger could post many, many, many blogs regarding the information in this chapter. Frustration is the key emotion for a libertarian reading this chapter.
Due to time/life constraints I shall list rather than analyze the annoying portions of this chapter: the concept of obligatory beneficence, obligation to rescue even if one is not causally responsible for the life-threatening danger to the victim, endorsement of various versions of soft and hard paternalism, a discussion of antipaternalism does not mention libertarians, justification of various versions of paternalism based on the concept that many decisions made by people are not substantially autonomous and thereby rights are not violated, support for the FDA, generally positive discussion of the "precautionary principle", and the complete lack of understanding that all value is subjective and thus cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) and cost-benefit analysis (CBA) and risk-benefit analysis (RBA) and quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) and health-adjusted life-years (HALYs) are economically unjustifiable.
I may spend the rest of my life refuting many of the arguments presented in this chapter.
Due to time/life constraints I shall list rather than analyze the annoying portions of this chapter: the concept of obligatory beneficence, obligation to rescue even if one is not causally responsible for the life-threatening danger to the victim, endorsement of various versions of soft and hard paternalism, a discussion of antipaternalism does not mention libertarians, justification of various versions of paternalism based on the concept that many decisions made by people are not substantially autonomous and thereby rights are not violated, support for the FDA, generally positive discussion of the "precautionary principle", and the complete lack of understanding that all value is subjective and thus cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) and cost-benefit analysis (CBA) and risk-benefit analysis (RBA) and quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) and health-adjusted life-years (HALYs) are economically unjustifiable.
I may spend the rest of my life refuting many of the arguments presented in this chapter.
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