Brassington Iain
CSEP/School of Law, University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL.
Bioethics. 2007 Mar;21(3):160-8. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8519.2007.00539.x.
John Harris suggests that partcipation in or support research, particularly medical research, is a moral duty. One kind of defence of this position rests on an appeal to the past, and produces two arguments. The first of these arguments is that it is unfair to accept the benefits of research without contributing something back in the form of support for, or participation in, research. A second argument is that we have a social duty to maintain those practices and institutions that sustain us, such as those which contribute to medical knowledge. This argument is related to the first, but it does not rely so heavily on fairness. Another kind of defence of the duty to research rests on an appeal to the future benefits of research: research is an effective way to discharge a duty to rescue others from serious illness or death, therefore we have a duty to research. I suggest that all three of Harris' lines fail to provide a compelling duty to research and spell out why. Moreover, not only do the lines of argument fail in their own terms: in combination, they turn out to be antagonistic to the very position that Harris wants to defend. While it is not my intention here to deny that there might be a duty to research, I claim that Harris' argument for the existence of such a duty is not the best way to establish it.
约翰·哈里斯认为，参与或支持研究，尤其是医学研究，是一种道德义务。对这一立场的一种辩护诉诸过去，并产生了两个论点。第一个论点是，不通过支持或参与研究的方式做出回报就接受研究的益处是不公平的。第二个论点是，我们有社会义务维持那些维持我们生存的实践和制度，比如那些有助于医学知识积累的实践和制度。这个论点与第一个相关，但它不太依赖公平性。对研究义务的另一种辩护诉诸研究未来的益处：研究是履行拯救他人于重病或死亡的义务的有效方式，因此我们有研究的义务。我认为哈里斯的这三条论证思路都未能提供令人信服的研究义务，并阐明了原因。此外，这些论证思路不仅各自站不住脚：综合起来看，它们结果与哈里斯想要捍卫的立场背道而驰。虽然我在此无意否认可能存在研究的义务，但我认为哈里斯关于存在这种义务的论证并非确立它的最佳方式。
