McCullough Laurence B
Weil Medical College of Cornell University, New York, New York, USA
J Med Philos. 2017 Feb;42(1):1-6. doi: 10.1093/jmp/jhw034.
The daily work of the clinical ethics teacher and clinical ethics consultant falls into the routine of classifying clinical cases by ethical type and proposing ethically justified alternatives for the professionally responsible management of a specific type of case. Settling too far into this routine creates the risk of philosophical inertia, which is not good either for the clinical ethicist or for the field of clinical ethics. The antidote to this philosophical inertia and resultant blinkered vision of clinical ethics is sustained, willing exposure to philosophical provocation. The papers in this clinical ethics issue of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy provide just such philosophical provocation related to core topics in clinical ethics: the distinction between clinical practice and clinical research; telemedicine, or medicine at a distance; illness narratives; the concept of the placebo effect; and sex reassignment.
临床伦理教师和临床伦理顾问的日常工作陷入了按伦理类型对临床病例进行分类，并针对特定类型病例的专业责任管理提出伦理上合理替代方案的常规流程。过于深陷这一常规会产生哲学惰性的风险，这对临床伦理学家和临床伦理领域都不利。对抗这种哲学惰性以及由此产生的临床伦理狭隘视野的解药，是持续且愿意接受哲学挑战。《医学与哲学杂志》本期临床伦理专刊中的论文就提供了与临床伦理核心主题相关的此类哲学挑战：临床实践与临床研究的区别；远程医疗，即远距离医疗；疾病叙事；安慰剂效应的概念；以及性别重新分配。
