Bioethics Course Offerings
CORE COURSES
Advanced Introduction to Bioethics
G83.1005 Ruddick and others. 4 points.
This course explores a range of concepts and principles for
framing and addressing moral questions in both medical and environmental
practices. Combining these two areas broadens bioethics to include and connect
individual, public, and global health issues. Topics include respect for life
and nature; comprehensive concepts of health, disease, and cure; autonomy and
rights to life and health care; ethical principles of medical care, research,
and environmental “stewardship”; population and environmental constraints on
creating and extending human lives.
Contemporary Debates in Environmental Ethics
E50.2020 Jamieson and others. 4 points.
Environmental philosophy is a large subject that involves
discussions in metaphysics, philosophy of science, and history of philosophy,
as well as in such normative areas as ethics, aesthetics, and political
philosophy. This course is primarily devoted to these normative areas.
Beginning with some basic concepts in value theory, the goal is not to arrive
at definite solutions to specific environmental problems, but rather to (1)
improve the student’s ability to think critically, read closely, and argue well
about environmental issues; (2) introduce the student to some major controversies in
environmental philosophy; and (3) aid the student in arriving at his or her own
rational and clear-minded views about the matters under discussion.
Philosophical Research (Practicum and Master’s Essay)
G83.3300, 3301 2-6 points.
Students work on a practicum, or affiliation with a medical
or environmental organization, committee, or project, and a supervised master’s
essay on the moral issues these groups address and ignore (or, alternatively,
an extension of a course term essay).
ELECTIVE COURSES (PARTIAL LISTING)
Advanced Introduction to Ethics
G83.1104 Background course for entering graduate
students. Murphy, Street, Unger, Velleman. 4 points.
This course is divided into a first part, providing a
fundamental graduate-level introduction to normative ethical theory, and a
second part, focusing, in a research seminar manner, on the theory of rights.
The second part includes student presentations.
Clinical Ethics
G83.2222
Ruddick and School of Medicine faculty. 4 points.
Theoretical and practical medical ethics, combined with observation in a clinical setting.
Colloquium on Health, Medicine, Law, and Society
L13.3500 Law. 3 points.
This interdisciplinary colloquium tackles problems in the United States
in the 21st century, exploring the intersections of health care, law,
education, politics, and ethics. The colloquium focuses on four central themes:
(1) the consequences that flow from characterizing an issue as social, medical,
ethical, scientific, religious, or legal; (2) the role of rights and the
complexity of constructing rules and often fragile enforcement mechanisms; (3)
the level at which policy should be set or money raised—federal, state, local, professional,
family, or individual; and (4) the pervasive influence of class, race, and
gender.
Community Health and Medical Care
P11.1830 Rodwin, Weitzman. 4 points.
This course is designed to familiarize students with some
basic concepts and ideas concerning the distribution of health and illness in
society, the organization of the health care system, and the relationship of
one to the other. Students discuss and debate definitions of health and
illness, tools for their assessment, and the historical context for
developments in public health and medicine.
Comparative Health Care Systems
P11.2852 Rodwin. 4 points.
An introduction to the organization and financing of health
care and to the reimbursement of providers (hospitals and physicians) in
nations throughout the world. Special emphasis is placed on industrialized
nations, particularly Canada
and Western Europe.
Contemporary Ethical Theory
G83.2284 Murphy, Street, Unger, Velleman. 4 points.
Varieties of normative ethical theories and the nature and justification
of moral judgment, with special attention to issues of moral objectivity.
Cultures of Biomedicine
G14.3214 Martin, Rapp. 4 points.
Overview of central issues in medical anthropology. Focuses
on the relationship of theory to practice. Examines problems in international
health, occupational health, health care delivery, and clinical issues.
Illustration of the roles of the anthropologist at the interface of the medical
and social sciences. Implications of cross-cultural variation and commonality
in health institutions; behavior and beliefs for change in health care systems.
Students critique the literature in a particular area of medical anthropology;
research projects utilize the New
York University
hospital and medical school.
Earth Biology
G23.1201 Volk. 4 points.
Global sciences of life: biogeochemical cycles,
biodiversity, evolution, and human impacts.
Environment and Urban Dynamics
P11.2615 Zimmerman. 4 points.
This course provides students with approaches to evaluating
and using environmental information and experiences in order to make planning,
policy, and management choices about the use and protection of environmental
resources in urban and natural environmental contexts. Environmental analysis
and planning techniques are emphasized using case-based and statistical
analyses that combine urban and environmental databases for environmental
policy and plans in the context of other societal needs and priorities.
Implications of sustainability and security for city and regional land usage
are overarching and cross-cutting themes in the course.
Environmental Health
G48.1004 Identical to G23.1004. Lippmann. 4 points.
Discussion of some of the basic concepts of environmental
health science in terms of contaminant sources, transport, fate, and levels in
environmental media (air, water, food, and soil) and occupational settings.
Hazard recognition and control are discussed in terms of toxicology,
epidemiology, exposure assessment, risk assessment, and risk management.
Environmental Politics
E50.2021 Jamieson. 3 points.
This seminar is devoted to discussing various dimensions of
environmental policy, especially as they arise at the intersection of concerns
about climate and questions about sustainability. Important themes of the
seminar include responsibility and equity, the relations between climate change
and variability, the complex feedbacks between climate and society,
interactions between science and policy, and the holistic nature of global
governance and regulation.
Environmental Values, Policies, and the Law
L01.3563 Jamieson. 2 points.
Environmental law is the site of conflicting value
perspectives. In addition to concerns about economic growth and quality of life
for our contemporary compatriots, concerns about future generations, citizens
of other countries and even nonhuman nature figure in our discussions and
debates. This seminar focuses on the way these value questions emerge in
discussion of “global” environmental change.
Ethics: Selected Topics
G83.2285 Murphy, Nagel, Ruddick, Street, Unger,
Velleman. 4 points.
Seminar on different topics in ethical theory and applied
ethics, varying yearly. Some of the following topics (as well as others of
research interest to the instructor and students) may be considered: concepts
of duty, virtue, and right; kinds of moral failure; the moral distinction
between actions and omissions; the relation of individual ethics to group
ethics and politics; morality and the law.
Global Health Governance and Management
P11.2244 Boufford. 4 points.
After discussing definitions of health in international
agreements and the general influence of globalization on health, this course
explores the roles and responsibility of national health leadership, primarily
ministries of health, in assuring the health of their populations and the
different strategies and variable capacity of national governments in
developed, developing, and transition counties. The course then explores in
some depth the role, functions, and effectiveness of global organizations affecting
health in the United Nations, NGO and business sectors, as well as multilateral
and bilateral donors and how they interact with each other and with national
leadership. Finally, the course looks at emerging instruments for global health
governance, how they operate, and their effectiveness for promoting health
action at the country level.
Health Law
L13.3525
S. Law. 3 points.
This course integrates legal issues in the delivery and
financing of medical care with historical, economic, sociological, and
political science data and theory. It first considers the core issues of
access, financing, and quality of care, and it concludes with two case studies,
focusing on reproductive health and care at the end of life. Three major themes
run through the course. The first is the conflict for control of medicine among
professionals, the state, financial markets, and individual and organized
patients and consumers. A second major theme is an exploration of the
respective roles of legislatures, administrators, courts, and private actors in
determining the shape of medical care services. Finally, the course highlights
issues of federalism that have arisen from reform at the federal level, the
impulse to give the states substantial discretion, and the contrary desire of
large corporations to block state authority through federal deregulation of
health benefit plans.
History and Principles of Public Health
E81.2522 3 points.
Examination of the mission of public health from a
historical perspective. Past and current public health issues, policies, and
practices are critically analyzed.
Impacts of Technology: Information: Technology and Privacy
E38.1034 Nissenbaum. 3 points.
The study of technology and social values can be—indeed,
must be—approached through a variety of disciplinary perspectives. This course
emphasizes the philosophical, which involves grappling with conceptual
underpinnings of technology and privacy—their meaning and value. Philosophical
analysis is, however, balanced with significant contributions by legal
scholars, computer scientists, social scientists, and popular social critics.
International Population and Family Health
E81.2383 Guttmacher. 3 points.
A cross-cultural framework is used to compare the health
status of populations and families and factors that affect their health in
societal subgroups (for example, urban, rural, poor, women and children, and
the elderly). This course emphasizes the effects of secular changes in women’s
roles and status and other societal, economic, and environmental trends on
population and family health.
Life and Death
G83.1175
Richardson,
Ruddick, Velleman. 4 points.
Scientific, metaphysical, and moral issues involving
concepts of life and death. Topics include the rights and wrongs of killing
oneself, other humans, animals; reproduction, biological/biographical life; and
theories of death and postmortem survival.
Philosophical Problems of Medicine
G83.1177 Ruddick. 4 points.
General and distinctive features of medical research and
practice and of philosophical assumptions that underlie current moral,
political, and methodological issues in medicine.
Sociology of Medicine
G94.2401 Duster. 4 points.
Political economy of health care in the United States, with concentration
on the roles of the medical profession in the system. Issues include the social
construction of illness, the social organization of treatment, and the
institutional organization of the medical profession in its methods of
recruitment and training. Discusses relations between the medical profession,
paraprofessional occupations, third-party payers, and the government.
Terrorism: Biological, Chemical, and Psychological Warfare
G48.1007 Evans. 4 points.
This course surveys the agents of terrorism, their immediate
effects, long-term consequences, and emerging research questions. Agents of
terrorism include chemical weapons, radioactive materials, infectious agents,
torture, and ethnic conflict. Long-term consequences include stress disorders,
respiratory disorders, sensitization, and conditioned responses to noxious
stimuli. Students meet with a broad range of experts to help deal with these
questions.
Weather, Air Pollution, and Health
G48.1010 Thurston. 4 points.
Concerns about global climate change have made clear the
need to better understand the interaction of air pollution and weather. This
course covers the scientific bases for the known effects of weather on air
pollution, and, conversely, for the known and hypothesized effects of air
pollution on weather, as well as the interactions of both with human health.
Lecture topics include the fundamentals of atmospheric motions and weather; air
pollution formation and dispersion in the atmosphere; acidic air pollution and
acid rain; the health effects of air pollution and of extreme weather; global-scale
weather and air pollution; and the ozone layer.
