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Ethics in America

Classroom Resources > Ethics in America > 4. Does Doctor Know Best?

Social Studies & History

9-12, College/Adult

Does Doctor Know Best?

Should you save the mother at the risk of losing the baby? Doctors from the National Cancer Institute and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center discuss controversies created by modern medicine with C. Everett Koop, journalist Ellen Goodman, and others.

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Ethics in America: Does Doctor Know Best? Transcript

Series Directory

Ethics in America

Credits

Produced by Columbia University Seminars on Media and Society. 1989.
  • ISBN: 0-89776-526-5

Programs

1 Do Unto Others

Must we house the homeless or report a child abuser? A panel including Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, Faye Wattleton of Planned Parenthood, and Willard Gaylin of the Hastings Center discusses the question of community responsibility.

2 To Defend a Killer

What rights do the guilty have? Ethical dilemmas of our criminal justice system are discussed by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, defense attorney Jack Litman, and philosopher John Smith of Yale.

3 Public Trust, Private Interests

Jeane Kirkpatrick, Joseph A. Califano Jr., Senator Alan Simpson, Peter Jennings, and others address the problems of trust — within government, between one public official and another, and between the government and the public.

4 Does Doctor Know Best?

Should you save the mother at the risk of losing the baby? Doctors from the National Cancer Institute and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center discuss controversies created by modern medicine with C. Everett Koop, journalist Ellen Goodman, and others.

5 Anatomy of a Hostile Takeover

Merger mania presents an alarming array of ethical problems. Debating the issues are T. Boone Pickens; chief executives from Borg-Warner, Goodyear, and Berkshire Hathaway; economist Lester Thurow; and Senator Tim Wirth.

6 Under Orders, Under Fire (Part I)

How do we wage war when the enemy dresses as civilians and children throw bombs? Generals William Westmoreland, David Jones, and Brent Scowcroft, correspondents Peter Jennings and Mike Wallace, and others question the duty to follow orders and a commander's obligation to protect soldiers.

7 Under Orders, Under Fire (Part II)

The carnage of My Lai raises the issue of confidentiality between the soldier, his religious confessor, and military justice. Generals debate the clash between military tribunals and the right of confidentiality with Chaplain Timothy Tatum of the U.S. Army War College, the Reverend J. Bryan Hehir of the U.S. Catholic Conference, and others.

8 Truth on Trial

Is an attorney's first obligation to the court, the client, or the public? Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Judge Robert Merhige, attorneys Floyd Abrams and Stanley Chesley, philosopher John Smith, and others debate civil litigation's ethical dilemmas.

9 The Human Experiment

Does finding a cure justify putting test subjects at risk? C. Everett Koop is joined by Dr. Arnold Relman, editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, and other distinguished panelists in a discussion of the medical research field.

10 Politics, Privacy, and the Press

What conduct on the part of a public official is relevant to "the public's right to know?" Panelists from both sides, including Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham, Peter Jennings, Mike Wallace, and Geraldine Ferraro, debate this issue.

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