Ethicist: In general it is wrong

Answer choices

1. A

   Too Strong: often2% picked this

   Doctors often do not know what is best for their own patients

   Our author doesn't have to think that doctors are often confused about what would be best. If they're only occasionally confused, and they want to consider an experimental treatment, and they would need to occasionally bypass consent in order to figure out whether this experimental treatment is better, then our author can still make the same argument.

   2%
2. B

   Out of Scope Relationship6% picked this

   If patients knew that experimental treatments were being used in medical emergencies, it could adversely affect the

   The author is never discussing any causal connection between patients' awareness of an experimental treatment with the integrity of the research. She wasn't saying we should sometimes bypass consent because we need the patients to be knocked out, so that they're not aware of the experimental treatment. She was presumably saying, an unconscious or barely conscious person arrives in the emergency room, and we'd like to try an experimental treatment but it's impossible, in their state, to get their consent.

   6%
3. C

   Too Strong: only if / highly likely8% picked this

   Nonconsensual medical research should be allowed only if the research is highly likely to yield results that

   The author hasn't committed to this stringent a standard. She does sound like she wants to be conservative about allowing nonconsensual research, but the might be willing to allow it in circumstances in which it's just likely (not highly likely) to yield results that would benefit the patient. Honestly, what she cares more about is that it would be highly likely to provide knowledge of the best treatment (which might actually come from us learning that "whoops, this experimental treatment is not the best. It did not benefit that patient.")

   8%
4. D

   Too Strong5% picked this

   In cases where the best treatment option is unknown, a patient ceases to have the right to know the

   Too Strong: ceases to have the right The author has definitely not committed to this harsh rule of thumb: any time we don't know the best treatment, the patient has no right to know the treatment plan and the alternatives. The author's conclusion only commits her to thinking, in at least some cases, we will supersede the patient's right to know the treatment plan and alternatives.

   5%
5. E

   Correct80% picked this

   The right of patients to informed consent is outweighed in at least some medical emergencies by the possible benefits of

   Why this is right

   This just reflects the balancing of competing interests that the author is making. She is Weighing Tradeoffs: on the one hand, the patient has a right to consent; on the other hand, we need to try experimental treatments on unconscious emergency room patients w/o their consent. If she thinks that we should sometimes do the experimental treatments, then she must be assuming that sometimes the 2nd thing outweighs the 1st thing.

   Skill tested: Necessary Assumption · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

   80%