Severing Our Roots

Blog, End of Life, United States / /

The Little Fool by Karen Swenholt. Image by Ian Riley Photography.

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

A couple of years ago, I was encouraged to meet a figurative artist (sculptress, in this case). So I drove many hours to meet Karen Swenholt, and the drive was worth it. One of her pieces is pictured above. It is a metaphor that resonates with many of us: the man feels rooted, bound to the earth, or his circumstances, etc., and yearns to be free. So he takes an instrument into his hand — a knife — to free himself from his hateful condition, not ...read more

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Physician-Assisted Suicide: NOT Exactly What Its Proponents Advertise It To Be

Blog, End of Life, United States / /

This Australian stamp was issued in celebration of the General Assembly of World Medical Associations almost 50 years ago. At that time, the hypodermic syringe was a symbol of cure. Now, the picture of gloved hands administering an injection can represent something much more menacing.

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

The topic of physician-assisted suicide (P-AS) is a persistent one, especially when people are in pain or are worried about impending death. We need to think deeply and well about this issue. To help, the Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture is addressing P-AS from a different perspective for the second time in as many ...read more

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Things Are Not As They Seem

Other Voices, United States / /

John A. Holt, TN-CBC Intern

Videos of Brittany Maynard, who ended her life on November 1, 2014, by physician-assisted suicide (PAS), have brought the discussion of PAS to national and even international levels. A less publicized case is that of Robert McLester.

Carol McLester did not know why her husband asked for the gun. Bed-ridden since his stroke thirteen months earlier, a retired Navy officer of the outdoorsy type would seem to be trustworthy with a pistol. Carol willingly delivered the gun, then walked into the kitchen to finish washing the dishes. A few minutes passed before a resounding BANG split the ...read more

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Knowing How to Treat Something Requires Knowing What It Is

Blog, United Kingdom / /

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

Here’s a riddle for you: what do you do with the above pictured item? Do you melt it, re-form it, and use it for jewelry? Do you add it to a paint base and cover your walls? Or do you include it in a rice dish and serve it to your family?

Truthfully, you do none of the above. The gold-colored powder pictured above is not real gold; it would not make good jewelry. It is not pigment to add to your wall paint. It is certainly not saffron or curry powder to add to a rice ...read more

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Stranger than Fiction

Blog, Germany, United States / /

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson had been on my shelf for some time before I summoned the courage to begin reading it. It is about William E. Dodd, a history professor from Chicago, who was appointed by President Roosevelt in 1933 to be America’s ambassador to Germany. The personalities and politics of many in the Third Reich as well as those in the diplomatic corps, and the Dodd family in particular, are paraded before the reader. Occasionally dropped into the narrative are laws that appear incidental to the story, but in truth provide ...read more

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Tennessee Constitutional Amendment 1

Blog, United States / /

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

Update: Tennessee voters approved Amendment 1 on 4 November 2014. 

From the outset, I need to remind the reader that I am not an attorney, and that our organization is an educational corporation. What follows is hopefully educational and helpful as you move through the next several weeks.

A Constitutional Amendment is a serious undertaking, as represented by the path necessary for an idea/concept to become an amendment in Tennessee. Amendment 1 is the first of several on our 4 November 2014 ballots. It is a long-term result of a State Supreme Court decision in the year 2000. That ...read more

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Comments and Questions from Our Inbox

Blog, United States / /

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

Readers are always welcome to send in questions regarding bioethics issues. This past month, a wide range of thoughtful questions and comments have arrived in our inbox. A few representative ones have been chosen for this newsletter (with no identifiers included, of course).

Read on . . . and remember that you can always contact us here.

1) What exactly are three-parent embryos? 

Mitochondria are the power packs in our human cells, and reside in the cytoplasm — not in the nucleus. Mitochondrial disease varies widely in its expression, and has a prevalence rate of about 1 in 10,000 (Ricki ...read more

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Response to NYT Magazine Journalist Kim Tingley

Blog, United States / /

Sowing the Seeds, commissioned work by Carol Harkness for The Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture. View the full-size image here.

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

In February, The Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture made a public comment at an FDA committee hearing. The New York Times Magazine on 27 June published an account of that meeting about three-parent embryos. The author of the article conflates normal human sexual reproduction (i.e., having babies with a chosen partner) with genetic modification. She opines:

What often gets lost in the loaded language of the debate over three-parent babies is the fact that ordinary human reproduction ...read more

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Art and Bioethics

Blog, United States / /

Drawing by Eric Muller, Allentown, Pennsylvania, 2005.

The arts can inform us in ways words do not. Below is a brief overview of how The Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture has recently employed artwork to help people consider important questions about what it means to be human.

What the Eyes See, the Mind Knows

40+ people attended our two sessions at the Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity Bioethics in Transition Conference, 19-21 June. Original art by multi-media artist Carol Harkness was featured, along with photos and graphics from other sources. Perhaps the most provocative conversation-starter was the 3-D “live ear” of Vincent van Gogh displayed currently ...read more

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Stamp of Approval — or Not

Blog, Europe / /

D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.

Hippocrates, the “father of medicine,” was honored by this commemorative stamp issued by Transkei in 1982. The Rod of Asclepius — the rod entwined by a serpent — as the symbol of medicine is included on the stamp as well.

Image: Hippocratic Medicine stamp from Australia, recognizing the General Assembly of World Medical Associations (~1968).

Asclepius, the Greek god associated with healing, is one of the gods referred to in the Hippocratic Oath. The Hippocratic Oath (probably not written by Hippocrates, by the way) in its ancient form included swearing to a number of gods and goddesses; forbade ...read more

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