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Why the Topic of Bioethics in Science
Classes?
A New Look at an Old Debate
What Does This Mean For An Educator?
If the acquisition and manipulation of all types of knowledge
is dependent upon exposure to content, properly timed experience,
and practice with different types of reasoning skills, then this
strongly suggests two things about the process of conflct resolution.
In the first place, we need to provide an opportunity for our
students to engage in discussions that allow them to examine their
own values, as we do with other forms of knowledge. Secondly,
that discussion must have a real world context in which the moral
reasoning process may occur. When one looks at classrooms in which
open discussions around principles and values occur, increases
in the level of moral reasoning occur. If we decide not to include
bioethics in the science curriculum, we are assuming that students
will develop these reasoning skills and acquire this moral knowledge
in the context of science related issues, in another comparable
environment. That is risking a lot.
The importance of these norms which interface scientific thinking
with social practices is not to be overstated. Some of these values
help to balance our individual selfish tendencies by imposing
the need for us to consider what might be beneficial to the whole
group. And, if object knowledge can modify brain structures and
subsequently shape our perceptions of the world, then moral knowledge
should be able to change social practices as those practices subsequently
modify what is valued. We can assist adolescents in creating their
own concept maps for the manipulation of objects and do likewise
for values. This will happen not with our prescription of those
values or norms, but by facilitating the process of adolescent
self discovery.
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Teaching Moral Problem Solving Techniques
Science Education Reform Index
