Arthur Caplan
Encyclopedia
Arthur L. Caplan, Ph.D.
, is Emmanuel and Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics and director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania
. Prior to coming to Penn in 1994, Caplan taught at the University of Minnesota
, the University of Pittsburgh
, and Columbia University
. He was the Associate Director of the Hastings Center
from 1984-1987. Born in Boston
, Caplan did his undergraduate work at Brandeis University
, and did his graduate work at Columbia University
, where he received a Ph.D. in the history and philosophy of science
.
, science
, philosophy
, bioethics
and health policy.
He has served on a number of national and international committees including as the Chair National Cancer Institute Biobanking Ethics Working Group, the Chair of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations on Human Cloning
, the Chair of the Advisory Committee to the Department of Health and Human Services on Blood Safety and Availability, a member of the Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Illnesses, the special advisory committee to the International Olympic Committee on genetics and gene therapy, the ethics committee of the American Society of Gene Therapy, and the special advisory panel to the National Institute of Mental Health
on human experimentation on vulnerable subjects. He has consulted with many corporations, not-for-profit organizations and consumer organizations. He is a member of the board of directors of The Keystone Center, the National Center for Policy Research on Women and Families, Octagon, The Franklin Institute, Iron Disorders Foundation and the National Disease Research Interchange. He chaired the advisory committee on bioethics at Glaxo from 2005-8. He is on the food advisory panel for Edelman public relations and co-director of a United Nations/Council of Europe Study on organ trafficking.
He writes a regular column on bioethics for MSNBC.com. He is a frequent guest and commentator on various media outlets.
He is a fellow of the Hastings Center
, the New York Academy of Medicine
, the College of Physicians of Philadelphia and the American Association for the Advancement of Science
. He is also on the Board of Trustees of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies
.
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...
, is Emmanuel and Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics and director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
. Prior to coming to Penn in 1994, Caplan taught at the University of Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...
, the University of Pittsburgh
University of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
, and Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
. He was the Associate Director of the Hastings Center
Hastings Center
The Hastings Center, founded in 1969, is an independent, non-partisan, non-profit bioethics research institute based in the United States. It is dedicated to the examination of essential questions in health care, biotechnology, and the environment...
from 1984-1987. Born in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Caplan did his undergraduate work at Brandeis University
Brandeis University
Brandeis University is an American private research university with a liberal arts focus. It is located in the southwestern corner of Waltham, Massachusetts, nine miles west of Boston. The University has an enrollment of approximately 3,200 undergraduate and 2,100 graduate students. In 2011, it...
, and did his graduate work at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
, where he received a Ph.D. in the history and philosophy of science
Philosophy of science
The philosophy of science is concerned with the assumptions, foundations, methods and implications of science. It is also concerned with the use and merit of science and sometimes overlaps metaphysics and epistemology by exploring whether scientific results are actually a study of truth...
.
Academic work
Caplan is the author or editor of twenty-five books and over 500 papers in refereed journals of medicineMedicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
, science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
, philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
, bioethics
Bioethics
Bioethics is the study of controversial ethics brought about by advances in biology and medicine. Bioethicists are concerned with the ethical questions that arise in the relationships among life sciences, biotechnology, medicine, politics, law, and philosophy....
and health policy.
He has served on a number of national and international committees including as the Chair National Cancer Institute Biobanking Ethics Working Group, the Chair of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations on Human Cloning
Human cloning
Human cloning is the creation of a genetically identical copy of a human. It does not usually refer to monozygotic multiple births nor the reproduction of human cells or tissue. The ethics of cloning is an extremely controversial issue...
, the Chair of the Advisory Committee to the Department of Health and Human Services on Blood Safety and Availability, a member of the Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Illnesses, the special advisory committee to the International Olympic Committee on genetics and gene therapy, the ethics committee of the American Society of Gene Therapy, and the special advisory panel to the National Institute of Mental Health
National Institute of Mental Health
The National Institute of Mental Health is one of 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health...
on human experimentation on vulnerable subjects. He has consulted with many corporations, not-for-profit organizations and consumer organizations. He is a member of the board of directors of The Keystone Center, the National Center for Policy Research on Women and Families, Octagon, The Franklin Institute, Iron Disorders Foundation and the National Disease Research Interchange. He chaired the advisory committee on bioethics at Glaxo from 2005-8. He is on the food advisory panel for Edelman public relations and co-director of a United Nations/Council of Europe Study on organ trafficking.
He writes a regular column on bioethics for MSNBC.com. He is a frequent guest and commentator on various media outlets.
He is a fellow of the Hastings Center
Hastings Center
The Hastings Center, founded in 1969, is an independent, non-partisan, non-profit bioethics research institute based in the United States. It is dedicated to the examination of essential questions in health care, biotechnology, and the environment...
, the New York Academy of Medicine
New York Academy of Medicine
The New York Academy of Medicine was founded in 1847 by a group of leading New York City metropolitan area physicians as a voice for the medical profession in medical practice and public health reform...
, the College of Physicians of Philadelphia and the American Association for the Advancement of Science
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science is an international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsibility, and supporting scientific education and science outreach for the...
. He is also on the Board of Trustees of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies
Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies
The Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies was founded in 2004 by philosopher Nick Bostrom and bioethicist James Hughes. Incorporated in the United States as a non-profit 501 organization, the IEET is a self-described "technoprogressive think tank" that seeks to contribute to understanding...
.
Awards and honors
Caplan is the recipient of many awards and honors including the McGovern Medal of the American Medical Writers Association and the Franklin Award from the City of Philadelphia. He was a person of the Year 2001 from USA Today, one of the fifty most influential people in American health care by Modern Health Care magazine, one of the ten most influential people in America in biotechnology by the National Journal and one of the ten most influential people in the ethics of biotechnology by the editors of Nature Biotechnology. He holds seven honorary degrees from colleges and medical schools. Discover magazine in December, 2008 named him one of the ten most influential people in science.Articles
- "Creating a medical, legal and ethical framework for complex living kidney donors", Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, 1: 2006: 1148-53
- "Gene therapy and erectile dysfunction", Human Gene Therapy, 18, 2006, 1177.
- "Taking ethics seriously in cosmetic dermatology", Archives of Dermatology, 142, 12, 2006: 1641-2
- "Lessons across the pond: Assisted reproductive technology in the UK and the USA", American Journal of Law Medicine & Ethics, 31, 2005: 419-446.
- "The appropriate use of artificial nutrition and hydration: fundamental principles and recommendations for the future", New England Journal of Medicine, 2005: 2607-2612 (with D. Cassarett and J. Kapo).
- "Misusing the Nazi Analogy", Science, 309, 2005:535
- "Attack of the Anti-Cloners", Arthur Caplan, Free Inquiry, Winter 2002/2003, p. 30.
- "Mapping Morality: The Rights and Wrongs of Genomics", in M. Yudell and R. DeSalle, eds., The Genomics Revolution, Joseph Henry Press, 2002: 189-94.
- "NAS Cloning Hearing", Science, 294 (2001): 1651
- "Cloning Human Embryos", Western Journal of Medicine, 176 (2002): 78-79.
- "Protecting Subjects' Interests in Genetics Research", American Journal of Human Genetics, 70 (2002):965-71 (with J.E Merz, D. Magnus, M.K. Cho).
- "What Is Morally Wrong with Eugenics?" in PR. Sloan, ed., Controlling Our Destinies, Notre Dame University Press, 2000: 209-23.
- "Breaking Bioethics" on the health page of MSNBC.com, featuring columns by Caplan http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3035344/
- "Lessons from the failure of human papillomavirus vaccine state requirements", Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics, 82, December, 2007: 760-3, (with JL Schwartz, RR Faden and J Sugarman).
- "Leveraging Genetic Resources or Moral Blackmail?— Indonesia and Avian Flu Virus Sample Sharing", American Journal of Bioethics, 7,11, 2007: 1-2 (with David R Curry).
- "The ethics of evil: The challenge and the lessons of Nazi medical experiments", in W. LaFleur, ed., Dark Medicine: Rationalizing Unethical Medical Research, Indiana University Press, 2007: 50-64.
- "Duty and ‘euthanasia’: the nurses of Meseritz-Obrawalde", Nursing Ethics, 14,6, 2007: 781-94, (with Susan Benedict and TL Page).
- "Caring for organs or for patients? Ethical concerns about the uniform anatomical gift act", Annals of Internal Medicine, 147, 2007: 876-79 (with M. DeVita).
- "Beyond Schiavo", Journal of Clinical Ethics, 18, 4, 2007: 1-6 (with Edward Bergman).
- "A shot in the rear: Why are we really against steroids?" Science Progress. 1, 2008: 1-3.
- "Simon Caplan’s Day" in M. Wallace, ed., 50 Years From Today, Thomas Nelson, 2008: 24-26.
Books
Caplan is the editor or author of 24 books including:- "The Penn Center Guide to Bioethics" (Springer, 2009)
- Smart Mice, Not-So-Smart People: An Interesting and Amusing Guide to Bioethics, (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006)ISBN 0742541711
- The Case of Terri Schiavo: Ethics at the end of life (2006)http://caseofterrischiavo.com/
- Health, Disease, and Illness: Concepts in Medicine (2004) ISBN 1-58901-014-0
- Who Owns Life? (2002) ISBN 1-57392-986-7
- Finding Common Ground: Ethics and Assisted Suicide (2001)
- Ethics And Organ Transplants, (1999)
- Am I My Brother's Keeper? (1998)
- Due Consideration: Controversy in an Age of Medical Miracles, (1997)
- Prescribing Our Future: Ethical Challenges in Genetic Counseling, Aldine Press, (1993)
- If I Were A Rich Man Could I Buy A Pancreas And Other Essays On Medical Ethics, (1992)
- When Medicine Went Mad: Bioethics And The Holocaust (1992).
External links
- University of Pennsylvania, Center for Bioethics official page for Arthur L. Caplan
- Bioethicists' Objection to Congressional Interference in Schiavo Case, March 27, 2005
- Art Caplan IEET Bio Page