Whitny Braun is an American bioethicist known for her research with regard to the Jain practice of Sallekhana and the Parsi

Parsi

Parsi or Parsee refers to a member of the larger of the two Zoroastrian communities in South Asia, the other being the Irani community....

 practice of Dakhmenashini. She is also affiliated with the Center for Christian Bioethics at Loma Linda University

Loma Linda University

Loma Linda University is a Seventh-day Adventist coeducational health sciences university located in Loma Linda, California, United States. The University comprises eight schools and the Faculty of Graduate Studies...

 in Loma Linda, California and currently studies philosophy and ethics at the School of Religion at Claremont Graduate University

Claremont Graduate University

Claremont Graduate University is a private, all-graduate research university located in Claremont, California, a city east of downtown Los Angeles...

. She has also published on the topic of healthcare in the American prison system, specifically with regard to organ donation and the death penalty. Her current research focuses on Christian, Jewish and Muslim philosophical approaches to artificial reproductive technology, specifically heterologous embryo transfer and the embryo industry in the United States.

Personal life

Braun was born in Redlands, California

Redlands, California

Redlands is a city in San Bernardino County, California, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 68,747, up from 63,591 at the 2000 census. The city is located east of downtown San Bernardino.- History :...

 and raised between Downey, California

Downey, California

Downey is a city located in southeast Los Angeles County, California, United States, southeast of downtown Los Angeles. The city is best known as the birthplace of the Apollo space program, and is the city where folk singer Karen Carpenter lived and died...

 and Coulterville, California

Coulterville, California

Coulterville is a census-designated place in Mariposa County, California. It is located on Maxwell Creek northwest of Mariposa, at an elevation of 1699 feet . Coulterville had a population of 201 at the 2010 census. It is a mining town located in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The ZIP Code...

 in the Seventh-day Adventist church and is currently an associate scholar of the Seventh-day Advenstist run Center for Christian Bioethics at Loma Linda University, however her writings and opinions most often reflect a secular humanist position and her interests lie in the application of under represented ethnic groups' normative ethics in a clinical setting. She often refers to herself as a pragmatist.

Braun is of Scottish, Dutch, Czech Jew and Mississippi Choctaw and Cherokee Native American descent. She is also the goddaughter of prominent ethnohistorian Matthew Restall

Matthew Restall

Matthew Restall is an ethnohistorian and Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Latin American History, Anthropology, and Women's Studies, Director of Latin American Studies, and Director of LiLACS at the Pennsylvania State University...

. At 18 she was the youngest contestant to ever compete on the American trivia game show Win Ben Stein's Money

Win Ben Stein's Money

Win Ben Stein's Money is an American television game show that ran from July 28, 1997 to January 31, 2003 on the Comedy Central cable network with episodes airing until May 8, 2003. It featured three contestants who competed in a general knowledge quiz contest to win the grand prize of $5,000 from...

. She also works as a freelance comedy writer and maintains a blog.

Braun and divides her time between Southern California, Yosemite National Park and Murcia, Spain