RLO: Moral Theories

• Introduction
• Consequentialism
• Scenario 1
• Deontology
• Bioethics
• Principles of Bioethics
• Scenario 2
• Summary

Scenario

Consider the following scenario: A doctor is working in the Accident and Emergency Department of a hospital. A homeless man is brought in with brain damage sustained in a road traffic accident. The doctor recognises him; the man has no family and is in reasonable physical, if not mental, health. The doctor knows there is still time to save the man’s life. He also knows that if he does not start treatment, the man will suffer brain death and his organs could possibly be used to improve the quality of or even save several other people’s lives. Assuming there is no penalty associated with either choice, what would a strict utilitarian do?

• Save the man’s life
• Contact the transplant team to ready them to harvest any available organs

The doctor would allow the man to die and try to use his organs to save as many people as possible. This would bring the greatest happiness to the greatest number of people.