Erik Parens
Biographic Data
| ID | 5893249 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Erik Parens |
| GIVEN NAMES | Erik |
| FAMILY NAME | Parens |
| SIGNATURE | PARENS E |
| AFFILIATIONS | Hastings Center |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4154-8393 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 33 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 0 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 33 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1990 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 0 |
Shannon Vallor's Wise Polemic against AI Enthusiasm
In The AI Mirror: How to Reclaim Our Humanity in an Age of Machine Thinking, Shannon Vallor excavates the moral significance of the difference between experiences such as cognition, empathy, and love that emerge in embodied beings like us, and simulacra of those experiences as produced by bodiless systems like generative AIs. She argues, helpfully and powerfully, that there is no greater existential threat to humanity than failing to remember and…
Editors and Authors
Wrestling with Public Input on an Ethical Analysis of Scientific Research
Bioethicists frequently call for empirical researchers to engage participants and community members in their research, but don't themselves typically engage community members in their normative research. In this article, we describe an effort to include members of the public in normative discussions about the risks, potential benefits, and ethical responsibilities of social and behavioral genomics (SBG) research. We reflect on what might—and migh…
Wrestling with Social and Behavioral Genomics
In this consensus report by a diverse group of academics who conduct and/or are concerned about social and behavioral genomics (SBG) research, the authors recount the often‐ugly history of scientific attempts to understand the genetic contributions to human behaviors and social outcomes. They then describe what the current science—including genomewide association studies and polygenic indexes—can and cannot tell us, as well as its risks and poten…
Tribute to Henri Parens, M.D
About The Special Report
This collection of essays is the first written product of The Hastings Center's Initiative in Bioethics and the Humanities. This new initiative, which we created with generous support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and private donors, has three aims. The first is to bring together insights from the humanities and the sciences to advance public conversation about the ancient question, how should we live? The second aim is to cultiv…
Disability, Technology, and Flourishing
Because people with disabilities live in a world not built for them, they are often the first to experiment with new technologies and are often expert in making choices about when to use them. People with disabilities face the question that all human beings increasingly face: to what extent will a given technology promote or thwart my flourishing? More generally, and at least as importantly, what does “flourishing” mean, and how can people use te…
Admiring Dan's Creation
Dan Callahan never tired of probing the fundamental ethical question that Socrates asked, “How should we live?” The investigation animated him. He asked, Can we, for a moment, set aside our preoccupation with better health and a longer life and think together about what we want those things for ? Can we explore what a good life consists in? It turned out there was no better alibi for asking that fundamental question than taking up the seemingly m…
On What We Have Learned and Still Need to Learn about the Psychosocial Impacts of Genetic Testing
Since the start of the program to investigate the ethical, legal, and social implications (ELSI) of the Human Genome Project in 1990, many ELSI scholars have maintained that genetic testing should be used with caution because of the potential for negative psychosocial effects associated with receiving genetic information. More recently, though, some ELSI scholars have produced evidence suggesting that the original ELSI concerns were unfounded, ex…
Sequencing Newborns
Many scientists and doctors hope that affordable genome sequencing will lead to more personalized medical care and improve public health in ways that will benefit children, families, and society more broadly. One hope in particular is that all newborns could be sequenced at birth, thereby setting the stage for a lifetime of medical care and self‐directed preventive actions tailored to each child's genome. Indeed, commentators often suggest that u…
Drifting Away from Informed Consent in the Era of Personalized Medicine
The price of sequencing all the DNA in a person's genome is falling so fast that, according to one biotech leader, soon it won't cost much more than flushing a toilet. Getting all that genomic data at an ever‐lower cost excites the imaginations not only of biotech investors and researchers but also of the President and many members of Congress. They envision the data ushering in an age of “personalized medicine,” where medical care is tailored to…
An Introduction to Thinking about Trustworthy Research into the Genetics of Intelligence
The advent of new technologies has rekindled some hopes that it will be possible to identify genetic variants that will help to explain why individuals are different with respect to complex traits. At least one leader in the development of “whole genome sequencing”—the Chinese company BGI—has been quite public about its commitment to using the technique to investigate the genetics of intelligence in general and high intelligence in particular. Be…
The Authors Reply
Reply to a commentary by Felicitas Holzer and Ignacio Mastroleoon “Models of Consent to Return of Incidental Findings in Genomic Research.”
Living with the Ancient Puzzle
We began this special report by suggesting that neuroimaging technologies are tools that can, when used carefully and in conjunction with the other tools of neuroscience and psychology, help illuminate the capacities and behaviors that constitute our minds. In the course of this special report we have called attention to some basic points that are worth remembering as we encounter more and more claims about human psychology that are based on evid…
Models of Consent to Return of Incidental Findings in Genomic Research
Genomic research-including whole genome sequencing and whole exome sequencing-has a growing presence in contemporary biomedical investigation. The capacity of sequencing techniques to generate results that go beyond the primary aims of the research-historically referred to as "incidental findings"-has generated considerable discussion as to how this information should be handled-that is, whether incidental results should be returned, and if so, w…
Neuroimaging
For over a century, scientists have sought to see through the protective shield of the human skull and into the living brain. Today, an array of technologies allows researchers and clinicians to create astonishingly detailed images of our brain's structure as well as colorful depictions of the electrical and physiological changes that occur within it when we see, hear, think and feel. These technologies—and the images they generate—are an increas…
Alzheimer's disease and personhood
As in the United States, the Dutch conversation about assisted suicide emerged primarily in the context of cancer. At least in that context, before acceding to a request for assistance in dying, caregivers must be sure that the person has made a voluntary and carefully considered request, and that her suffering is unbearable and without prospect of improvement. The Dutch have recently been trying to use those criteria in the context of Alzheimer'…
Incidental Findings in the Era of Whole Genome Sequencing
The rise of technologies that can inexpensively sequence entire genomes means that researchers and clinicians have access to ever vaster stores of genomic data, some of which could be of great use to research participants or patients, and most of which, at least for today, will be of little, uncertain, or no use. Those facts are essential features of a new ethical territory we are now entering with genetics research. As we explore that territory,…
Authenticity and Ambivalence
Special Supplement
Genetics and Complexity
letter and reply
Special Supplement
At the first of the discussions that led eventually to this report, a respected researcher-clinician in the world of reprogenetic medicine referred to his field as one big embryo experiment. The phrase nicely captures what this report is about. It is about the ethical issues and policy challenges that arise in the context of researchers and clinicians doing new things with embryos. The range of such activities is wide and growing: from studying e…
The Boundaries of Identity
review of PRENATNAL TESTING AND DISABILITY RIGHTS, edited by Erik Parens and Adrienne Asch
Medicine and the Culture of Embodied Desire
Embryonic stem cells and the bigger reprogenetic picture
No prominent works on this page.
From philosophy to politics
At the Center
The Loss of Wholeness
What Research? Which Embryos
Taking Behavioral Genetics Seriously
Tools from and for Democratic Deliberations
http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/3527797
Special Supplement
Special Supplement
Erik Parens, Adrienne Asch, Special Supplement: The Disability Rights Critique of Prenatal Genetic Testing Reflections and Recommendations, The Hastings Center Report, Vol. 29, No. 5 (Sep. - Oct., 1999), pp. S1-S22
Medicine and the Culture of Embodied Desire
Embryonic stem cells and the bigger reprogenetic picture
The Boundaries of Identity
review of PRENATNAL TESTING AND DISABILITY RIGHTS, edited by Erik Parens and Adrienne Asch
Special Supplement
At the first of the discussions that led eventually to this report, a respected researcher-clinician in the world of reprogenetic medicine referred to his field as one big embryo experiment. The phrase nicely captures what this report is about. It is about the ethical issues and policy challenges that arise in the context of researchers and clinicians doing new things with embryos. The range of such activities is wide and growing: from studying e…
Special Supplement
Genetics and Complexity
letter and reply
Authenticity and Ambivalence
Alzheimer's disease and personhood
As in the United States, the Dutch conversation about assisted suicide emerged primarily in the context of cancer. At least in that context, before acceding to a request for assistance in dying, caregivers must be sure that the person has made a voluntary and carefully considered request, and that her suffering is unbearable and without prospect of improvement. The Dutch have recently been trying to use those criteria in the context of Alzheimer'…
Incidental Findings in the Era of Whole Genome Sequencing
The rise of technologies that can inexpensively sequence entire genomes means that researchers and clinicians have access to ever vaster stores of genomic data, some of which could be of great use to research participants or patients, and most of which, at least for today, will be of little, uncertain, or no use. Those facts are essential features of a new ethical territory we are now entering with genetics research. As we explore that territory,…
Living with the Ancient Puzzle
We began this special report by suggesting that neuroimaging technologies are tools that can, when used carefully and in conjunction with the other tools of neuroscience and psychology, help illuminate the capacities and behaviors that constitute our minds. In the course of this special report we have called attention to some basic points that are worth remembering as we encounter more and more claims about human psychology that are based on evid…
Models of Consent to Return of Incidental Findings in Genomic Research
Genomic research-including whole genome sequencing and whole exome sequencing-has a growing presence in contemporary biomedical investigation. The capacity of sequencing techniques to generate results that go beyond the primary aims of the research-historically referred to as "incidental findings"-has generated considerable discussion as to how this information should be handled-that is, whether incidental results should be returned, and if so, w…
Neuroimaging
For over a century, scientists have sought to see through the protective shield of the human skull and into the living brain. Today, an array of technologies allows researchers and clinicians to create astonishingly detailed images of our brain's structure as well as colorful depictions of the electrical and physiological changes that occur within it when we see, hear, think and feel. These technologies—and the images they generate—are an increas…
Drifting Away from Informed Consent in the Era of Personalized Medicine
The price of sequencing all the DNA in a person's genome is falling so fast that, according to one biotech leader, soon it won't cost much more than flushing a toilet. Getting all that genomic data at an ever‐lower cost excites the imaginations not only of biotech investors and researchers but also of the President and many members of Congress. They envision the data ushering in an age of “personalized medicine,” where medical care is tailored to…
An Introduction to Thinking about Trustworthy Research into the Genetics of Intelligence
The advent of new technologies has rekindled some hopes that it will be possible to identify genetic variants that will help to explain why individuals are different with respect to complex traits. At least one leader in the development of “whole genome sequencing”—the Chinese company BGI—has been quite public about its commitment to using the technique to investigate the genetics of intelligence in general and high intelligence in particular. Be…
The Authors Reply
Reply to a commentary by Felicitas Holzer and Ignacio Mastroleoon “Models of Consent to Return of Incidental Findings in Genomic Research.”
Sequencing Newborns
Many scientists and doctors hope that affordable genome sequencing will lead to more personalized medical care and improve public health in ways that will benefit children, families, and society more broadly. One hope in particular is that all newborns could be sequenced at birth, thereby setting the stage for a lifetime of medical care and self‐directed preventive actions tailored to each child's genome. Indeed, commentators often suggest that u…
Disability, Technology, and Flourishing
Because people with disabilities live in a world not built for them, they are often the first to experiment with new technologies and are often expert in making choices about when to use them. People with disabilities face the question that all human beings increasingly face: to what extent will a given technology promote or thwart my flourishing? More generally, and at least as importantly, what does “flourishing” mean, and how can people use te…
Psychology (23 works) · Sociology (15 works) · Political science (11 works) · Biology (10 works) · Computer Science (10 works) · Genetics (9 works) · Philosophy (9 works) · Social Psychology (9 works) · Genetics (8 works) · Law (8 works)