For this Lesson Quiz, you are to return to the scenario presented in the Unit III Lesson 4 Quiz. However, the scenario
is modified in the following respects. Assume that the last paragraph of the scenario has been deleted (i.e. the one
beginning with “You are convinced …”). Assume that before the paragraph beginning with “You need to decide
between two options …” a new paragraph has been inserted. The new paragraph reads as follows.
The Pilot Program is going to be launched in three days. You had previously announced to the world
media that you would be holding a press conference today, wherein you would outline the Pilot
Program and the Major Program and describe both the potential benefits and potential risks of these
programs. You will, of course, be questioned by the reporters attending the conference as to any
potential problems. Given the importance of the Pilot Program and the Major Program, the press
conference will be covered by the world media, including the media of all interested nations and
communities.
Using that scenario, do the following. First, determine how exercising one of the two available options (i.e. either
disclosing or suppressing the Q-Cancer evidence) would involve violating something that could plausibly be considered
a Deontological Side Constraint in such a way as to violate the Principle of Humanity. If you find more than one such
violation, focus only on the single most important one. Then answer the following questions.
1. Identify which option (i.e. disclosing or suppressing) would involve violating a Deontological Side Constraint.
2. Articulate the Deontological Side Constraint that would be violated.
3. Explain how carrying out the option that you identified in Question 1 would violate the Deontological Side
Constraint that you identified in Question 2. (Here you are to simply state very clearly how the relevant action
would involve violating the specified Deontological Side Constraint. This is not a matter of some complex
theoretical explanation; I am just asking you to clearly specify how it is that a Deontological Side Constraint
would come to be violated.)
4. Explain how the violation of a Deontological Side Constraint that you identified in Question 3 would involve
impermissibly using one or more persons in violation of the Principle of Humanity. The core of your answer will
involve identifying who would be used, how they would be used, and why this would be an impermissible use
of a person according to the Principle of Humanity.
Although there are four questions presented above, your set of Quiz answers need not be long. Your answers,
especially for the first two or three questions, can be very short. It seems to me that the first two questions could
each be answered with a single sentence. Of course, if you need more than that to state the point clearly, write more
than that. The third question could probably be answered in two to three sentences, though it might require more.
The answer for Question 4 could also be fairly short, but would probably require several sentences. You just need to
make sure you clearly communicate the necessary information. I could have posed this as a single essay question on
this issue, but some students have a hard time separating out and assembling the building blocks for a proper answer
to an essay question that requires an analysis of a fact scenario in terms of an ethical concept. Thus, I have broken
things down into very short steps. You can see how the parts fit together to form a whole.