|
Participation in this course does not presuppose student identification
with any particular faith tradition or knowledge of scientific theory
and practice. While we encourage students to speak about their personal
values, beliefs and experiences, our primary concern is to critically
engage with some of the urgent debates and issues that arise as religious
and scientific communities respond to the fundamental questions of
human existence (e.g. from where do human beings derive and what is
human nature) and to the development of recent scientific theories
and technologies (e.g. assisted reproductive technologies and genetic
engineering).
At no time will a student be compelled to disclose his/her personal
values and ideas. On the other hand, all students are expected to assume
a critical stance in relationship to religious and scientific values
and ideas.
The course begins with overview of the life sciences and faith traditions,
their specific ways of interpreting, evaluating and responding to human
existence. The main body of the course is divided into four sections,
each dealing with a particular range of theoretical and practical issues.
The first section explores different ideas about the origins of humanity.
We look at evolutionary theory as well as various religious beliefs
about human origins. We conclude this section with a debate about teaching
creationism and evolution in public schools. The second section explores
various questions related to human rights and reproduction, including
stem cell research, assisted reproductive technologies and the controversies
regarding the morning-after pill. The third section steps back to ask
larger questions about what it means to be healthy and what is necessary
to enjoy good health. What do science and religion say about how to
best sustain healthy individuals and communities? What role do faith
(e.g. prayer) and science (e.g. genetic engineering) play in this project?
We conclude with a debate on health care as it relates to individual
rights and community responsibilities. The final section of the course
looks at questions regarding the meaning of life and, in particular,
questions regarding what role science may and ought to play to extend
the length and enrich the quality of human life. Specifically we examine
scientific and religious perspectives on extending the length of life
on the one hand (through, for example, the application of medicines
that slow the aging process) and arguments in favor of permitting individuals
to have the right to die when facing terminal illness or seriously
incapacitating injury.
back to top
- To bridge the disciplines of life sciences, religious studies,
social sciences and health care.
- To encourage interdisciplinary, critical and ethical thinking,
as well as scientific and faith literacy.
- To encourage oral communication through student presentations,
discussions and debates.
- To examine religious and scientific perspectives on age-old
debates and contemporary issues.
- To develop student research and writing abilities through the
production of research that reflects past and present debates
that emerge from the nexus of science, technology, religion and
social policy.
- To encourage engaged citizenship by helping students to develop
their capacities to investigate and analyze ethical problems and
social policies and to be proactive in the latter’s formulation.
J. Brian Cassel, Ph.D.
jbcassel@hsc.vcu.edu;
628-1926; Box 980037; fax: 827-4100
Office hours before class (3 – 4 p.m.) usually in Trani Center,
Room 116
or by appointment in VCU Medical Center, North Hospital, Room B-55.
Mark D. Wood, Ph.D.
mdwood@saturn.vcu.edu;
828-1026; Box 842025; 312 N. Shafer, #101
Office hours generally Tuesday and Wednesday 2 – 3 p.m. or
by appointment
s
Handouts, material on reserve at VCU Cabell Library, Internet resources.
Blackboard will be used to post references and links to relevant
resources such as journals, books, list-serves, organizations and
associations, and Web sites, as well as the syllabus and other course
materials.
back to top
- Reflection/response papers: Eight papers/20 points each (160
pts.) or 40 percent of course grade. Throughout the semester we
will ask you to write eight short, one-to-two page, typed reflection/response
papers. These papers aim to engage you with the material. We will
pass out guidelines for these each week. You will not be asked
to write a reflection/response paper for the week during which
you are doing a debate.
Note: Papers will be accepted only on or before the day they are
due at class time and only if typed.
- Classroom debate: 60 points or 15 percent of the course grade.
Each student will be asked to prepare and participate with a team
of four other students in one debate during the semester. The
debates will follow at the end of each of the four main sections
of the course. The first debate concerns whether creationism and
evolution should be taught in public schools together or separately
and/or whether either should be taught at all. The second debate
concerns whether the morning after pill ought to be made available
to students at public universities and high schools and/or whether
it should be made available as an over-the-counter, nonprescription
drug at pharmacies. The third debate involves examining the tension
between individual rights and community obligations as they relate
to health care. The fourth debate concerns whether individuals
should have the right to terminate their own lives when facing
a terminal illness or injury that seriously threatens their ability
to live a fulfilling life.
- Attendance and participation: 60 points or 15 percent of the
course grade.
Your participation grade is based on the following. First, attendance.
We give points for days you are in class. In order to receive
points for being in class you must be here on time and stay in
class the entire period (on time means that if the class starts
at 4 p.m. you should arrive by or before 4 p.m. (30 pts.) Second,
your participation grade is based on the quantity and quality
of your contributions to our class, the level of learning about
the issues we address and to achieving the educational goals of
the course (30 pts.).
Note: If you acquire three absences (three weeks of the course)
your grade will be lowered one letter. If you acquire four absences
(four weeks of the course) your grade will be lowered two letter
grades. If you acquire five or more absences (five or more weeks
of the course) you cannot receive credit for the course.
- Research paper: 120 points or 30 percent of the course grade.
The research paper provides students with an opportunity to examine
a topic related to faith and the life sciences in greater depth
and detail. The topic should not have significant overlap with
topics presented in class (e.g. euthanasia) but rather explore
other topics that emerge from the nexus of faith and life sciences.
The paper should be 10 – 12 pages in length, typed, double-spaced,
12 pt. font, one-inch margins. We will provide more information
on choosing a topic, doing research, and organizing and writing
your paper.
To earn an “A” requires 360 or more points.
To earn a “B” requires between 320 and 359 points.
To earn a “C” requires between 280 and 319 points.
And so on.
See the VCU Resource Guide for a complete description of the VCU
Honor System and your other rights and responsibilities. We would
emphasize that as a student in this course, “you will be expected
to practice personal and academic integrity; respect the rights
and property of others; honor the rights of others to their opinions;
and strive to learn from the differences in people, ideas and cultures.”
http://www.students.vcu.edu/rg/policies/rg7rp.html
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the Americans
with Disabilities Act of 1990 require Virginia Commonwealth University
to provide academic adjustments or accommodations for students with
documented disabilities. Students seeking academic adjustments or
accommodations must self-identify with the coordinator of Services
for Students with Disabilities on the appropriate campus. After
meeting with the coordinator, students are encouraged to meet with
their instructors to discuss their needs and, if applicable, any
lab safety concerns related to their disabilities.
Virginia Commonwealth University is an equal opportunity, affirmative
action university providing access to education and employment without
regard to age, race, color, national origin, gender, religion, sexual
orientation, veteran’s status, political affiliation or disability.
back to top
Jan 21 (Week 1) - Introduction
- Introductions to professors, students and the syllabus (Check
out http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/scienceopticsu/powersof10/index.html)
- Some categories: faith, science, epistemology, ontology, methodology,
ethics
- Scientific perspectives and Barbour’s typology
- Some dilemmas to consider
- What do I teach in my eighth-grade biology class?
- We want a baby with blue eyes, blond hair and an I.Q over
150.
- To take or not take the job at Philip Morris; that is the
question.
- We must do everything we can to keep her alive.5. Wrap
up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
- Read Chapters 7 “The Paradigm of Evolution” and
8 “Testing Darwin’s Hypotheses” from John Moore’s
book, “Science as a way of knowing: The foundations of modern
biology,” and be very prepared to discuss this in next week’s
class.
- Do the survey.
- Write a short (one-to-two page) paper in which you answer these
questions: “Describe the epistemology of the evolution paradigm.
That is, how does a biologist know that evolution is a valid theory
or description of the origins of life? What kind of evidence does
he/she use? And does that suffice to convince you?”
Jan 28 (Week 2) - Unit One A: Human origins
- Overview of Unit One
- Your definitions of faith, science and the nature of the relationship
between the two
- Religious perspectives on human origins: Wood
- Scientific perspectives on human origins: Cassel
Clips from Spencer Wells’ “Journey of a man: A Genetic
Odyssey”
- Concepts of epistemology, ontology, methodology, ethics
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Read the following creation stories and compare and contrast the
differences and similarities between them in a one-to-two page paper.
How do they understand the place of human beings in relationship
to nature and the universe? How do they define human nature (i.e.
what is a human being)? For Native American views go to the Shundahia
Network at http://www.shundahai.org,
hit “Circle Stories” and enjoy some of the stories told
by contemporary Native Americans about life. For Jewish perspectives
go to http://www.religioustolerance.org/ev_bibl.htm.
Compare the Judaic-Christian story of creation in Genesis with the
account provided by evolutionary theory. For some information on
Buddhist views of creation versus evolution and creationist views
go to http://www.geocities.com/scimah/evolution.htm.
Once you have done this brief research (and feel free to explore
other Web sites and use other information) compare and contrast
two different religious views and the evolutionary view of the origins
and nature of human beings.
Feb 4 (Week 3) - Unit One B: Human origins
- Scientific perspective: Thomas Huff
- Religious perspectives on human origins
- A Buddhist perspective: Daniel Perdue
- A creationist-Christian perspective: Maury Middleton
- 3. Panel discussion
Assignment for next week:
Go to http://www.eppc.org/publications/pubID.1548/pub_detail.asp
and read “Evolution and the Curriculum: A conversation with
Phillip Johnson and Gregg Easterbrook” and prepare for the
debate with your team members. See also additional resources to
prepare for debate on the Blackboard website.
Feb 11 (Week 4) - Unit One C: Human origins
- Discussion of basic terms: creationism, evolution, the law and
public policy
- Debate: The intellectual challenges of faiths’ creation
stories and sciences’ causal explanations are played out
in school board meetings and courts of law almost every year.
What is the status of the theory of evolution? What are the challenges
of “Intelligent Design?” What is the relevance of
each faith’s creation story? What should students in public
schools learn about and struggle with?
Resolved: Public schools should teach evolutionary theory, and
only evolutionary theory, to describe and explain the origins
of life, humans and consciousness.
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Read “Cloning Trevor” at http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2002/06/dunn.htm
and write a one-to-two page paper.
Feb 18 (Week 5) - Unit Two A: Human reproduction: rights and
responsibilities
- Overview of Unit Two (Gattaca) and discussion of Trevor
(Assisted reproductive technologies, stem cell research, birth
control and public policy)
- Perspectives on assisted reproductive technologies (ART) and
birth control
- A genetic counselor’s perspective: John Quillin, VCU
Massey Cancer Center
- A fertility clinic lab director’s perspective: Dr.
Dennis Matt, Virginia Andrology and IVF
- A Catholic perspective: Father Russell Smith, Health Care
Vicar, Richmond Diocese (RC)
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Go to http://www.georgetown.edu/research/nrcbl/nbac/pubs.html,
scroll down page to Ethical Issues in Human Stem Cell Research,
September 1999 and read the Executive Summary. Then take some time
to look at some of the various religious perspectives on stem cell
research (http://www.georgetown.edu/research/nrcbl/nbac/stemcell3.pdf).
Once you have done this compare and contrast three differing positions.
How are they similar and how do they differ from each other? At
core are differences in ideas about what is a human being.
back to top
Feb 25 (Week 6) - Unit Two B: Human reproduction: rights and
responsibilities
- Overview of religious perspectives on stem cell research: Wood
- More perspectives on stem cell research
- A Jewish perspective: Dr. Jack Spiro, Chair of Judaic Studies
- An clinical perspective: Professor Esther Nelson, Religious
Studies
- Discussion regarding the ethics of stem cell research
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Required reading for debate preparation: Reprogenetics and Public
Policy – http://www.thehastingscenter.org/pdf/reprogenetics_and_public_policy.pdf
Mar 3 (Week 7) - Unit Two C: Human reproduction: rights and responsibilities
- Discussion of basic terms of reproduction, conception and stem
cell research.
- Debate: For purposes of curing a disease, should researchers
or clinicians be allowed to create, manipulate, and destroy human
[pre-]embryos? In addition to required reading, see supplemental
readings on Blackboard.
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Reading: Chibnall, Jeral and Cerullo: “Experiments on distant
intercessory prayer: God, science, and the lesson of Massah.”
Archives of Internal Medicine, volume 161 (Nov. 26, 2001), 2529-2536,
plus editorial letters in volume 162 (June 24, 2002), 1420-1423.
Questions:
- Summarize the authors’ concerns about scientific testing
of prayer in your own words.
- Do you concur with Chibnall et al., or with the letters criticizing
their article? 3) Would the same epistemological concerns apply
to Origins — testing Creationists’ faith claims about
the earth being 6,000 – 10,000 years old, the worldwide
flood and the tower of Babel?
Mar 10 (Week 8) - Unit Three A: Models of health/models of mind,
body and soul
- Overview of Unit Three: Epistemological, ontological and methodological
issues
- Mixing prayer and science: Cassel
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
First, what does it mean to be healthy? Second, what is required
to maintain one’s health? And third, what ought we do, as
individuals and as a society, to maintain our health? Since our
three speakers after the break represent a Buddhist, Hindu/Yogic,
and Jewish perspective on health, you might try looking up articles
that describe how these three religious perspectives answer the
questions above. Type into a search engine, for example, “Buddhism
and health” or “Judaism and health.” You might
wish to contrast what these different religions have to say regarding
health and, immediately related, happiness.
Mar 17 Spring Break
Mar 24 (Week 9) - Unit Three B: Models of health/models of mind,
body and soul
- Mind, body and soul: Mind/body models and their implications:
Cassel/Wood
- Religious models of health
- A homeopathic perspective: Deeptankar Demazumder
- A Native American perspective: Karenne Wood, Chair, Virginia
Council on Indians
- A yoga instructor’s perspective: Lynn Brookes, co-founder,
Yoga Source
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week: Prepare for debate. Required and supplemental
readings are on Blackboard.
back to top
Mar 31 (Week 10) - Unit Three C: Models of health/models of
mind, body and soul
- Discussion of basic terms – health, humanity, human nature
- Health Care as universal right or private responsibility (Cuba
and the U.S.): Wood
- Debate: It would appear that religion is powerless to transform
human nature: despite thousands of years promoting altruism, love
and forgiveness, religions have failed to cure humanity of its
tendencies toward hatred and violence. Some would even say that
religion has fostered, rather than tempered, hatred and violence.
Is it time to turn to the life sciences for a cure?
Resolved: We should turn to the sciences, rather than religions,
to cure humankind of its worst disease: inhumanity.
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Reading assignment for next week:
“Comfort, compassion, dignity mark end-of-life care”
by Marla Fern Gold at
http://www.providermagazine.com/pdf/cover-12-2003.pdf
“ Discussing do-not-resuscitate status” by Charles von
Gunten at
http://www.jco.org/cgi/content/full/19/5/1576
Letters in regards to von Gunten’s article at
http://www.jco.org/cgi/content/full/19/13/3301
See Blackboard for instructions on writing the response paper.
Apr 7 (Week 11) - Unit Four A: Transcendence and transformation
at the ends of life
- Overview of the ethical, technological, religious and scientific
issues: Cassel and Wood
- Scientific/technological/Western views on the end of life
- An oncologist responds to pain and dying: Thomas Smith,
M.D.
- A geriatrics nurse practioner responds: Laura Finch, G.N.P.
3. Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Our topic next week is religious perspectives on death and dying.
Four speakers will be joining us, representing Native American,
Catholic, Jewish, and Presbyterian/Spiritualist perspectives. To
prepare for our discussion next week we’d like you research
and write about two or three (you pick) religious perspectives on
death and dying. As you do this we would like you to discuss the
relationship between their respective views on death and dying and
the views on the meaning of life. How are their ideas about life
and death related to each other? Exploring this question will help
facilitate our discussion of the “ends” of life, that
is, the relationship between the goals of life and the end of life.
To facilitate this project we’ve provided four web sites on
Blackboard — all of which are required reading.
Apr 14 (Week 12) - Unit Four B: Transcendence and transformation
and the ends of life
- Religious perspectives on the meaning of life and scientific
transformation
- A Jewish perspective: Jack Spiro, Chair of Religious Studies
- A Roman Catholic perspective: Fr. Russell Smith, Health
Care Vicar, Richmond Diocese
- A holistic perspective: Georgieanne Ginder, VCU Medical
Center Volunteer
- Wrap up loose ends and look ahead.
Assignment for next week:
Prepare for debate. See Blackboard for required and supplemental
readings.
Apr 21 (Week 13) - Unit Four C: Transcendence and transformation
and the ends of life
- Discussion of basic terms
- Debate: In this final debate, we will tackle an issue that
challenges society’s understanding of what life is, what
death is, what quality of life is and who should decide what is
right or wrong in specific cases. The most recent case to break
through our national denial of death and dying is the case of
Terri Schiavo (previous ones included Nancy Cruzan and Karen Ann
Quinlan). Each of these cases has resulted in much discussion,
debate and changes in law and medical practice. Debaters will
take a hypothetical end-of-life case where the spouse with legal
authority asks for the feeding tube to be removed from a middle-aged
husband who has been in a persistent vegetative state for over
five years. Three debate teams will present three different perspectives:
medical team (who will present the medical facts of the case),
spouse and son (who will argue for withdrawal of the feeding tube),
and parents (who will argue for maintaining the feeding tube indefinitely).
Assignment for next week:
There is no required reading or assignment for this week. We expect
you’ll be working on your research papers. But if you do have
extra time and energy …
In 1999, the New York Times Magazine had a series of articles about
the best this and the best that of the past millenium. The best
idea, as judged by Richard Powers, was empiricism — the best
way to test claims about the nature of the world is through observation.
This is the epistemological foundation of science and experiment.
His essay nicely captures what a revolution unfolded over the past
1,000 years when Abu Ali al-Hasan Ibn al-Haytham, from Basra, resolved
an 800-year-old question about the nature of vision that had until
then vexed philosophers. At http://www.nytimes.com/library/magazine/millennium/m1/powers.html.
Apr 28 (Week 14) - Looking backward, looking forward
- Review of course: Wood and Cassel
- Discussion of research papers – problems? questions?
all set?
- Course evaluations: students
- Follow-up survey on knowledge, attitudes and beliefs
May 5 University Study Day
May 7 Final Exam week
Research Paper Due (two copies)
Mark D. Wood, Ph.D.
Professor Wood is an associate professor of religious studies and
African American studies at Virginia Commonwealth University. He
presently is the coordinator for the Religious Studies program in
the School of World Studies. Wood teaches courses on religion, ethics
and society. He has published articles on religious studies, education
and democracy. His book on Cornel West explores a variety of issues
in the context of the movement for democratic globalization. Wood
has taken students to Cuba and Italy on summer study abroad programs.
He is an advocate for VCU’s community-engaged learning and
education for social responsibility. Wood likes mountain bike riding,
the Byrd theater and scrabble.
J. Brian Cassel, Ph.D.
Professor Cassel is the systems analyst in the Massey Cancer Center.
His doctorate is in social-personality psychology, and he wrote
his dissertation on altruism and AIDS volunteers. He also has worked
as a program evaluator in HIV/AIDS, and has taught social and health
psychology, research design, and clinical outcomes evaluation. Cassel’s
research interests include clinical informatics and the social psychology
of morality and justice. His other interests include spending a
lot of time with his wife watching their dog run crazily around
their backyard.
back to top
|
