Xenocide
Can Modern Bioethics Practices Stop the
Unthinkable?
This is a website that incorporates the science fiction stories written
by Orson Scott Card titled "Speaker for the Dead," "Xenocide," and
"Children of the Mind" in order to explore and educate about the uses
of modern day Bioethics. With this website students can explore a
hypothetical situation derived from Mr. Card's books and decide upon a
course of action based on what they learn about bioethics in the
following pages. Just click on the planet to begin.
Works Sited
Card, Orson Scott. Speaker For the
Dead. New York: Tor, 1995.
This book was the origin of my
idea for
this project. The whole problem behind the ethics on the website
is
based on the story in this book. Everything that doesn’t have to
do
with the workings of bioethics or scientific processes came directly
from this book. I would like to give special thanks to Orson Scott Card
Chowning, Jeanne. "Biotech Expo." E-mail to Alex Velte. 24 Nov 2004, 30
Nov 2004, 10 Dec 2004, 14 Dec 2004.
Personal interview.17 Nov 2004.
My mentor and I used these emails
to
correspond and bounce ideas off of each other. These were a great
way
of letting ideas flourish and to brainstorm. Jeanne also came to visit
me at my school and I was able to show her some of the things I was
working out in my head much faster and in more detail than what the
emails had been allowing me.
"Ethics as A Discipline." An Ethics Primer. ed. 2004.
This was a packet that Jeanne
mailed to
me and had a quick overview of the common ethics schools of
thought.
Much of it is spent on analyzing and summarizing the different schools
of thought. This was very helpful in the meat of my project and
will
be used throughout my website.
Hanson, Scott. "Adam's Piggy." Ender's Game. 03 Jan 2005.
http://www.ender.com/ender
This site was used exclusively
for the
picture of the piggy on the page titled Pequenino DNA. It is a
fan
site made by Scott Hanson and illustrated by Adam Dann, who actually
drew the picture of the Pequenino and the human.
Lewis, Ricki. Human Genetics: Concepts and Application. 5th ed. New
York: McGraw-Hill, 2003.
This is my Biotech book the Mrs.
Glodowski assigned us for this year in Biotech. I used it mainly
for pictures and diagrams but it was also helpfull when I needed
information on the viral DNA options. It was a good source,
though a tad limited.
Munson, Ronald. "Intervention and Reflection." 6th ed.
This is another packet that
Jeanne sent
me, which goes into much more detail than the first one. Never
the
less it will be used to a great
degree in the main body of the website
and will be referenced many times. It is an excellent synopsis
and
holds much
information about the individual
schools of thought on
bioethics around the world.
Mentorship Description
My mentor was Jeanne Chowning. She is a
manager of education programs for nonprofit that helps the public
understand biotechnological research, including developing bioethics
materials and programs for teachers. Her address is 2033 6th Ave
Ste 1100 Seattle, WA 98121; and her phone number is (206)
956-3647. I kept in contact with her mainly through email.
Her email address is jchowning@nwabr.org.
I felt that this mentorship was very advantageous to
my project and me. I learned a lot about bioethics that Mrs.
Glodowski wasn’t going to go as in depth into. We met once at my school
and we discussed many resources where I could find good information on
bioethics and what my project ultimately wanted to turn out as.
Most of our correspondence was through email and we were able to bounce
technical ideas off each other through that. These 12 emails were
most useful for information that I needed quickly, I could just email
her and get a response often by the next day. Jeanne was a great
help and I am thankful for her time and support.