Response I

Abstract

When Kenneth Vaux indicated to me that he was planning a conference in honor of my (past) contributions to medical ethics, I recall saying that since I couldn’t prevent his doing so, I’d be there. When he further said he hoped the papers would assay the state of the art and the state of medical ethical questions today, I insisted that I’d be there—lest those contributions of mine, such as they are, be unanimously received as past history only. Whoever has any aspiration or discernment of heart and mind or any moral wisdom at all knows, or ought to know, that these do not arise altogether from the times in which we live, nor pass away with time’s passing times. So I wanted to show my presence. The same was my response when—in addition, and running directly contrary to Koheleth’s list of vain things (Eccl. 12:12)—Ken Vaux said a book was to be made of it. I said I’d respond to the essays; indeed, I insisted on it. The ethical issues and the debatable options do, indeed, remain perennially the same, however different their specific shape from those times to these. Hence, I trust that what follows manifests a fitting sense of déjà vu.

By daylight, when I wish to awe My friends with my acumen, How wittily I hem and haw (To err is only human).

But when at night I lie abed and Morpheus treats me badly, The clever things I should have said Come trooping to me gladly! Ah, what a killer I would be How deucedly attractive, If repertoires of repartee Were only retroactive!

—Anonymous