DEMIAN WHITING
Work
Address: University of Liverpool, Department of Health Sciences Research, Room
B105, 1st Floor Block B Waterhouse Buildings, 1-5 Brownlow Street,
Liverpool L69 3GL
Telephone:
+44 (0)151 7955305 (Work)
Email:
ddw@liv.ac.uk
PhD in
Philosophy,
PGCE Teaching Degree in
Religious Education, Sheffield Hallam,
BSc in Philosophy with
Law,
EMPLOYMENT HISTORY
Lectureship
in Health Care Ethics,
Community Dementia Support
Worker, NHS,
Part-time Philosophy
Tutor,
TEACHING ACTIVITY
I am lead for the teaching
of medical ethics on the Liverpool MBChB course. I deliver lectures centrally
relevant to clinical practice, run Special Study Modules, and have substantial
involvement in the assessment of medical ethics and professionalism. I also
teach on the Postgraduate Course in Healthcare Ethics, including a module on
psychiatry and ethics.
RESEARCH INTERESTS
My research interests
include, medical ethics and professionalism (including, the regulation of
attitudes, apologies and conscientious objections in medical practice),
philosophy of mind (including, theories of emotion, and phenomenological
approaches to understanding mind), and philosophy of health (including,
theories of health, disorder, and decisional capacity).
PUBLICATIONS
Journal
Articles
2012. Are emotions perceptual
experiences of value? Ratio.
Forthcoming.
2011. Abortion and referral: why the law does not
need changing. Journal of Evaluation
in Clinical Practice. Forthcoming
2010. Serious professional misconduct and the
need for an apology. Clinical Ethics.
In Press.
2010. The
feeling theory of emotion and the object-directed emotions. European Journal of Philosophy. In Press.
2009. Does
decision-making capacity require the absence of pathological values? Philosophy, Psychiatry and Psychology,
16: 341-344
2009. Should doctors ever be
professionally required to change their attitudes? Clinical Ethics, 4: 67-73
2007. Inappropriate attitudes, fitness to
practice, and the challenges facing medical educators. Journal of Medical Ethics, 33: 667-670
2006. Some more reflections on emotions,
thoughts, and therapy. Philosophy,
Psychiatry, and Psychology, 13: 255-257
2006. Why treating problems in emotion may not
require altering eliciting cognitions. Philosophy,
Psychiatry, and Psychology 13: 237-246
2006. Standing up for an affective account of
emotion. Philosophical Explorations,
9: 261-276
2004. Emotional disorder. Ratio, 17: 90-103
Book
reviews
2002. Review of Fisher, P. 2002. The Vehement Passions.
2001. Review of Byrne, P. 2001. Philosophical and Ethical Problems in Mental
Handicap. MacMillan Press. Philosophy, 76:171-174
PRECIS OF ARTICLES IN PRESS / FORTHCOMING
Are emotions perceptual
experiences of value? (6300 words)
Some emotion theorists hold that
emotions are perceptions of value. In this paper I say why they are wrong. I
claim that in the case of emotion there is nothing that can provide the
perceptual modality that is needed if the perceptual theory is to succeed. I
argue that the five sensory modalities are not possible candidates for
providing us with emotional perception. But I also say why the usual
candidate offered namely feeling or affectivity does not give us the
sought-after perceptual modality. I conclude that as there seems to be nothing
else that can provide the needed perceptual modality we have excellent reason
to hold that emotions are not perceptual experiences of value.
The
feeling theory of emotion and the object-directed emotions. (12600 words)
An objection commonly made to feeling
theories of emotion has it that emotions cannot be feelings, as emotions have
intentional objects. Jack does not just feel fear, but he feels fear-of-something. To explain this
property of emotion we will have to assign to emotion a representational
structure, and feelings do not have the sought after representational
structure. In this paper I argue that emotions do not possess an intentional structure (even though we might
sometimes speak as if they do), and
that the so-called object-directed emotions are really compound mental states
comprising (non-intentional) emotions and bona fide representational mental
states.
Serious
professional misconduct and the need for an apology (5500
words)
In this paper I argue that
doctors found guilty of serious professional misconduct should be required to
apologise as a condition of their registration. I argue that such a
requirement is to be justified on the basis of the need
to protect patients, maintain public confidence in the profession,
and declare and uphold proper standards of conduct.
Abortion and referral: why
the law does not need changing (3000 words)
In an article published recently Daniel Hill argues that
it is unacceptable that British law allows doctors to refuse to terminate
non-emergency pregnancies but not to refuse to refer given that many doctors
who are opposed to non-emergency abortion will be opposed also to any action
that aids non-emergency abortion, including the action of referral. In this
reply, I argue that Hills argument fails to describe properly the correct
function of the law, which has never been about ensuring people can exercise
moral consistency in their behaviours.
Responses
to my work
2009. Tan, J, Stewart, A, and Hope T. Decision-making
as a broader concept. Philosophy,
Psychiatry and Psychology, 16: 345-349
2009. Thornton, T. Demian
Whiting on pathological values. In
the Space of Reasons
2006. Pugmire, D. Taming the beast within. Philosophy, Psychiatry, and Psychology,
13: 251-253
2006. Harland, R. Why the phenomenology remains
foundational. Philosophy, Psychiatry,
and Psychology, 13: 247-249
RECENT PRESENTATIONS
On Fear. Department of Philosophy.
Should doctors ever be required to change their attitudes?
Commentary on Christopher Bennett, Self-defence and proportionate emotion.
Department of Philosophy,
Decision-making capacity and values. Department of Philosophy,
PAPERS
IN PREPARATION
Conscientious objection in medicine and the law
Freedom, values, and decisional capacity
On Fear
Understanding mind: why we have to attend to the phenomenology
Emotion and moral judgment
Is the use of aversive emotion in public health advertising ethically permissible?
(Co-authored with Stephen Brown)
OTHER
PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
Member of the University Physical Intervention
Research Ethics Committee
Chair and founding member of the University Medical
Student Support Think Tank
Subject editor for PhilPapers, a directory of online philosophy articles
Personal Tutor for 15 undergraduate medical students
Organiser of the
I have refereed for the following journals: Journal of Medical Ethics, Bioethics, and Grazer
Philosophische Studien