PHI332 : The
Class : Argument
ID : Independent Premises : Exercise 2.4.3
Exercise 2.4.3
If any of the following are arguments, diagram them. Begin by marking inference
(premise or conclusion) indicators as before. Then check your work with my answers
on the next page.
- The contexts and clinical settings in which physician and patient interact
and exchange information material to therapeutic decisions are so multifarious,
the informational needs and degree of dependency of individual patients so various,
and the professional relationship itself such an intimate and irreducibly judgment-laden
one, that it is unwise to require as a matter of law that a particular species
of information be disclosed (pp. 80-1).
[Hint: "so . . . that" and "such . . . that" are inference
indicators.]
- She is functioning on a psychotic level with respect to ideas concerning
her gangrenous feet. . . . Her judgment concerning recovery is markedly impaired.
. . . She does not appreciate the dangers to her life. I conclude that she is
incompetent to decide this issue (pp. 170-1).
- For some incompetent patients it might be impossible to be clearly satisfied
as to the patient's intent either to accept or reject the life-sustaining treatment.
. . . In such cases, a surrogate decision-maker cannot presume that treatment
decisions made by a third party on the patient's behalf will further the patient's
right to self-determination. . . . Thus, in the absence of adequate proof of
the patient's wishes, it is naïve to pretend that the right to self-determination
serves as the basis for substituted decision-making (p. 210).
Download Word file.
Check your work.
Once you have completed this excercise you should:
Go on to Exercise 2.4.4
or
Go back to Independent Premises
E-mail George Rudebusch at George.Rudebusch@nau.edu
or call (520) 523-7091
