– Prof. Meghan Davis
Bloomberg School of Public Health, School of Medicine
The Berman Institute of Bioethics is a national and international leader in making sense of and finding answers to new ethical issues arising from rapid gains in health care, public health, and the biomedical sciences. But advances in science and technology increasingly touch aspects of our lives that go far beyond bioethics’ traditional purview.
These efforts have been driven by the Exploration of Practical Ethics program, made possible by $250,000 in seed funding from Andreas Dracopoulos. Since launching in 2016, the Practical Ethics Program has funded 16 innovative projects, engaging faculty from every division of the university in interdisciplinary research addressing contemporary, real-world ethical challenges.
Their work has resulted in scholarly publications, media relations coverage, partnerships with government officials and industry leaders, and more than $1 million in additional external grant proposals to extend work begun in the Practical Ethics program.
As robots are granted greater autonomy, it’s imperative that they are endowed with ethical reasoning commensurate with their ability to both benefit and harm humanity. The project, led by ethics and robotics experts from the Berman Institute and the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab, aims to develop an ethical framework for robots, implement the framework by extending existing robot capabilities, and assess the framework’s impact on robot behavior.
The Practical Ethics Program required JHU faculty to work with colleagues from other divisions across the university. In addition, researchers have developed meaningful collaborations with institutions worldwide.
“Through Practical Ethics, I discovered a community of like-minded people and resources at Hopkins that I might not have otherwise found, and a meaningful home for my work beyond the Peabody Institute.”
A primary goal of the Practical Ethics Program is to complete projects with real-world impact. Even with work still in progress, researchers are garnering news coverage, publishing scholarship, and more.
“The grant enabled us to do intensely focused work on the ethics of university community engagement, which has become one of the ongoing priority themes of the Arrighi Center for Global Studies.”
Researchers are leveraging the success of their Practical Ethics projects to seek additional external funding. Currently more than $1 million in proposals are pending.
“Our submitted $500,000 proposal would further work initiated by Practical Ethics, as well as grow into a new area, how antimicrobial use changes impact management practices on a farm.”