title: Trust, moral responsibility, the self, and well-ordered societies: the importance of basic philosophical concepts for clinical ethics.
abstract: Although the work of clinical ethics is intensely practical, it employs and presumes philosophical concepts from the central branches of philosophy, including metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and political philosophy. This essay introduces this issue in the Journal on clinical ethics by considering how the papers and book reviews included in it illuminate four such concepts: trust, moral responsibility, the self and well-ordered societies.
authors.affiliation: Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX 77030, USA. mccullou@bcm.tmc.edu
authors.forename: Laurence B
authors.initials: LB
authors.lastname: Mccullough
mesh_terms: D004532:Ego; D026690:Ethics, Clinical; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008329:Managed Care Programs; D028681:Moral Obligations; D026684:Personal Autonomy; D010684:Philosophy; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D012919:Social Behavior; D035502:Trust; D014481:United States