The OUGHT-IS GAP in medical ethics: An online-workshop to integrate interdisciplinary perspectives from different European countries

The IS-OUGHT GAP is familiar, and Hume’s argument that one cannot derive an “ought” from an “is” continues to be debated. The OUGHT-IS GAP differs: if we know what ought to be the case, how can we translate this into practice, so that what ought to be the case is (or will be) the case? Training and policy initiatives may help but, as a recent AJOB paper argued, bioethics could incorporate (more) interventions and implementation research.[1]

This blended online workshop will seek to explore two sets of questions related to the OUGHT-IS GAP:

Part 1 (Projects): Reasons for the OUGHT-IS GAP and attempts to bridge the gap

  • What are the reasons/explanations for gaps between the way health practice ought to be and the way it is?
  • What hinders actors from practicing healthcare according to professional-ethical ‘oughts’?
  • Are there examples of attempts to bridge the OUGHT-IS GAP in different fields of healthcare? 
  • If so, what do actors in these projects do to stimulate change and how do they justify their actions?

Part 2 (Methods): Proposed methodologies for bridging the OUGHT-IS GAP and research that addresses the methodology/ies behind individual steps in the bridging-process

  • Why should health care ethicists be concerned with the OUGHT-IS GAP?
  • What role does/could socio-empirical research play in bridging the OUGHT-IS GAP?
  • What kinds of “interventions” could be suitable to change practice according to a justified normative claim.
  • Are ethical interventions different from other interventions in health care research?

The two parts are strongly interrelated, and one strength of this format is that provides space and opportunity to interrogate that interrelatedness.

The workshop will span over the course of a year. 25 participants who are doing research in Bioethics and/or Medical Ethics in at least six European countries will make contributions to the issue, discuss implications and will collaboratively develop answers to larger and interrelated questions. The workshop is funded by the European Association of Centres of Medical Ethics (EACME) and organized by Katja Kuehlmeyer and Georg Marckmann (Institute of Ethics, History and Theory of Medicine, LMU Munich) and Jonathan Ives and Richard Huxtable (Centre for Ethics in Medicine, University of Bristol).

[1] Sisk et al (2020) The “Ought-Is” Problem: An Implementation Science Framework for Translating Ethical Norms Into Practice, AJOB, 20(4): 62-70.