Onora O’Neill/ Jonathan Wolff
Monday 9 February 2015, 6.30 – 8pm
New Theatre, East Building, LSE
Onora O’Neill, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of Cambridge. She is also the current Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission and a crossbench member of the House of Lords
Jonathan Wolff, Professor of Philosophy, University College London
Chair: Peter Dennis, LSE Fellow, Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method and Forum for European Philosophy Fellow
Informed consent is not the most fundamental ethical standard, but a means of securing respect for other, more basic standards or aims. It is neither possible nor required when public goods—such as sound currency or clean air—are to be provided. Where it is possible and can be required, as in transactions with individuals, it must be tailored to their cognitive capacities. Genuine, legitimating consent is demanding, and is not achieved by the ‘tick and click’ approaches used in many commercial transactions.
