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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
A paper which looks at Plato's concept of the Noble Lie, and considers the way in which it might be applied to medical ethics: the writer explores the idea that "brain death" might be regarded as a modern example of a Noble Lie put forward by science, rather than religion. Bibliography lists 10 sources.
Page Count:
10 pages (~225 words per page)
File: JL5_JLnoblie.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
the "noble lie" to medical ethics strictly according to the implications it would have had in Platos time, or we can investigate such a relationship with regard to modern social
culture, and the growth of moral relativism which we associate with a postmodern society. Similarly, we might start from the premise that although there is some room for flexibility in
ethical medicine, the "noble lie" itself is no longer appropriate. Certainly, if we look at the original proposition put forward by Plato, it seems at
first glance to have little relevance to modern society. In The Republic, Plato gives a description of a society where the people are divided into different groups - rulers, farmers,
auxiliaries and so on. Rulers are drawn from a military elite, known as guardians, and auxiliaries are trainee guardians. The "noble lie" concerns the rationale for this stratification of society.
The rulers tell the populace that the divisions between one social group and another are because of divine intervention: God has put different kinds of metal into the souls of
the people, and these dictate their position in the social "pecking order". Those whose souls contain gold are of a higher rank than those with silver, who in turn are
higher than those with iron. Plato argued that this deception was necessary in order to maintain a stable society, and we can certainly see
the logic behind it. It is a concept which appears, in a slightly different form, in Huxleys "Brave New World", it is evident in Confucianism, and it was central to
the social ideology of nineteenth-century English Christianity. Clearly it is a pervasive notion, in terms of social control, but why should such a deception be "noble"? Plato felt that most
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