The Belmont Report
So I’m reading the Belmont Report for one of my classes (we’re going to conduct research, and although it’s only within the classroom and we technically don’t need certification, our professor has decided it’s good experience anyway).
The Belmont Report is... really interesting. Specifically the section about Respect for Persons, wherein it makes a distinction between autonomous people, and people who have diminished autonomy, such as young children, the elderly who have lost cognition, and people with temporary or permanent mental disabilities. A comatose person, for example, would count as someone having diminished autonomy.
I appreciated that the Report says that if someone has been determined to have diminished autonomy, that this status should be periodically reevaluated. A label of “diminished authority” is therefor not a permanent thing.
