George,
This is an interesting challenge.
I would formulate it a bit differently, though.
It's not stats techniques that you need to assign your students, it's statistically based notions like acceptable risk.
For example: no medication will ever be 100% harmless on a large population.
There always will be at least a small subgroup whose particular conditions make them over-react to the drug.
This group may be so small as to escape even the most carefully designed battery of statistical tests.
For example, Vioxx was of great service to many suffering people.
It created side effects in (statistically) a few of them.
It caused impairments or even death for very few of them.
The questions then can be :
- what are the FDA requirements with respect to these potential cases ?
- how does the FDA decide in grey areas ?
- how far should we mandate drug companies to discover the possibility of existence of outlier groups (like 3 standard deviations away, or more) ? - what should the companies do when they discover outlier groups, before launching the product, with or without FDA rules ?
- what's cover-up, where does it start and end ?
- when it comes to medication, should you use a utilitarian or a deontological approach ?
- as a sufferer yourself, until how many % in a hundred would you accept the risks associated with Vioxx ?
- should government prevent you from assuming this personal risk, and why ?
Maybe, one method could be to have students examine industry arguments in cases like Vioxx, and ask them to weigh the validity of these arguments from both a statistical and an ethical points of view.
jp
------------------------------------------------------------
Jean Pasquero
UQAM (Université du Québec à Montréal)
MONTREAL - CANADA
tel. (+1) (514) 987 3000 ^ 3893
De: Social Issues in Management Listserv de la part de Geirge Watson
Date: sam. 2009-12-19 15:21
À: SIM@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Objet : [SIM] Identifying an Ethical Issue
I teach an CSR/Ethics course to (primarilly) graduating seniors. I've been
frustrated by their inability to quantitatively assess either the probability
of harm their decisions may cause, the economic impact of alternatives, or even
the consideration of human suffering in a moderately straightforward
operational decision. Unfortunately, it is frequently the case that one does
not know they will or may violate legal or ethical standards unless they can
analyze associated information and data.
Vioxx is one example. It's easy to overlook the difference between 4 and 7
heart failures in a sample of thousands unless you are prepared to do the
statistical analysis. And, if you see no difference you are pefectly happy to
launch the product. Moreover, you will miss the true economics of launching a
harzardous medication. And, rationalize you do no harm.
So, I think it may be time for me to start revisiting some key statistical and
economic techniques and skills in addition to moral theory - perhaps regression
(binomial and linear), chi-sqaured, expected value, and probability.
I would appreciate your opinions regarding reviewing this material in an ethics
course; if anyone is trying this, experiencing the same frustrations, or has
some addition fundamental skills that need to be reviewed in order to make
sound ethical decisions I would be most welcome to here from them.
George
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