What’s a Body Worth? Kabasenche Delivers Final Fall Common Reading Lecture This Evening

Philosophy Assistant Professor Bill Kabasenche will present the final Common Reading Tuesdays fall lecture, entitled “What’s Your Body Worth? The Ethics of Commodifying Human Tissues.”

Day/Date: Tuesday, Nov. 13

Time: 7 p.m.
Place: Todd 130
The public is welcome.

His lecture springs from topics raised in this year’s Common Reading book, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.” It details how cells taken without consent from Lacks have been grown in labs and used in a wide variety of applications around the world; the book raises issues about race, culture, economics, ethics, and more. Throughout this academic year, thousands of students are using the book in first-year classes across many disciplines.

In his presentation, Kabasenche will consider these questions:

“What … about the worth of those from whom these tissues come? What, from an ethical perspective, counts as properly valuing human beings, and what does this imply for tissues taken from them?”

In addition to philosophy, he is on faculty in the Center for Reproductive Biology, director of the Global Campus’s Bioethics Graduate Certificate, and co-director of Pullman Regional Hospital’s ethics committee.