Parr | Bioethics Joint Lecture Series: Tom Murray

Good Sport: What just about everyone gets wrong about sport, ethics, and performance-enhancing drugs

Abstract:

We know that athletes use drugs to enhance their performance. We know that in almost all sports using performance-enhancing drugs is forbidden. Why do athletes use them despite the prohibitions and the sanctions if they’re caught? Anyway, what’s wrong with using PEDs in the first place? If everyone was allowed to use them, wouldn’t the competitions be just as fair?

Tom will answer these questions and explain what’s missing from the conversation: the reality of relentless pressure to not surrender any advantage to your competitors; and the values that give sport its meaning in our lives.

Thomas H. Murray is President Emeritus of The Hastings Center.  He served as Presidential appointee on the National Bioethics Advisory Commission and as chair of its Genetics subcommittee. He was founding chair of the World Anti-Doping Agency’s Ethics panel and is a member of the IAAF Ethics Board and Disciplinary Commission. Dr. Murray is the author of more than 300 publications including The Worth of a Child. His latest book is Good Sport: Why Out Games Matter…and How Doping Undermines Them (OUP, 2018).