A Dental Ethics Blog
Dentistry is part medicine and part artistry. A good dentist needs both to bring patients teeth back to health and function. Cosmetics are opposed to health as some situations require sacrificing longterm health for cosmetics and some sacrificing cosmetics for health. This article offers a different philosophical perspective. A healthy simile is to be understood…
Defining health is a metaphysical concern because health is an abstract idea or concept. We explore metaphysical questions such as what is health by using the dialectical method. This post is an initial attempt at defining oral health using the dialectical method. We will first explore some common sense conceptions of health to better our…
What Does Smile Design Have to do with Philosophy? Simle design makes dentistry an artistry but also a philosophy. Questions asking what is beautiful are metaphysical questions (read about metaphysics here). Metaphysical questions are those concerned with the nature of reality when it comes to abstract ideas or concepts. The idea of beauty is not…
First Principles Many people think metaphysics is what is transcendental, what is “beyond the physical” or “outside spacetime.” Laypeople get this impression from pseudo-intellectual hippies. Academics get this impression from an etymological misunderstanding of “meta” and “physics.” Metaphysics, however, is the study of first principles: a set of propositions that explain the nature of reality as…
The Golden Rule or empathy principle is the most familiar ethical imperative one comes across in everyday life. The rule states that one must treat others as oneself would want to be treated in a similar situation. The rule is easy to understand but it is not recommended to be used in a healthcare setting. This…
Is Dentistry a Profession or a Business? Throughout dental school, students are asked whether dentistry is a profession or a business. No harm in asking. It is clear to some that dentistry is just a business. Like car mechanics, dentists sell services to people. A patient has trouble with a tooth. The dentist inspects the…