Foni phronimos - An interview with Edmund D. Pellegrino

？ JG. - Professor Pellegrino, I'd like to begin by asking you to describe your work during your tenure as Chair of the President's Council on Bioethics. Specifically, in what ways do you feel that you fostered and cultivated the direction of the council?？ EDP. - I hesitate to speculate on what should have been. I have no criticisms of my predecessors. Nor can I be critical of the new Commission, because their work has just begun, and reflects the needs and tasks placed before its members by the President and his administration. So, I can only speak to what I sought to achieve during my time as Chair. I tried to foster the council as primarily a public education instrument, on the complicated subject of bioethics, which has now become evermore important to public policy, because many of the disputes and differences of opinions are being put into the frame of guidelines, policy and/or law. I truly believe in a democracy. Maybe some people would criticize me for thinking that the general public is more thoughtful than many think they are. I honestly believe that if we set out the alternatives and arguments, people can evaluate them for themselves and a democracy is the only way to allow this to fully occur. So, the first thing on my agenda was to ensure that the function of the Council was not policy formulation as some would have it, but rather education of both the public and the policy makers. In this way, we sought to argue ethically important issues - whatever they happened to be - from a basis of rational consideration of the alternatives that were available, and thus to educate and inform both the government and the people - as the ultimate subjects of ethical decisions.？ JG - Do you feel that you were successful in doing this?？ EDP - That is hard to evaluate at this point, Jim. We do not know the impact of these studies, so I cannot answer that question. That question would be a good starting point from which to look back at the history of previous councils, co