You will take two core modules:
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Global Bioethics
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Human Rights and Healthcare Law
You will then choose three optional modules from the following:
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Criminal Law and Medicine
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European Health Law
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Global Ethics
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Mentally Disordered Offenders and the Law
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Philosophy of Cognitive Science
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Philosophy of Health and Happiness
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Value of Life
You will also take a research skills module and complete a 15,000-word dissertation.
You will study the following two core modules:
Global Bioethics
This module introduces you to the increasing number of dilemmas in bioethics that cross national boundaries and transcend domestic regulation. Bioethical dilemmas, whether arising from scientific and technological developments or from the research practices of pharmaceutical companies, raise issues which cannot be effectively addressed at national or regional levels. Bioethics clearly calls for global solutions to what are global dilemmas and you will be introduced to some of the key bioethical issues which arise in the contemporary global context
Human Rights and Healthcare Law
This course explores the interface between human rights and health care law. It examines the evolution of Health Care Law both before and after the enactment of the UK Human Rights Act 1998. It explores this debate in the context of a number of controversial and topical issues.
Further information on the Human Rights and Healthcare Law module is available on the Law School website.
You will then choose one optional module from the following:
Criminal Law and Medicine
The aim of this module is to explore some key aspects of criminal law and its relation to medicine. The focus will be on the arrangements in England and Wales, but where appropriate reference will be made to comparative material from other countries.
Further information on the Criminal Law and Medicine module is available on the Law School website.
European Health Law
Module details coming soon
Global Ethics
This module introduces you to key concepts and debates in global ethics. It explores the nature of ethics and provides the theoretical tools necessary for you to analyse the arguments of others and create robust ethical arguments of your own.
Mentally Disordered Offenders and the Law
This module covers a number of areas, including relevant legislation (The Mental Health Act, The Human Rights Act and The Mental Capacity Act) and topics such as psychiatric defences, mental health tribunals, civil law and statutory care in the community as well as recent developments and proposed reforms.
Further information on the Mentally Disordered Offenders and the Law module is available on the Law School website.
Philosophy of Cognitive Science
This module covers a range of advanced topics in empirically-informed philosophy of mind. In any given year, some of the following topics will be addressed in detail: theories of intentionality; differences between human and animal cognition; pathologies of belief such as delusions and self-deception; theories of emotion; accounts of cognitive rationality; the relationship between ownership and authorship of thoughts; the narrative view of the self; the psychology of wisdom and expertise.
Philosophy of Health and Happiness
The module will examine debates at the forefront of current research in the philosophy of health and happiness. You will explore conceptual problems (e.g. what ‘health’ and ‘disease’ are) and question contemporary lifestyle issues (for instance, regarding how health, happiness and meaning relate, as well as whether there is a correlation between income and life satisfaction). You will also be asked to consider how technological advances (such as those in genetics) are changing these understandings.
Value of Life
This module is intended to provide scope for an assessment of that brand of extreme philosophical pessimism according to which life not only has no positive value but is something we should be better off without – that, to echo the title of a recent book by David Benatar, it is “better never to have been”. The initial focus will be on the arguments for this view put forward recently by Benatar himself and before him by Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860). The focus will then shift to the more affirmative approaches of thinkers like Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) and William James (1842-1910). An important subsidiary theme will be the nature of pleasure, pain, happiness and suffering.
We charge an annual tuition fee. Fees for 2013/14 are as follows:
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Home / EU: full-time - £5,130
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Overseas: full-time - £13,200
Part-time programme fees are one half of the full-time programme fees.
Learn more about fees and funding
Scholarships and studentships
Scholarships to cover fees and/or maintenance costs may be available.
For further information, visit the College of Arts and Law scholarships page or email financialsupport@bham.ac.uk
International students can often gain funding through overseas research scholarships, Commonwealth scholarships or their home government.