Jonathan D. Moreno

Jonathan D. Moreno
Born June 11, 1952
Main interests
 Bioethics, neuroethics, history of science,
philosophy, national security
Notable ideas
 bioethical naturalism, neurosecurity

Jonathan D. Moreno is an American philosopher and historian who specializes in the intersection of bioethics, culture, science, and national security, and has published seminal works on the history, sociology and politics of biology and medicine.

Moreno is the David and Lyn Silfen University Professor and Professor of Medical Ethics and the History and Sociology of Science at the University of Pennsylvania. As the David and Lyn Silfen University Professor, Moreno is one of fourteen Penn Integrates Knowledge professors. He is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and served on the Obama-Biden Transition Project in 2008 as the Director of the Department of Health and Human Services Agency Review for Bioethics.

Moreno is a senior advisor for the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues, and served on the senior staff of the Clinton Administration’s National Bioethics Advisory Commission and the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments. He is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and is the U.S. member of the UNESCO International Bioethics Committee.

Early life

Jonathan D. Moreno was born and grew up in New York’s Hudson Valley. His father, J.L. Moreno, was a psychiatrist and the pioneer of psychodrama, the precursor of social network theory. His father and mother, psychotherapist Zerka T. Moreno, worked closely together. Both of his parents emigrated to the United States from Europe before World War II. Moreno and his older sister, Regina Moreno, spent much of their childhood in Beacon, New York on the grounds of their parents’ sanitarium and psychodrama training center.

Education

Moreno attended Hofstra University where he earned a B.A. in philosophy and psychology with highest honors in 1973. From 1973 to 1975 he was a graduate student in the philosophy doctoral program in the CUNY Graduate Center and completed his Ph.D. in philosophy at Washington University in St. Louis in 1977. Moreno’s doctoral dissertation traced the development of a distinctly American semiotic tradition from Charles Sanders Peirce to Nelson Goodman. His dissertation director was Richard S. Rudner, the longtime editor of the Journal of the Philosophy of Science.

Career

Following graduation, Moreno held full-time academic appointments in philosophy at Swarthmore College, the University of Texas at Austin, and George Washington University. During 1984-85 he was an associate at the Hastings Center, the first bioethics think tank. From 1985-1987 he was philosopher-in-residence at the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, DC.

He was the director of the Program in Medical Humanities and a Professor of Pediatrics and Medicine at the SUNY Health Science Center in Brooklyn from 1989 until 1998, when he joined University of Virginia faculty as the Emily Davie and Joseph S. Kornfeld Professor of Biomedical Ethics and director of the Center for Biomedical Ethics.

In 2007, Moreno joined the faculty at the University of Pennsylvania as part of President Amy Gutmann’s Penn Integrates Knowledge (PIK) Initiative, where he is the David and Lyn Silfen University Professor and a Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy and of the History and Sociology of Science. He also holds a courtesy appointment in Penn’s Department of Philosophy, is a member of the Center for Neuroscience and Society, and is the interim chair of the program in Science, Technology, and Society.

As an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, Moreno has served on and chaired a number of committees on bioethics, embryonic stem cell research, national defense research, and neuroscience. He is also a past president of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities, was a bioethics advisor for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and is a Fellow of the Hastings Center and the New York Academy of Medicine.[1] As a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress, Moreno is the Editor of Science Progress, an online journal focusing on progressive science and technology policy.

Awards and honors

Moreno has received many awards and honors, among them a 1984-1985 Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellowship in cooperation with the Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies. He also received an honorary doctorate from Hofstra University in 1998 and the Benjamin Rush Medal from the College of William and Mary School of Law in 2008.[2]

Major works

Moreno has published more than 20 books, monographs, anthologies and textbooks and more than 300 papers, reviews and book chapters. He is also a member of several editorial boards.

Impromptu Man: J.L. Moreno and the Origins of Psychodrama, Encounter Culture, and the Social Network

In Moreno's latest work, he explores the impact of J.L Moreno's work in psychodrama, group therapy, and humanistic psychology on psychiatric treatment, societal organization, and, most remarkably, on social networks. This work is not only a biography of a largely unsung psychiatrist, but also an expansive overview of his influence on improvisational theater, group therapy, social reform, and networks within military, industry, schools and jails. J.L. Moreno discovered the underlying theory of Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, social network, in 1932 when he drew his first sociogram, which mapped interactions between individuals and showed that, despite degrees of separation, individuals influenced others in their network.

Daniel Goleman, a Harvard-trained psychologist, author of Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, and two time Pulitzer Prize nominee, stated, "Impromptu Man captures the remarkable impact of a singular genius, J.L. Moreno, whose creations—the best-known being psychodrama—have shaped our culture in myriad ways, many unrecognized. The record will be set straight for all time by this can’t-put-down biography, a tribute by Jonathan D. Moreno to his father’s masterly legacy.”

The Body Politic: The Battle Over Science in America

In The Body Politic, Moreno elucidates the cultural, political and societal underpinnings of biotechnology by tracing its history from early America to the present culture wars of the “new biology.” The book considers the intersection of society and biotechnology in areas such as embryonic stem cell research, reproductive cloning, and synthetic biology, and demonstrates how biology and society have shaped each other into modern-day biopolitics. Kirkus Reviews named "The Body Politic" as a "Best Book of 2011."[3]

Progress in Bioethics: Science, Policy and Politics

Progress in Bioethics is a compilation of essays that explore the politicization of modern-day bioethics. Experts consider the fundamental values of progressivism and conservatism in bioethics, and situate bioethical issues within the nuances of politics and culture in the United States.

Mind Wars: Brain Science and the Military in the 21st Century

The first book of its kind, Mind Wars covers the ethical dilemmas and bizarre history of cutting-edge technology and neuroscience developed for military applications. As the author discusses the innovative Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the role of the intelligence community and countless university science departments in preparing the military and intelligence services for the twenty-first century, he also charts the future of national security.

Fully updated and revised, this edition features new material on deep brain stimulation, neuro hormones, and enhanced interrogation. With in-depth discussions of “psyops” mind control experiments, drugs that erase both fear and the need to sleep, microchip brain implants and advanced prosthetics, supersoldiers and robot armies, Mind Wars may read like science fiction or the latest conspiracy thriller, but its subjects are very real and changing the course of modern warfare.

In the Wake of Terror: Medicine and Morality in a Time of Crisis

In the Wake of Terror presents essays on the complex moral questions that accompany societal concerns about terrorism and biological warfare. The essays, written by experts from the fields of medicine, health care policy, law, political science, history, philosophy, and theology, consider issues of civil liberties, medical experiments, and preparedness for future terrorist attacks.

Undue Risk: Secret State Experiments on Humans

Undue Risk is the first comprehensive study of the history and ethics of human experiments for national security purposes, from World War II to the first Gulf War and its aftermath. Topics covered include the Nazi doctors trial, the Japanese medical experiments, the human radiation experiments, and biological and chemical weapons testing.

Deciding Together: Bioethics and Moral Consensus

In Deciding Together, Moreno discusses the process of moral consensus and its place in societal value systems from social, philosophical, and historical perspectives. In this work, he also constructs his concept of bioethical naturalism, a naturalistic meta-philosophy that explains moral consensus through psychology and the consensus process .

Selected publications

Articles

Books

References

  1. ↑ The Hastings Center Hastings Center Fellows. Accessed November 6, 2010
  2. ↑ "People: Jonathan Moreno". University of Pennsylvania. 2008. Archived from the original on 2008-04-11. Retrieved 2008-06-15.
  3. ↑ Kirkus Reviews. "Best Nonfiction of 2011". Retrieved October 27, 2013.

External links