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Dr Richard C Jennings

College position(s)

Director of Studies

Subject

Philosophy

Degrees, Awards and Prizes

BA (Michigan State University) PhD (Washington University, St Louis)

Research themes

Broadly speaking, my research includes ethical issues in contemporary science. More specifically I’m concerned with professional practice in science (Responsible Conduct of Research) and with the ethical uses of science. Most recently I have been concerned particularly with the social and ethical issues that arise in the development and commercialisation of genetically modified food crops. For reasons of interest and purposes of teaching, I keep track of current discussions of ethical issues arising in science. In the past I have lectured on ethical issues in contemporary science for the Department of History and Philosophy of Science.  I have run workshops on Ethical Conduct and the Ethics of Scientific Practice for the Graduate programme at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, and for the final year and first year graduate students in the University of Cambridge Department of Physics.

Responsibilities

As well as directing studies for Girton undergraduates who study Philosophy, I work with the admissions team by interviewing applicants to study Philosophy at Girton.  I supervise Philosophy students in their first year undergraduate study for two of the five compulsory papers, the Metaphysics paper and the Meaning paper.  I supervise second year Philosophy students’ study for the single compulsory paper, Knowledge, Language and the World.  In addition to supervising study in Philosophy I supervise the Philosophy of Science paper that is offered to second year Natural Science students by the Department of History and Philosophy of Science.

Other

Affiliated Research Scholar, Department of History and Philosophy of Science (HPS), University of Cambridge

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