Is it possible to say something new about suffering? Do we drain suffering of meaning when we analyze it, objectify it, categorize it, look at it from a safe distance?

We use the reflections of ethics, and the vision of the visual arts and music to take a closer look at suffering. The goal of our session is consider together the contexts in which suffering is transformed, to ponder how insights about suffering can be used, and to discover what it is that prevents us from more deeply exploring our mutual fate.

We will begin with the problem of suffering in contemporary bioethics. Suffering is central to bioethics, but is rarely looked at directly. It can be argued that bioethics emerged as a response to suffering. Whether you subscribe to the “bioethics was born out of the abuses of World War II and medical research” or “bioethics emerged as a way of speaking (patients’) truth to (medical) power, the focus of the relatively new endeavor was to respond to, and alleviate, suffering, human, animal, and more recently, the suffering of nature.

Given the central place of suffering in the work of bioethics, it is remarkable that so little attention is paid to it. Raymond De Vries will review the bioethical literature on suffering and explore some of the reasons it has been largely ignored by bioethicists.

Tim Lowly is a painter whose subjects re-cast the question of what constitutes suffering. He will present a number of reproductions from his paintings that might represent "suffering" to a casual observer but beg the question on closer examination.

John Rapson will survey a variety of blues songs that deal with illness and suffering as a fact of life, a process that cannot be avoided. Using audio clips and transcribed lyrics, he will describe how these artists address the cause of their suffering and find ways to traverse it, even transforming it into a catharsis for healing

Dr. Joudah will talk about how to negotiate the application of power, and avoid its misuse, as physician and as writer

Doctor writing has become a new genre, but there are that unique considerations that don’t exist in other fields. Who “owns” the patient’s story? Are doctors exploiting their patients’ trust? Should doctors obtain consent? Who is benefiting from the story? This talk will examine the ethical quandaries that must be navigated when doctors write about their patients