The promotion of science together with the growth of moral values is necessary for human development. Ethics requires reporting authentic results rather than withholding relevant information. In other words, scientists are expected to be honest. Another ethical requirement on the part of scientists is the proper treatment of living beings, both humans and animals.
This requires control and balance mechanisms to ensure that the health and safety of these subjects are not endangered either in research laboratories or in their natural environment. The desire for fame or recognition, selfishness, greed, prejudice, snobbery, racism and political considerations have often led to immorality in the field of science. It can also be defined to include systematic knowledge of the physical or material world, systematized knowledge in general, knowledge of facts and principles, and knowledge acquired through systematic study. Of course, it is also necessary to invite members of the public, or even critics, to appreciate their perceptions and expectations about scientific research.
Scientific researchers are part of a larger human society that has recently experienced profound changes in attitudes about ethics, morality and responsibility in business, the professions, and government. For years, the absence of formal statements by research institutions on the principles that should guide the research carried out by their members has aroused criticism for the lack of clearly identifiable means to guarantee the integrity of the research process. Until the last decade, scientists, research institutions and government agencies relied solely on a system of self-regulation based on shared ethical principles and generally accepted research practices to ensure the integrity of the research process. The authorship of the original research reports is an important indicator of achievement, priority and prestige within the scientific community.
Integrity involves the coherent integration of emotions, knowledge and aspirations, while maintaining moral values. Informed consent, truth and confidentiality derive from the principle of autonomy, and each of them is discussed. Scientific societies and scientific journals, some of which have tens of thousands of members and readers, and the peer-review processes used by journals and research sponsors are visible forms of the social organization of disciplines. This framework also focuses on following moral rules or duty regardless of the outcome, so it allows for the possibility that one may have acted in an ethical manner, even if the outcome is bad.
Ethics is a broad term that encompasses the study of the nature of morals and the specific moral choices that must be made. However, the responsibilities of the research community and research institutions in ensuring individual compliance with scientific principles, traditions and codes of ethics are not well defined. An example of this is the awareness that scientific research goes hand in hand with new concerns about ethics and values when it comes to combining the initiative on the human genome with funding for research on the humanistic implications of the project. The above theoretical discussion on the principles of ethics has practical application in clinical practice in all settings.
