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Dietary Supplements: Ethical Issues

  • Living reference work entry
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Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics

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Synonyms

FDA; Food additives; Food science; Food technology; Functional foods; Nutrition

Introduction

Although dietary supplements are a ubiquitous part of modern life, especially in the United States, very little philosophical work has been done on the ethical issues surrounding them. This is even more surprising given that many of the specific issues with dietary supplements resonate with other contemporary debates in moral and political philosophy. The purpose of this entry, therefore, is to identify the primary moral dilemmas concerning dietary supplements, to identify the positions that previous stakeholders have taken with respect to those dilemmas, and to suggest future directions for continued research.

To those ends, this entry is divided into six sections, including this introduction. Section “Defining Dietary Supplements” investigates the definition of dietary supplements as well as some marginal instances that challenge conventional definitions. Section “Prevalence”...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Wilkinson College of Humanities and Social Sciences, One University Drive, Orange, CA, 92866, USA

    Daniel Pilchman

  2. Alere Healthcare of Illinois, Inc, 9500 W. Bryn Mawr Avenu, Rosemont, IL, 60018, USA

    Catherine Howard

Authors
  1. Daniel Pilchman
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  2. Catherine Howard
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Correspondence to Daniel Pilchman .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Michigan State University Dept. Philosophy, East Lansing, Michigan, USA

    Paul B. Thompson

  2. University of North Texas Dept. Philosophy & Religion Studies, Denton, Texas, USA

    David M. Kaplan

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Pilchman, D., Howard, C. (2016). Dietary Supplements: Ethical Issues. In: Thompson, P., Kaplan, D. (eds) Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6167-4_570-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6167-4_570-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-007-6167-4

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