This year’s Herndon lecturer, Dr. Thomas Beauchamp, is one of the originators of the “principlist” approach to bioethics, which understands the principles of autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and justice as critical directives in bioethical reflection. Professor of Philosophy and a Senior Research Scholar in Georgetown University’s Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Beauchamp is widely known as the primary author of The Belmont Report and as co-author of The Principles of Biomedical Ethics.