Your complimentary articles

You’ve read all of your complimentary articles for this month. To have complete access to the thousands of philosophy articles on this site, please

If you are a subscriber please sign in to your account.

To buy or renew a subscription please visit the Shop.

If you are a print subscriber you can contact us to create an online account.

Philosophy and Sport

Sports and Drugs (and rock and roll?)

Jessie Burdick wonders whether it is cheating for athletes to take dietary supplements, and we ask you, the reader, to tell us what you think.

What would you be willing to do to become a professional athlete? This is a question that demands more than a fleeting thought, because not only will becoming a successful professional athlete bring you millions of dollars, but you will achieve fame, fortune and worldwide recognition. Along with that you will be getting paid a lot to do something that you really love and enjoy.

It seems like professional athletes have it all. They are as worshipped as movie stars, allowed to act like rock stars and always seem to age gracefully after their sports careers are over. So perhaps the question should be what wouldn’t you be willing to do to become a professional athlete?

Would you be willing to cheat to be a professional athlete? Hopefully you are asking the question “What do you consider cheating?” because then you are really considering my question.

…