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Books > Science & Mathematics > Biology, life sciences > Life sciences: general issues > Bio-ethics
Our technological culture has an extremely dynamic character: old ways of reproducing ourselves, managing nature and keeping animals are continually replaced by new ones; norms and values with respect to our bodies, food production, health care and environmental protection are regularly being put up for discussion. This constantly confronts us with new moral problems and dilemmas. In discussion with other approaches this book argues that pragmatism, with its strong emphasis on the interaction between technology and values, gives us both procedural help and stresses the importance of living and cooperating together in tackling these problems and dilemmas. The issues in this book include the interaction of technology and ethics, the status of pragmatism, the concept of practice, and discourse ethics and deliberative democracy. It has an interactive design, with original contributions alternating with critical comments. The book is of interest for students, scholars and policymakers in the fields of bioethics, animal ethics, environmental ethics, pragmatist philosophy and science and technology studies.
Bioethics for Scientists provides an introduction to the ethics of modern life sciences and encompasses a wide range of environmental, social, scientific and medical issues. Subjects such as global warming, GM crops and the recent advances in genetics and cloning affect all areas of society. Scientists in all fields are frequently reminded of their own responsibilities, not just within their own profession but also to society. International experts provide in-depth discussion of these subjects with a clear understanding of the science involved, and explore different approaches and opinions which consider the implications of these issues on science and society. Bioethics for Scientists will show you how to think about the issues without trying to tell you what to think. Where relevant, case studies are included to support these discussions. This book includes chapters on:
'[This book] specialises in the public understanding and attitudes towards biotechnology and the social and ethical implications of the new genetics…' Dr J R Downie, Division of Environmental & Evolutionary Biology, University of Glasgow, UK 'Unique emphasis on the environmental, agricultural and animal science contents' Dr Sana Loue, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, CWRU School of Medicine, Ohio, USA
When Joseph Murray performed the first successful living kidney donor transplant in 1954, he thought this would be a temporary stopgap. Today, we are no closer to the goal of adequate organ supply without living donors-if anything, the supply-demand ratio is worse. While most research on the ethics of organ transplantation focuses on how to allocate organs as a scarce medical resource, the ethical treatment of organ donors themselves has been relatively neglected. In The Living Organ Donor as Patient: Theory and Practice, Lainie Friedman Ross and J. Richard Thistlethwaite, Jr. argue that living donor organ transplantation can be ethical provided that we treat living solid organ donors as patients in their own right. Ross and Thistlethwaite develop a five-principle framework to examine some of the attempts to increase living donation. It uses the three principles of the Belmont Report: respect for persons, beneficence, and justice modified to organ transplantation, as well as the principles of vulnerability and special relationships creating special obligations. Their approach requires that the transplant community fully embrace current and prospective living organ donors as patients to whom we have special obligations. Only when living organ donors are regarded as patients in their own right and have a living donor advocate team dedicated to their well-being can the moral limits of living solid organ donation be realized and living donors be given the full respect and care they deserve.
Bioethics is the study of ethical issues arising out of advances in the life sciences and medicine. Historically, bioethics has been associated with issues in research ethics and clinical ethics as a result of research scandals such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and public debates about the definition of death, medical paternalism, health care rationing, and abortion. As biomedical technologies have advanced, challenging new questions have arisen for bioethics and new sub-disciplines such as neuroethics and public health ethics have entered the scene. This volume features ten original essays on five cutting-edge controversies in bioethics written by leading philosophers. I. Research Ethics: How Should We Justify Ancillary Care Duties? II. Clinical Ethics: Are Psychopaths Morally Accountable? III. Reproductive Ethics: Is There A Solution to the Non-Identity Problem? IV. Neuroethics: What is Addiction and Does It Excuse? V. Public Health Ethics: Is Luck Egalitarianism Implausibly Harsh? S. Matthew Liao and Collin O'Neil's concise introduction to the essays in the volume, the annotated bibliographies and study questions for each controversy, and the supplemental guide to additional current controversies in bioethics give the reader a broad grasp of the different kinds of challenges in bioethics.
A thought provoking examination of the interrelationship between and among feminist bioethics, human rights, and global development, Linking Visions addresses global concerns about oppression in the context of health care, medical research, and population health. Reflecting the ever-expanding diversity and comprehensiveness of feminist bioethics, contributors examine such topics as reproductive rights of women in India, HIV/AIDs policies, patenting genetic material, the language of human rights, and consequences of the OGlobal Gag RuleO. Linking Visions demonstrates the far-reaching effects of feminism on global bioethics, highlighting and celebrating the reality that feminist work is no longer relegated solely to the realm of reproductive, sexual, or maternal ethics.
In a critical intervention into the bioethics debate over human enhancement, philosopher Melinda Hall tackles the claim that the expansion and development of human capacities is a moral obligation. Hall draws on French philosopher Michel Foucault to reveal and challenge the ways disability is central to the conversation. The Bioethics of Enhancement includes a close reading and analysis of the last century of enhancement thinking and contemporary transhumanist thinkers, the strongest promoters of the obligation to pursue enhancement technology. With specific attention to the work of bioethicists Nick Bostrom and Julian Savulescu, the book challenges the rhetoric and strategies of enhancement thinking. These include the desire to transcend the body and decide who should live in future generations through emerging technologies such as genetic selection. Hall provides new analyses rethinking both the philosophy of enhancement and disability, arguing that enhancement should be a matter of social and political interventions, not genetic and biological interventions. Hall concludes that human vulnerability and difference should be cherished rather than extinguished. This book will be of interest to academics working in bioethics and disability studies, along with those working in Continental philosophy (especially on Foucault).
What do you think about cloning, stem cell research, brain enhancement, or doing experiments on newly dead patients? Read Smart Mice, Not so Smart People and you'll know what Art Caplan thinks. But this assortment of pithy, provocative opinions on all things bioethical does more than simply give you a piece of the author's mind-it also invites and even dares you to make up your own mind. In his typical style, Caplan-one of the most sought-after bioethicists of our time-provokes discussion on issues at the center of the new genetics, cloning in the laboratory and in the media, stem cell research, experiments on human subjects, blood donation and organ transplantation, and healthcare delivery. Are new developments in these areas good or bad? As an engaged citizen in a democratic society, it is your responsibility to decide. This book will help you do it.
With implications that go to the core of what it means to be human, the issues raised by genetic manipulation–especially cloning–have sparked a passionate debate among governmental, religious, and scientific quarters, as well as the media and the general public. Keeping to the actual science rather than speculation is of the utmost importance for an enlightened approach to this weighty discussion. In clear, lively prose, The Science and Ethics of Engineering the Human Germ Line: Mendel’s Maze provides an authoritative treatment of the principles of science and bioethics that bear upon such technologies as germ-line insertion and cloning. It offers a realistic assessment of possible applications, limitations, and new developments likely to arise in these areas. Written by a top physician-investigator, this book progresses from the basics of building a living organism from inanimate parts through to recombinant DNA technology, assisted reproductive technologies, and gene transfer and germ-line engineering. Ethical considerations are woven into this material throughout, while a special section covers the intellectual role played by various social biases. As genetic and reproductive technologies spread from the laboratory to the clinic–and society takes further notice–students and practitioners of biology and medicine, as well as the interested general reader, will find The Science and Ethics of Engineering the Human Germ Line: Mendel’s Maze to be an essential and accessible guide to these important subjects.
Vexing Nature? On the Ethical Case Against Agricultural Biotechnology is a collection of philosophical essays on the ethical dimensions of agricultural biotechnology and genetically modified (GM) crops. Agricultural biotechnology refers to a diverse set of industrial techniques used to produce genetically modified foods. Genetically modified (GM) crops are plants manipulated at the molecular level to enhance their value to farmers and consumers. The ethical issues discussed in Vexing Nature? On the Ethical Case Against Agricultural Biotechnology are diverse and complex. Comstock addresses such concerns as the possibility of genetic engineering producing unanticipated allergens in previously safe foods, unexpectedly toxic health supplements, novel GM diseases, environmental catastrophe, bizarre new lines of animals possessing genes taken from humans, exceedingly wealthy corporations more powerful than the nations trying to regulate them, bankrupted family farmers in the US and Europe, exploited peasant farmers in developing countries, inhumanely treated animals in our labs and on our farms, and corrupted attitudes to nature among our children. In a fascinating narrative account of a journey that began in 1988 and ended twelve years later, Comstock tells the story of how he, an early and somewhat vocal critic of agricultural biotechnology, changed his mind about the ethical acceptability of GM organisms (GMO). Once tempted to oppose all uses of genetic engineering in agriculture, Comstock came to believe that many uses are morally justifiable, and even required. Vexing Nature? On the Ethical Case Against Agricultural Biotechnology explains his early, anti-GMO, position; the ethical, environmental, economic, social justice and animal rights arguments that led him to reverse himself; and the implications of his new position for public policy.
The goal of this open access book is to develop an approach to clinical health care ethics that is more accessible to, and usable by, health professionals than the now-dominant approaches that focus, for example, on the application of ethical principles. The book elaborates the view that health professionals have the emotional and intellectual resources to discuss and address ethical issues in clinical health care without needing to rely on the expertise of bioethicists. The early chapters review the history of bioethics and explain how academics from outside health care came to dominate the field of health care ethics, both in professional schools and in clinical health care. The middle chapters elaborate a series of concepts, drawn from philosophy and the social sciences, that set the stage for developing a framework that builds upon the individual moral experience of health professionals, that explains the discontinuities between the demands of bioethics and the experience and perceptions of health professionals, and that enables the articulation of a full theory of clinical ethics with clinicians themselves as the foundation. Against that background, the first of three chapters on professional education presents a general framework for teaching clinical ethics; the second discusses how to integrate ethics into formal health care curricula; and the third addresses the opportunities for teaching available in clinical settings. The final chapter, "Empowering Clinicians", brings together the various dimensions of the argument and anticipates potential questions about the framework developed in earlier chapters.
The rapid advances made in genetic research and technology over the last few decades have led to a host of important discoveries that have allowed for the detection (and hopefully soon the treatment) of a number of genetic conditions and diseases. Not surprisingly, these advances have also raised numerous ethical concerns about how result ing technologies will be implemented, and the impact they will have on different com munities. One particular concern is the enormous costs involved in conducting genetic research and the fact that the private sector has become heavily involved; the desire to commercialize the results and technology derived from genetic research is considered problematic. In September 1998, the Second International Conference on DNA Sampling, titled "The Commercialization of Genetic Research: Ethical, Legal and Policy Issues," was held of the conference, and of this book, was to in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. The goal facilitate an interdisciplinary discussion of the legal, ethical, and policy implications arising from the commercialization of genetic research. We solicited contributions for the book from authors in fields as diverse as ethics, law, medicine, health policy, and the social sciences. The papers included, while based on presentations given at the conference, have been substantially expanded and enhanced by the commentary received and discussions held at the conference."
This book is the second collection of essays on reproductive ethics from Drs. Campo-Engelstein and Burcher. This volume is unique in that it is both timely and includes several essays on new technologies, while also being a comprehensive review of most of the major questions in the field, from racial disparities in reproductive healthcare to gene editing and the possibility of the creation of a transhuman species. The scholars writing these essays are pre-eminent in their fields, and their backgrounds are quite varied, including philosophers, anthropologists, physicians, and professors of law. Reproductive ethics remains an underdeveloped area of bioethics despite the recent technological breakthroughs that carry both great promise and potential threats. Building on the first volume of work from a conference held just over one year ago, this new collection of essays from a conference held April 2017 continues this discussion as well as provides ethical insights and reviews of these emerging technologies. The ethical questions swirling around human reproduction are both old and new, but the conference presentations, and the essays derived from them, focus on new ways of appreciating old arguments such as the ethics of abortion, as well as new ways of seeing new technologies such as CRISPR and mitochondrial transfer.
This title was first published in 2002: This volume discusses the subject of biomedical ethics. Various views, historical and contemporary, are discussed, with the editors using the contrasting concepts in the shift from paternalism to autonomy in 20th-century medicine as a heuristic tool for the critical study of ethics in medicine.As far as the evidence in this volume goes, paternalistic medical practices and patient autonomy had an uneasy relationship by the beginning of the 20th century. A hundred years later, full autonomy in decisions on medical treatment is still subject to numerous caveats. The text pays close attention to the interplay between various players, noting how factors such as social contexts, governmental organizations and the biotechnological industry influence and shape responses to the principle of bioethics.
Islamic Bioethics presents a wide variety of perspectives and debates on how Islamic societies deal with the ethical dilemmas raised by biomedicine and new technologies. The book is a 'constructive dialogue' between contributors selected from a multidisciplinary group of Muslim and non-Muslim scholars from different Islamic countries. The 11 chapters illuminate the diversity and complexity of the issues discussed in Islamic bioethics and pave the way to a better understanding of Islamic bioethics and dialogue in the global bioethics community. The chapters take both theoretical and practical approaches to the topic, and each covers an emerging issue in Islamic bioethics.This book will be useful for academics and professional institutions in both Islamic and non-Islamic countries, and will be instrumental in providing researchers, scholars, students, policymakers and medical professionals with access to the latest issues and debates related to Islamic bioethics.Contributors include: Tariq Ramadan, Abdallah Daar, Ali Albar, Mohsin Ebrahim, Baharouddin Azizan Alastair Campbel, Bagher Larijani, Carol Taylor, Gamal Serour, James Rusthoven, Ilhan Ilkilic, Ingrid Mattson, Hassan Chamsi-Pasha, Jonathan Crane, Hakan Ertin, Mehunisha Suleman.
Attitudes towards science, medicine and the body are all profoundly shaped by people's worldviews. When discussing issues of bioethics, religion often plays a major role. In this volume, the role of genetic manipulation and neurotechnology in shaping human identity is examined from multiple religious perspectives. This can help us to understand how religion might affect the impact of the initiatives such as the UNESCO Declaration in Bioethics and Human Rights. The book features bioethics experts from six major religions: Buddhism, Confucianism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Judaism. It includes a number of distinct religious and cultural views on the anthropological, ethical and social challenges of emerging technologies in the light of human rights and in the context of global bioethics. The contributors work together to explore issues such as: cultural attitudes to gene editing; neuroactive drugs; the interaction between genes and behaviours; the relationship between the soul, the mind and DNA; and how can clinical applications of these technologies benefit the developing world. This is a significant collection, demonstrating how religion and modern technologies relate to one another. It will, therefore, be of great interest to academics working in bioethics, religion and the body, interreligious dialogue, and religion and science, technology and neuroscience.
Government agencies and commissions, courts, and legislatures have during the past several decades produced reports, rendered decisions, and passed laws that have both defined the fundamental issues in the field of bioethics and established ways of managing them in our society. Providing a history of these key bioethical decisions, this Source Book in Bioethics is the first and only comprehensive collection of the critical public documents in biomedical ethics, including many hard-to-find or out-of-print materials. Covering the period from 1947 to 1995, this volume brings together core legislative documents, court briefs, and reports by professional organizations, public bodies, and governments around the world. Sections on human experimentation, care of the terminally ill, genetics, human reproduction, and emerging areas in bioethics include such pivotal works as "The Nuremberg Code," "The Tuskegee Report," and "In the Matter of Baby M," as well less readily available documents as "The Declaration of Inuyama," the Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences statement on genetic engineering, and "The Warnock Committee Report" on reproductive technologies from the United Kingdom. Three eminent scholars in the field provide brief introductions to each document explaining the significance of these classic sources. This historical volume will be a standard text for courses in bioethics, health policy, and death and dying, and a primary reference for anyone interested in this increasingly relevant field.
Advances in genetics and related biotechnologies are having a profound effect on sport, raising important ethical questions about the limits and possibilities of the human body. Drawing on real case studies and grounded in rigorous scientific evidence, this book offers an ethical critique of current practices and explores the intersection of genetics, ethics and sport. Written by two of the world's leading authorities on the ethics of biotechnology in sport, the book addresses the philosophical implications of the latest scientific developments and technological data. Distinguishing fact from popular myth and science fiction, it covers key topics such as the genetic basis of sport performance and the role of genetic testing in talent identification and development. Its ten chapters discuss current debates surrounding issues such as the shifting relationship between genetics, sports medicine and sports science, gene enhancement, gene transfer technology, doping and disability sport. The first book to be published on this important subject in more than a decade, this is fascinating reading for anyone with an interest in the ethics of sport, bioethics or sport performance.
The ethics of creating-or declining to create-human beings has been addressed in several contexts: debates over abortion and embryo research; literature on "self-creation"; and discussions of procreative rights and responsibilities, genetic engineering, and future generations. Here, for the first time, is a sustained, scholarly analysis of all of these issues-a discussion combining breadth of topics with philosophical depth, imagination with current scientific understanding, argumentative rigor with accessibility. The overarching aim of Creation Ethics is to illuminate a broad array of issues connected with reproduction and genetics, through the lens of moral philosophy. With novel frameworks for understanding prenatal moral status and human identity, and exceptional fairness to those holding different views, David DeGrazia sheds new light on the ethics of abortion and embryo research, genetic enhancement and prenatal genetic interventions, procreation and parenting, and decisions that affect the quality of life of future generations. Along the way, he helpfully introduces personal identity theory and value theory as well as such complex topics as moral status, wrongful life, and the "nonidentity problem." The results include a subjective account of human well-being, a standard for responsible procreation and parenting, and a theoretical bridge between consequentialist and nonconsequentialist ethical theories. The upshot is a synoptic, mostly liberal vision of the ethics of creating human beings. "This is a valuable book on a fascinating topic, written by a major figure in the field. The topic of the ethics of creating people is both practically urgent, as new technologies develop for shaping human offspring, and also of great theoretical importance for ethics and meta-ethics because it engages the deepest issues, including those of moral status, the nature of justice, and identity. DeGrazia has already proved to be an important force in shaping the debate regarding these issues. Anyone writing on this topic will have to address this book head-on. The style is remarkably lucid and almost jargon-free. Given that the book is filled with complex, sustained argumentation, this is quite an accomplishment. This book will be of interest to legal scholars, philosophers working in normative ethics, meta-ethics, and bioethics, and public policy scholars." - Allen Buchanan, James B. Duke Professor of Philosophy, Duke University
This textbook does not focus on one major world religion, but uniquely looks more broadly to demonstrate the relevance and importance of ethics based in a variety of religious traditions. Each chapter includes a helpful pedagogy including a general overview, case studies, suggestions for further reading, questions for discussion, and a chronological structure, making this the ideal textbook for students approaching the topic for the first time. Explores controversial topics such as CRISPR, vegetarianism, nuclear weapons, women's leadership, and reparations for slavery, which are engaging topics for students and will instigate debate.
Bioethics has long been accepted as an interdisciplinary field. The recent 'empirical turn' in bioethics is, however, creating challenges that move beyond those of simple interdisciplinary collaboration, as researchers grapple with the methodological, empirical and meta-ethical challenges of combining the normative and the empirical, as well as navigating the difficulties that can arise from attempts to transcend traditional disciplinary boundaries. Empirical Bioethics: Theoretical and Practical Perspectives brings together contributions from leading experts in the field which speak to these challenges, providing insight into how they can be understood and suggestions for how they might be overcome. Combining discussions of meta-ethical challenges, examples of different methodologies for integrating empirical and normative research, and reflection on the challenges of conducting and publishing such work, this book will both introduce the novice to the field and challenge the expert.
Emerging medical technologies are changing our views on human nature and what it means to be alive, healthy, and leading a good life. Reproductive technologies, genetic diagnosis, organ transplantation, and psychopharmacological drugs all raise existential questions that need to be tackled by way of philosophical analysis. Yet questions regarding the meaning of life have been strangely absent from medical ethics so far. This book brings phenomenology, the main player in the continental tradition of philosophy, to bioethics, and it does so in a comprehensive and clear manner. Starting out by analysing illness as an embodied, contextualized, and narrated experience, the book addresses the role of empathy, dialogue, and interpretation in the encounter between health-care professional and patient. Medical science and emerging technologies are then brought to scrutiny as endeavours that bring enormous possibilities in relieving human suffering but also great risks in transforming our fundamental life views. How are we to understand and deal with attempts to change the predicaments of coming to life and the possibilities of becoming better than well or even, eventually, surviving death? This is the first book to bring the phenomenological tradition, including philosophers such as Martin Heidegger, Edith Stein, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Jean-Paul Sartre, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Paul Ricoeur, Hans Jonas, and Charles Taylor, to answer such burning questions.
What do you think about cloning, stem cell research, brain enhancement, or doing experiments on newly dead patients? Read Smart Mice, Not so Smart People and you'll know what Art Caplan thinks. But this assortment of pithy, provocative opinions on all things bioethical does more than simply give you a piece of the author's mind--it also invites and even dares you to make up your own mind. In his typical style, Caplan--one of the most sought-after bioethicists of our time--provokes discussion on issues at the center of the new genetics, cloning in the laboratory and in the media, stem cell research, experiments on human subjects, blood donation and organ transplantation, and healthcare delivery. Are new developments in these areas good or bad? As an engaged citizen in a democratic society, it is your responsibility to decide. This book will help you do it.
Islamic Perspectives on the Principles of Biomedical Ethics presents results from a pioneering seminar in 2013 between Muslim religious scholars, biomedical scientists, and Western bioethicists at the research Center for Islamic Legislation & Ethics, Qatar Faculty of Islamic Studies. By examining principle-based bioethics, the contributors to this volume addressed a number of key issues related to the future of the field. Discussion is based around the role of religion in bioethical reasoning, specifically from an Islamic perspective. Also considered is a presentation of the concept of universal principles for bioethics, with a response looking at the possibility (or not) of involving religion. Finally, there is in-depth analysis of how far specific disciplines within the Islamic tradition - such as the higher objectives of Sharia (maqasid al-Shari'ah) and legal maxims (qawa'id fiqhiyah) - can enrich principle-based bioethics.
How does biotechnology touch on human destiny? What are its promises and challenges? In search for a response, the present volume turns to the thought of Hans Jonas, one of the pioneers and founding fathers of bioethics. The continued relevance of his ideas is exemplified by the way Jurgen Habermas applies them to the current debate. The chief promise of biotechnology is to increase our freedom by overcoming the limits of the human condition. The main risk of biotechnology, as both Jonas and Habermas see it, is to diminish or outright abolish our capacity for responsibility and morality. It is argued that the greater freedom is not simply freedom from constraints but freedom for our destiny: the freedom to be the benevolent, responsible, and spontaneous authors of our lives, capable of communion and love. The touchstone for evaluating any biotechnological procedure has to be this greater freedom.
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