Expanding Horizons in Bioethics

ISBN-13: 9781402030611 / Angielski / Twarda / 2005 / 255 str.

Arthur W. Galston; Arthur W. Galston; Christiana Z. Peppard

Opis

Like its predecessor, New Dimensions in Bioethics, this volume developed out of a series of lectures at Yale University's Institution for Social and Policy Studies. Each speaker in the Bioethics & Public Policy Seminar Series was invited because of her or his expertise in a given area of bioethics. Each of the more successful participants was invited to contribute a manuscript for publication. The essays are bound together by the application of an ethical analysis to scientific questions, and by consideration of policy implications. At its inception, bioethics was virtually synonymous with medical ethics. As the field grew and attracted new practitioners, it became clear that other applications of this new subject required extension of its scope. For example, environmental ethics, propelled by such authors as Aldo Leopold and Rachel Carson, quickly developed a vigorous literature of its own. More recently, developments in the analysis of the human genome, the enticing medical possibilities offered by the therapeutic use of stem cells, the complexities surrounding the cloning of animals and possibly humans and the development of transgenic agricultural crops have given new impetus to the expansion of traditional bioethical horizons. Bioethics must now adjust to these new realities, for it is clear that public interest in the field is growing as these new challenges appear.

Recenzje

From a pre-publication review:
"The collection of essays makes an original contribution through the generally very high standard of scholarship of the papers, and through the engagement by those authors with very contemporary issues in bioethics... It is rare that so many highly original views are collected in one volume."

Spis treści

Contributors. Acknowledgements. Preface, Arthur Galston. Introduction, Christiana Peppard. I. Science and Society. The Past, Present and Future of Human Nature, Samuel Gorovitz. Unethical Contexts for Ethical Questions, David Ehrenfeld. Human Subject Protections: Some Thoughts on Costs and Benefits in the Humanistic Disciplines, C. Kristina Gunsalus. Secret State Experiments and Medical Ethics, Jonathan Moreno. Cross-Cultural Considerations in Medical Ethics: The Case of Human Subjects Research, Marcia Angell. II. Medical Ethics. Reproductive Rights and Health in the Developing World, Ruth Macklin. Genetic Testing of Human Embryos: Ethical Challenges and Policy Choices, Kathy Hudson, Susannah Baruch & Gail Javitt. Choosing Our Children: The Uneasy Alliance of Law and Ethics in John Robertson’s Thought, Karen Lebacqz. The Heart Disease Epidemic That Wasn't: Lessons Learned from Death Certificate Statistics, Harry M. Rosenberg. Recent History of End-of-Life Care and Implications for the Future, James Flory & Ezekiel Emanuel. III. Environmental Ethics. The Pragmatic Power and Promise of Theoretical Environmental Ethics: Forging a New Discourse, J. Baird Callicott. The Expanding Circle and Moral Community—Naturally Speaking, Chalmers Clark. Science, Conservation and Global Security, George M. Woodwell. Energy, Technology and Climate: Running Out of Gas, David Goodstein. Index.

Blurb

What are the resources and needs, the strengths and the vulnerabilities of patients, of society, or of nature? How do we evaluate the societal potential of scientific discovery?

It is fairly well assured that we are influencing the terms of existence of many inhabitants of this planet, from flora to fauna to humans. Moreover, history has shown that while technologies can be used neutrally, they can be (and have been) used to the great benefit – or the great detriment – of human life and the fate of the world as a whole. How various types of knowledge and technological ability will be deployed is up to us, individually and collectively. How such information and ability should be deployed, and for what reasons, are questions at the core of bioethical inquiry. These are the "expanding horizons in bioethics" to which this volume refers.

This volume is comprised of fourteen essays. It is a rare gathering of scholarly opinion, featuring well-known experts from a diversity of disciplines. The topics addressed are of immediate concern to the public. The essays ask questions about human nature, genetic technologies, reproductive rights, human subjects research, and environmental issues – all in provocative and challenging new ways. Yet the themes that emerge throughout the volume are of enduring interest to anyone concerned about the interactions of scientific development, ethics, and society.

This volume is of interest to students and teachers of bioethics and related topics, as well as to professionals working in these disciplines.

"The collection of essays makes an original contribution through the generally very high standard of scholarship of the papers, and through the engagement by those authors with very contemporary issues in bioethics… It is rare that so many highly original views are collected in one volume."

Quote from a pre-publication review.