Document Detail


How experience confronts ethics.
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  19338522     Owner:  NLM     Status:  MEDLINE    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
Analytic moral philosophy's strong divide between empirical and normative restricts facts to providing information for the application of norms and does not allow them to confront or challenge norms. So any genuine attempt to incorporate experience and empirical research into bioethics--to give the empirical more than the status of mere 'descriptive ethics'--must make a sharp break with the kind of analytic moral philosophy that has dominated contemporary bioethics. Examples from bioethics and science are used to illustrate the problems with the method of application that philosophically prevails in both domains and with the conception of rationality that underlies this method. Cues from how these problems can be handled in science then introduce summaries of richer, more productive naturalist and constructivist accounts of reason and normative knowledge. Liberated by a naturalist approach to ethics and an enlarged conception of rationality, empirical work can be recognized not just as essential to bioethics but also as contributing to normative knowledge.
Authors:
Barry Hoffmaster; Cliff Hooker
Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article; Review    
Journal Detail:
Title:  Bioethics     Volume:  23     ISSN:  1467-8519     ISO Abbreviation:  Bioethics     Publication Date:  2009 May 
Date Detail:
Created Date:  2009-04-02     Completed Date:  2009-08-07     Revised Date:  2009-11-19    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  8704792     Medline TA:  Bioethics     Country:  England    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  214-25     Citation Subset:  E; IM    
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. choffmas@uwo.ca
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MeSH Terms
Descriptor/Qualifier:
Decision Making / ethics
Empirical Research*
Empiricism*
Ethical Analysis
Ethical Theory
Ethics, Medical*
Genetic Counseling / ethics
Humans
Judgment / ethics
Knowledge
Logic
Morals
Principle-Based Ethics
Problem Solving / ethics
Science / ethics
Social Values

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine


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