THE FOOTHOLDS OF AN INTEGRATIVE BIOETHICS IN THE WORK OF VAN RENSSELAER POTTER

Hrvoje Jurić

DOI Number
10.22190/FULP1702127J
First page
127
Last page
144

Abstract


Regardless of the still persistent tendencies to narrow the concept of bioethics down to (bio)medical or even clinical bioethics, it is clear that today’s bioethics integrates discussions of a much wider range of issues – from bio-medical to global-ecological. The broadening of the field of bioethics is the result of the insight that the issues of the techno-scientific era humanity faces are interwoven with the issues that regard other living beings and nature as a whole. This insight into the interweavement of the issues involved (and the interweavement of the relationships themselves within the living world) has brought about the networking of various sciences, professions and non-scientific views, which we know under the names of multi-, inter- and trans-disciplinarity, and pluriperspectivism. However, bioethics should not be satisfied with a mere mechanical gathering of various disciplinal views and worldviews, but should aspire after real integration, the shaping of a unified platform for discussion of the ethical problems regarding life in all its forms, shapes, degrees, stages and manifestations. Developing the starting premises of this platform is the task of “integrative bioethics”. In order to do so, taking account of the work of Van Rensselaer Potter cannot be avoided, since his idea of bioethics and the development of his bioethical thought extensively coincide with what bioethics generally means, as well as with its historical transformations: from the moment he coined the term ‘bioethics’, through having founded so-called “bridge bioethics” to the reformulation and expansion of the contents of bioethics into so-called “global bioethics”. The aim of this paper is to examine the extent to which Potter’s work can serve as a stimulus and be the foothold of the goal to establish bioethics as integrative bioethics.

Keywords

bioethics, integrative bioethics, interdisciplinarity, pluriperspectivity, Van Rensselaer Potter

Full Text:

PDF

References


Baranzke, H. (2002). Würde der Kreatur? Die Idee der Würde im Horizont der Bioethik, Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg.

Bauby, J.-D. (1997). The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Alfred A. Knopf, New York.

Beauchamp, T. L., Childress, J. F. (1994). Principles of Biomedical Ethics, Oxford University Press, New York.

Beauchamp, T. L. (1996). Načela u bioetici (Principles in Bioethics), Društvena istraživanja Vol. 5, No. 3–4, 1996, pp. 533–544.

Berthold, D. (2004). Aldo Leopold: In Search of a Poetic Science, Human Ecology Review, Vol. 11, No. 3, 2004, pp. 205–214.

Callahan, D. (1988). The Development of Biomedical Ethics in the United States. In Callahan, D., Dunstan, G. R. (eds.), Biomedical Ethics: An Anglo-American Dialogue, New York Academy of Sciences, New York, 1988, pp. 1–3.

Callahan, D. (1995). Bioethics. In Reich, W. Th. (ed.), Encyclopedia of Bioethics, Vol. I, Macmillan, New York, 1995, pp. 247–256.

Callicott, J. B. (1987). The Land Aesthetic. In Callicott, J. B. (ed.), Companion to A Sand County Almanac. Interpretative and Critical Essays, The University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1987, pp. 131–171.

Čović, A. (1998a). La biopoétique et la bioéthique dans la prose existentiale de J.-D. Bauby Le scaphandre et le papillon, Synthesis philosophica, Vol. 13, No. 1, 1998, pp. 269–283.

Čović, A. (1998b). Wissen und Moralität, Synthesis philosophica, Vol. 13, No. 2, 1998, pp. 547–566.

Čović, A. (2005). Bioethik unter den Bedingungen des Postkommunismus – Fallbeispiel Kroatien. In Čović, A., Hoffman, Th. S. (eds.), Bioethik und kulturelle Pluralität. Die südosteuropäische Perspektive, Academia Verlag, Sankt Augustin, 2005, pp. 148–172.

Engelhardt, H. T. (1988). Foreword. In Potter, V. R., Global Bioethics: Building on the Leopold Legacy, Michigan State University Press, East Lansing, 1988, pp. VII–XII.

Fox, M. W. (2000). Bringing Life to Ethics. Global Bioethics for a Humane Society, State University of New York Press, New York.

Höffe, O., ed. (1997). Lexikon der Ethik, Beck, München.

Hoffmann, Th. S. (2005). Zur Aktualität Kants für die Bioethik, Synthesis philosophica, Vol. 20, No. 1, 2005, pp. 121–140.

Jonas, H. (1984). Das Prinzip Verantwortung: Versuch einer Ethik für die technologische Zivilisation, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt a. M.

Kuhse, H., Singer, P., eds. (2003). Bioethics: An Anthology, Blackwell, Malden et al.

Kuhse, H., Singer, P., eds. (2004). A Companion to Bioethics, Blackwell, Malden et al.

Leopold, A. (1987). A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There, Oxford University Press, New York.

Midgley, M. (2001). Science and Poetry, Routledge, London.

Pieper, A., Thurnherr, U., eds. (1998). Angewandte Ethik: Eine Einführung, Beck, München.

Potter, V. R. (1970a). Bioethics: The Science of Survival, Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, Vol. 14, No. 1, 1970, pp. 127–153.

Potter, V. R. (1970b). Biocybernetics and Survival, Zygon – Journal of Religion & Science, Vol. 5., No. 3, 1970, pp. 229–246.

Potter, V. R. (1971). Bioethics: Bridge to the Future, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs.

Potter, V. R. (1988). Global Bioethics: Building on the Leopold Legacy, Michigan State University Press, East Lansing.

Potter, V. R. (2001). Global Bioethics Final Message. http://www.mcardle.wisc.edu/faculty/bio/PotterGlobalBioethics.html.

Rehmann-Sutter, Ch. (2002). Bioethik. In Düwell, M., Hübenthal, Ch., Werner, M. H. (eds.), Handbuch Ethik, Metzler, Stuttgart, Weimar, 2002, pp. 247–252.

Reich, W. Th. (1995). Introduction. In Reich W. Th. (ed.), Encyclopedia of Bioethics, Vol. I, Macmillan, New York, 1995, pp. IX-XXXII.

Siep, L. (1998). Bioethik. In Pieper A., Thurnherr, U. (eds.), Angewandte Ethik: Eine Einführung, Beck, München, 1998, pp. 16–36.

Singer, P. (1993). Practical Ethics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Šegota, I. (1999). Van Rensselaer Potter II: ‘Father’ of Bioethics, Synthesis philosophica, Vol. 14, No. 1–2, 1999, pp. 169–182.

Trosko, J. E., Pitot, H. C. (2003). In Memoriam: Professor Emeritus Van Rensselaer Potter II (1911–2001), Cancer Research, Vol. 63, No. 7, 2001, p. 1724.

Whitehouse, P. J. (2003). The Rebirth of Bioethics: Extending the Original Formulations of Van Rensselaer Potter, The American Journal of Bioethics, Vol. 3, No. 4, 2003, pp. 26–31.

Zimmerman, M. E. (1983). Toward a Heideggerean Ethos for Radical Environmentalism, Environmental Ethics, Vol. 5, No. 2, 1983, pp. 99–131.

Zimmerman, M. E. (1993). Rethinking the Heidegger-Deep Ecology Relationship, Environmental Ethics, Vol. 15, No. 3, 1993, pp. 195–224.

Zimmerman, M. E. (1997). Heidegger and Deep Ecology. In Embree, L. et al. (eds.), Encyclopedia of Phenomenology, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, 1997, pp. 137–141.




DOI: https://doi.org/10.22190/FULP1702127J

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


ISSN 1450-5517 (Print)
ISSN 2406-1786 (Online)