Bioethics: Ancient Themes in Contemporary IssuesMark G. Kuczewski, Ronald M. Polansky MIT Press, 2000 - 304 pagine In recent years, bioethicists have worked on government commissions, on ethics committees in hospitals and nursing homes, and as bedside consultants. Because ethical knowledge is based on experience within the field rather than on universal theoretical propositions, it is open to criticism for its lack of theoretical foundation. Once in the clinic, however, ethicists noted the extent to which medical practice itself combined the certitudes of science with craft forms of knowledge. In an effort to forge a middle path between pure science and applied medical and ethical knowledge, bioethicists turned to the work of classical philosophy, especially the theme of a practical wisdom that entails a variable knowledge of particulars. In this book contemporary bioethicists and scholars of ancient philosophy explore the import of classical ethics on such pressing bioethical concerns as managed care, euthanasia, suicide, and abortion. Although the contributors write within the limits of their own disciplines, through cross references and counterarguments they engage in fruitful dialogue. |
Sommario
Remembering the Hippocratics Knowledge Practice and Ethos of Ancient Greek PhysicianHealers | 3 |
Is Medicine Art Science or Practical Wisdom? Ancient and Contemporary Reflections | 31 |
Phronesis and the Misdescription of Medicine Against The Medical School Commencement Speech | 57 |
Aristotle Phronesis and Postmodern Bioethics | 67 |
Confessions of an Unrepentant Sophist | 93 |
Philosophical Therapy Ancient and Modern | 109 |
The Heuristic Value of Classical Approaches | 129 |
Thrasymachus and Managed Care How Not to Think about the Craft of Medicine | 131 |
Potentiality and Persons An Aristotelian Perspective | 155 |
Can Communitarianism End the Shrill and Interminable Public Debates? Abortion as a CaseinPoint | 179 |
Classical and Modern Reflections on Medical Ethics and the Best Interests of the Sick Child | 193 |
Facing Death Like a Stoic Epictetus on Suicide in the Case of Illness | 229 |
Euthanasia and the Physicians Role Reflections on Some Views in the Ancient Greek Tradition | 251 |
Contributors | 291 |
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