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"We face unprecedented choices in genetics for which traditional ethics provides little direct guidance. What role can the religious community play in addressing the ethical and theological issues that even scientists now acknowledge as urgent?"--cover.
Life is a gift that includes powers to be used and celebrated, but that doesn't necessarily justify the use of every new power that comes along. This volume appeals to both secular and religious readers in the centre of the great debate over our new genetic powers. These essays affirm many traditional Christian perspectives and virtues, while also introducing new insights. transfer, genetic manipulation, patenting, health insurance and the moral status of embryos. They conclude that it is naive to either to reject outright or wholeheartedly embrace the new genetic powers. In fact, sometimes the best we can expect is to learn how to cope with moral uncertainty.
Developments in biotechnology, such as cloning and the decoding of the human genome, are generating questions and choices that traditionally have fallen within the realm of religion and philosophy: the definition of human life, human vs. divine control of nature, the relationship between human and non-human life, and the intentional manipulation of the mechanisms of life and death. In Claiming Power over Life, eight contributors challenge policymakers to recognize the value of religious views on biotechnology and discuss how best to integrate the wisdom of the Christian and Jewish traditions into public policy debates. Arguing that civic discourse on the subject has been impoverished by an i...
Our relationship to future generations raises fundamental issues for ethical thought, to which a Christian theological response is both possible and significant. A relationship to future generations is implicitly central to many of today's most public controversies - over environmental protection, genetic research, and the purpose of education, to name but a few; but it has received little explicit or extended consideration. In Living for the Future Rachel Muers argues and seeks to demonstrate that to consider future generations as ethically significant is not simply to extend an existing ethical framework, but to rethink how ethics is done. Doing intergenerationally responsible theology and...
The human population's annual total consumption is not sustainable by one planet. This unprecedented situation calls for a reform of religious cultures that promote a large ideal family size. Many observers assume that Christianity is inevitably part of this problem because it promotes "family values" and statistically, in America and elsewhere, has a higher birthrate than nonreligious people. This book explores diverse ideas about human reproduction in the church past and present. It investigates an extreme fringe of U.S. Protestantism, including the Quiverfull movement, that use Old Testament "fruitful" verses to support natalist ideas explicitly promoting higher fecundity. It also challen...
This important book focuses on how newly emerging institutions for future generations can contribute to tackling large scale global environmental problems, such as threats to biodiversity and climate change. It is especially timely given the new global impetus for decarbonisation, as well as the huge growth of climate litigation and climate protest movements, often led by young people.
What do we owe future people? Intergenerational ethics is of great philosophical and practical importance, given human beings' ability to affect not only the quality of life of future people, but also how many of them there will be (if any at all). This book develops a distinctly contractualist answer to this question--we need to justify our actions to them on grounds they could not reasonably reject. The book explores what future people could or could not reasonably reject in terms of intergenerational resource distribution, individual procreative decisions, optimal population size, and risk imposition.
An ideal introduction to health care ethics for students who are unfamiliar with the subject area. Author-ethicists Michael Panicola, David Belde, John Paul Slosar, and Mark Repenshek have crafted a text grounded in rich theological and philosophical traditions and presented in an engaging manner. This text provides students with an understanding of the foundational aspects of health care ethics and leads them into a discussion of contemporary issues through the use of timely and challenging case studies. A unique focus on discernment and decision making brings the material to life for students.
This collection of twenty-two research papers explores the creative interaction between evolutionary and molecular biology, philosophy, and theology. It is the result of the third of five international research conferences co-sponsored by the Vatican Observatory, Rome and the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, Berkeley. The over arching goal of these conferences is to support the engagement of constructive theology with the natural sciences and to investigate the philosophical and theological elements in ongoing theoretical research in the natural sciences. Contents: An extensive introduction (Robert John Russell), two recent statements on evolution and Christian faith by Pope Joh...
Publisher description -- The sixteen original essays in this book provide a critical guide to many ethical issues at the heart of genetics technology--and our genetics future. Drawing on fields ranging from medicine and law to religion, health policy, and biotechnology, the essays address the core topics at the heart of current debates: legal, policy, and business dimensions of the genetics revolution; cultural and social implications of genetics; and practical and clinical issues. The essays serve as authoritative guides to current concerns in a wide range of areas, from the impact of genetics on aging and long-term care to the ethics of pharmacogenetics, prenatal screening, and research with children. An epilogue connects ethics discourse to debates on embryonic stem cell research and therapeutic cloning.