The Ethics of De-Extinction

NanoEthics 8 (2):165-178 (2014)
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Abstract

“de-extinction” refers to the process of resurrecting extinct species by genetic methods. This science-fiction-sounding idea is in fact already in early processes of scientific implementation. Although this recent “revival of the dead” raises deep ethical questions, the ethics of de-extinction has barely received philosophical treatment. Rather than seeking a verdict for or against de-extinction, this paper attempts an overview and some novel analyses of the main ethical considerations. Five dimensions of the ethics of de-extinction are explored: (a) the possible contribution of de-extinction to promoting ecological values, (b) the deontological argument that we owe de-extinction to species we rendered extinct, (c) the question of “playing God” through de-extinction, (d) the utilitarian perspective, and (e) the role of aesthetic considerations in the ethics of de-extinction. A general feature arising from the paper’s discussion is that, due to de-extinction’s special character, it repeatedly tests the limits of our ethical notions

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Shlomo Cohen
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

Citations of this work

Won’t Somebody Please Think of the Mammoths? De-extinction and Animal Welfare.Heather Browning - 2018 - Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 31 (6):785-803.
The ethics of species extinctions.Anna Wienhues, Patrik Baard, Alfonso Donoso & Markku Oksanen - 2023 - Cambridge Prisms: Extinction 1 (e23):1–15.
Why Wake the Dead? Identity and De-extinction.Christopher Hunter Lean - 2020 - Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 33 (3):571-589.

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Reasons and Persons.Derek Parfit - 1984 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.
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Practical Ethics.Peter Singer - 1979 - New York: Cambridge University Press. Edited by Susan J. Armstrong & Richard George Botzler.

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