Christian Ethics and Commonsense Morality goes against the grain of various postmodern approaches to morality in contemporary religious ethics. In this book, Jung seeks to provide a new framework in which the nature of common Christian moral beliefs and practices can be given a new meaning. He suggests that, once major philosophical assumptions behind postmodern theories of morality are called into question, we may look at Christian morality in quite a different light. On his account, (...) Christian morality is a historical morality insofar as it is rooted in the rich historical traditions of the Christian church. Yet this kind of historical dependence does not entail the evidential dependence of all moral beliefs on historical traditions. It is possible to argue for the epistemic autonomy of moral beliefs, according to which Christian and other moral beliefs can be justified independently of their historical sources. The particularity of Christian morality lies not in its particular historical sources that also function as the grounds of justification, but rather in its explanatory and motivational capacity to further articulate the kind of moral knowledge that is readily available to most human beings and to enable people to act upon their moral knowledge. (shrink)

Offers an innovative theological look at what family might mean that cuts deeper than current, mostly polarised debates. The book taps literary, artistic and biblical sources and brings them into conversation with family studies from humanities and social science to understand why family is currently a controversial topic.

This book provides both a short history of Christian ethics and looks at itsbasic sources as they arise from Judaism, Greco-Roman ethics, andChristianity.

This fresh analysis of the "state of the question" in Christian ethics charts the course for future study and exploration in the field. Written in honor of James Gustafson, who provides a conclusion, these 22 original and tightly argued essays examine hotly debated controversies on a wide range of topics, from sources of theological ethics to the moral life. At the core of these complementary perspectives is the ever-increasing tension between the particularly of religious and philosophical (...) traditions and the universality of moral discourse. Designed for classroom use. (shrink)

This article explores the process of teaching Christian theological ethics beyond the common focus on European and North American sources. In conversation with moves to decolonise university curricula, the article proposes a theology of listening, an example of a research seminar for master’s and doctoral students at the University of Aberdeen on Christian ethics beyond Europe and North America, and an exploration of broader challenges for the formation of the theologian. The article asks, what can (...) we learn when we give up power and control when teaching and learning theology? How can we shift our methods of knowing and practising theology? We write as theologians from India, Mexico, and the United States living in the United Kingdom. We reflect on forms of exclusion in theological method and formation that arise from colonising, systemic violence, and inequalities. The article considers intercultural challenges when encountering different methods of reflection on the Christian experience. In a search for a more profoundly theological approach, we propose listening to the other as integral to doing theology. In an intercultural move, we draw on Dietrich Bonhoeffer's theology of listening, proposing that theology must be an advent of voices from beyond our usual places and methods. (shrink)

The papyri transmit a part of the testimonia relevant to pre-Socratic philosophy. The ʼCorpus dei Papiri Filosofici‛ takes this material only partly into account. In this volume, a team of specialists discusses some of the most important papyrological texts that are major instruments for reconstructing pre-Socratic philosophy and doxography. Furthermore, these texts help to increase our knowledge of how pre-Socratic thought – through contributions to physics, cosmology, ethics, ontology, theology, anthropology, hermeneutics, and aesthetics – paved the way for the (...) canonic scientific fields of European culture. More specifically, each paper tackles papyrological texts concerning the Orphics, the Milesians, Heraclitus, Empedocles, Anaxagoras, the early Atomists, and the Sophists. For the first time in the field of pre-Socratics studies, several papers are devoted to the Herculanean sources, along with others concerning the Graeco-Egyptian papyri and the Derveni Papyrus. (shrink)

I thought it useful, in responding to the paper written by J.A. Selling, to look at the relation between fundamental and applied ethics and between faith, ethics and science. Not so much because I do not share his opinion — I agree with the content of his paper — nor to limit the reflection to the general ethical foundation, but because the meaning and range of the term ‘Christian ethics’, as it relates to applied ethics, (...) is anything but evident. This is particularly true for ethical judgments within those social sectors where religion no longer plays a commonly accepted role as a public source of legitimation. Does not the communis opinio hold that religious traditions have nothing to contribute to ethics, and certainly to applied ethics, that cannot be known and confirmed from human reason? Therefore, within a pluralistic society, reference to religious arguments in ethical reflection seems more hindersome than helpful when we seek a pragmatic consensus on rational, nonconfessional grounds, and strive towards a common value judgment on matters where religions are not competent.I believe that there are many positive arguments to support this communis opinio. I expect they will be used in our further discussion. When I continue to plead for a countercultural link between the Christian worldview and applied ethics, I do so to clarify the meaning of our position as a Centre. I believe that we must avoid understanding our position only as a sociological or political arrangement. We would do better to wonder whether there is any inherent link between Christianity and applied ethics, and if so, where this link lies. If there is no link, our function is reduced to a sociopolitical arrangement, which I personally would find regrettable. (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to formulate a way of thinking about issues of power, moral identity, and ethical norms by developing a theory of responsibility from a specifically theological viewpoint; the author thereby makes clear the significance for Christian commitment of current reflection on moral responsibility. The concept of responsibility is relatively new in ethics, but the drastic extension of human power through various technological developments has lately thrown into question the way human beings conceive of (...) themselves as morally accountable agents. It is this radical extension of power in our time which poses the need for a new paradigm of responsibility in ethics. Schweiker engages in an informed way with what is therefore a highly topical discussion. By developing a coherent theory of responsibility, and inquiring as to its source, the author demonstrates the unique contribution of Christian faith to ethics in our time. (shrink)

An introduction to Christian ethics that provides a new, constructive framework for Christian moral and political thought. It draws on and integrates classic sources and approaches with contemporary liberationist and critical voices while making the ethical relationship between human and nonhuman life a central concern.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Christian Ethics and Commonsense Morality: An Intuitionist Account by Kevin JungAleksandar S. SantracChristian Ethics and Commonsense Morality: An Intuitionist Account Kevin Jung NEW YORK AND LONDON: ROUTLEDGE, 2014. 202 PP. $145.00In Christian Ethics and Commonsense Morality: An Intuitionist Account, Kevin Jung boldly constructs and defends a commonsense morality of intuition as a plausible ethical theory against both postmodern constructivist ethical systems and narrow (...) objectivist theories. Following the antifoundationalist ethical methods of postmodern approaches to reality and morality in chapter 1 and a moderate defense of realism in chapter 2, Jung attempts to save both objectivity and de-feasibility of moral realistic accounts, offering some modern reinterpretations of moral realism in chapters 3 and 4. All these forms of Wittgensteinian conceptions of realism unsatisfactorily lead to infinite regress in justifying claims because they are grounded only in the wishes, interests, and sentiments of the individual culture and society (60).After a brief introduction to the unique role of emotions in ethical theories, his investigation leads to reconciliation between objectivist naturalistic ethics [End Page 192] and theological forms of ethical theories. Theological ethicists can remain committed to intuitionism (objectivist and naturalistic forms of common morality) refined by particular religious expressions of morality (112). Intuitionism, broadly defined in chapter 7, is described as "initial appearances" (118); moral truths, according to Jung's intuitionist account, are "mediately self-evident" (128), not "immediately," because it still requires careful reflection and cognitive searching for objectivist grounds of morality. Jung's affirmation of the plausibility of intuitionism seems to be a final blow to all forms of postmodern and skeptical accounts of antifoundationalist forms of ethical theories; he successfully defends an intuitionist account of morality against its naturalist and religious critics.The last chapter offers three types of relationship between commonsense morality and Christian morality. The identity model reduces Christian morality to commonsense morality. The two-tier model considers Christian morality to be a superior form of morality with instrumental value of commonsense morality. And, finally, integration, Jung's favorite model, considers commonsense morality as neither identical nor subordinate but central to Christian morality (163). With this he affirms that Christian morality is unique not because of differences in moral beliefs but because "it is fully committed to recognizing the oneness of humanity and the universally accessible nature of basic moral truths for all human beings" (166). Jung's reflection is exceptionally insightful. Building the case as a good lawyer, he leads us to the defenseless nature of constructivist postmodern moral theories and their revisions as well as to a commitment of Christian morality to the objective commonsense morality. On this view, even heroic moral acts based on obedience to God (such as Christian sacrificial love) might be compatible with commonsense morality. It is surprising, however, that Jung never consulted or quoted Bernard Gert's account of the common morality, especially when discussing differences between moral duty and ideals (167). Additionally, Jung's argument that Christian morality is unexceptional since moral knowledge can be obtained through multiple sources in which God also reveals his will (178) does not sufficiently probe into the distinctiveness of God's sometimes radical demands of Jews/Christians (e.g., Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac), which come not from intuitionist accounts of objective natural reason or common sense but from faith. Christian saints are not heroes of general moral example but heroes of faith, a qualitatively different realm of human experience. Still, audiences interested in all aspects of ethics will greatly benefit from this superb engagement with recent discussions. [End Page 193]Aleksandar S. SantracWashington Adventist UniversityCopyright © 2017 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

Military physicians are often perceived to be in a position of ‘dual loyalty’ because they have responsibilities towards their patients but also towards their employer, the military institution. Further, they have to ascribe to and are bound by two distinct codes of ethics, each with its own set of values and duties, that could at first glance be considered to be very different or even incompatible. How, then, can military physicians reconcile these two codes of ethics and their (...) distinct professional/institutional values, and assume their responsibilities towards both their patients and the military institution? To clarify this situation, and to show how such a reconciliation might be possible, we compared the history and content of two national professional codes of ethics: the Defence Ethics of the Canadian Armed Forces and the Code of Ethics of the Canadian Medical Association. Interestingly, even if the medical code is more focused on duties and responsibility while the military code is more focused on core values and is supported by a comprehensive ethical training program, they also have many elements in common. Further, both are based on the same core values of loyalty and integrity, and they are broad in scope but are relatively flexible in application. While there are still important sources of tension between and limits within these two codes of ethics, there are fewer differences than may appear at first glance because the core values and principles of military and medical ethics are not so different. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Christian Ethics in a Technological Age by Brian BrockDavid W. GillChristian Ethics in a Technological Age Brian Brock Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2010. 408 pp. $34.00Brian Brock is a lecturer in moral and practical theology at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, and the author of Singing the Ethos of God: On the Place of Christian Ethics in Scripture (Eerdmans, 2007). Christian (...) class='Hi'>Ethics in a Technological [End Page 188] Age was originally Brock’s doctoral thesis at King’s College, London. Brock begins by highlighting and finding wanting the modern practice of “technology assessment” as epitomized in the establishment of the US Office of Technology Assessment in 1972. We live in a world, a milieu, of ever-multiplying new technologies and technological artifacts. “Technology assessment” attempts to evaluate their impacts as thoroughly as possible through scientific, managerial methods. Costs and benefits, benefits and harms, short-term and long-term, near and distant effects: how can we measure what we know and extrapolate to what we need to know?In part 1 Brock engages in some detail the thinking of Martin Heidegger, George Grant, and Michel Foucault on technology. Although Heidegger and Foucault in particular are not ultimate authorities for Brock, his chapters on their work provide a helpful philosophical critique of the inadequacies of today’s narrow managerial approaches to technological assessment. The real problems lie much deeper: in the ways technology reflects and restructures our whole way of thinking about life, materiality, subjects and objects, and means and ends.Having used Heidegger, Grant, and Foucault to unmask the complex reality of technology in the modern era, Brock turns in part 2 to Augustine, Karl Barth, and Bernd Wannenwetsch to try to build a Christian theological ethics of technology and work that will, in the end, provide a richer texture for our interactions with the questions raised by new technologies. In briefest terms, he argues that our questions and judgments about technology should arise within the church gathered for worship rather than within the management team gathered for measurement of effects. It could be said that in the former it is God who questions technology whereas in the latter technology and its servants constitute an implicit challenge to God and the world external to themselves.Brock’s study will be of particular interest to students of his primary six sources: Heidegger, Grant, Foucault, Augustine, Barth, and Wannenwetsch, whose ideas and quotations dominate the pages of this book. Without any doubt Christian Ethics in a Technological Age is a significant work that deserves careful consideration in graduate seminars and among specialists in the field; nonetheless, I have three criticisms. First, the work would have been much stronger if it demonstrated awareness and understanding of the work of Jacques Ellul, Carl Mitcham, Albert Borgmann, and other leading thinkers in this arena. Second, Brock’s writing style (long, complex Germanic sentence structures, eccentric vocabulary choices such as the recurrent use of “purchase”) gets in the way of successful communication—especially with the very managers and technologists he presumably would like to influence. Third, while sympathizing with his rejection of managerial formulas for analysis, some much more concrete and practical counsel on the implications of his position would have been [End Page 189] helpful. How do trust and trustworthiness get reestablished? How does a worshipping congregation hear God’s guidance about its particular engagements with technologies? We have some eloquent statements of the concepts but little by way of illustration or example.David W. GillGordon-Conwell Theological SeminaryCopyright © 2013 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

Introduction: to the student -- Ethics and Christian ethics -- An overview of ethics -- Definitions -- Subject matter -- Assumptions -- Cautions -- Alternatives to Christian ethics -- Religious systems -- Judaism -- Islam -- Hinduism -- Buddhism -- Humanism -- Objectivism -- Behaviorism -- Alternatives within Christian ethics -- Obedience to external authority -- In Roman Catholicism -- In Protestantism -- Responsibility for personal decisions -- What am I to do? (...) -- What am I to be? -- Transforming society -- Reinhold Neibuhr's "impossible possibility" -- Paul Ramsey's "obedient love" -- James Gustafson's "theocentric ethics" -- Liberation theology -- Ethics and the Christian faith -- Sources of guidance -- The Bible -- The Christian community -- The nature of the church -- The function of the church -- The Christian in the church -- Personal experience -- The use of the mind -- The prompting of the conscience -- The leadership of the spirit -- Biblical ethics -- The Hebrew Scripture -- General characteristics of Hebrew morality -- The law, the prophets, and the writings -- Jesus and the Gospels -- Jesus and Judaism -- Characteristics of Jesus's ethical teachings -- Basic concepts in Jesus's ethical teachings -- The example of Jesus -- The ethical teachings of Paul -- Theology and ethics -- An ethic of responsible freedom -- An ethic of love -- An ethic of a new life -- Faith working through love -- Theological premises -- Beliefs about God -- Beliefs about humankind -- Beliefs about history -- Faith -- Faith and salvation -- Life in the Christian community -- The instruction of Scripture -- Worship and morality -- Love (agape) -- The nature of love -- The source of love -- The demands of love -- The relationship between love and justice -- Decision -- Christian ethics and contemporary issues -- Human sexuality and the marriage relationship -- The current scene -- A Christian interpretation of sexuality -- A theological perspective -- Questions about the relationship -- A Christian interpretation of marriage -- Homosexuality and the Christian faith -- Contemporary social perspective -- A biblical perspective -- Varying Christian interpretations -- Homosexuality and the Christian way of live. (shrink)

In this second edition of the best-selling Cambridge Companion to Christian Ethics, Robin Gill brings together twenty essays by leading experts, to provide a comprehensive introduction to Christian ethics which is both authoritative and up to date. This volume boasts four entirely new chapters, while previous chapters and all bibliographies have been updated to reflect significant developments in the field over the last decade. Gill offers a superb overview of the subject, examining the scriptural bases of (...) ethics as well as discussing Christian ethics in the context of contemporary issues, including war and the arms trade, social justice, ecology, economics, medicine and genetics. All of the contributors have a proven track record of balanced, comprehensive and comprehensible writing making this book an accessible and invaluable source not only for students in upper-level undergraduate courses, graduate students and teachers, but anyone interested in Christian ethics today. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Introducing Christian Ethics by Samuel Wells and Ben Quash, and: Christian Ethics: An Introductory Reader ed. by Samuel WellsBradley B. BurroughsReview of Introducing Christian Ethics SAMUEL WELLS AND BEN QUASH Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. 400 pp. $49.95Review of Christian Ethics: An Introductory Reader EDITED BY SAMUEL WELLS Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. 360 pp. $51.95Whether in a semester-long course or a (...) textbook, the task of introducing Christian ethics generally requires one to choose between various competing priorities. Perhaps the most remarkable feature of Introducing Christian Ethics is that it eschews such choices. Instead of settling for an “either/or,” Samuel Wells and Ben Quash repeatedly push for “both/and.” Their introduction not only traces the historical development of Christian ethics, examining major historical thinkers and elucidating the larger arcs that connect them, but also treats the work of contemporary Christian ethicists. Moreover, on the one hand, the authors develop a typology of ethical thought that distinguishes various strands according to the audience to which ethical reflection is directed—universal ethics (which addresses all people), subversive ethics (which addresses the oppressed), and ecclesial ethics (which addresses Christians). On the other hand, the authors also show how notable representatives of these strands approach matters of contemporary ethical concern. To this, Wells adds a sourcebook that allows for readers to interact further with many of the thinkers treated in the introductory text as well as helps to shed further light upon these three strands of Christian ethics. The scope of the project represented by these two books is thus exceptionally ambitious: it strives to provide a comprehensive overview of the field and organize it according to an innovative typology.Introducing Christian Ethics proceeds in three parts. In part 1, Wells and Quash tell “the story of Christian ethics,” exploring the biblical, historical, and philosophical sources from which Christian ethics has most commonly drawn and offering brief depictions of a vast array of Christian thinkers, including Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Reinhold Niebuhr, and many others. Part 2, titled “The Questions Christian Ethics Asks,” lays out the threefold taxonomy of universal, subversive, and ecclesial ethics, illustrating each with reference to thinkers both historical and contemporary. Finally, part 3 turns to “the questions asked of Christian [End Page 233] ethics,” treating issues of “good order” (including the role of the state and the nature of justice), “good life” (economics, poverty, and work), “good relationships” (friendship, marriage, homosexuality), “good beginnings and endings” (contraception, abortion, euthanasia), and “good earth” (animals, crops ecology). For each of the issues treated in part 3, the authors offer an overview and an account of how thinkers from each of the strands of Christian ethics have addressed that topic.Wells and Quash bring an admirably broad view of the field to bear upon this project. Famous thinkers factor prominently. And yet the book also treats the work of those less likely to appear in introductory texts, such as Germain Grisez, John Mbiti, and Stephen Clark. Whether they are of the renowned or lesser-known, the sketches of thinkers that occur throughout the book are on the whole quite accurate. Although there are places where experts might wish to call out slight mischaracterizations, the renderings are precise enough to serve introductory readers. Wells and Quash’s broadness of vision also includes both Protestant and Roman Catholic thought. Whereas Introducing Christian Ethics focuses primarily upon papal encyclicals as exemplifying the latter, Wells’s introductory reader adds selections from Gustavo Gutiérrez, Margaret Farley, Dorothy Day, and others to help exemplify the complexity of Roman Catholic ethical reflection. Eastern Orthodoxy gets shorter shrift, an observation offered as a note to potential readers rather than a criticism.Even as its comprehensiveness equips Introducing Christian Ethics for use in a variety of ways and contexts, the quest for comprehensiveness appears to be at the heart of some of the book’s infelicities. Attempting to treat so many thinkers and concepts, it frequently moves at a brisk pace, touching upon complex phenomena and abruptly moving on. In many places, the questions the book answers for the entry-level readers at which it aims... (shrink)

In a single convenient resource, this book organizes and presents clearly the documents of the Catholic church pertaining to medical ethics.

Drawing on the work of Raimond Gaita, the paper considers the role that may be played by the lives of the saints, both in alerting us to the moral standing of other human beings, and in helping us to articulate the concept of "humanity" understood in a morally rich sense. The paper considers whether Gaita's treatment of these themes presents something like a natural law ethic, in the sense of supplying arguments which favour broadly Christian conclusions without depending upon (...) explicitly Christian premises. It also considers whether Gaita's view, contrary to his own belief, invites extrapolation in the direction of a more religiously engaged stance. In these ways, the paper aims to address the question of the relationship between religious and moral understanding in terms that are arguably more fruitful than those suggested by the dominant ethical theories. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Karl Barth and Christian Ethics: Living in Truth by William WerpehowskiJames W. SkillenKarl Barth and Christian Ethics: Living in Truth William Werpehowski BURLINGTON, VT: ASHGATE, 2014. 172 PP. $54.95 (PAPERBACK), $153.00 (CLOTH)In this two-part volume, William Werpehowski aims in part 1 to elucidate Karl Barth's "approach to the nature and source of the good, the divine command in its relation to the personal history (...) of a moral agent, and the place of narrative in Christian ethics" (xii). The author does this both by exposition of Barth's writings and by engaging with the arguments of other students of Barth, including James Gustafson, Stanley Hauerwas, John Webster, Matthew Rose, and Gerald McKenny. The titles of the chapters of part 1 indicate the ground being covered: "Divine Commands and Philosophical Dilemmas," "Command and History," "Narrative and Ethics," and "Realism and Discernment." In part 2 the author presents diverse essays on "virtue, moral practices, and discernment," most of which deal with the rearing and education of children, which shows the author's sympathy with Barth even as he draws on other traditions of Christian ethics.Werpehowski's exposition is generally clear and detailed as he seeks to explain and defend Barth's identification of the norm for human ethics with the subject, Jesus Christ. According to Barth, "humanity's obedience to God … must always be obedience to and conformity with Jesus Christ. He is the criterion by which is measured all demands on our behavior" (6). Furthermore, "God's eternal will is for humanity in Jesus Christ; the normative criterion is identical to God's will and the history it accomplishes" (7). Although the response to God's electing love in Christ should be willing obedience, Barth (with Werpehowski) does not deal substantively with the accountability of those who do not so respond. In the end, for Barth, God's "Yes" in Christ always trumps God's "No" to sin (see 65–69).At times the author's defense of Barth appears to be more a deflection of, than an engagement with, the criticism. One example: the author offers a brief summary of Nigel Biggar's sympathetic criticism of Barth at the point where he believes Barth deals inadequately with human responsibility and accountability. Werpehowski acknowledges the legitimacy of Biggar's point—"that the temporal world of eternal grace may be depicted as our one common world only if creaturely rationality and non-arbitrary moral justification are prominently affirmed" (63); he states that Biggar is trying to save Barth "at his best" from a weakness in his position. Yet Werpehowski's next step is to say that Biggar's correction "is in danger of being an overcorrection" because his [End Page 212] moral justification requirement "belongs more to the periphery of the ethics of [Barth's] divine command" (64). That requirement, says Werpehowski, "must be governed by the central significance of the gracious God who commands in the reality of the ethical event" (64).Werpehowski's book is worthy of careful study, especially by those who want to understand Barth in relation to other ethicists. A criticism I have concerns the limits of Barth's ethics with respect to human institutions and social practices for which humans bear communal responsibility. Werpehowski acknowledges that those limits are due to Barth's focus on the relation of Christ to the individual person in the "ethical event." By contrast, at a few points in part 2, Werpehowski draws in Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who insists that it is in "friendships, families, work, citizenship, and life in the church" where Christ is present preserving and reconciling the world to God (141). Despite all the attention in recent decades to Christian social and political ethics, the author does little with that subject in either his assessment of Barth or in the chapters of part 2.James W. SkillenPresident (retired), Center for Public JusticeCopyright © 2017 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

The spiritual and moral crisis in society, which is a sign of the loss of clear ideas about good and evil, when the ideal of a person becomes "successful in human life" and no matter how successful it becomes, when moral laws and human life are worthless, needs urgent return to spiritual sources. As one of the means of spiritual education of adolescents, a Christian ethics elective was introduced at the secondary school №26 in Odessa.

To my mind, the most urgent current task in the social sciences is one in the context of which the unduly cut-and-dried distinctions between positive and normative, between sociology and ethics, between secular pluralism and religious spirituality, and so on, should be abandoned. I would like to reclaim the legacy of a Marxian-type dialectic by stating that the social sciences today (and I would even risk speaking of a single present-day ‘social science’) have the threefold task of (1) thinking (...) through in depth the directions of a desirable social change, (2) asking what are the ‘resources for action’ already available for this end within the totality of social actors and (3) identifying the moral capacities that need to be stimulated and/or created so that the resources for action which are not yet available, but which are desirable under point (1), may be able to take root and flourish. I defy anyone to disentangle clearly and analytically the positive and normative parts of such a task …If the somewhat acrimonious debate on the status of the gift that I have had with Alain Caillé for the last two years continues to hold my interest and if I have eventually overcome my irritation in the face of what has occasionally seemed to me a failure of understanding linked to the defence of an ‘article of local faith’, it is because our debate is a fundamental part of the worthwhile task of the social sciences. Nevertheless, I shall make it clear straight away that the expression ‘sociological gift’ hardly satisfies me, in the light of the description of this task which I have just supplied. (shrink)

Maureen Junker-Kenny offers a systematic overview of the discipline of theological ethics in the variety of its approaches, which draw upon different philosophical traditions and theological visions in treating its sources. Part One examines the four sources of theological ethics: the Bible, tradition, philosophical accounts of the human, and the individual human sciences. Part Two compares five frameworks in English- and German-speaking theological ethics, based on virtue, worship, natural law, autonomy, and feminist analyses. Part Three (...) compares three types of vision - integralist, praxis-oriented, and discourse-focused -, and Junker-Kenny concludes by situating the investigation of the discipline within contemporary philosophical and theological exchanges on religion in the public sphere. The book provides a framework in which students can locate the specific use of core ethical concepts and argumentations, comparing how each approach relates to the Bible, to historical reason, theological thought, practical self-understandings and interdisciplinary perspectives on ethics in a scientific and technological culture. In an age of globalisation where different cultures, religions, lifestyles and values meet in the workplace, in schools, and in public spaces shaped by religious and cultural traditions, it is necessary to foster the ability to create possibilities and venues for dialogue between different self-understandings. Analysing the variety of approaches to theological ethics helps articulate different visions of what constitutes a fulfilled life, of how the moral vocation of each human being can be supported, and of the role of the Christian faith for ethics. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 545 Haroutunian, would have balked at the notion that their " empiricism " could be abstracted from the christological and trinitarian confession 0£ the church. In general, it would seem that a genuinely " empirical" approach would seek to engage the actual truth claims of religious com· munities on their own terms-even when those claims conflict with historicist suppositions. Second, in so far as Dean thinks there (...) is a uniquely American reli· gious experience or style of thought, privileging that style seems a dangerous move indeed. Dean is not unaware of the dangers. He specifically denies that he is engaging in any form of " American exceptionalism " (p. 25) ; it is simply that an " appropriately American historicism, centering on American culture, would have a greater chance of suggesting practices that work for and are true for America " (p. 24). But I am skeptical that such disclaimers address the real problem. Near the very end of the book, Dean suggests that a modi· fied naturalism might lead to " a notion of God that was more genuinely American than anything earlier," culminating in the recognition that " American thought about God is really the thought of a national com· munity" (p. 144). Descriptively that may well be the case; but then the Christian theologian must seek norms elsewhere. History Making History does not show us how historicist insigh~ might be incorporated into ecumenical, trinitarian theology, but that does not mean the attempt will prove unfruitful. Meanwhile, this bit of philosophical tale-telling will hold the interest of readers theological and otherwise. JOSEPH L. MANCINA Yale University New Haven, Connecticut Medical Ethics: Sources of Catholic Teaching. By KEVIN D. O'ROURKE, O.P. and PHILIP BOYLE, O.P. St. Louis: Catholic Health Associa· tion, 1989. Medical Ethics: Common Ground for Understanding. By KEVIN D. O'RouRKE, O.P. and DENNIS BRODEUR. St. Louis: Catholic Health Association, 1989. Healthcare Ethics: A Theological Analysis. By KEVIN D. O'RouRKE, O.P. and BENEDICT ASHLEY, O.P. 3rd ed. St. Louis: Catholic Health Association, 1989. Sources of Catholic Teaching is a compendium of recent "official" statements by Roman Catholic ecclesiastical bodies on issues concern· ing medical ethics. Arranged alphabetically according to topics, this col- 546 BOOK REVIEWS lection of statements from the papacy, the Roman Congregations, and the conferences of Catholic bishops could prove to he a very helpful reference tool. It contains a brief introduction which seeks to explain the role of these statements in the Catholic moral theology and Catholic medical ethics, a table of contents of the statements included, and then the statements themselves. In most instances it does not contain the entire document or statement hut only excerpts therefrom. There are some weaknesses in this work. First, these statements are not self-explanatory; they are in need of interpretation and explanation in many instances. But the authors present only the bald text and do not offer any explanatory comments. They apparently presume that these statements are pellucid to the reader, hut this is an unwarranted pre· sumption. For example, clarifying comments should have been added to the statement from the Declaration on Euthanasia because the allocution of Pius XII about giving lethal doses of analgesia is not entirely clear. A second difficulty with this work is the brief and somewhat insubstantial introduction on conscience and the role these statements should play in the formation of conscience. This sort of work invites a substantial and extended commentary on the nature of moral judgments, the relationship of conscience to the natural law, and the authority of these statements. The authors note that not all of the official statements issued by various organs of the Church are of equal authority, hut they do not try to identify the specific authoritative status of the various statements they include in their work. The reader is thus left to his or her own devices to determine, for example, the relative weight of statements of the administrative hoard of the NCCB versus statements of state episcopal conferences. A still further problem is that some of the statements are of virtually no significant authority for Catholics. For example, the statement of the administrative hoard of the NCCB on AIDS is of questionable... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Just Capitalism: A Christian Ethic of Economic Globalization by Brent WatersNicholas Aaron FriesnerJust Capitalism: A Christian Ethic of Economic Globalization Brent Waters LOUISVILLE: WESTMINSTER JOHN KNOX PRESS, 2016. 260 pp. $40.00In Just Capitalism, Brent Waters offers a wide-ranging defense of economic globalization, the market state, and the pursuit of affluence, which together provide a means to spread human flourishing around the globe. For Waters, the free-flowing (...) economic exchange enabled by globalization does not inherently conflict with Christian tradition, and it can be harnessed in a responsible manner to share and communicate the goods of creation. He argues that breaking down global barriers to market participation expresses a preferential option for the poor and provides a means for achieving the work of the Spirit by spreading the materials goods that lift people out of poverty and alleviate suffering. The book's primary contribution is its broad explanation of recent work on the economics of globalization and Waters's ability to put this literature into a theological conversation. The argument is particularly timely for Christian ethicists who are concerned with developing the tools to respond to expanding movements toward isolationism and economic protectionism in the United States and Europe.Part 1 of Just Capitalism claims that moral theology has not properly interrogated the common view that affluence fundamentally conflicts with the Christian tradition. By contextualizing both the biblical sources and the traditional theological voices that support this view, Waters shows that these sources assumed an economic model in which resources are scarce and wealth is built by exploiting the poor. Instead, Waters argues that our present economic system is based on increasing productivity, and therefore wealth is not necessarily exploitative. In fact, he claims that the pursuit of affluence can be beneficial for helping to lift people out of poverty. Rather than retreating from engagement with wealth and the market, Christians should recognize that free exchange is a necessary, though not sufficient, condition for human flourishing (15). [End Page 213]In part 2, Waters develops a notion of koinonia, whereby human flourishing depends on communicating the goods of creation in the associations of civil society. Responding to worries about the homogenizing forces of market economies that make individuals into producers and consumers, Waters offers the church as a communicative association that stands in tension with capitalist markets by cultivating reciprocity instead of consumption, breaking down barriers in a gathering community, and being nonterritorial in its scope (150–51). Because communicative associations like the church are essential to the vitality of civil society, the challenge is to "embrace the dynamism of global markets in order to promote more widespread prosperity," while establishing the requisite political stability that allows these associations to exist (159).Nevertheless, Waters does not spend much time elaborating on specific moments when the church should come into conflict with capitalism—he notes that his reservations only give him "two-and-a-half-cheers" for globalization, rather than three (14–15). In his desire to show compatibility with globalization, he neglects to give a sense of when communicative associations could justifiably remove themselves from the system of exchange. This relates to Waters's final chapter on capitalist responses to environmental devastation, which relies on his earlier development of a stewardship model, one that seems to reduce creation to its instrumental value for human "delight" (89–90, 92, 111, 115). Waters admits that the pursuit of affluence requires short-term environmental damage, especially in developing countries; nevertheless, he thinks that affluent societies will better preserve the environment (through "national parks and wildlife preserves") (217), and some environmental exploitation is needed to form these affluent societies. This will probably be insufficient for environmental ethicists who resist the notion that creation's purpose is to be ordered to promote human flourishing (204). He is clear, however, that "Eden is a garden, and not a wilderness" (203).Nicholas Aaron FriesnerBrown UniversityCopyright © 2018 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

The T&T Clark Handbook of Christian Ethics provides an ecumenical introduction to Christian ethics, its sources, methods, and applications. With contributions by theological ethicists known for their excellence in scholarship and teaching, the essays in this volume offer fresh purchase on, and an agenda for, the discipline of Christian ethics in the 21st century. The essays are organized in three sections, following an introduction that presents the four-font approach and elucidates why it is (...) critically employed through these subsequent sections. The first section explores the sources of Christian ethics, including each of the four fonts: scripture, tradition, experience, and reason. The second section examines fundamental or basic elements of Christian ethics and covers different methods, approaches, and voices in doing Christian ethics, such as natural law, virtue ethics, conscience, responsibility, narrative, worship, and engagement with other religions. The third section addresses current moral issues in politics, medicine, economics, ecology, criminal justice and other related spheres from the perspective of Christian ethics, including war, genetics, neuroethics, end-of-life decisions, marriage, family, work, sexuality, nonhuman animals, migration, aging, policing, incarceration, capital punishment, and more. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Kinship across Borders: A Christian Ethic of Immigration by Kristin E. HeyerVictor CarmonaKinship across Borders: A Christian Ethic of Immigration By Kristin E. Heyer WASHINGTON, DC: GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2012. 198 PP. $29.95Heyer renders an important service to the discipline, which has not seen a book-length account of a Christian immigration ethic since Dana Wilbanks’s Recreating America (1996). In Kinship across Borders, Heyer provides a (...) nuanced and comprehensive theological ethical analysis of undocumented immigration and argues that “a Christian immigration ethic calls believers to promote structures and practices marked by kinship and justice” (4). To that end, she advances four distinct theses in as many chapters—interpretations of personhood, sin, family, and solidarity—each appropriating a specific resource from the Christian tradition in order to reorient immigration policies from a “paradigm centered on national interest, expediency, or economic efficiency” to one that is person centered (4). Her project challenges American Christians to reckon with their responsibility in advancing structures and furthering ideologies that sustain forced migrations, including economic refugees, in the Western Hemisphere.Chapter 1 relies on Margaret Farley’s “obligating features of person-hood”—namely, autonomy and relationality—to identify the prevailing immigration paradigm, which views immigrants as economic commodities, security threats, and/or foreigners to be assimilated (21). This paradigm reflects internalized ideologies and a series of external structures that weaken the personal agency of immigrants who, in significant ways, “are unable to [End Page 194] determine the direction their lives will take” (22). Chapter 2 turns to Catholic social encyclicals and liberation theology to develop a dialectical interpretation of personal and social sin. Heyer posits that though persons are responsible for their actions, they “remain subject to external [structural] influences” that limit the ways in which they may exercise their agency (46). She uses this idea not to accuse undocumented immigrants but rather to highlight the sinful ideological blinders that often limit American Christians’ capacity to act hospitably towards them. “Given the relationship between the United States and sending countries in geographic, economic, and political terms,” she writes, “US citizens may be willfully negligent of or indirectly responsible for the conditions that give rise to undocumented migration across their borders” (46).Chapters 3 and 4 provide robust accounts of cross-border kinship in the context of the family and globalization, with their rich visions of human relationships that break open the prevailing immigration paradigm. For example, though familismo among Latin American immigrants may lend itself to restrict women’s personal agency, it nevertheless offers an “extensive and malleable understanding of kinship networks, … [with] boundaries among members that remain fluid and transcend genetics,” thus broadening the relationships within which to flourish (82). To address global kinship, Heyer develops an account of institutional, incarnational, and conflictual solidarity that breaks free from the tendency to frame the immigration debate in the United States as a purely domestic issue that lacks meaningful global implications. Chapter 5 concludes the book by identifying implications for reorienting immigration policy and rhetoric as well as Christian ethics so that they better account for the immigrant experience by developing the necessary resources, including a more robust understanding of moral agency in the midst of marginalization.The argument is strongest in chapters 2 and 3, which develop a crisp critical analysis of the sources and insightful interpretations of often overlooked ones, including immigrants’ experiences. Furthermore, Heyer adeptly engages multiple US Hispanic theologians and Christian ethicists in ways that sharpen her argument throughout. The argument is weakest in chapter 5 because it does not fully integrate earlier insights on cross-border familial and global kinship while accounting for civic kinship. I strongly recommend Kinship across Borders for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students taking courses on Catholic social thought, Protestant social ethics, and theology and/or ethics of migration. [End Page 195]Victor CarmonaOblate School of TheologyCopyright © 2015 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Love and Christian Ethics: Tradition, Theory, and Society eds. by Frederick V. Simmons and Brian C. SorrelsMichael Le ChevallierLove and Christian Ethics: Tradition, Theory, and Society Edited by Frederick V. Simmons and Brian C. Sorrels WASHINGTON, DC: GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2016. 400 pp. $119.00 / $39.95Fredrick Simmons and Brian Sorrels present an impressive, cohesive volume of essays by twenty-two leading scholars who engage different (...) facets of love and theological ethics. although dedicated to gene outka—thus setting the broad theme and establishing his work as a privileged point of reference throughout the volume—Love and Christian Ethics should not be confused with a Festschrift. it accomplishes far more in intellectual diversity and depth, making a significant contribution to scholarship.The volume is organized into three sections: tradition, theory, and society. across the first section, the authors address love within major sources and figures, treating scripture, greek philosophy, augustine, aquinas, Kant, and Kierkegaard. Far from a textbook presentation, each essay marks out its own argument regarding the place of love in the respective subject. The second section is devoted to major theoretical questions raised within scholarship on love and ethics, addressing topics like the relation of eudaimonism to love (a running thread that emerges in the book), forgiveness, friendship, and evolution. The final section moves into the field of practice, application, and society, including an essay critically engaging implicit presentations of love found in the law, another treating love and international development, and one poignant essay by Mark D. Jordan calling for a moratorium on strong pronouncements in sexual ethics until ethicists can cultivate a loving knowledge of sex. This final section also includes reflections on love in the Jewish and Muslim traditions. Simmons's introduction and William Werpehowksi's afterword provide useful bookends. although no single thesis blandly governs this volume as a whole—incorporating complementary, divergent, and competing positions—in constructing this volume, Simmons and Sorrels argue that love is not eclipsed in Christian ethics but has a rich and variegated tradition. Werpehowski appraises [End Page 210] the volume as a whole, identifying key threads that emerge, like relations of love to eudaimonism and the theme of neighbor love.The volume is admirable in its breadth and depth. It offers a robust encounter with major figures and questions, providing historical recovery as well as critical and constructive engagement. That said, depth can work against breadth, with essays like Oliver O'Donovan's demanding a familiarity with Augustine Confessions that will send the reader back to his or her bookcases. Missing too are other notable figures and topics, such as the Protestant Reformers, Christian mystics, and feminist ethicists. Nevertheless, these gaps do not diminish the volume as a whole. I found myself again and again excited by the insights offered by the contributors, unsettling easy assumptions regarding the relation between eudaimonia and love, illustrating the depths of accounts of friendship for thinking about polity and mediating institutions, and cautioning against overconfidence in sexual ethics as its boundaries destabilize.Love and Christian Ethics would benefit scholars, teachers, and students alike. Its broad engagement with contemporary scholarship on love makes it a useful starting point for any researcher dipping or diving into this field. Introducing professors to key and sometimes obscured questions within figures and topics, it can round out lectures and help introduce students to the growing edge of scholarship on love. It would serve as a useful reference for any upper division or graduate course engaging with this significant, but often ignored, theme in Christian ethics.Rare is it to find a book that embodies the very theme it presents. These essays on love are a scholarly gift of the best sort—one not diminished but enhanced in its sharing.Michael Le ChevallierUniversity of ChicagoCopyright © 2018 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

In his widely read book, Five Types of Ethical Theory (1930), C.D. Broad introduced the distinction between two approaches to ethics: teleology and deontology. In the second half of the twentieth century, these terms found their way into Christian ethics, giving rise to a problem. Christian ethics seems to be straightforwardly teleological, but it also seems to be straightforwardly deontological. In this article, I argue that the problem is largely a product of the way teleology (...) is construed: the ends in teleological ethics are implicitly assumed to be outcomes or states of affairs. I demonstrate the point through a reading of both the early philosophical sources and the more recent works of Charles Camosy and John Perry. I then argue that major sources in the Christian tradition, including those used by Camosy and Perry, are better understood as offering a more expansive picture of teleology in which ends are not always outcomes or states of affairs. I conclude by arguing that this more expansive picture of teleology resolves some important problems that have plagued debates about teleology and deontology in Christian ethics. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Renewing Moral Theology: Christian Ethics as Action, Character, and Grace by Daniel A. WestbergHoward HarrisRenewing Moral Theology: Christian Ethics as Action, Character, and Grace Daniel A. Westberg DOWNERS GROVE, IL: IVP ACADEMIC, 2015. 281 PP. $25.00Renewing Moral Theology by Daniel Westberg has two professed purposes—to be a moral theology text for seminary use and to be a book with wider public appeal. Short chapters, (...) real-life examples, simple reading lists, and unobtrusive footnotes make it accessible to that wider public. Yet the rigor and careful argument will satisfy the need in many introductory classrooms for a moral theology text that is cognizant of Aquinas, Vatican II reforms, and Anglican scholarship.Westberg sees the 1960s as a disruptive time for ethical thought in the Anglican tradition, with the "shifting and seductive winds" of situation ethics gaining sufficient sway to sweep away the prevailing systematic approach to moral theology (9). He seeks to follow an Anglican path of mutual enrichment, blending Evangelical emphases and Catholic moral philosophy. Virtue ethics, with its roots in Aristotle and Aquinas and its more recent renaissance, is at the core of the book. Part 1 deals with moral reasoning and action, while part 2 discusses the seven principal virtues: wisdom in action, justice, fortitude, self-control, faith, hope, and love.The initial focus is on practical reasoning, action, and character, acknowledging that many daily questions have a moral component yet do not require casuistry and law for resolution. Westberg puts forward a four-stage model of practical reason involving intention, deliberation, decision, and execution, sourced from Aquinas (reminiscent of James Rest's Four Component Model). The model is used to show that both intellect and will must be engaged and that the process can be iterative. The importance of the Holy Spirit in the forming of character and in the infusion of the theological virtues is made clear in Westberg's elucidation of the sequence through practical reasoning to action. Christian ethics is different, and Christians need "a new way of explaining Christian discipleship" (18).Part 2 begins with a useful introductory chapter about the development of virtues, with a focus on Christ and a caution against vagueness, against reducing morality to an undefined love that is of little relevance in either deliberation or action. In the discussion of individual virtues, Westberg brings together traditional scholarship, including Aquinas, Augustine, Aristotle, and Barth, with contemporary work from theology, philosophy, and psychology including Hauerwas, O'Donovan, and Veritatis splendor. Westberg questions the idea, grounded in Aristotle, that excellence in a virtue lies in a mean between extremes, wondering [End Page 203] aloud if Aristotle went too far in this (152). The treatment of love includes an examination of the nature of agape in which Westberg sets out to show that this Christian love ought not be seen as self-sacrificing but as mutual and nurturing. The Gospel basis is apparent here as the argument is grounded on "God is love" (1 John 4:16); on examples of Jesus showing preferential love for the disciples and Lazarus, Martha, and Mary; and on "a mutuality of love in the Godhead," before noting parallels to Aristotle's notions of friendship (238–40).Throughout the book difficult questions are not shunned, with diversion avoided by pointing to alternative sources of more detailed analysis; animal ethics, loving one's enemies, and whether non-Christians can be "good" are dealt with in this way, while the implications of biblical teaching on sin receives a longer treatment. Renewing Moral Theology puts Christ at the center of a discussion of how to live well. It is accessible to the Christian who has an interest in moral questions while being sufficiently tightly argued for the introductory classroom at which it is also aimed.Howard HarrisUniversity of South AustraliaCopyright © 2017 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

The article explores the understudied subject of the distinctly Christian ethics of human intelligence (HUMINT) and considers how a Christian intelligence officer (IO) can draw on the robust and diverse tradition of Christian ethics to make their secular vocation compatible with the ethical principles of their faith. The current intelligence ethics literature is dominated by the Just Intelligence Theory (JIT), an adaptation of the just war tradition, which offers many valuable contributions. However, I propose (...) the enrichment of JIT by discursive ethics from within the respective Catholic and Reformed theologies. I also consider the originally non-Christian concepts of the ethics of care and the I-Thou ideal through Christian hermeneutics. I conclude that the IO's ceaseless questioning of their conduct and its sources, and the continuous striving for primarily personal relations, as opposed to institutional relations, is the essence of the ever-imperfect process of becoming a Christian IO. Such an IO is a hearing and critical disciple who does not pretend to know the mind of God, but one whose conduct is directed by their critical reflection on their Christian faith and on the institutional setting wherein they operate. Paradoxically, this presents an enormous ethical possibility for a Christian IO. (shrink)

In this article, I demonstrate that the term ‘ubuntu’ has frequently appeared in writing since at least 1846. I also analyse changes in how ubuntu has been defined in written sources in the period 1846 to 2011. The analysis shows that in written sources published prior to 1950, it appears that ubuntu is always defined as a human quality. At different stages during the second half of the 1900s, some authors began to define ubuntu more broadly: definitions included (...) ubuntu as African humanism, a philosophy, an ethic, and as a worldview. Furthermore, my findings indicate that it was during the period from 1993 to 1995 that the Nguni proverb ‘umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu’ (often translated as ‘a person is a person through other persons’) was used for the first time to describe what ubuntu is. Most authors today refer to the proverb when describing ubuntu, irrespective of whether they consider ubuntu to be a human quality, African humanism, a philosophy, an ethic, or a worldview. (shrink)

The theological virtue of hope has long been neglected in Christian ethics. However, as social, civic and global anxieties mount, the need to overcome despair has become urgent. This book proposes the theological virtue of hope as a promising source of rejuvenation. Theological hope sustains us from the sloth, presumption and despair that threaten amid injustice, tragedy and dying; it provides an ultimate meaning and transcendent purpose to our lives; and it rejoices and refreshes us 'on the way' (...) with the prospect of eternal beatitude. Rather than degrading this life and world, hope ordains earthly goods to our eschatological end, forming us to pursue social justice with a resilience and vitality that transcend the cynicism and disillusionment so widespread at present. Drawing on Thomas Aquinas and virtue ethics, the book shows how the virtue of hope contributes to human happiness in this life and not just the next. (shrink)

The leitmotif of Freedom in Response, as the title suggests, is a reasoned exposition of the nature of freedom, as it is presented in the Bible and developed by such later theologians as Martin Luther. Oswald Bayer considers Luther's teachings on pastoral care, marriage, and the three estates, bringing in Kant and Hegel as conversation partners, together with Kant's friend and critic, the innovative theologian and philosopher Johann Georg Hamann. Oswald Bayer is a major contemporary Lutheran theologian, but so far (...) little of his work has been translated from German into English. This selection of essays indicates the depth and range of his thought on issues relating to theological ethics. (shrink)

This volume represents a translation of the majority of the essays in one of those collections.

A social responsibility (SR) theory of the press has emerged in various democratic societies worldwide since World War II. The Hutchins Commission in the United States is the source of this paradigm in some cases, but a similar emphasis on serving society rather than commerce or government has also arisen in parallel fashion without any connection to Hutchins. Professionalism and codes of professional ethics are too narrow to serve as the framework for a global SR paradigm of the 21st (...) century. Instead, universal ethical principles are the most appropriate framework, and the cross-cultural axis around which these principles revolve is the sacredness of human life. Embedded in the protonorm of human sacredness are such ethical principles as human dignity, truthtelling, and nonmaleficence. These principles are citizen ethics rather than professional ethics; they are set in the social domain where SR gets its rationale. They provide a frame of reference internationally for assessing local news media practices and formulating codes of ethics. (shrink)

In response to Koplin and Wilkinson, I argue, first, that the uncertain clinical prospects of human-pig chimera based transplantation makes the reason to spend resources for clarifying whether such practice might imply serious ethical breach due to enhanced cognitive capacities of the chimeras rather weak. T he benefits of further pursuing this avenue of research is so uncertain, so that taking even very unclear risks of serious ethical breach is not worth the price in terms of spent resources, and therefore (...) only limited resources should be spent to clarify such risk before the project is abandoned due to unacceptable risks. Second, I argue that as there are some reason to pursue this avenue further, the analogy to the notion of halting all farming of larger animals for food does not hold up. The reason is that we do not need to probe any further any comparable risk to know that such farming practices should be halted. A fundamental underlying issue to the question discussed by Koplin and Wilkinson1 in this paper is formulated when they write: > We should therefore be confident that human-pig chimeras would lack morally relevant cognitive capacities before setting out to use them as a source of transplantable human organs. This leaves open the question of how confident …. (shrink)

The entry of Ukraine into a new period of formation of all spheres of social, economic, political, and spiritual development, when the statehood is restored, the multifaceted revival of the Ukrainian people, the problem of national, spiritual and moral and ethical education of student youth is activated. Spiritually - the moral crisis of Ukrainian society needs urgent return to spiritual sources. Ukraine has historically been a Christian state, and a return to Christian norms of morality and (...) class='Hi'>ethics will help it to re-emerge and take its place among European countries. The revival of Christian morality can change society and, above all, young people need it. Therefore, we see as one of the means of spiritual revival of the nation, the introduction of an optional elective course "Fundamentals of Christian Ethics" in Ukrainian secondary schools. This subject will enable teenagers to form a Christian value system that will be guided throughout their lives. (shrink)

The phenomenon of twinning in early fetal development has become a popular source for doubt regarding the ascription of moral status to early embryos. In this paper, the possible moral basis for such a line of reasoning is critically analysed with sceptical results. Three different versions of the argument from twinning are considered, all of which are found to rest on confusions between the actual division of embryos involed in twinning and the property of early embryos to be divisible, be (...) based on highly questionable ethical assumptions, or to imply inconsistent claims regarding the moral importance of potentiality and/or the moral status of embryos. This is taken to expose a number of related inconsistencies in the moral basis of pro-life positions. In particular, ascribing moral significance to the property of being (in)divisible is found to be incompatible with the claim that human individuals possess unique values which could underpin an absolute moral ban on murder. (shrink)

This paper argues that the question of the compatibility between competition and solidarity needs to be clarified by distinguishing a variety of possible normative frameworks. Using a core metaphor of a race between runners hired by stadiums, I develop and discuss three ethical frameworks: the emergentist perspective, which considers that competition is in itself the locus of solidarity; the social-democratic perspective, which views solidarity as the main counterweight to the abrasive effects of competition – without, however, calling into question the (...) system that generates this competition; and the oppositional perspective, which considers solidarity as an implication of the desire to assist the victims of asymmetrical social power, unfairly distributed through competition, and therefore sees ‘genuine’ solidarity as a means to subvert competitive logic itself. In each case, I deconstruct the fundamental ‘axioms’ that underlie the approach, and I gradually demonstrate why there are compelling ethical arguments for a radical subversion of the logic of competition within a framework of ‘genuine’ solidarity. Thus, while the social-democratic perspective trumps the emergentist perspective, it is in turn trumped by the oppositional perspective. The basic idea is that competition which is statically fair, tends to become dynamically unfair, revealing a deep-lying source of structural alienation. This requires a renewed view of the nature of agents’ rationality, however, and an abandonment of some cherished beliefs and prejudices concerning the alleged fairness of competition in market economies. (shrink)

There is no cure or vaccine for HIV/AIDS. The only life-prolonging treatment available is antiretroviral (ARV) therapy. WHO estimates, however, that less than 5 percent of those who require treatment in developing countries currently enjoy access to these medicines. In Africa fewer than 50,000 people–less than 2 percent of the people in need–currently receive ARV therapy. These facts have elicited strongly divergent reactions, and views about the appropriate response to this crisis have varied widely.The intensity of the debate concerning access (...) to life-prolonging medicines for the treatment of HIV/AIDS, and the heated rhetoric with which they are often conducted, suggest that these disagreements may be rooted in deeper disagreements of value. It is not obvious, however, what disagreements of value are at stake in this debate. By analyzing the statements of scholars, public officials, activist organizations, and private sector representatives, each of whom may endorse very different policy recommendations on access to HIV/AIDS drugs, we have identified and created a typology of the different sources of disagreement in the debate. We conclude that the central disagreements concerning access to medicines arise from competing understandings of how responsibilities for bringing remedy to hardships should be allocated to different agents and institutions. A central lesson that emerges from our analysis is that thinking about “health equity” must extend beyond the explanation and justification of goals, values, and ideals, and engage more honestly with the difficult question of how responsibilities for bringing remedy to health crises should be allocated in complex social contexts. (shrink)

Neuroenhancement involves the use of neurotechnologies to improve cognitive, affective or behavioural functioning, where these are not judged to be clinically impaired. Questions about enhancement have become one of the key topics of neuroethics over the past decade. The current study draws on in-depth public engagement activities in ten European countries giving a bottom-up perspective on the ethics and desirability of enhancement. This informed the design of an online contrastive vignette experiment that was administered to representative samples of 1000 (...) respondents in the ten countries and the United States. The experiment investigated how the gender of the protagonist, his or her level of performance, the efficacy of the enhancer and the mode of enhancement affected support for neuroenhancement in both educational and employment contexts. Of these, higher efficacy and lower performance were found to increase willingness to support enhancement. A series of commonly articulated claims about the individual and societal dimensions of neuroenhancement were derived from the public engagement activities. Underlying these claims, multivariate analysis identified two social values. The Societal/protective highlights counter normative consequences and opposes the use enhancers. The Individual/proactionary highlights opportunities and supports use. For most respondents these values are not mutually exclusive. This suggests that for many neuroenhancement is viewed simultaneously as a source of both promise and concern. (shrink)