Naslov
Respect for Cultural Diversity in Bioethics: Redundant or Ineffective?

Autori
Bracanović, Tomislav

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Sažeci sa skupova, sažetak, znanstveni

Izvornik
The 9th World Congress of Bioethics: The Challenge of Cross-Cultural Bioethics in the 21st Century / Sorta-Bilajac, Iva ; Blažević, Ivana ; Tancabel, Ana - Rijeka : The International Association of Bioethics ; University of Rijeka - School of Medicine ; The Croatian Society for Clinical Bioethics, 2008, 219-219

Skup
The 9th World Congress of Bioethics: The Challenge of Cross-Cultural Bioethics in the 21st Century

Mjesto i datum
Rijeka, Hrvatska, 03.09.2008. - 08.09.2008

Vrsta sudjelovanja
Predavanje

Vrsta recenzije
Međunarodna recenzija

Ključne riječi
Cultural Diversity; Bioethics

Sažetak
From various ‘ monocultural’ types of bioethics (like Asian or Jewish bioethics) to some of its ‘ multicultural’ (in particular certain South-East European) versions, there is a strong tendency to take ‘ respect for cultural diversity’ (RCD) proviso as an important or even indispensable ingredient of bioethical inquiry. The central objective of this paper is to show that this tendency is misleading and that RCD in bioethics should be abandoned altogether. Two strategies of arguing for this claim will be presented. (a) By relying on the idea of ‘ the empirical underdetermination of descriptive cultural relativism’ (Michelle Moody-Adams), one can argue that cultural qua moral diversity is an insubstantial concept out of touch with empirical reality. The point is that uniquely moral disagreements between various cultures in fact do not exist and that bioethical projects built upon the idea of RCD are loaded with conceptually redundant tools. (b) If one acknowledges that cultural qua moral diversity is an empirically well-founded concept, bioethicists would still do well to do without RCD. The lesson to be drawn here relies on some standard criticisms of ethical relativism (James Rachels, Thomas Nagel, Gordon Graham). By taking various and mutually exclusive moral views seriously or, conversely, due to its reluctance to dispense with diverse culturally generated moral views, bioethics seems to come dangerously close to sacrificing its own normative and action-guiding agenda. The point here is that even if uniquely moral disagreements between various cultures do exist, bioethical projects built upon the idea of RCD remain loaded with prescriptively ineffective tools.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Filozofija

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