Human dignity is a stubborn concept, at least for jurists and philosophers. After World War II it found its way immediately into the opening articles of the UN Charta, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the German Grundgesetz, apparently out of the blue, i. e. almost without any precedent in earlier juridical docu- ments. Consequently, scholars of law still have difficulties to formulate an adequate understanding of human dignity. And although the concept has a certain tradition in philosophy, if (...) we search for an independent ethi- cally attractive understanding of human dignity, it turns out that going back to Cicero, Kant or the Christian heritage is of little help, too. Much more promising, though, is a look at the long-standing usage of the expression ‘human dignity’ and its German counterpart Würde des Menschen where something like a universal right not to be humiliated is expressed. Given this understanding, we can read the commandment to respect human dignity as the basic obligation to treat other people in a way that allows them to keep their personal, individual dignities—or at least minimally decent ones. To be sure, this formulation is just a very first, tentative step on the way to a philosophically satisfying conception of human dignity, but in the author’s opinion it is definitely a promising start for a research group. (shrink)

Christine Korsgaard has become one of the leading interpreters of Kant's moral philosophy. She is identified with a small group of philosophers who are intent on producing a version of Kant's moral philosophy that is at once sensitive to its historical roots while revealing its particular relevance to contemporary problems. She rejects the traditional picture of Kant's ethics as a cold vision of the moral life which emphasises duty at the expense of love and value. Rather, Kant's work is seen (...) as providing a resource for addressing not only the metaphysics of morals, but also for tackling practical questions about personal relations, politics, and everyday human interaction. This collection contains some of the finest current work on Kant's ethics and will command the attention of all those involved in teaching and studying moral theory. (shrink)

This book follows hard upon Korsgaard's The Sources of Normativity. Both present the author's influential version of a Kantian theory of normative ethics and metaethics. Whereas The Sources of Normativity was a systematic investigation of "normativity" written as a single unit, the present volume is a collection of previously published papers, some of them already well known and much discussed, dating between 1983 and 1993. By the nature of the case, one might expect less thematic unity in this book than (...) in the other one, but the present book is a deeper and more wide ranging presentation of the author's views. Korsgaard's historical focus in The Sources of Normativity is less on Kant and more on the British moralists. Creating the Kingdom of Ends deals quite explicitly with the interpretation of Kant's moral philosophy. The papers in this book contain, in my judgment, the heart of Korsgaard's work: a variety of fresh and illuminating insights into Kant's moral theory and its relation to contemporary ethical theory which have helped to reshape the image of Kant's ethics and to refocus the issues dealt with in current moral philosophy. Or to make claims less grand but of more immediate relevance to this review, there is no question that some of the papers in this book have helped to reshape both the present writer's image of Kant's ethics and his conception of the way questions of ethical theory should be addressed. I hope below to say something both about where I think Korsgaard has gotten these matters right, and where I find her position either unclear or dubious. (shrink)

Derek Parfit presents the third volume of On What Matters, his landmark work of moral philosophy. Parfit develops further his influential treatment of reasons, normativity, the meaning of moral discourse, and the status of morality. He engages with his critics, and shows the way to resolution of their differences.

Für viele stellt das Instrumentalisierungsverbot, wonach man andere Menschen nie blo als Mittel behandeln darf, eine fundamentale moralische Wahrheit dar. Dieses Buch ist der Versuch, diese Ansicht näher zu fassen und zu begründen. Das Instrumentalisierungsverbot spielt nicht nur in unserer Alltagsmoral, sondern auch in moraltheoretischen Diskussionen eine wichtige Rolle. Verschiedenste Praktiken werden mit der Begründung als unzulässig kritisiert, dass mit ihnen Menschen instrumentalisiert würden. Doch was heit es, die anderen blo als Mittel zu behandeln? Es besteht, so wird in diesem (...) Buch argumentiert, ein Zusammenhang zwischen unzulässiger Instrumentalisierung und Verletzung der Würde von Personen. In der Explikation des Würdebegriffs wird dieser Zusammenhang entfaltet. Die unzulässige Instrumentalisierung von Personen verletzt in bestimmten Fällen deren Würde, in anderen Fällen Ansprüche, die in der Würde von Personen begründet sind. Die Würde von Personen wird dabei als Anspruch auf Selbstachtung gefasst. Selbstachtung wird nicht im Sinne der Selbstwertschätzung verstanden. Im Blick steht vielmehr ein normatives Verständnis von Selbstachtung, wonach Personen ein Leben in Selbstachtung führen, sofern ihr Selbstverfügungsrecht von anderen und ihnen selbst geachtet wird. Der Anspruch auf Selbstachtung wird als Anspruch darauf begriffen, über wesentliche Bereiche des eigenen Lebens verfügen zu können. Diese Überlegungen zu Würde und Selbstachtung werden moraltheoretisch eingeordnet und abschlieend auf paradigmatische Fälle der praktischen Ethik angewendet, bei denen es um die Instrumentalisierung von Menschen geht. (shrink)

Next SectionPreimplantation tissue typing has been proposed as a method for creating a tissue matched child that can serve as a haematopoietic stem cell donor to save its sick sibling in need of a stem cell transplant. Despite recent promising results, many people have expressed their disapproval of this method. This paper addresses the main concerns of these critics: the risk of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) for the child to be born; the intention to have a donor child; the limits (...) that should be placed on what may be done to the donor child, and whether the intended recipient can be someone other than a sibling. The author will show that these concerns do not constitute a sufficient ground to forbid people to use this technique to save not only a sibling, but also any other loved one’s life. Finally, the author briefly deals with two alternative scenarios: the creation of a human leukocyte antigen (HLA) matched child as an insurance policy, and the banking of HLA matched embryos. (shrink)

A couple may have a child to provide stem cells for another child. They may also use preimplantation testing—even, troubling though it is, prenatal testing and selective abortion—to ensure a close tissue match.

Cloning - few words have as much potential to grip our imagination or grab the headlines. No longer the stuff of science fiction or Star Wars - it is happening now. Yet human cloning is currently banned throughout the world, and therapeutic cloning banned in many countries. In this highly controversial book, John Harris does a lot more than ask why we are so afraid of cloning. He presents a deft and informed defence of human cloning, carefully exposing the rhetorical (...) and highly dubious arguments against it. He begins with an introduction to what a human clone is, before tackling some of the most common and frequently bizarre criticisms of cloning: Is it really wicked? Can we regulate it? What about the welfare of cloned children? Does it turn human beings into commodities? Dismissing one by one some of the myths about human cloning, in particular that it is degrading and unsafe, he astutely argues that some of our most cherished values, such as the freedom to start a family and the freedom from state control, actually support the case for human cloning. Offering a brave and lucid insight into this ethical minefield, John Harris at last shows that far from ending the diversity of human life or creating a race of super-clones, cloning has the power to improve and heal human life. (shrink)