How pragmatic is bioethics?
pp. 41-68
in: Jozef Keulartz, Michiel Korthals, Maartje Schermer, Tsjalling Swierstra (eds), Pragmatist ethics for a technological culture, Berlin, Springer, 2002Abstract
In his Birth of Bioethics Al Jonsen describes American pragmatism as the source for some of the most distinctive traits of bioethics (Jonsen, 1998). A similar thesis - that much of the bioethical literature has in fact been developed from a pragmatist model - is defended by various authors in Pragmatic Bioethics (McGee, 1999). For example, Jonathan Moreno claims that in the 1950s and 1960s theologians dominated bioethics but that a shift has taken place since the 1970s towards a more pragmatist orientation. According to Susan M. Wolf (1994) this shift has taken place later. She states that bioethics (as well as health law) has always been an applied and practical discipline, but has only recently witnessed the turn to a truly pragmatist paradigm.