by Adam Briggle (Author)
Several presidents have created bioethics councils to advise their administrations on the importance, meaning and possible implementation or regulation of rapidly developing biomedical technologies. From 2001 to 2005, the President's Council on Bioethics, created by President George W. Bush, was under the leadership of Leon Kass. The Kass Council, as it was known, undertook what Adam Briggle describes as a more rich understanding of its task than that of previous councils. The council sought to understand what it means to advance human flourishing at the intersection of philosophy, politics, science, and technology within a democratic society.
Briggle's survey of the history of U.S. public bioethics and advisory bioethics commissions, followed by an analysis of what constitutes a rich bioethics, forms the first part of the book. The second part treats the Kass Council as a case study of a federal institution that offered public, ethical advice within a highly polarised context, with the attendant charges of inappropriate politicisation and policy irrelevance. The conclusion synthesises the author's findings into a story about the possible relationships between philosophy and policy making.
A Rich Bioethics: Public Policy, Biotechnology, and the Kass Council will attract students and scholars in bioethics and the fields of science, technology, and society, as well as those interested in the ethical and political dilemmas raised by modern science.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 240
Edition: 1
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press
Published: 15 Jun 2010
ISBN 10: 0268022216
ISBN 13: 9780268022211
Adam Briggle is assistant professor of philosophy at the University of North Texas.