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By Evan Rosa, Communications Director at The Center for Bioethics and Culture
Reviewed: Progress in Bioethics: Science, Policy, and Politics (Basic Bioethics), Jonathan D. Moreno and Sam Berger, eds., The MIT Press, 2010
“The fatal metaphor of progress, which means leaving things behind us, has utterly obscured the real idea of growth, which means leaving things inside us.” (G.K. Chesterton, Fancies Versus Fads)
Political science, for Aristotle and other ancients, was considered the surest path toward human flourishing for communities of individuals. Progress in Bioethics exemplifies a few ways that we’ve wandered from the ideal of seeking a robust and thick moral account of how to share public life. Interacting with each of the contributors would be worthwhile, and as with any edited volume, the whole does not necessarily represent the parts. Here, I comment more generally, and I offer three worries that reveal what is, at bottom, a lack of philosophical precision and political virtue.
“What is progressive bioethics?,” the book’s editors wonder (xvii). That’s a great question, which fifteen contributors address through reflections on the nature of progressive politics and values, advancing biotechnology, the role of religion and other “value-laden” ideologies, justice in health care and medicine, and how bioethics operates in public.
To set forth some sort of positive account or manifesto of progressivism in bioethics, most of the contributors are content to attempt a basic presentation of their positions, without much in the way of reasons or argument. What remains is political and ethical analysis and general systematizing—a sort of bioethical accounting for the political left. This is no criticism; indeed, I read with deep interest to hear these writers’ take on contemporary liberal bioethical identity.
The cumulative effect of the volume is threefold: (1) a commitment to the autonomy and priority of science, (2) an eschewing of ideological (moral or religious) limitation, (3) and a clear commitment to the progressive stance in the rhetorical games of contemporary politics.
The autonomy of science. Many writers note progressives’ concern for “getting the science” right—an effect of their academic approach to bioethics. The concern is of course legitimate. All bioethicists find themselves betwixt advancing scientific technique and ethical regulation—a sparkling few are ever experts in both fields. By definition, science and ethics concern different spheres: science is concerned with physical reality and ethics is concerned with moral reality. How we interpret this will lead to vastly different bioethical principles. The reigning interpretation among many a conservative and progressive alike is one of conflict: that scientific advance and ethical guidance find common ground only on a battlefield.
Moreover, progressives and conservatives alike are nobly concerned with finding a way to reconcile this conflict. The bioethical left emphasizes the autonomy of science. This allows for widespread, free and mostly unbounded technological exploration. This attitude is overwhelmingly clear in Progress in Bioethics. Moreno and Berger note “[a] distinctively progressive bioethics is a natural outgrowth of the close connection between progressivism and science . . . focus[ing] on results rather than ideology” (8), “letting empirical fact and not ideology drive regulatory and governmental decisions” (274). Richard Lempert thinks progressive bioethics entails a scientific “methodological commitment” (23). There is an overall greater concern for getting the science right than getting the ethics right.
On this point, I want to suggest an alternative approach for thinking about the relationship of science and ethics—one that respects the nature of both types of inquiry, and introduces a third “mediating” factor: metaphysics, that is, an over-arching appreciation of the nature of technology, morality, and especially human beings—we, the technical–moral souls-incarnate—who are involved. Metaphysics, I think, helps us keep the complex and very politically charged relationship of science and ethics in perspective. Now, this is no political agenda. It’s not a conception of ideological tyranny over science. It is an appeal to the nature of morality: ethics is concerned with the character and actions of moral agents. And by our nature, we moral agents practice science, so naturally, bioethical evaluation (and regulation, if we are to take the action-guiding nature of ethics seriously) will be deeply concerned with the morality of technological progress.
Eschewing ideology. In praise, a few essays offered outlying, insightful contributions on issues of ideology and values. William F. May’s suggestion of a “campus” or “open terrain” for bioethics would provide a careful and open bioethical discourse in public, with ample room for scientific and ethical voices. Laurie Zoloth makes a religious appeal to challenge the scope of contemporary bioethics—suggesting greater attention on the poor, and ill and under-represented, fitting a Judeo-Christian view of social justice for the most vulnerable of humanity. This would be an extension of our bioethical vision, within which we need to avoid the tendency to focus on areas of technique (means) more than people (ends).
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