Are some controversial views in bioethics Juvenalian satire without irony

Bibliographic Data

ID21702328
AuthorsMatti Häyry (0000-0003-4276-4757, Aalto University, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume44
Issue2
Pages177-189
Publication date2023-04-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueMetamedicine (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0166-2031 • E-ISSN: 1573-1200
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s11017-022-09604-0
PMID36566305
OpenAlexW4312140388
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited21

The article examines five controversial views, expressed in Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal , Helga Kuhse and Peter Singer’s Should the Baby Live? The Problem of Handicapped Infants , Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva’s “After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?”, Julian Savulescu’s “Procreative beneficence: why we should select the best children”, and the author’s “A rational cure for prereproductive stress syndrome”. These views have similarities and differences on five levels: the grievances they raise, the proposals they make, the justifications they explicitly use, the justifications they implicitly rely on, and the criticisms that they have encountered. A comparison of these similarities and differences produces two findings. First, some controversial views based on utilitarian considerations would probably fare better flipped upside down and presented as Juvenalian satires. Secondly, a modicum of humor or modesty could help presenters of controversial views to stir polite critical discussion on the themes that they put forward

Abortion · Alternative medicine · Autonomy · Beneficence · Bioethics · Epistemology · Irony · Philosophy of medicine · Political science · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Ethics and Legal Issues in Pediatric Healthcare · Ethics in medical practice · Law · Medicine · Neuroethics, Human Enhancement, Biomedical Innovations · Philosophy · Psychology