Human Identity and Bioethics

✍ Scribed by David DeGrazia

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2005
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 314
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

When philosophers address personal identity, they usually explore numerical identity. When non-philosophers address personal identity, they often have in mind narrative identity. This book develops accounts of both senses of identity, arguing that both are normatively important, and is unique in its exploration of a wide range of issues in bioethics through the lens of identity. Defending a biological view of our numerical identity and a framework for understanding narrative identity, David DeGrazia investigates various issues for which considerations of identity prove critical.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover......Page 1
Half-title......Page 3
Title......Page 5
Copyright......Page 6
Dedication......Page 7
Contents......Page 9
Acknowledgments......Page 11
1 Introduction......Page 15
personhood......Page 17
plan of the book......Page 21
2 Human Persons......Page 25
Locke’s Theory......Page 27
Parfit’s Innovations......Page 29
A Strong Connection to Some Everyday Practical Concerns......Page 33
concerns about the intuitive case method......Page 37
why take essentialism seriously?......Page 41
essence-based challenges to the psychological view......Page 43
a strategy for replying to these challenges: the constitution view......Page 47
The Newborn Problem......Page 52
A Problematic View of Personal Identity......Page 55
Conclusion about Baker’s Constitution View......Page 59
A Presumption Favoring a Biological View......Page 60
Several Concerns about This Approach......Page 65
a semibiological alternative: human beings as a partly psychological kind......Page 79
one more alternative: mind essentialism......Page 82
conclusion......Page 87
3 Human Persons......Page 91
what else matters in survival?......Page 93
narrative identity......Page 96
A Framework for Understanding Narrative Identity......Page 97
The Role of Others in a Person’s Narrative Identity......Page 100
Narrative Identity’s Close Fit with Certain Practical Concerns......Page 102
Is It Possible?......Page 103
How Self-Creation Relates to Narrative Identity and Other Key Concepts......Page 120
Do the Demands of Authenticity Set Moral Limits on Self-Creation?......Page 122
conclusion: bringing the two senses of identity together......Page 127
introduction to the debate......Page 129
critique of appeals to our essence in defense of the higher-brain standard......Page 138
critique of appeals to personal identity in defense of the higher-brain standard......Page 145
can appeal to narrative identity support the higher-brain view?......Page 148
might death be a moral concept that is independent of identity theory?......Page 153
Against Brain Death......Page 156
Updating the Traditional View......Page 161
Why Not Disaggregate Death into a Process?......Page 163
some comments on policy options......Page 166
A Daring Policy Approach......Page 167
Conscience-Based Exemptions – on Either Approach......Page 170
A More Cautious Policy Approach – and Conclusion......Page 171
5 Advance Directives, Dementia, and the Someone Else Problem......Page 173
The Reasoning......Page 178
Critique of This Reasoning......Page 181
The Odd Implications of the Nonidentity Thesis......Page 182
has narrative identity been disrupted?......Page 187
views that vindicate advance directives on the basis of precedent autonomy......Page 190
Appeals to Precedent Autonomy on the Assumption That Numerical Identity Matters......Page 191
Appeals to Precedent Autonomy without the Assumption That Numerical Identity Matters......Page 197
skepticism about precedent autonomy......Page 200
the importance of time-relative interests......Page 203
Several Theses......Page 211
A Note about Medical Decision Making......Page 215
6 Enhancement Technologies and Self-Creation......Page 217
introduction to enhancement technologies......Page 219
familiar concerns about enhancement technologies......Page 229
the relationship of enhancement projects to identity......Page 242
the charge of inauthenticity and a possible basis in equivocation......Page 245
the charge of violating inviolable core characteristics......Page 246
conclusion......Page 256
7 Prenatal Identity......Page 258
our origins......Page 259
prenatal genetic interventions and human identity......Page 268
Preindividuation Genetic Interventions in Relation to Identity......Page 269
Postindividuation Genetic Interventions in Relation to Identity......Page 271
on the ethics of prenatal genetic interventions......Page 275
Prenatal Genetic Therapy......Page 276
Prenatal Genetic Enhancement......Page 279
reproductive choices that may affect identity: the nonidentity problem......Page 282
on abortion......Page 293
The Future-Like-Ours Argument......Page 295
A Leading Reply: The Good Samaritan Argument......Page 297
A Successful Reply: The Appeal to Time-Relative Interests......Page 300
Two Challenges to This Approach......Page 302
Conclusion......Page 307
Index......Page 309