Autonomy is either relational or it does not exist at all. All life is irreducibly relational and human personhood is helplessly engaging and being engaged by all life. Significant as individual personal consciousness is, consciousness of others as fellow selves is a higher form of consciousness. It is the other selves that define and affirm the autonomous individual. Relationality is the basis of autonomy. This work claims that autonomy should not undermine relationality and that individual good is based on common good. Overemphasizing autonomy may lead to moral relativism, hence ethical anarchism. Veracity ought to be the proto-principle of bioethics.

Autonomy is either relational or it does not exist at all. All life is irreducibly relational and human personhood is helplessly engaging and being engaged by all life. Significant as individual personal consciousness is, consciousness of others as fellow selves is a higher form of consciousness. It is the other selves that define and affirm the autonomous individual. Relationality is the basis of autonomy. This work claims that autonomy should not undermine relationality and that individual good is based on common good. Overemphasizing autonomy may lead to moral relativism, hence ethical anarchism. Veracity ought to be the proto-principle of bioethics.

This book develops a unique account of autonomy in which its attribution to agents is dependent in part on their relationships with others and not merely upon their mental states. This is then applied to bioethical issues—e.g., informed consent and patient confidentiality—in which autonomy plays a central role.

Just about everyone will face a difficult bioethics decision at some point. In this book a theologian, ethicist, and lawyer equips Christians to make such decisions based on biblical truth, wisdom, and virtue. Though a relatively new discipline, bioethics has generated extraordinary interest due to a number of socially pressing issues. Bioethics and the Christian Life places bioethics within the holistic context of the Christian life, both developing a general Christian approach to making bioethics decisions and addressing a number of specific, controversial areas of bioethics. Clear, concise, and well-organized, the book is divided into three sections. The first lays the theological foundation for bioethics decision-making and discusses the importance of wisdom and virtue in working through these issues. The second section addresses beginning-of-life issues, such as abortion, stem-cell research, and infertility treatments. The third section covers end-of-life issues, such as living wills, accepting and refusing medical treatment, and treatment of patients in permanent vegetative states.

Providing readers with the confidence needed to debate key issues in bioethics, this introductory text clearly explains bioethical theories and their philosophical foundations. Over 250 activities introduce topics for personal reflection, and discussion points encourage students to think for themselves and build their own arguments. Highlighting the potential pitfalls for those new to bioethics, each chapter features boxes providing factual information and outlining the philosophical background, along with detailed case studies that offer an insight into real-life examples of bioethical problems. Within-chapter essay questions and quizzes, along with end-of-chapter review questions, allow students to check their understanding and to broaden their thinking about the topics discussed. The accompanying podcasts by the author (two of whose podcasts on iTunesUTM have attracted over 3 million downloads) explain points that might be difficult for beginners. These, along with a range of extra resources for students and instructors, are available at www.cambridge.org/bioethics.

An argument against the “lifeboat ethic” of contemporary bioethics that views medicine as a commodity rather than a tradition of care and caring. Bioethics emerged in the 1960s from a conviction that physicians and researchers needed the guidance of philosophers in handling the issues raised by technological advances in medicine. It blossomed as a response to the perceived doctor-knows-best paternalism of the traditional medical ethic and today plays a critical role in health policies and treatment decisions. Bioethics claimed to offer a set of generally applicable, universally accepted guidelines that would simplify complex situations. In Thieves of Virtue, Tom Koch contends that bioethics has failed to deliver on its promises. Instead, he argues, bioethics has promoted a view of medicine as a commodity whose delivery is predicated not on care but on economic efficiency. At the heart of bioethics, Koch writes, is a “lifeboat ethic” that assumes “scarcity” of medical resources is a natural condition rather than the result of prior economic, political, and social choices. The idea of natural scarcity requiring ethical triage signaled a shift in ethical emphasis from patient care and the physician's responsibility for it to neoliberal accountancies and the promotion of research as the preeminent good. The solution to the failure of bioethics is not a new set of simplistic principles. Koch points the way to a transformed medical ethics that is humanist, responsible, and defensible.

This book educates whilst also challenging the contemporary schools of thought within philosophical and religious ethics. In addition, it underlines the fact that the substance of ethics in general and bioethics/healthcare ethics specifically, is much more expansive and inclusive than is usually thought. Bioethics is a relatively new academic discipline. However, ethics has existed informally since before the time of Hippocrates. The indigenous culture of African peoples has an ethical worldview which predates the western discourse. This indigenous ethical worldview has been orally transmitted over centuries. The earliest known written African text containing some concepts and content of ethics is the “Declaration of Innocence” written in 1500 B.C., found in an Egyptian text. Ubuntu is an example of African culture that presents an ethical worldview. This work interprets the culture of Ubuntu to explain the contribution of a representative indigenous African ethics to global bioethics. Many modern scholars have written about the meaning of Ubuntu for African societies over centuries. Some scholars have viewed Ubuntu as the greatest contribution of African cultures to other world cultures. None of the scholars, however has explored the culture of Ubuntu as providing a representative indigenous ethics that can contribute to global bioethics as discussed in this book.​