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Primary Goods, Contingency, and the Moral Challenge of Genetic Enhancement

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Notes

  1. Allen Buchanan, et al., From Chance to Choice: Genetics and Justice (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2000), p. 1; see also S. Mathew Liao, Julian Savulescu, and David Wasserman, “The Ethics of Enhancement,” Journal of Applied Philosophy, vol. 25, no. 3, 2008.

  2. Ronald Dworkin, Sovereign Virtue: The Theory and Practice of Equality (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press 2000); see also Michael Sandel, The Case Against Perfection: Ethics in the Age of Genetic Engineering (Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007).

  3. Eduarto Mendieta, “Habermas on Human Cloning,” Philosophy & Social Criticism, vol. 30, no. 5–6, 2004, p. 722.

  4. See Thomas Douglas, “Moral Enhancement,” Journal of Applied Philosophy vol. 25, 2008; see also Ingmar Persson and Julian Savulescu, “The Perils of Cognitive Enhancement and the Urgent Imperative to Enhance the Moral Character of Humanity,” Journal of Applied Philosophy, vol. 25, 2008.

  5. Sandel, op. cit., p. 51.

  6. Dworkin, op. cit., p. 443.

  7. Jürgen Habermas, The Future of Human Nature (Cambridge, England: Polity Press 2003), p. 39.

  8. See Lenny Moss, “Contra Habermas and Towards a Critical Theory of Human Nature and the Question of Genetic Enhancement,” New Formations vol. 60, 2007; see also Dworkin, op.cit.

  9. Nicholas Agar, Liberal Eugenics: In Defense of Human Enhancement (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), p. 135.

  10. See Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia. (New York: Basic Books, 1974) and Peter Singer, “Shopping at the Genetic Supermarket,” in Song, Sang-Yong, et al. eds., Asian Bioethics in the 21st Century (Tsukuba, Japan: University of Tsukuba Publishing 2003).

  11. See Dov Fox “The Illiberality of ‘Liberal Eugenics’,” Ratio, vol. 20, no. 1, 2007.

  12. See Buchanan et al., op. cit, pp. 304–344.

  13. See Singer op.cit; see also Julian Savulescu, “Procreative Beneficence: Why We Should Select the Best Children,” Bioethics, vol. 15, no. 5–6, 2001, and Agar, op. cit.

  14. See Jonathan Glover Choosing Children Genes, Disability, and Design (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2006), p. 103; see also Buchanan et al., op. cit.

  15. See Agar, op. cit., p. 172; see also Buchanan et al., op. cit.; and John A. Robertson, Children of Choice: Freedom and the New Reproductive Technologies (Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1994), p. 167, and Glover, op. cit., p. 79.

  16. See Agar, op. cit., p. 113.

  17. See Habermas, op.cit, p. 51.

  18. See James Hughes “Embracing Change with all Four Arms,” Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics, vol. 6, no. 4, 1996; see also Singer, op. cit., and Nozick, op. cit.

  19. See Fox, op. cit, p. 24.

  20. See Buchanan et al., op. cit.; see also, Fox, op. cit., and Fritz Allhoff, “Germ-Line Genetic Enhancement and Rawlsian Primary Goods,” Journal of Evolution and Technology, vol. 18, no. 1, 2008.

  21. John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 62.

  22. Rawls, op. cit., p. 396.

  23. Allhoff, op.cit., p. 20.

  24. Ibid., p. 21.

  25. Fox, op. cit, p. 11.

  26. See Fox, op. cit, p. 12; see also Allhoff, op. cit., p. 21.

  27. See Rawls, op. cit, p. 396.

  28. Rawls, op.cit., pp. 142–143.

  29. See Adina Schwartz, “Moral Neutrality and Primary Goods,”’ Ethics, vol. 83, no. 4, 1973.

  30. See Thomas Nagel “Rawls on Justice,” The Philosophical Review, vol. 82, no. 2, 1973; see also Michael Sandel, Liberalism and the Limits of Justice (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1982).

  31. See Bonnie P. Tucker “Deafness—Disability or Subculture: The Emerging Conflict,” Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy vol. 3, 1994; see also Bonnie P. Tucker, “Deaf Culture, Cochlear Implants, and Elective Disability,” The Hastings Center Report vol. 28, no. 4, 1998.

  32. See Glover, op. cit., p. 16.

  33. Habermas op.cit., p. 40.

  34. See Courtois, op cit.

  35. Habermas, op.cit., p. 67.

  36. Ibid., pp. 38–40.

  37. Ibid., p. 39.

  38. Ibid.

  39. Ibid., p. 51.

  40. Ibid., p. 63.

  41. Ibid., p. 13.

  42. Ibid., p. 79.

  43. See Ludwig Siep, “The Value of Natural Contingency,” in Marcus Düwell, Christoph Rehmann-Sutter, and Dietmar Mieth, eds., The Contingent Nature of Life: Bioethics and the Limits of Human Existence (Dordrecht: Springer 2008).

  44. Charles Taylor, The Ethics of Authenticity (1991), p. 91.

  45. See Axel Honneth The Struggle for Recognition (Cambridge, England: Polity Press, 1995)

  46. I would like to thank two anonymous referees and Thomas Magnell, the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Value Inquiry, for their useful comments.

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  1. University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany

    Somogy Varga

  2. Center for Subjectivity Research, University of Copenhagen, Njalsgade 140-142, 2300, Copenhagen S, Denmark

    Somogy Varga

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Varga, S. Primary Goods, Contingency, and the Moral Challenge of Genetic Enhancement. J Value Inquiry 45, 279–291 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10790-011-9291-z

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