The anthropological turn, which Pannenberg decisively and successfully executed in the early 1980s, has provided his latest ethical argumentation with an extra dimension and increased depth. Pannenberg now believes that ethics has its foundations in anthropology rather than directly in dogmatics. The ethical as a common concern of all humankind must not be isolated and made independent of metaphysics and religion. For only then can the claim of universal validity for ethics be sustained, which in turn Pannenberg sees (...) as the condition of its binding nature for Christians. Our awareness of moral obligations would become vague when it cannot be clarified in terms of any universally valid norms. Our final verdict on Pannenberg's new approach, however, must await greater clarity on whether his universal moral claim can withstand the potent challenge arising in today's increasingly pluralistic world; otherwise, his latest methodology would only bring him from the historicist fringe to the anthropologist margin. (shrink)

Socrates has an implicit argument for his afterlife story that concludes the Gorgias, with two key premises. One is at 527a–c, where he summarizes the ethical position he has been arguing for through most of the dialogue, regarding the intrinsic goodness of justice, the intrinsic badness of injustice, and the desirability of rehabilitative punishments. The second occurs at 507e–508a, where Socrates asserts that the universe is held together by justice. This argument explains why Socrates regards his story as a logos, (...) not merely a muthos. It also helps us understand the nature of the rewards and punishments in his story. (shrink)

Socrates has an implicit argument for his afterlife story that concludes the Gorgias, with two key premises. One is at 527a–c, where he summarizes the ethical position he has been arguing for through most of the dialogue, regarding the intrinsic goodness of justice, the intrinsic badness of injustice, and the desirability of rehabilitative punishments. The second occurs at 507e–508a, where Socrates asserts that the universe is held together by justice. This argument explains why Socrates regards his story as a logos, (...) not merely a muthos. It also helps us understand the nature of the rewards and punishments in his story. (shrink)

This essay examines the relevance of eschatological themes to the political theory of Michael Walzer. A distinctive eschatological hope is identified, which functions as a guide to thought throughout Walzer's writings, even though he seldom expresses it (and sometimes denies it). This analysis of Walzer's work demonstrates that eschatology is relevant to the contemporary discussion of justice, and conversely, that contemporary political theory can be a guide for the construction and evaluation of theological doctrines of eschatology. Any (...) class='Hi'>eschatology that enters into political debate in a modern, pluralistic society like the United States, however, must have at least one important characteristic: it must be informed by a profound sense of limitation. (shrink)

This paper argues that eschatology is defined by a combination of sacred cosmogonic power and moral requirement. Moralizing religion is this combination, which claims to ground a distinctive kind of possibility (possible hereafter states). Eschatology has certain features that hold in all of its forms, with variations in whether the hereafter is conceived as a timeless and body-less eternity, or a more temporal and concrete existence. The paradigm for this analysis is found in Soren Kierkegaard's depiction of faith (...) in Fear and Trembling. (shrink)

The ecological crisis in the world necessitates the reconfiguration of the hegemony of modern science, theology, politics, economics and technology – the root cause of a pending ecological catastrophe. The aim is to redress a growing culture of apathy in the context of devastating weather conditions, social and political discord, and unrelenting violent wars. Public theology serves as a conceptual framework with transversal rationality as an interlocutor between the different theological (systematic, ethics, pastoral care and eco-theology), religious and philosophical (...) perspectives. The theological ontology of care is presented followed by the role of communities of critical prophetic discourse. The notion of earth as a community leads to the prospect of a new eco-theology. Finally, the pending ecological catastrophe is reconceptualised in and through Christian eschatology. This is an inter- and intra-disciplinary discussion on the disastrous consequences of modernity and anthropocentric behaviour in terms of the current environmental crisis. Various scholars offer valuable insights into what the problem is, who responsible is for the environmental crisis, and how Christian communities should forge an accountability of care for the earth and vulnerable human beings. The eschatological reality of God’s preferred future remains a constant of hopeful and sustainable life in the Anthropocene age. It is recommended that we change the way we exist by transforming modernity as developed and sustained through theology, socio-political, economic and technological ‘advances’. Contribution: This article focussed on the ecological crisis because of anthropocentrism and distorted theological, political and socio-economic paradigms to serve human interests despite the consequences for the earth. We need to reconfigure interdisciplinary and intradisciplinary scientific approaches to embrace earth as a key scientific interlocutor. The ecological crisis should be conceptualised within the reality of Christian eschatology – Jesus Christ is ultimately, the eschaton. (shrink)

Part 1. Eschatology and ethics. Introduction -- Apocalyptic eschatology -- Christological eschatology -- Separatist eschatology -- Transformative eschatology -- Part 2. An ethics of life. A culture of life -- Medical ethics -- Part 3. Earth ethics. In the space of the earth, what is the earth? -- The time of the earth -- Ecology -- Earth ethics -- Part 4. Ethics of just peace. Criteria for forming a judgment (...) -- Divine and human righteousness and justice -- Dragon slaying and peacemaking in Christianity -- Control is good, trust is better : liberty and security in the "free world" -- The righteousness of God and human and civil rights -- Part 5. Joy in God : aesthetic counterpoints. Sabbath : the feast of creation -- The jubilation of Christ's resurrection -- "And peace in the midst of strife.". (shrink)

This book, through extensive textual study, explores the Buddha's and Buddhism's uncompromising and unflinching emphasis on the centrality of ethics as against any pernicious dogmas and metaphysical beliefs, and their attempts to causally relate moral perfection to soteriological or eschatological goal. What is most admirable about Buddhism is that it integrates the vertical development of human consciousness, for which the other is the necessary condition, with the gradual development of morality. It was this emphasis which separated Siddhartha, before he (...) attained the Awakened Wisdom (bodhi), from his teachers - Alara Kalama and Uddaka Ramaputta - and it is for this reason that the Buddha calls himself and his Dhamma Patisotagami, i.e. going against the currents of the prevailing dogmas and pernicious beliefs. In brief, Buddhism is about overcoming of suffering, the greatest evil, through ethicization of human consciousness and conduct, which also takes care of the ethicization of the society and the universe. Besides, some of the essays of this book explore many other themes like Buddhist epistemology, nature of self, time, and intercultural. (shrink)

American Christian Zionism has recently become the subject of much publishing and discussion, most of which focuses on the idea that millenarian convictions are motivating Christian Zionists to attempt to hasten the apocalypse. This approach is neither entirely fair nor particularly beneficial for the purposes of challenging this influential movement, as it trades more in the easy dismissal of caricatures than in substantive theological engagement. This essay explores a narrow facet of such engagement through dialogue between the eschatologies of John (...) Howard Yoder and contemporary American Christian Zionism. An exposition of the connections between the cross, ecclesiology, social action, and apocalyptic in Yoder's eschatology will bring into relief particularly problematic aspects of traditional dispensationalist Christology and ecclesiology which leave continuing legacies in the system of convictions which sustains contemporary Christian Zionist activism. (shrink)

Frank L. Tipler's book The Physics of Immortality is a striking attempt by a scientist to resolve the conflict between theology and science on the basis of a physicalist position that identifies theology as a branch of physics, and that calculates God “in exactly the same way as physicists calculate the characteristics of electrons.” Tipler's work may be seen as a scientistic myth, and its critique is organized around the three basic characteristics of such myths: (1) it is illogical in (...) that it argues as if physics were in fact metaphysics; (2) it is grim in that its glorification of technology is insensitive to ethical issues; (3) it is meaningless in that its espousal of a strong theory of artificial intelligence empties concrete personal histories by subsuming them under abstractions that distort our understandings both of God and of resurrection. (shrink)

Foundations of Christian ethics -- What is Christian ethics? -- Frames of reference -- Christian ethics and moral philosophy -- Christian ethics and the ethics of Christendom -- Christian ethics and the churches -- Christian ethics and the Bible -- Christian ethics and the New Testament -- The covenant, the law, and the prophets -- The covenant -- The law -- The prophets -- Jesus and the Old Testament -- The ethics (...) of Jesus -- What did Jesus teach? -- Eschatology and ethics -- The ethics of compromise -- Ethical perspectives of the early church -- The law and the gospel -- The kingdom and the Christian community -- The gospel and social institutions -- God, sin and Christian character -- God and Christian character -- The Christian virtues -- The nature of sin -- Some illustrations -- Victory over sin -- Duties to self and society -- Duty to self -- Duties in interpersonal relations -- The larger society -- Problems of social decision -- Marriage and the family -- The primacy of the family -- Jesus and the family -- Is monogamy essential? -- Foundations of Christian family life -- Divorce -- The ethics of economic life -- The economic ethics of the New Testament -- The Christian view of property -- The Christian view of work -- What is economic justice? -- Christianity and the race problem -- Biblical foundations -- The causes of race prejudice -- Effects of race prejudice -- Proposals for Christian action -- The Christian conscience and the state -- What is the state? -- Our biblical and theological base -- Love and justice -- Love and coercion -- Liberty, equality, and democracy -- War, peace, and international order -- Basic Christian foundations -- Points of convergence in Christian opinion -- Pacifism and nonpacifism -- Christian ethics and culture -- What is culture? -- Biblical and theological foundations -- Science, art, and education -- Index. (shrink)

Our current planetary emergency is one in which we are facing significant global warming as a result of human-driven climate change. This is having and will continue to have catastrophic results for the earth’s ecosystems and for life as we know it. The Christian tradition often works actively against the seriousness of these challenges due to its eschatological outlook. Process theology, as one stream within the Christian tradition, embraces a different vision of the future that fosters engagement in current concerns (...) rather than an escapist approach. A process theological proposal is therefore offered that calls for an embodied ethic that embraces the acronym SHE. SHE stands for Sustainability, Health, and Ethics. It provides a dietary grid as a way to embody ethics to bring about societal change in light of environmental challenges. SHE is proposed against a background that argues for Christian engagement in our current global crisis. The idea of “small turnings” as a conceptual idea is adopted to help frame how the SHE grid might be understood. (shrink)

Content Description The origins and uses of the classical moral theories / Roger Sullivan -- Wisdom as foundational ethical theory in Thomas Aquinas / Lawrence Dewan -- Descartes and the ethics of generosity / Leslie Armour -- Is pity the basis of ethics? : Nietzsche versus Schopenhauer / T.L.S. Sprigge -- Jacques Maritain and Karol Wojtyla : approches to modernity / Kenneth Schmitz -- On the foundations of ethics / Hugo Meynell -- Ethics, the humanities, and (...) the formation of persons / Thomas De Koninck -- Personal identity and the sense of duty / Elizabeth Trott -- Passing through : women's experiences and ethics / Monique Dumais -- Ladri'ere's eschatology of reason and the foundations of ethics / Louis Perron -- The foundations of ethics and moral practices / William Sweet. (shrink)

Ethics in the Last Days of Humanity is not about the science of global warming so much as the absence of a serious ethical and religious response to it. When all existing 'reality' breaks down, ethics can no longer be based on nature or religious law. Cupitt advocates for an alternative inspired by the historical Jesus.

The Gorgias ends with Socrates telling an eschatological myth that he insists is a rational account and no mere tale. Using this story, Socrates reasserts the central lessons of the previous discussion. However, it isn’t clear how this story can persuade any of the characters in the dialogue. Those (such as Socrates) who already believe the underlying philosophical lessons don’t appear to require the myth, and those (such as Callicles) who reject these teachings are unlikely to be moved by this (...) far-fetched tale. This raises the question of who the myth is told for and what function it is meant to serve. This chapter argues that the myth is aimed, not at Callicles, but Socrates and those who aspire to follow him. There are uncertainties about the philosophical life that are due to the nature of embodiment, as well as reasons to doubt the connection between happiness and virtue. The myth assists with the former by presenting an image that draws a philosopher away from the goods of the body toward the goods of the soul. The story assists with the latter by presenting an image of cosmic justice, thereby securing happiness in proportion to virtue. (shrink)

The so-called "early Marx" comes in for sympathetic treatment from an Australian philosopher. Kamenka argues that Marx never lost his ethical vision of human dignity in future society, though "alienation" and related concepts are no longer relied upon in Das Kapital. Midway through the study an ethical position, based on the view that goods produce harmonious systems whereas evils cannot, is outlined and defended. Kamenka maintains that his "positive," non-normative ethic can be made compatible with a Marx purged of his (...) eschatology and of some Hegelian trappings. The concluding stigmatization of Soviet Marxist ethics as being "normative" is perhaps the weakest part of an uneven work. --W. L. M. (shrink)

Since virtue and the virtues have been important in Reformed theology for most of its history, this essay is devoted to the question of how this tradition may contribute to and interact with contemporary virtue ethics. Reformed concepts of sanctification as open to moral growth, covenant as a narrative context of divine commandments, and unio cum Christo as defining human teleology and virtuousness provide valuable contributions to the development of such an ethics. On the other hand, Reformed conceptions (...) of reform, natural law, common grace and christological eschatology offer theological arguments for overcoming Hauerwas’s problematic overemphasis on the distinctiveness of the church’s ethic. (shrink)

Despite petitions from friends and critics through much of his career, Paul Ramsey adamantly refused to revise his first book, Basic Christian Ethics. Yet, several pieces of Ramsey’s private correspondence indicate specific changes to Basic Christian Ethics that he felt were necessary. These include a desire to distance his use of agape from associations with Anders Nygren’s Agape and Eros, an added emphasis on the importance of the doctrine of creation for his understanding of agape, covenant, and natural (...) law, and a shift from eschatology to Christology as the foundational doctrine for political ethics. Drawing upon personal letters and other disparate comments throughout Ramsey’s published work, this paper explores the impact such proposed revisions might have on contemporary interest (or lack thereof) in Basic Christian Ethics. In so doing it also highlights Ramsey’s ability to rethink central theological concepts in his work and draw his readers’ attention to fundamental questions in the field of moral theology. (shrink)

In Aquinas's Eschatological Ethics and the Virtue of Temperance, Matthew Levering argues that Catholic ethics make sense only in light of the biblical worldview that Jesus has inaugurated the kingdom of God by pouring out his spirit. Jesus has made it possible for us to know and obey God's law for human flourishing as individuals and communities. He has reoriented our lives toward the goal of beatific communion with him in charity, which affects the exercise of the moral (...) virtues that pertain to human flourishing. Without the context of the inaugurated kingdom, Catholic ethics as traditionally conceived will seem like an effort to find a middle ground between legalistic rigorism and relativistic laxism, which is especially the case with the virtue of temperance, the focus of Levering's book. After an opening chapter on the eschatological/biblical character of Catholic ethics, the ensuing chapters engage Aquinas's theology of temperance in the Summa theologiae, which identifies and examines a number of virtues associated with temperance. Levering demonstrates that the theology of temperance is profoundly biblical, and that Aquinas's theology of temperance relies for its intelligibility upon Christ's inauguration of the kingdom of God as the graced fulfillment of our created nature. The book develops new vistas for scholars and students interested in moral theology. (shrink)

In the first half, I suggest that Kant’s conception of our moral life goes through a significant shift after 1793, with reverberations in his eschatology. The earlier account, based on the postulate of immortality, describes our moral life as an endless pursuit of the highest good, but all this changes in the later account, and I point out three possible reasons for this change of heart. In the second half, I explore how the considerations Kant brings up to argue (...) for his accounts can inform our process of formulating positions with respect to the afterlife. I argue that, in the absence of a convincing theoretical proof for or against the afterlife as well as apodictically certain knowledge of how demanding the moral law is, the Kantian strategy would be to ask which account of our moral life delivers the kind of contentment that can sustain our moral resolve. I also point out a way theists might be able to find contentment despite their moral failures by imagining God’s moral kenosis. (shrink)

There is no question of an alternative between social ethics and "political theology"; we need both a prophetic, eschatological theology and a dynamic, imaginative social doctrine.

Through an exploration of the interpretation history of Matt. 25:33-46, this article develops an apocalyptic ethics based on Christ’s encountering us in the least of his brothers and sisters. Proposing the newly coined expression ‘ visitatio Christi’, the article offers a counterpoint to the common theological-ethical theme of imitatio Christi. First, it recalls how Jesus’ eschatological parable has time and again inspired love of the neighbour in need and challenged the scope of the required option for the poor. Next, (...) the article shows how an apocalyptic ethics based in Matthew 25, which imagines our moral life as a response to the visitatio Christi, implies a transformation of attitude/perception, a reversal of roles, and finds its source in the sacramental presence of Christ in the poor. Finally, the different aspects of the argument are recapitulated drawing upon Pope Francis’s use of Matthew 25. (shrink)

In this essay, I seek to enhance eschatological perspectives on work through specific engagement with Qoheleth’s theology of time in Eccl. 2–3. I suggest that prior to a perceptual transformation in the first of the book’s so-called carpe diem passages, Qoheleth is dissatisfied with his labour because he construes it temporally-speaking within a chronology characterised by competition. Within such a construal, death poses the ultimate obstacle to the enjoyment of labour, because it strips away the promise of an immortal inheritance (...) produced by human hands. What transforms Qoheleth’s relationship to labour is a new understanding of time as kairos, defined as the opportune time in which God unexpectedly intervenes in human work ‘under the sun’ and does something paradigmatically new. Under this ‘kairological’ perspective, Qoheleth assumes a posture of receipt, declaring present labour as a gift from God, with internal as well as external goods for the worker. Qoheleth’s ‘accipe diem work ethic’ draws the eschatological ultimacy of life and peace into present labour, re-orienting eschatological understandings of work that fall prey to competitive-chronological notions of progress. (shrink)

The works of H. Richard and Reinhold Niebuhr provide an appropriate starting point for renewed attention to the idea of responsibility in Christian ethics. While responsible choice and ‘the responsible society’ were important themes in ecumenical Protestant ethics in Britain and the US from the 1930s to the late 1950s, the idea has been neglected in recent decades. German theology, however, has considered Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s wartime writings on the ‘venture of responsibility’ and a biblical theology of judgment and (...) responsibility in light of a growing literature in philosophy and social thought that structures the moral life around a technological society’s responsibility for the human future. These different ways of thinking about responsibility invite further theological and ethical reflection on their history, their disagreements, and their possibilities for the future. (shrink)

IN RECENT YEARS SEVERAL IMPORTANT PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES ON THE ethical and political character of Pauline messianism have been published by continental philosophers such as Alain Badiou, Stanislaus Breton, Jacob Taubes, and Giorgio Agamben. In contrast to the Weberian "secularization thesis," which interprets Paul's eschatological messianism as one of indifference to worldly conditions, these authors—more in keeping with Walter Benjamin and Karl Barth—interpret it as radically political: a challenge to conventional modern politics of human and especially national sovereignty. In this essay (...) I bring these studies of Paul into conversation with recent critical discussions of Christian political theology to consider how messianic ethics may or may not be relevant to contemporary political theory, particularly in reformulating a "secularity" that neither excludes nor privileges particular religious voices and traditions. (shrink)

Aggregative consequentialism and several other popular moral theories are threatened with paralysis: when coupled with some plausible assumptions, they seem to imply that it is always ethically indifferent what you do. Modern cosmology teaches that the world might well contain an infinite number of happy and sad people and other candidate value-bearing locations. Aggregative ethics implies that such a world contains an infinite amount of positive value and an infinite amount of negative value. You can affect only a finite (...) amount of good or bad. In standard cardinal arithmetic, an infinite quantity is unchanged by the addition or subtraction of any finite quantity. So it appears you cannot change the value of the world. Modifications of aggregationism aimed at resolving the paralysis are only partially effective and cause severe side effects, including problems of “fanaticism”, “distortion”, and erosion of the intuitions that originally motivated the theory. Is the infinitarian challenge fatal? (shrink)

The ethics of Wolfhart Pannenberg has a nomological dimension at its center. Based on the history of the natural law tradition, Pannenberg maintains the possibility of the natural law theory on the following five grounds. -/- The theological ground is his understanding of the Decalogue, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Pauline interpretation of the law. For its historical ground, Pannenberg articulates the natural law theories of Patristic theology and the theologies of Troeltsch and Brunner. The ontological ground (...) is the order of the world, which God established in the process of history. The anthropological ground is the mutuality of human society. The latter two dimensions are related to the epistemological ground, which is based on the hermeneutics of universal history. -/- Pannenberg attempts to combine the law, the gospel, and love in relation to the Kingdom of God. Thus, Pannenberg’s Kingdom ethics is nomological as well as eschatological. (shrink)

This article advocates evangelical environmental care by grounding an ethic of nature at the centre of evangelical theology, namely, in Christ and his resurrection. As Paul points out in 1 Corinthians 15, the continuity between our earthly bodies and our resurrected bodies entails that we should take care of our bodies. Drawing on Romans 8, I argue that the same line of reasoning applies to nature: the continuity between creation and the new creation entails that we should take care of (...) nature. Finally, I consider some objections to my argument regarding its possible eschatological consequences. (shrink)

In this article, the author aims to demonstrate how Agamben’s concept of Homo Sacer is ideally epitomized by a soldier in war. A soldier in war holds a peculiar position, as killing of soldiers is considered neither illegal by laws nor immoral by ethics, and so a soldier is not considered to be legally or morally “guilty” in the usual sense of the word if he or she kills another soldier in war. The author analyzes the notion of Homo (...) Sacer – a figure representing a human that can be killed without the killer being punished, but at the same time someone who cannot be sacrificed – and further demonstrates that a soldier in war can be said to hold precisely such a status. The reason why a soldier cannot be sacrificed resides in the fact that he has already been “sacrificed to war” by his own society, in exchange for the safety of all other members of society. Perceiving a soldier as Homo Sacer provides a novel explanation and an additional argument for the moral symmetry of combatants, one of the pillars of non-revisionist Just War Theory, as all soldiers can be understood as persons sacrificed by their own societies. (shrink)

Research question and aim Clinical Ethics Committees (CECs) aim to support healthcare professionals (HPs) and healthcare organizations to deal with the ethical issues of clinical practice. In 2020, a CEC was established in an Oncology Research Hospital in the North of Italy. This paper describes the development process and the activities performed 20 months from the CEC’s implementation, to increase knowledge about CEC’s implementation strategy. Research design We collected quantitative data related to number and characteristics of CEC activities carried (...) out from October 2020 to June 2022 using the CEC internal database. Data were reported descriptively and compared with data from the literature to provide a complete overview of the CEC’s development and implementation process. Participants and research context The study has been conducted at the local health authority (LHA) of Reggio Emilia. It is a report of the activities provided by the CEC, where no HPs or patients were involved. Ethical Considerations The report is part of a larger study named EVAluating a Clinical Ethics Committee implementation process (EvaCEC), which has been approved by the Local Ethics Committee (AUSLRE Protocollo n° 2022/0026554 of 24/02/2022). EvaCEC is also the first author's PhD project. Findings In total, the CEC performed 7 ethics consultations (EC), published three policies related to particular ethical questions of clinical and organizational practice, provided one educational online course on ethics consultation targeting employed HPs, and promoted a specific dissemination process among the different departments of the LHA. According to our results, the CEC widely fulfilled the standard threefold set of clinical ethics support services tasks (namely, ethics consultation, ethics education, and policy development), but further investigations are needed to evaluate the CEC’s impact on clinical practice. Conclusion Our findings may increase knowledge regarding the composition, role, and tasks of a CEC in an Italian setting, informing future strategies and efforts to regulate these institutions officially. (shrink)

The new business opportunities and prospects emerging in Europe within the Common Market and other Western and European countries also raise important ethical challenges. This work comprises a collection of ethical insights to enhance the conduct of business in an evolving Europe.

This book develops a thorough account of the sphere of human moral action in sustained dialogue with Jürgen Moltmann.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 14.1 (2004) 47-54 [Access article in PDF] Ethical Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research*(A Recommended Manuscript) Adopted on 16 October 2001Revised on 20 August 2002 Ethics Committee of the Chinese National Human Genome Center at Shanghai, Shanghai 201203 Human embryonic stem cell (ES) research is a great project in the frontier of biomedical science for the twenty-first century. Be- cause the (...) research involves the use of human embryos, it triggers serious debate on ethical issues. Opponents consider the embryo to be an early form of human life that should be respected and not destroyed. However, the majority of scientists support embryonic stem cell research, believing that it offers good prospects for the treatment of diseases that have remained incurable until now and so will benefit humankind. The Ethics Committee of the Department of Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications of the Chinese National Human Genome Center at Shanghai seriously discussed the ethical debate initiated by embryonic stem cell research. We concluded that we should support the scientists of our country in actively carrying out human embryonic stem cell research for the noble cause of "medicine being a beneficent art." For the healthy and orderly development of human embryonic stem cell research in our country, we put forward the following recommended Ethical Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research as a reference for leaders, administrative departments, and related scientists. Preface Article 1. Human embryonic stem cells are the primitive cells that play the main role in the growth and development of a human body. These [End Page 47] primitive cells have the potential for infinite proliferation, self-renewal, and multi-directional differentiation. If scientists can discover the mechanism of differentiation of human embryonic stem cells, it will be possible to induce differentiation of human embryonic stem cells to form various types of human cells for clinical cell therapy. If human embryonic stem cell research can be integrated with modern biomedical engineering techniques, it also will be possible to make repair and replacement of human tissues and organs a reality. Article 2. There are two ways to classify human embryonic stem cells. One way is to classify them according to their potential for differentiation. There could be three kinds of stem cells: totipotent stem cells, pluripotent stem cells, and unipotent stem cells.A totipotent stem cell has the potential to develop into a whole individual. It can differentiate into the more than 200 cell types in the whole body, construct any tissue or organ of the body, and finally develop into a whole individual. The fertilized egg and the cleavage cells at the very early stage of embryonic development are totipotent stem cells.A pluripotent stem cell has the potential to differentiate into many cell types derived from the three embryonic layers. However, it has lost the capacity to develop into a complete organism.A unipotent stem cell is derived from the further differentiation of the pluripotent stem cell. It can differentiate only into one cell type such as a hematopoietic stem cell, neural stem cell, and others.The other way is to classify human stem cells according to their source. There could be two kinds of human stem cells: embryonic stem cells and tissue stem cells (also called adult stem cells). The former involves experimentation with embryos, which has serious ethical implications. Ethical issues associated with the latter are mainly expressed in the various opinions regarding the allocation of health resources. Article 3. Human embryonic stem cells are the group of cells called the blastocyst inner cell mass during the early stage of embryonic development. They are the main source of totipotent stem cells, and hence the focal and hot point in stem cell research. Studies on the clinical application of embryonic stem cells probably will involve use of the somatic cell nucleus transfer (SCNT) technique, which destroys the early human embryo. At present, the ethical and moral debate is very serious in human embryonic stem cell research regarding whether the research will develop... (shrink)

While the story of Stanislav Petrov – the Soviet Lieutenant Colonel who likely saved the world from nuclear holocaust in 1983 – is often trotted out to advocate for the view that human beings ought to be kept “in the loop” of automated weapons’ responses, I argue that the episode in fact belies this reading. By attending more closely to the features of this event – to Petrov’s professional background, to his familiarity with the warning system, and to his decisions (...) to defy his protocol – it becomes clear that Petrov was not seamlessly working “in his loop,” but reassessing it entirely. I claim that this exhibits a paradox intrinsic to all automated loops: namely, that their optimum function in fact rests on unforeseen human interventions that cannot be reliably codified ex ante, that is, that good judgment cannot simply be “programmed into” their protocols. This dependence, moreover, reveals automation’s ineluctable need for virtue ethics – not in the usual sense (whereby ethics deliberates about, say, possible damages and loss of life), but in the sense that ethical judgment, rightly understood, entails the reassessment of all of the conditions surrounding a decision, including whether a protocol should be followed at all. (shrink)

In books making the argument for animal ethics, most works either do not address the religious tradition of ethics or use the religious tradition to argue against animal ethics. This book stands out by addressing the ethics of animals within the religious tradition of moral theology and engaging it to create a new ethics. Chris Steck's book seeks to present a comprehensive, Catholic theology of animals and an ethical response to them. His claim first is (...) that animals are part of the kingdom to come (and therefore part of the eschtological framework) therefore animals should be included within the same ethical framework as humans. And, second, he claims that eschatology is not just about the future (after death) but also about the present. Further, he includes any animal with "significant intellectual capacities" as part of the definition of "animal," demonstrating the need to develop traditional teaching in this area. Given what we now know about animals from contemporary scientific investigations and how interpretations of Genesis have evolved, it makes sense to revise our theological ethics. (shrink)

In this paper, I review evidence which strongly supports the claim that life will eventually be extinguished from the universe. I then examine the ethical implications of this evidence, focusing, in particular, on the question whether it is a bad thing that life will eventually die out.

The article considers a particular case of Richard Kearney's characteristic hermeneutical exploration of `the possible' as an `imaginative' way of casting light upon philosophical issues. This particular case is his recent hermeneutical and phenomenological consideration of `Otherness' in the context of philosophy of religion. This consideration, strongly influenced by philosophers such as Heidegger, Levinas, Ricoeur and Derrida, is developed in two of his recent works Strangers, Gods and Monsters and The God Who May Be . The article examines how he (...) seeks to navigate an interpretation of divine otherness as an ethical appeal which escapes the dilemma of a God either so transcendent as to be anonymous or so immanent as to be a mere projection. It outlines how, rejecting onto-theology in favour of eschatology, Kearney envisages the divine as an ethically enabling possibility. This possibility, he claims, enables us to achieve, beyond our own intrinsic resources, an ethical order of justice and love through which the kingdom of God — the God Who May Be — is accomplished. There is a co-relativity between the divine as enabling possibility and humanity which accomplishes this possibility. It investigates the way in which Kearney seeks to legitimize, within a phenomenological frame of reference, an experiential affirmation of this conception of divine transcendence as eschatological possibility. It argues that this phenomenological consideration needs to be qualified and complemented by certain metaphysical considerations which Kearney disputes. Key Words: eschatology • ethics • God • hermeneutics • metaphysics • Otherness • phenomenology • possibility. (shrink)