Morality and ethics. Two dimensions for bioethics

Abstract

Bioethics, in providing a stage for interdisciplinary discussion has as its challenge to argue in a context in which there is a multiplicity of ethical voices. The world today, consists of moral "relatives" and moral "strangers", as said by T Engelhardt; the difficulty lies in the return to the search for a moral authority with a communal base content. Bioethics must put forth interpretations and appoint norms for the working in diverse scenarios as justice in health, clinical research, biodiversity and genetics amongst others.

This challenge for bioethics results in a useful distinction, following that, which has been expressed by J.Habermas: the pragmatic, the ethical and moral used as different applications of Practical Reason. Furthermore to speak of a language which belongs to the Kantian tradition, of which today we are all part whenever philosophy concerns that which is moral. Despite the fact that T Engelhardt does not believe Habermas´s Theory of Communicative Action to be a solution to the contemporary moral problem, the language of this work may be vital for the field of Bioethics.