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Document Details :

Title: Bioethics and Medical Law
Subtitle: An Orientation
Author(s): NYS, Herman , SCHOTSMANS, Paul
Journal: Ethical Perspectives
Volume: 1    Issue: 4   Date: December 1994   
Pages: 185-207
DOI: 10.2143/EP.1.4.630065

Abstract :
Bioethics has been in existence now for more than twenty years. Much has changed, however, since Van Rensselaer Potter first used the term bioethics in 1971. For Potter, bioethics was an applied science with its roots in the biological sciences and its orientation towards the betterment of human life. Today the concept is used in a different context. It has become the name given to the ethical research that has become necessary in light of the new possibilities created by revolutionary developments in medical science. Generally speaking, bioethics is concerned with the beginning and the end of life. In a certain sense, however, this is merely a de facto definition which does not possess a great deal of internal logical consistency.

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