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Document Details : Title: Narrativity and Hermeneutics in Applied Ethics Author(s): VERSTRAETEN, Johan Journal: Ethical Perspectives Volume: 1 Issue: 2 Date: June 1994 Pages: 51-56 DOI: 10.2143/EP.1.2.630093 Abstract : ‘Narrativity and Hermeneutics’ is not an obvious subject to mark the fifth anniversary of a centre devoted to applied ethics. Narrative tradition and the interpretation of texts are not the main concern of handbooks on biomedical ethics, engineering ethics, business ethics or ecological ethics. The reasons are evident; most practitioners of applied ethics see their area of research as a functionally differentiated discipline, a carefully circumscribed field wherein only specialists are competent. In their textbooks they adopt the view of ethical expertise as defended by Theo van Willingenburg in his noteworthy thesis Inside the Ethical Expert. According to this view, practitioners of applied ethics are experts possessing a body of specialized knowledge and skill within a given domain acquired through a substantial amount of study and training. Besides being able to clarify problems and analyze concepts and arguments, they are, as experts, also able to apply specific skills of moral reasoning to reach a substantiated evaluation of values and norms, with the ultimate purpose of offering suitable ethical advice. |
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