"Expressive Individualism" Ignores a Full Human Experience
A philosophy major once told me, "All you ethicists really write about is sex and death." He was joking, but after I thought about it, I decided he was not wrong. Bioethics is concerned with the edges of life—its beginning and end. Even when we talk about technological and pharmaceutical enhancements to our bodies, we're really talking about the implications of frailty and finitude. Birth and death are the bookends of our experience as embodied human beings. They mark the times when we are completely dependent on others; we bring nothing with us when we enter life and leave all when we depart.
Even though embodiment is an integral part of the human experience, our laws reflect a vision of human...
has an M.S. in chemistry from the University of Texas at Dallas, and an M.A. in bioethics from Trinity International University. She resides in Dallas and currently works as a freelance science writer and educator.
Get Salvo in your inbox! This article originally appeared in Salvo, Issue #57, Summer 2021 Copyright © 2024 Salvo | www.salvomag.com https://salvomag.com/article/salvo57/being-a-person
