Abstract

CASADO DA ROCHA, Antonio  and  MENENDEZ VISO, Armando. FACT AND VALUE IN BIOETHICS: HOW TO GET RID OF THE DICHOTOMYFact and value in bioethics: How to get rid of the dichotomy. Prax. filos. [online]. 2008, n.26, pp.245-264. ISSN 0120-4688.

This article offers a perspective on recent developments in bioethics, a field in which the distinction between fact and value is pervasive. By surveying how the word “value” is used in principle- based, mainstream biomedical ethics, it is shown that some uses enforce an essentialist tendency to speak of values as freestanding entities.As an illustration and explanation of the increasing pervasiveness of this language, both in English-speaking and Spanish-speaking bioethics, we describe the role of “value talk” in recent writings by Diego Gracia.We focus on how his proposal of a methodology for bioethics uses the fact/value dichotomy, and analyse his position in relation to the agenda for the debate on the concepts of health and disease proposed by George Khushf. As a conclusion, we suggest an alternative way of thinking about values in order to overcome the dichotomy.

Keywords : fact; value; biomedical ethics; normativism; naturalism.

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