The Dismal Fate of Flourishing in Public Policy Bioethics

Abstract

The re-emerging debate about human gene editing appears to be limited to whether gene editing will effectively advance the ends, goals, or values of autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence, and justice. As is the case for most of contemporary bioethics, what is not being considered is a substantive debate about what our goals should be in gene editing—that is, the debate is not trying to establish an account of human flourishing. The chapter posits that the public would include many other goals in their moral calculus and discusses why it is important to have this broader discussion. Finally, the chapter turns to a sociological explanation for why this debate is “thin” and not “thick,” why it only asks about whether the means of human gene editing maximize certain fixed ends instead of what our ends—our flourishing—should be.