University Medical Center Göttingen, Institute for Medical Ethics and History of Medicine, Göttingen, Germany.
Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Institute for History of Medicine and Ethics in Medicine, Berlin, Germany.
Bioethics. 2021 Jul;35(6):499-507. doi: 10.1111/bioe.12841. Epub 2021 Jan 3.
Slippery slope-, taboo-breaking- or Nazi-analogy-arguments are common, but not uncontroversial examples of the complex relationship between bioethics and the various ways of using historical arguments in these debates. In our analysis we examine first the relationship between bioethics and medical history both as separate disciplines and as argumentative practices. Secondly, we then analyse six common types of historical arguments in bioethics (slippery slope-, analogy-, continuity-, knockout/taboo-, ethical progress- and accomplice-arguments), some as arguments within the academic debate of bioethics, others as arguments within political and public debates over bioethical issues. We conclude by suggesting to bioethicists to better understand historical arguments as socially and culturally embedded practices of critical reflection of power, medical and government paternalism and possible future scenarios. More interdisciplinarity between ethicists and medical historians is needed to appropriately rationalize and understand the different legacies.
滑坡谬误、打破禁忌或纳粹类比论证是常见的，但并非生物伦理学与这些辩论中使用历史论证的各种方式之间复杂关系的无争议例子。在我们的分析中，我们首先考察了生物伦理学与医学史之间的关系，既作为独立的学科，也作为论证实践。其次，我们分析了生物伦理学中六种常见的历史论证类型（滑坡论证、类比论证、连续性论证、排除/禁忌论证、伦理进步论证和同谋论证），有些是生物伦理学学术辩论中的论证，有些是生物伦理问题的政治和公共辩论中的论证。最后，我们建议生物伦理学家更好地将历史论证理解为对权力、医学和政府家长制以及可能的未来情景的批判性思考的社会和文化上的固有实践。伦理学家和医学历史学家之间需要更多的跨学科合作，以合理地理解和解释不同的遗产。
