Christopher Cowley
This volume of original work comprises a modest challenge,sometimes direct, sometimes implicit, to the mainstream Anglo-Americanconception of the discipline of medical ethics. does so not by trying to fill the gaps with exotic minority interest topics,but by re-examining some of the fundamental assumptions of the familiarphilosophical arguments, and some of the basic situations that generate theissues. The most important such situation is the encounter between the doctorand the suffering patient, which forms one of the themes of the book. Theauthors show that concepts such as the body, suffering and consent - and therole such concepts play within patients’ lives - are much more complicated thanthe Anglo-American mainstream appreciates. Some of these concepts have beendiscussed with subtlety by Continental philosophers (like Heidegger, Ricoeur), and a secondary purpose of the volume isto apply their ideas to medical ethics. Designed for upper-level undergraduatesand graduate students with some philosophical background in ethics, Reconceiving Medical Ethics opens up new avenues for discussion in this ever-developing field.
