Human Dignity and Bioethics.

• Position: Brief article - Book review

Pellegrino, Edmund D., Adam Schulman & Thomas W. Merrill, eds. Human Dignity and Bioethics. Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 2009.

This collection of essays was commissioned by the President's Council on Bioethics and explores a fundamental concept crucial to today's discourse in law and ethics in general and in bioethics in particular. Since its formation in 2001, the council has frequently used the term "human dignity" in its discussions and reports. In this volume, scholars from the fields of philosophy, medicine, medical ethics, law, political science, and public policy address the issue of what the concept of "human dignity" entails and its proper role in bioethical controversies.

Essays and commentaries are provided by Adam Schulman, F. Daniel Davis, Daniel C. Dennett, Robert P. Karynak, Alfonso Gomez-Lobo, Patricia S. Churchland, Gilbert Meilaender, Holmes Rolston III...