TOTAL BRAIN DEATH: A REPLY TO ALAN SHEWMON

D. Alan Shewmon has advanced a well-documented challenge to the widely accepted total brain death criterion for death of the human being. We show that Shewmon's argument against this criterion is unsound, though he does refute the standard argument for that criterion. We advance a distinct argu...

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Detalhes bibliográficos
Authors: Lee, Patrick (Author) ; Grisez, Germain Gabriel 1929- (Author)
Tipo de documento: Recurso Electrónico Artigo
Idioma:Inglês
Verificar disponibilidade: HBZ Gateway
Interlibrary Loan:Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany)
Publicado em: 2012
Em: Bioethics
Ano: 2012, Volume: 26, Número: 5, Páginas: 275-284
Outras palavras-chave:B Brain Death
B radical capacity
B Sentience
B Animal
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Descrição
Resumo:D. Alan Shewmon has advanced a well-documented challenge to the widely accepted total brain death criterion for death of the human being. We show that Shewmon's argument against this criterion is unsound, though he does refute the standard argument for that criterion. We advance a distinct argument for the total brain death criterion and answer likely objections. Since human beings are rational animals – sentient organisms of a specific type – the loss of the radical capacity for sentience (the capacity to sense or to develop the capacity to sense) involves a substantial change, the passing away of the human organism. In human beings total brain death involves the complete loss of the radical capacity for sentience, and so in human beings total brain death is death.
ISSN:1467-8519
Obras secundárias:Enthalten in: Bioethics
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8519.2010.01846.x