What Is Bioethics?

Abstract Bioethics is an interdisciplinary inquiry into ethical issues in the life sciences and biomedicine. The extent to which medical ethics should be seen as central to bioethics has been debated, but this is now the dominant view. The core aims and features of bioethics are that it involves bringing moral reason to bear, via three central activities—clinical consultation, bioethics and public policy and scholarly bioethics ethics—on morally pressing issues. This characterization of bioethics is one that includes an important spectrum from more philosophical bioethics to more empirical bioethics, and also includes those who favour a more missionary perspective.