Re: Virtue Ethics, Deontological Ethics, and Biotechnology

On Friday, May 12, 2006, David Opderbeck wrote:

>>>I'm starting work on a paper that will examine a virtue ethics approach to biotechnology patent law. I'm getting reasonably well-versed in virtue ethics from secular and Catholic social theory perspectives, but I'm also trying to dig up evangelical perspectives. It seems there is some tension between deontological and virtue approaches within evangelicalism -- or maybe that's just my misperception based on early stage research. Anyway, I'd be grateful if anyone here is aware of any good sources from an evangelical / protestant perspective. (I'm aware of Hauerwas and the anabaptist tradition).<<<

There's not much, believe me. There's Hauerwas (who is labelled a virtue ethicist only because there's no other category he fits comfortably into), and perhaps James Gilman (*Fidelity of the Heart*). William Willimon wrote a book on pastoral ethics (*Calling and Character*) that takes a virtue ethics approach, but it's a narrowly focused text, and probably of little value in a discussion of biotechnology.

I think there are plausible reasons for this lack of interest in virtue ethics among evangelical scholars. Most academic evangelicals I know are reflexive deontologists (including divine command theorists), and there's not much common ground readily apparent between deontology and virtue ethics. If one is a default divine command ethicist, the development of a virtuous character is at best a useful side effect of obedience to divine commands. So your comment regarding "some tensions" between deontology and virtue ethics among evangelicals is, as far as I can tell, spot-on.
 
Since I teach courses in engineering ethics, and ethics and technology, I'd be very interested in reading your paper, David.

Tom Pearson

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Thomas D. Pearson
Department of History & Philosophy
The University of Texas-Pan American
Edinburg, Texas
e-mail: pearson@utpa.edu
 
Received on Sat May 13 00:05:31 2006