The position is part of the research programme ‘Human Dignity as the Foundation of Human Rights?’ which is a five year project on the question to what extent the foundational role of human dignity in the human rights framework can be justified. The programme is funded by NWO.
Human Dignity in Bioethics
PhD project a: There is a significant body of literature on human dignity in bioethics. Since bioethics deals with the boundaries of human life, it is not surprising that human dignity is challenged by the life sciences. Do human embryos have dignity? Do humans in coma or with brain-death have human dignity? Is it compatible with human dignity to enhance specific features of human beings?
However, the relation between the concept of human dignity as used in bioethics and the human rights framework has so far not been systematically examined. The PhD-project shall be a contribution to overcome this theoretical lacuna in bioethics. It will reconstruct the use of human dignity in bioethical literature, investigate possibilities for applying a theoretically developed concept of human dignity to bioethics and investigate the more general problems of the application of the human rights framework in bioethics.
PhD Researcher: Practical Philosophy (project a: Human dignity in Bioethics)
