Eidgenössische Ethikkommission für die Biotechnologie im Ausserhumanbereich EKAH

Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology ECNH

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Contributions to Ethics and Biotechnology book series

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Animal Enhancement. New technical opportunities and ethical issues

Contributions to Ethics and Biotechnology, Volume 7 (2010)

The current intense debate on the ethical aspects of ‘human enhancement’ also throws new light on the scientific and technical ‘enhancement’ of animals. Admittedly, ‘animal enhancement’ is in many respects a well-known phenomenon. In agriculture in particular, animals have long been intentionally improved through breeding, and some experiments on animals can also be understood in these terms. However, whereas a key issue in the debate on human enhancement is the fundamental differentiation between healing and improvement, in the debate regarding animals this distinction is largely irrelevant. As a result of current scientific and technical developments, the level of intervention and potentially its ethical significance too are changing. This book is probably one of the first studies to provide a broad overview of developments in the field of the converging technologies and sciences which play a role in animal enhancement and examines the key ethical issues involved.

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Last updated on: 30.01.2012

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Animal Enhancement – Neue technische Möglichkeiten und ethische Fragen

Autoren

Dr. Arianna Ferrari is a research scientist at the Institute for Technology Assessment and System Analysis (ITAS) at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Her work there involves looking at the ethical and political issues surrounding human enhancement. Further areas of her work are animal philosophy, philosophy of technology, philosophy of biology and issues in the field of applied ethics.

Christopher Coenen is also a research scientist at the ITAS and is at present working in the fields of human enhancement, synthetic biology and nanotechnology.

Prof. Dr. Armin Grunwald is head of ITAS and of the Office for Technology Assessment (TAB) in the German Bundestag, which is run by ITAS. He is also Professor of Philosophy of Technology and Technical Ethics at the KIT. His fields are the theory and practice of sustainable development, ethical issues in nanotechnology and synthetic biology, as well as the theory and methods of technology assessment.

Dr. Arnold Sauter has been a research scientist at the TAB since 1995. Since obtaining a doctorate in zoology and genetics he has been involved in interdisciplinary investigations into a wide range of biotechnologies and medical technologies, focusing on the results of genome research and applications in gene technology.