Joseph Fletcher
This article needs additional citations for verification. (February 2022) |
Joseph Francis Fletcher | |
---|---|
Born | biomedical ethics | April 10, 1905
Awards | Humanist of the Year |
Joseph Francis Fletcher (April 10, 1905 in
Life
Fletcher was a prolific academic, teaching, participating in symposia, and completing ten books, and hundreds of articles, book reviews, and translations. He taught Christian Ethics at Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and at Harvard Divinity School from 1944 to 1970. He was the first professor of medical ethics at the University of Virginia and co-founded the Program in Biology and Society there. He retired from teaching in 1977.
In 1974, the American Humanist Association named him Humanist of the Year. He was one of the signers of the Humanist Manifesto.[2]
He served as president of the
One of his children, Joseph F. Fletcher Jr. was a historian.[citation needed]
Quotes
"We need to educate people to the idea that the quality of life is more important than mere length of life. Our cultural tradition holds that life has absolute value, but that is really not good enough anymore. Sometimes, no life is better."[citation needed]
“mercy killing” is justified for “an incorrigible ‘human vegetable,’ whether spontaneously functioning or artificially supported, [who] is progressively degraded while constantly eating up private or public financial resources in violation of the distributive justice owed to others.” Joseph Fletcher, “Ethics and Euthanasia,” in Horan and Mall, eds., Death, Dying, and Euthanasia, p. 301.
"Ethics critically examines values and how they are to be acted out; but whether they are acted out or not, loyalty to them depends on character or personal quality, and so it follows that the quality of medicine depends on the character of its clinicians."[citation needed]
"We ought to love people and use things; the essence of immorality is to love things and use people."
"People [with children with
Notes
- ^ John R. Shook, Dictionary Of Modern American Philosophers, Vol. 1, Continuum International Publishing Group, 2005, p. 803
- ^ "Humanist Manifesto II". American Humanist Association. Archived from the original on October 20, 2012. Retrieved October 14, 2012.
- ^ Bard, Bernard; Joseph Fletcher (April 1968). "The Right to Die". The Atlantic Monthly: 59–64.
References
- Joseph Francis Fletcher Papers, The Claude Moore Health Sciences Library, Department of Historical Collections and Services, University of Virginia, with:
- "Memoir of an Ex-Radical," Box 20: 29
- "Recollections," Box 20: 31
Notable works
- 1954 Morals and Medicine N.J.: Princeton University Press.
- 1966 Situation Ethics: The New Morality, Philadelphia: Westminster Press. (translated into 5 languages)
- 1974 The Ethics of Genetic Control: Ending Reproductive Roulette. New York: Doubleday.