PHL 111 Lecture Notes - Lecture 22: Fallacy, Gene Therapy

• School: Tunxis Community College
• Department: Philosophy
• Course: PHL 111
• Professor: Minor

Document Summary

We tend to think the therapy-enhancement distinction sets a clear boundary, but it doesn"t. Tendency to think that since genetic therapy treats diseases/defects it is legitimate, and that since genetic enhancement seeks improvements in human capacities it is illegitimate. 2 reasons why we think this way: We think we have an uncontroversial definition of health and disease. We think only treating disease is a legitimate goal of medicine. Species-functional (sf) health/disease refer to biological functioning. Value-laden (vl) health/disease refer to conventional norms. Goals of medicine are prevention, detection and treatment of disease (according to 1 and/or 2) In describing how humans can deviate from sf health, the definition is (via naturalistic. In prescribing how humans can align with or deviate from vl health, the definition permits therapy and may permit some forms of enhancement if they do not violate other norms.