Massimo Reichlin

• Vita-Salute San Raffaele University

A collection of essay by G.E. Moore on ethics and religion

We respond to useful comments by Luciana Ceri, Eugenio Lecaldano and Filippo Magni on our new translation of Moore's Principia Ethica

Taking stock of standard philosophical analyses of the concept, it is proposed that the domain of morality be defined by reference to seven characteristics: normativity, informality, importance, universality, categoricalness, overridingness, and a reference to beneficence and justice as the basic contents of its rules. These features establish a ra...

A New Italian translation of Principia Ethica coming almost 60 years after the 1964 translation by Gianni Vattimo with Nicola Abbagnano’s preface. The new edition makes room for the English text, besides the Italian translation including the 1922 Preface, besides, a complete bibliography of Moore’s ethical writings and the secondary literature on M...

L’argumentation morale implique de donner des raisons de soutenir des conclusions normatives, et quand le fondement de ces raisons est mis en question, un effort de justification systématique est alors exigé. L’article discute trois modèles de justification philosophique : le modèle des « décisions de principe » proposé par Richard Hare ; deux vers...

Human brain organoids (HBOs) are three-dimensional biological entities grown in the laboratory in order to recapitulate the structure and functions of the adult human brain. They can be taken to be novel living entities for their specific features and uses. As a contribution to the ongoing discussion on the use of HBOs, the authors identify three s...

The U.S. Supreme Court's Dobbs ruling triggered a global debate about access to abortion and the legislative models governing it. In the United States, there was a sudden reversal of federal guidance about pregnancy termination that is unprecedented in Western and high-income countries. The strong polarization on the issue of abortion and the diffi...

In complex, pluralistic societies, different views concerning the moral duties of healthcare professionals inevitably exist: according to some accounts, doctors can and should cooperate in performing abortion or physician-assisted suicide, while according to others they should always defend human life and protect their patients' health. It is argue...

Tännsjö’s book Setting Health-Care Priorities defends the view that there are three main normative theories in the domain of distributive justice, and that these theories are both highly plausible in themselves, and practically convergent in their normative conclusions. All three theories (utilitarianism, the maximin/leximin theory and egalitariani...

It is argued that, in reworking the sentimentalist tradition of Hutcheson and Hume, Smith endeavours to tackle some of its main problems, i.e. the weakness of the foundation it provides for moral duty and its possible reduction of moral beliefs to subjective feelings. Smith addresses these problems by recovering, through his doctrine of the imparti...

The paper argues that there is a tension between the analytic defence of the general constitutionality of art. 580 of the penal code, developed by the Court in the first paragraphs of its writ, and the explicit declaration of its partial unconstitutionality which is argued in later paragraphs. It is argued that, at least with reference to a specifi...

A general rationale is presented for withholding and withdrawing medical treatment in end-of-life situations, and an argument is offered for the moral irrelevance of the distinction, both in the context of pharmaceutical treatments, such as chemotherapy in cancer, and in the context of life-sustaining treatments, such as the artificial ventilator i...

Vengono analizzate le principali interpretazioni del concetto di beneficenza nella bioetica contemporanea e i loro referenti filosofici. In particolare, vengono presentate le posizioni di Ross e di Frankena, che hanno avuto una rilevante influenza sulla formazione del paradigma dei principi, dominante nella bioetica anglosassone dello scorso decenn...

Vengono analizzate le critiche portate da Rachels e Kuhse, autorevoli esponenti dell'utilitarismo anglosassone, alla teoria della sacralità della vita in relazione al problema dell'eutanasia. In entrambi questi autori si mostra in maniera evidente un fraintendimento radicale della natura dell'etica, fondamentalmente dovuto al carattere rigidamente...