Vatican newspaper responds to U.S. journal on human dignity, science

Published: 2008-05-28

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Protecting human dignity is the only guiding principle that ensures progress in biomedical technology does not harm the weakest humans, the Vatican newspaper said. Using human dignity as the guiding principle for determining what is medically and scientifically ethical is not simply a Catholic approach and it is not a ruse to stop scientific progress, said the front-page article in L'Osservatore Romano. The newspaper's May 28 article, "In Defense of Human Dignity," was a response to an article dated May 28 in The New Republic, a U.S. journal, arguing that members of President George W. Bush's Council on Bioethics were using the concept of dignity, particularly in its Catholic understanding, to obstruct scientific progress and impose conservative Christian values on the nation. The journal's article, "The Stupidity of Dignity, Conservative Bioethics' Latest, Most Dangerous Ploy," was written by Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. Pinker said the bioethics council's March report, "Human Dignity and Bioethics" -- a collection of essays by council members and invited contributors -- "should alarm anyone concerned with American biomedicine and its promise to improve human welfare."

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