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Publication Details

The Place of Humanity in the Ethics of Social Consequences

(Original title: Miesto humánnosti v etike sociálnych dôsledkov)
Filozofia, 60 (2005), 8, 613-623.
Type of work: Papers
Publication language: Slovak
Abstract

In the author’s view the humanity has its place in the ethics of social consequences (which is a form of non-utilitarian consequentialism): its implementation leads directly to positive social consequences, i.e. the main evaluation criteria in this conception. However, in applying the principle of humanity one has to see humanity as the protection of sustainable life according to the degree, to which an individual human life meets at least minimal qualitative standards of human life. The resulting idea is that a person living only on the biological level should be let die. This is not an expression of non-humanity, as it is not in case of helping a dying person with fatal diagnosis in his ever increasing suffering. As the problem of war is concerned, according to the author no war is human, as it always brings about dying of innocent people.

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