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Bioethics: Principles, Issues, and Cases Lewis Vaughn. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2010. ISBN 978-0-19-518282-8; 686 PAGES, PAPER, $84.95
In his preface, Vaughn states that his ambition for this book is to do what any good bioethics textbook should do in a way that is more useful and rewarding to students and teachers. For the most part, he has accomplished his goal. He combines a good basic discussion of most of the key issues in contemporary bioethics with extensive readings from original publications that reflect the major arguments from differing perspectives. Each issue-focused chapter also includes several news-making cases for students to evaluate and discuss. All of this is built on the foundation of a brief, but fairly thorough, introduction to ethics, moral principles, and moral reasoning.
Vaughn's foundational introduction to ethics does a good job of presenting the traditional Western rational basis for moral philosophy and the...