Animal Enhancement – Neue technische Möglichkeiten und ethische Fragen [Animal Enhancement. New technical opportunities and ethical issues]

Contributions to Ethics and Biotechnology, Volume 7 (2010) - in German

The current intense debate on the ethical aspects of ‘human enhancement’ also throws new light on the scientific and technical ‘enhancement’ of animals. Admittedly, ‘animal enhancement’ is in many respects a well-known phenomenon. In agriculture in particular, animals have long been intentionally improved through breeding, and some experiments on animals can also be understood in these terms. However, whereas a key issue in the debate on human enhancement is the fundamental differentiation between healing and improvement, in the debate regarding animals this distinction is largely irrelevant. As a result of current scientific and technical developments, the level of intervention and potentially its ethical significance too are changing. This book is probably one of the first studies to provide a broad overview of developments in the field of the converging technologies and sciences which play a role in animal enhancement and examines the key ethical issues involved.

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Last edition: 20.05.2021