98920 - Bioethics and Biolaw (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

The course will be devoted to the fundamental principles, values and moral and legal arguments for a critical bioethics and democratic bio-law. The focus will be on issues relevant to public ethics and democratic deliberation challenged by global policies and moral dilemmas connected to the ever new boundaries of scientific and technological knowledge.

Course contents

The importance of being an animal


The course will attempt to address the animal question from a philosophical perspective. In the background of the most up-to-date bioethical debate on justice for animals, the course will provide a map of the most significant theories and focus on animal rights, one of the most complex challenges facing the rights discourse.
If in order to protect animals one traces animal rights back to human rights one risks watering down the normative poignancy of the latter, but if one denies the existence of the former one can hardly think of defending animals within a constitutional legal framework. Hence the importance of thinking and rethinking about nonhuman animals, about their value, their (often gratuitous, or even desired) suffering, the degradation of many of their existences, and the feeling of irrelevance that mostly affects them and thus generates a serious moral, juridical-political and (last but not least) civil problem.

 

Timetable of lessons: Wednesday, Thursday - 9 am - 11 am: Aula I, Zamboni street, n° 38 and Friday - 9 am - 11 am: Aula IV Zamboni street, n° 38.

Beginning of the Course: I Semester - September, 18 2024.

Student Reception: Wednesday at 3.00 pm, unless otherwise stated and reported in the news online.

Readings/Bibliography

§ Textbooks (compulsory for all students):

Carol J. Adams, The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory, 1990, Part I.

Jacques Derrida, L'animale che dunque sono, Rusconi, Milan 2006.

Martha C. Nussbaum, Justice for Animals, 2023.

Tom Regan, Animal Rights, selected parts (this selection of pages is available as a pdf among the Virtual Course Materials).

 

For not-attending students:

Silvana Castignone (a cura di), I diritti degli animali. Prospettive bioetiche e giuridiche, Il Mulino, Bologna 1988.

 

§ Optional seminar activities will be offered by the Course

The Schedule of the events will be given at the beginning of the course.

Teaching methods

§ Lectures, seminars and discussion on bioethical themes.

Interdisciplinary seminars will be hold by experts working in the field.

§ Lessons will be recorded (but not necessary in real time) and made available by accessing ad hoc virtual teams-classroom. Access is possible through the unibo institutional credentials at the link present from September on the virtual materials of the Course.

Assessment methods

Final oral examination. Room 5.01 (str. Zamboni 38). On September there will be an examination schedule.

Evaluating criteria:

Expertise; practical reasoning ability; critical competence.

On the basis of these three main parameters it will be formalised in an evaluation expressed in thirtieths, which may vary according to the full range of available grades.

Notes:

18-21/30 basic level

22-25/30 moderate level

26-28/30 good level

29-30/30 excellent level.

 

Students with disabilities and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)Students with disabilities or Specific Learning Disorders have the right to special accommodations according to their condition, following an assessment by the Service for Students with Disabilities and SLD. Please do not contact the teacher but get in touch with the Service directly to schedule an appointment. It will be the responsibility of the Service to determine the appropriate adaptations. For more information, visit the page:

https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en/for-students

Teaching tools

§ Optional seminar activities will be offered by the Course

The Schedule of the events will be given at the beginning of the course.

§ USEFUL LINKS:

http://www.governo.it/bioetica/ http://ec.europa.eu/research/biosociety/bioethics/bioethics_ethics http://bioethics.georgetown.edu/pcbe/ http://www.governo.it/bioetica/%20%C3%82%C2%8Ehttp://ec.europa.eu/research/biosociety/bioethics/bioethics_ethics%20http://bioethics.georgetown.edu/pcbe/]

Office hours

See the website of Marina Lalatta Costerbosa