Applied Ethics: the role of Philosophy in interdisciplinary cooperation

Abstract

This article has three objectives. Firstly, to clarify what applied ethics is and how it is implemeted from a meta-reflective discourse. Applied ethics carries out cooperative and interdisciplinary work in the solution of problems in technical and morally plural societies. Secondly, to make the role of philosophy explicit in the interdisciplinary work of applied ethics. In particular, we will focus on five aspects: 1) To provide a meta-reflective and post-conventional view, with intention of normative universality, without disregarding the situation in which we find ourselves. 2) To undo linguistic misunderstandings and to clarify other concepts. 3) To detect moral assumptions that, in an environment that should be morally plural, require either justification or overcoming. 4) To contribute concepts from the philosophical tradition that help to illuminate the problem in question. 5) To analyze the arguments and find out the importance given to them and why. Thirdly, the last goal is to underline the importance of the foundation of this ethics, which moves in the juggling balance among its commitment to the critical hermeneutics of the contexts, the available knowledge to us, and the possibilities of effectiveness and feasibility of its recommendations. Its revisionism is neither relativism nor mere pragmatism.