Terrence Ackerman has suggested that we ought to view general bioethical principles as generalizations which summarize our previous bioethical decisions rather than as moral rules. He would have us derive our ethical views instead principally from the facts of the cases in question and our intuitions about them. The proposal is attractive because of its similarity to medical decision-making, but it fails because it allows for no higher order standard of reference against which conflicting ethical intuitions may be judged.
KIE: Issue is taken with a proposal by Terrence Ackerman in the September 1980 issue of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy that bioethical decision making should proceed directly from a case at hand and the goals of those involved, with general moral principles relegated to the status of summaries of previous bioethical decisions. Basson contends that this approach fails, despite its attractive similarity to medical decision making, because it allows for no higher order standard of reference against which conflicting ethical intuitions may be judged.