Abstract: BIOETHICS: A Systematic Approach is an extensive revision of Bioethics: A Return to Fundamentals. The subtitle has changed in order to emphasize that what distinguishes the authors’ approach to bioethics from almost all others is that it is systematic. It applies the account of morality and rationality presented in COMMON MORALITY: Deciding What To Do (2004) and MORALITY: Its Nature and Justification, Revised Edition (2005) to the moral problems that arise in the practice of medicine. The concept of rationality used to justify morality is the same concept that is used to define the concept of malady or disease. The book offers an account of the concept of death, and provides an account of euthanasia that fits within the systematic account of morality and rationality that have been provided. It also shows that this systematic account explains the controversy about the morality of abortion. There are new chapters on moral disagreements, abortion, and on “what doctors must know”, and significant improvements have been made in the treatment of the concepts of consent and malady. An entire chapter is devoted to the concept of mental maladies. Arguments are also developed against principlism and shows how principlism’s authors’ misunderstanding of this view undermines their criticisms.

Keywords: morality, rationality, irrationality, moral rules, duties, principlism, malady, adequate information, competence, coercion