Is the ex mortuo transplantation practice a modern form of cannibalism? Cover Image

Czy praktyka transplantacyjna ex mortuo jest współczesną formą kanibalizmu?
Is the ex mortuo transplantation practice a modern form of cannibalism?

Author(s): Joanna Picewicz
Subject(s): Philosophy, Ethics / Practical Philosophy
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu w Białymstoku
Keywords: transplantation; transplant; human body; human corpse; cultural cannibalism; hunger cannibalism; medical cannibalism

Summary/Abstract: Transplantation is defined by the opponents of this practice as neo-cannibalism, medical cannibalism or modern cannibalism due to the strictly utilitarian treatment of human corpses. It is claimed that the human body is brought into the role of a resource, raw material for further processing. The capabilities offered by medicine have contributed to changing the system of human values: the perception and understanding of human corporality. After death, the human body should be surrounded by a special piety, but it is treated in a purely utilitarian way in order to retrieve its pieces for a transplant. Some even see in transplantation practice a connection with cannibalism. The purpose and motivation of both practices is the same: a person, to save their life, assimilates a particular element of the human body by means of a medical transplant, whereas a person who is forced to consume the human body also does so to save their life.

  • Issue Year: 1/2018
  • Issue No: XXX
  • Page Range: 98-110
  • Page Count: 13
  • Language: Polish