Human Flourishing as the Proper Goal of Medicine
Derek Estes, Saint Louis University
What are the proper ends of medicine? Some bioethicists—particularly religions ones—have argued that the proper end of medicine is health. Leon Kass, for instance, defends this view: “I trust it will shock no one if I say that I am rather inclined to the old-fashioned view that health—or if you prefer, the healthy human being—is the end of the physician’s art.” Call this the healing view of medicine. This view is an intuitive one. If one breaks their leg, they go to the doctor to get it fixed, and if they have a disease, they go to the doctor to get it removed. Some procedures, however, do not promote health. Vasectomies and tubal ligation, for example, are usually not aimed at health per se, and, if anything, actually damage what would otherwise be a healthy reproductive system. In fact, almost no elective medical procedures actually promote health; they are either neutral or harmful with respect to health, but not beneficial. In response to this issue (if in fact it is one), some bioethicists have argued that the proper end of medicine is not health but is instead patient values. In their paper, “Value Promotion as a Goal of Medicine,” Eric Mathison and Jeremy Davis argue that the goals of medicine are pluralistic but that among the goals of medicine is the promotion of patient values. Mathison and Davis argue that at times patient values will conflict with the promotion of health, such as in the case of physician-assisted death, but that physicians may still facilitate such values since they fall within the purview of medicine’s proper ends. Call this the patient values view of medicine.
In this paper, I offer an alternative to both the healing view of medicine and the patient values view of medicine. I argue instead that the proper end of medicine is human flourishing. At times, the restoration of health is what best promotes human flourishing, as in the case of a broken leg or in the case of disease. In other cases, the promotion of patient values best promotes human flourishing, such as in the case of some plastic surgeries or (potentially) in the case of vasectomies or tubal ligation.
The upshot of this account, I will argue, is that human flourishing as the proper end of health better captures common moral intuitions about the goals of medicine. This account, however, also raises issues. I conclude my presentation by raising some of these issues—namely the need for a robust philosophical anthropology to determine what human flourishing in fact requires. I also conclude with reflections on the implications of this account for religious opposition to certain medical procedures on the basis of the healing view of health.
In this paper, I offer an alternative to both the healing view of medicine and the patient values view of medicine. I argue instead that the proper end of medicine is human flourishing. At times, the restoration of health is what best promotes human flourishing, as in the case of a broken leg or in the case of disease. In other cases, the promotion of patient values best promotes human flourishing, such as in the case of some plastic surgeries or (potentially) in the case of vasectomies or tubal ligation.
The upshot of this account, I will argue, is that human flourishing as the proper end of health better captures common moral intuitions about the goals of medicine. This account, however, also raises issues. I conclude my presentation by raising some of these issues—namely the need for a robust philosophical anthropology to determine what human flourishing in fact requires. I also conclude with reflections on the implications of this account for religious opposition to certain medical procedures on the basis of the healing view of health.