What does bioethics mean to humanists? Drawing on his work in disability studies and his experience as the father of a child with Down syndrome, Michael Bérubé argues that an understanding of disability and human variation is critical not only for the humanities, but also for the life sciences and “applied” fields such as bioethics. Join Bérubé as he takes on the work of philosophers such as Julian Glover; Eva Kittay; Jeff McMahan; Martha Nussbaum; Michael Sandel; and Peter Singer to show that intellectual disability should be of crucial importance to intellectuals—and that our major intellectual traditions have largely failed to meet that challenge. 

Cosponsored by the Initiative on Humanities and Difference, Advanced Research Collaborative.