THE BIOETHICAL IMPERATIVE

The need for a deeper appreciation of human conduct with its fellow humans and other living beings of nature gave more emphasis, through the German theologian and philosopher Fritz Jahr, in 1927, with his concept of ethics before life and its creatures, i.e., bioethics: a moral, ethical, and philosophical reflection on the conduct and criteria between human relations among themselves, with nonhumans and Nature as a whole.

It is well known that man has been gradually threatening the lives of other beings, some extinct already, others on the brink of extinction, including the ecological imbalance caused by the introduction of species where these did not previously exist. Man, therefore, puts his own survival at risk, as the planet survives through reciprocal, harmonious, interdependent associations, where the lack of one greatly affects the existence of the other.

The recent warning about the possible extinction of white rhinos - to give an example - comes to attest to how far we are from the respect and integrity that should be given to other beings. The deep root of this event does not consist only in the isolated actions of some who were constantly aiming at the horns of this magnificent creature; it is above all ignorance, coupled with the social situation of the needy people living in the vicinity of these African animals, who are under the dominion of arrogant and extremely corrupt governments, fetish and mystification, the thirst for easy profits, and all other petty aspirations.

This situation defies the consciousness of those few who defend the “Bioethical Imperative,” i.e., reverence for any kind of life on the planet. From science, by proving that these horns, from the biological point of view, have the same properties found in nails, beaks and horns of any other living being, and which has absolutely nothing to do with possible aphrodisiac properties that both excite the libido of markets of Asian consumers, and with the same illusion, decimated populations of sharks for the consumption of their fins by the same pseudo properties, or the bones of the imposing Asian tiger.

It is ultimately a problem of the evolutionary stage of the so-called civilization of all time, presumed that in the present day, the human being had already overcome the bonds and fetters that so delay their progress towards a future where everything and everyone could live in harmony. Humans are always confronting the concepts of morality and ethics and yet is increasingly distant in the construction and concrete establishment of these values.

Albert Schweitzer, one of the greatest human geniuses of the twentieth century, stated that “ethics consists in responsibility to all that lives, responsibility so magnified that it has no limits,” since each being, however “insignificant” it may be, is provided with responsibilities that beneficially affect all lives, in this dynamic symbiosis that still abounds on this planet, but whose balance has been gradually affected by human intervention.

Schweitzer lived his life under the criterion of reverence for life, and at night as he relaxed, studied, or played Bach's songs on the piano under the heat and humidity in Lambaréné, Gabon, he left the doors and windows of his residence closed, let the insects do not come in and burn their wings in the hot lamp!

This is reverence for life that dwells, which is part of the consciousness of the integral man, for the unconscious man lives in ignorance and arrogance, for there is a great affinity between these two attributes, for the more ignorant he is, the more arrogant he becomes.

In one of his speeches, Schweitzer wisely warned that: “Man will only be truly ethical when complying with the obligation to help all kinds of life to which can be addressed, and when to avoid causing injury to any living creature. He will not ask why this or that life deserves his sympathy, as valuable, nor will he be interested to know if, and to what extent, this life is still susceptible to feelings. Life as such will be holy for him.”