Benjamin G Gregg
- Professor (Department of Government, College of Liberal Arts)
Faculty Profile: Benjamin G Gregg
Main Profile Content
Featured Work
Creating Human Nature: The Political Challenges of Human Genetic Engineering
Cambridge University Press, 2022
Human genetic enhancement, examined from the standpoint of the new field of political bioethics, displaces the age-old question of truth: What is human nature? This book displaces that question with another: What kind of human nature should humans want to create for themselves? To answer that question, this book answers two others: What constraints should limit the applications of rapidly developing biotechnologies? What could possibly form the basis for corresponding public policy in a democratic society? Benjamin Gregg focuses on the distinctly political dimensions of human nature, where politics refers to competition among competing values on which to base public policy, legislation, and political culture. This book offers citizens of democratic communities a broad perspective on how they together might best approach urgent questions of how to deal with the socially and morally challenging potential for human genetic engineering.
Biography
Benjamin Gregg
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B.A., Yale University; Ph.D., Princeton University; D. Phil., Freie Universität Berlin
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https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9510-6147
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Professor of Government, University of Texas at Austin
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2023 Visiting Researcher, Centre for Bioethics and Medical Humanities
Faculty of Medicine, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia
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2022 Visiting Researcher, Centre for Biomedical Ethics
National University of Singapore
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2021-2022 Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Public International Law
University of Lund, Sweden
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Publications: In addition to over 60 sole-authored articles, he is the author of five books: The Human Rights State (2016); Human Rights as Social Construction (2012) [translation 作为社会建构的人权 in 2020 by 中国人民大学出版社]; Thick Moralities, Thin Politics (2003); and Coping in Politics with Indeterminate Norms (2003). Cambridge University Press published his newest book, Constructing Human Nature: The Political Challenges of Genetic Engineering, last October. His work has been translated into German, Portuguese, Italian, Japanese, and Chinese.
Teaching: He teaches bioethics, informed by philosophy and sociology, at the University of Texas at Austin as well as occasionally in Germany (Frankfurt), Austria (Linz and Innsbruck), Sweden (Lund), Japan (Tokyo and Hokkaido), China (Beijing), and Brazil (Goiãnia). The College of Liberal Arts Committees on Research and Teaching awarded him the Silver Spurs Fellowship in recognition of outstanding scholarship and teaching. He has conducted graduate master classes at the Universidade Federal de Goiás in Brazil, at the Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg in Germany, at the University of Hokkaido in Japan, and at the University of Glasgow in the UK.
Research: His current research agenda proceeds along several tracks that intersect at points: political bioethics; political challenges of artificial intelligence; and human rights as social science, not theology or metaphysics. Two book-manuscripts in progress:
The Political Challenges of an Artificial Intelligence Increasingly Independent of Social Responsibility; and: Indigeneity as Social Construct and Political Tool: Critique of a Contested Identity
Grants: He has received grants, in 2024, for research on reception of Darwin’s theory of evolution in Southeast Asia and North Africa; in 2023, for establishing university-to-university-level collaboration with the Center for Bioethics, Faculty of Medicine, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia; in 2023-25, from the National Science Foundation, for collaboration with laboratory scientists, on ethical issues of the new technology and how they may be addressed through new design features: “Building a Cell from Scratch: Design and Ethics”; in 2021/2022, as the Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Public International Law at Lund University, Sweden; in 2022, as a visiting researcher at the Centre for Biomedical Ethics, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore: “Might the Bioethical Principle of Individual Decisional Autonomy Have a Politically Liberalizing Effect on Soft Authoritarian Communities?”; in 2019, as a visiting researcher at the Danish Institute for Human Rights, Copenhagen: “Beyond Due Diligence: The Human Rights Corporation”; in 2018, as a visiting researcher at the Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics and at the Ethox Centre, both University of Oxford: “Creating Human Nature: The Political Challenges of Genetic Engineering.”
Professional Activities
2024
January 15, 2024
Bioethics as Political Tool in Designing Democratic Deliberation and Public Trust
European Research Council; European Commission; Polish National Science Centre. Krakow, Poland
INVITED TALKS 2018-2023
“Bioethics as Political Tool in Designing Democratic Deliberation and Public Trust.” European Research Council; European Commission; Polish National Science Centre. Krakow, Poland. January 2024.
“Bioethical Aspects of in vitro Fertilization.” Third Makassar Obstetrics and Gynecology Update, Makassar, Sulawesi, Indonesia. November 2023.
“Challenges of Bioethical Regulation in China Today.” Health Law and Genetics, Faculty of Law, University of Macau, Taipa, Macau SAR, China. November 2023.
“What Is Bioethics and Why Is It Important to Medical Education and to Clinical Practice?" Department of Biomedical Sciences, School of Medicine, Universitas Padjadjaran, Bandung, Java, Indonesia. June 2023.
“What Is Bioethics and Why Is It Important to Medical Education and to Clinical Practice?” Bioethics and Medical Humanities, School of Medicine, Universitas Diponegoro, Semarang, Java, Indonesia. June 2023.
“The Forensic Potential of Epigenetics.” Fakultas Kedokteran, Universitas Pattimura, Ambon, Malaku, Indonesia. June 2023.
“What Is Bioethics and Why Is It Important to Medical Education and to Clinical Practice?” Fakultas Kedokteran, Universitas Pattimura, Ambon, Malaku, Indonesia. June 2023.
“Artificial Intelligence Lacks the Political Capacity of Mutual Responsibility-Taking in Medicine and Politics.” Forensic Medicine and Medico-Legal Studies, School of Medicine, Universitas Hasanuddin, Makassar, Sulawesi, Indonesia. June 2023.
“Could There Be a Human Right to Freedom from Genetic Disability?” Bioethics and Humanities, School of Medicine, Universitas Hasanuddin, Makassar, Sulawesi, Indonesia. June 2023.
“Moral and Legal Guidelines for the Genetic Editing of Individuals.” Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Udayana, Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia. June 2023.
“Deploying Epigenetics to Identify Responsibility for Genetically Influenced Health Inequalities.” Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Udayana, Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia. June 2023.
“Genetically Informed Personalized Education.” Prodi Magister Ilmu Biomedik,
Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia. May 2023.
“Analog to Human Genetic Engineering: How Artificial Intelligence Threatens the Political Capacity of Human Intelligence.” Program Magister Bioetika, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia. May 2023.
“Moral and Legal Guidelines for the Genetic Editing of Individuals.” Center for Bioethics and Medical Humanities, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia. May 2023.
“Deploying Epigenetics to Identify Genetically Influenced Social Injustices.” Kelompok Kerja (Pokja) Genetik, Unit Riset Translasional (URT), Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia. May 2023.
“A Brief Introduction to Creating Human Nature: The Political Challenges of Genetic Engineering.” Professur für Ethik der Medizin, Medizinische Fakultät, Universität Augsburg, Germany. April 2023.
“A Right to Privacy versus a Right to Health.” The Kerala Law Academy Law College in association with Centre for Advanced Legal Studies and Research, Trivandrum, India. December 2022.
“Moral and Legal Guidelines for the Genetic Editing of Individuals.” Cluster of Excellence CIBSS: Centre for Integrative Biological Signaling Studies, University of Freiburg, Germany. November 2022.
“How Artificial Intelligence May One Day Threaten the Political Capacity of Human Intelligence.” Faculty of Law, Kuala Lumpur, Universiti Malaya, Malaysia. August 2022.
“A Right to Privacy versus a Right to Health.” Centre for Legal Theory and Centre for Asian Legal Studies, Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore. August 2022.
“A Human Right to Freedom from Genetic Disability.” Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Law, Kuala Lumpur, Universiti Malaya, Malaysia. August 2022.
“Genetic Engineering Where Severe Cognitive Disability is Indicated: Toward Enabling the Future Person’s Capacity for Participation in Political Community.” Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Law, Kuala Lumpur, Universiti Malaya, Malaysia. August 2022.
“Human Nature as Social Construct, Human Dignity as Decisional Autonomy: Moral and Legal Guidelines for the Genetic Editing of Our Species.” Department of Medical Ethics & Law, Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Teknolgi MARA, Sungai Buloh Campus, Selangor, Malaysia. August 2022.
“Genetic-Editing Regulation Guided by Human Dignity as Decisional Autonomy.” University of Granada, Spain. May 2022.
“How Artificial Intelligence May One Day Threaten the Political Capacity of Human Intelligence.” Department of Political Science and Public Administration, Istanbul Medipol University, Turkey. May 2022.
“Regulating Genetic Engineering Guided by Human Dignity, Not Genetic Essentialism.” Institut für Biomedizinische Ethik und Medizingeschichte [Institute of Biomedical Ethics and History of Medicine], Universität Zürich, Switzerland. May 2022.
“Human Nature as Social Construct, Human Dignity as Decisional Autonomy:
Moral and Legal Guidelines for the Genetic Editing of Our Species.” Saints Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, North Macedonia. April 2022.
“Containing COVID-19: A Human Right to Privacy versus a Human Right to Health.” Saints Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, North Macedonia. April 2022.
“Against Essentialism in Conceptions of Human Rights and Human Nature.” Instituto de Filosofia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal. April 2022.
“Against Essentialism in Conceptions of Human Rights and Human Nature.” Centre for Research Ethics and Bioethics, Uppsala University; Department of Philosophy, Stockholm University; and Stockholm Centre for Health Care Ethics, Sweden. March 2022.
“How Artificial Intelligence May One Day Threaten the Political Capacity of Human Intelligence.” Institut für Information Systems Engineering, Technische Universität Wien, Vienna, Austria. March 2022.
“Genetic Engineering Where Severe Cognitive Disability is Indicated: Toward Enabling the Future Person’s Capacity for Participation in Political Community.” Department of Philosophy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. March 2022.
“A Human Right to Freedom from Genetic Disability.” Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, Department of Philosophy, University of Oxford, UK. March 2022.
“Genetic Engineering Where Severe Cognitive Disability is Indicated: Toward Enabling the Future Person’s Capacity for Participation in Political Community.” Ethox Centre and Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities, University of Oxford, UK. February 2022.
“Genetic Engineering where Severe Cognitive Disability is Indicated: Toward Threshold Capacities for Political Participation in Liberal Democratic Communities.” Department of Political Science, Lund University, Sweden. February 2022.
“Marx’s Challenge to China Today: For a Free Press and Democratic Political Participation, Against Ideological Distortions and Authoritarian Governance.” School of Marxism, Xiamen University, China. December 2021.
“Human Nature as Social Construct, Human Dignity as Decisional Autonomy:
Moral and Legal Guidelines for the Genetic Editing of Our Species.” Fulbright Distinguished Chair Inaugural Address, School of Law, University of Lund, Sweden. December 2021
“Gene-Editing for Cognitive Disability.” Health Law Research Centre of the Faculty of Law, University of Lund, Sweden. September 2021.
“Human Rights as a Politics of Imagination: Morality Beyond Tradition, Solidarity Without Nationalism, Justice Authored by Its Addressees,” Globalizing Education Faculty Learning Community, a collaboration between Hemispheres Consortium at UT Austin and International Programs at Austin Community College (virtual). October 2020.
Keynote Address. “How to Oppose Authoritarian Democracy in Brazil: A Guide for Citizens.” Direitos Humanos em tempos neoliberais e antihumanistas [Human Rights in Neoliberal and Antihumanist Times]. Universidade Federal de Goiás [Federal University of Goiás]. Goiânia, Brazil. September 2019.
“Political Challenges of Regulating Human Genetic Engineering.” Centre de recherches interdisciplinaires [Center for Interdisciplinary Research], Université de Paris. Paris, France. July 2019.
“The Coming Political Challenges of Artificial Intelligence.” Information Technology University of Copenhagen, Denmark. June 2019.
“Beyond Due Diligence: The Human Rights Corporation.” Danish Institute for Human Rights, Copenhagen, Denmark. June 2019.
“Political Bioethics: Deciding Difficult Bioethical Issues Under Conditions of Value Pluralism and Deep Disagreement.” Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg. [Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg]. Halle, Germany. May 2019.
“The Coming Political Challenges of Artificial Intelligence.” Institut für Geschichte und Ethik der Medizin, Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg [Institute for History and Ethics of Medicine, Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg]. Halle, Germany. May 2019.
“Deploying Epigenetics to Identify Genetically Influenced Social Inequalities.” Nuffield Department of Population Health, Ethox Centre, University of Oxford, UK. December 2018.
“Political Bioethics.” St. Cross Lecture in Ethics, Department of Philosophy, University of Oxford, UK. November 2018.
“Can Corporate Profit-Seeking Accord with Human Rights-Promotion?” Adam Smith School of Business, University of Glasgow, Scotland. September 2018.
“Human Rights Advocacy as Bottom-Up Politics that Deploys the Rule of Law, Democracy, Cosmopolitan Declarations and International Law.” Bayerische Amerika-Akademie, Stiftung Bayerisches Amerikahaus [Bavarian American Academy, Bavarian Center for Transatlantic Relations]. Munich, Germany. July 2018.
“Therapie und Enhancement der Human-Intelligenz: Was leisten die Menschenrechte?” [Genetic Therapy and Genetic Enhancement of Human Intelligence: What Regulatory Guidance Might Human Rights Provide?] Katholische Hochschule für Sozialwesen [Catholic University of Social Services]. Berlin, Germany. April 2018.
“Why the Difference Between Two Forms of Engineered Intelligence Matters: AI and Genetically Manipulated Humans.” School of Psychology, National University of Ireland, Galway. February 2018.
“Can Biological Science Advance Social Justice?” School of Psychology, Psi Chi Honours Society, National University of Ireland, Galway. February 2018.