Abstract
This article aims to trace and describe the bioethical threads in medical practice and the understanding of medicine among Tibetan refugees living in India. Taking up such a task results mainly from the fact that only traces of bioethical reflection are visible in Tibetan society, but without the awareness that it requires systematic reflection on its essence and changes that accompany modern medicine. I define the state of the discussion on Tibetan bioethics as preparadigmatic, i.e., one that precedes the recognition of the importance of bioethics and the elaboration of its basic concepts. In this paper, I will show how the Tibetan refugees today, in an unconscious way, approach bioethics, using the example of life-related topics, namely beginning and death. To this end, I chose topics such as abortion, fetal sex reassignment, euthanasia, and suicide. On this basis, I will indicate the main reasons that hinder the emergence of bioethics and those that may contribute to systematic discussions in the future. An introduction to Tibetan medicine will precede these considerations. I will show how medical traditions, especially the Rgyud bzhi text, are related to Tibetan Buddhism and opinions of the 14th Dalai Lama.
Highlights
The presence of bioethics in contemporary Euroamerican debates on the development of medicine and the human condition seems obvious and requires no special introduction
Searching for the information related to bioethical aspects of death, we are doomed to working our way through numerous texts pertaining to religious practices wherein what rather rarely appears are references to euthanasia or suicide among Tibetan refugees
Based on the above considerations, we can assume that this matter is not so unequivocal because there have been issues in traditional Tibetan medicine that we can define as bioethical for many centuries
Summary
The presence of bioethics in contemporary Euroamerican debates on the development of medicine and the human condition seems obvious and requires no special introduction. These reflections often relate to issues that trigger numerous disputes regarding moral justifications and adopted decisions. This difficult situation may be indicated by the existence of various theoretical approaches, as well as various bioethical codes and laws adopted by individual states regulating the basic dilemmas concerning the issues of life, health, and death that arise as a result of biological or technological discoveries I shall use the concept of Tibetan medicine (gso ba rig pa) without discriminating whether it pertains to Tibetans living in the TAR, India, or Nepal This is because this division would be artificial. Their understanding of medicine is very much alike, with medicine at the same time originating from the same sources[2]
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