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In all great moral issues the moralist must choose and choosing has a price.

Composite tissue transplantation has gained a new dimension in line with advanced technological developments. In extremity losses, the traditionally implemented procedure is to enable the extremity to regain its functionality through replantation instead of transplantation. On the other hand, innovative studies are also carried out to support and strengthen the human body and improve the problematic body functions for increasing patients' quality of life. Studies on developing biomechatronic systems, which are related to biology, neurology, biophysics, mechanics, biomedical and tissue engineering, electronics, and computer sciences, are in progress, which indicates that a transformation has occurred in the approaches to composite tissue transplantation. This study aims to generate ideas about determining a conventional limit in the interventions towards the human body against the technological and scientific developments and to perform a value analysis on such interventions. This study was designed within the framework of the methodology of medical ethics and in the light of the slippery slope argument. The process of transformation from the medical procedures that aim to protect patients' bodily integrity to the innovative practices that provide an opportunity to bionically turn healthy human bodies into the half machine and half-human is investigated in the light of the slippery slope argument. This study indicated that the value-related problems regarding this issue are related to the principles of respect for autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, and justice. The limit to be determined for the practices that aim to protect the patients' bodily integrity and increase their quality of life and that are not life-saving depends on the distinction between an ill body and a healthy body. A meticulous clinical perspective and legislative regulations that prevent the instrumentalization of humans are required so as not to roll down to undesirable places on a slope. Advanced technological developments are ...

Our actions, individually and collectively, inevitably affect others, ourselves, and our institutions. They shape the people we become and the kind of world we inhabit. Sometimes those consequences are positive, a giant leap for moral humankind. Other times they are morally regressive. This propensity of current actions to shape the future is morally important. But slippery slope arguments are a poor way to capture it. That is not to say we can never develop cogent slippery slope arguments. Nonetheless, given their most common usage, it would be prudent to avoid them in moral and political debate. They are often fallacious and have often been used for ill. They are normally used to defend the moral status quo. Even when they are cogent, we can always ï¬nd an alternate way to capture their insights. Finally, by accepting that the moral roads on which we travel are slippery, we become better able to successfully navigate them.

Our actions, individually and collectively, inevitably affect others, ourselves, and our institutions. They shape the people we become and the kind of world we inhabit. Sometimes those consequences are positive, a giant leap for moral humankind. Other times they are morally regressive. This propensity of current actions to shape the future is morally important. But slippery slope arguments are a poor way to capture it. That is not to say we can never develop cogent slippery slope arguments. Nonetheless, given their most common usage, it would be prudent to avoid them in moral and political debate. They are often fallacious and have often been used for ill. They are normally used to defend the moral status quo. Even when they are cogent, we can always ï¬nd an alternate way to capture their insights. Finally, by accepting that the moral roads on which we travel are slippery, we become better able to successfully navigate them.

Our actions, individually and collectively, inevitably affect others, ourselves, and our institutions. They shape the people we become and the kind of world we inhabit. Sometimes those consequences are positive, a giant leap for moral humankind. Other times they are morally regressive. This propensity of current actions to shape the future is morally important. But slippery slope arguments are a poor way to capture it. That is not to say we can never develop cogent slippery slope arguments. Nonetheless, given their most common usage, it would be prudent to avoid them in moral and political debate. They are often fallacious and have often been used for ill. They are normally used to defend the moral status quo. Even when they are cogent, we can always ï¬nd an alternate way to capture their insights. Finally, by accepting that the moral roads on which we travel are slippery, we become better able to successfully navigate them.

A `slippery slope' argument in medical ethics is one that opposes itself to a new proposal on the grounds that it is not per se intolerable but will lead to a situation that is. Lamb evaluates such arguments, demonstrating their centrality to the subject

Argumentation is a crucial component of our lives. Although in the absence of rational debate our legal, political, and scientific systems would not be possible, there is still no integrated area of research on the psychology of argumentation. Furthermore, classical theories of argumentation are normative (i.e., the acceptability of an argument is determined by a set of norms or logical rules), which sometimes creates a dissociation between the theories and people's behavior. We think the current challenge for psychology is to bring together the cognitive and normative accounts of argumentation. In this article, we exemplify this point by analyzing two cases of argumentative structures experimentally studied in the context of cognitive psychology. Specifically, we focus on the slippery slope argument and the ad hominem argument under the frameworks of Bayesian and pragma-dialectics approaches, respectively. We think employing more descriptive and experimental accounts of argumentation would help Psychology to bring closer the cognitive and normative accounts of argumentation with the final goal of establishing an integrated area of research on the psychology of argumentation.

"When a country legalizes active euthanasia, it puts itself on a slippery slope from where it may well go further downward." If true, this is a forceful argument in the battle of those who try to prevent euthanasia from becoming legal. The force of any slippery-slope argument, however, is by definition limited by its reference to future developments which cannot empirically be sustained. Experience in the Netherlands—where a law regulating active euthanasia was accepted in April 2001—may shed light on the strengths as well as the weaknesses of the slippery slope argument in the context of the euthanasia debate. This paper consists of three parts. First, it clarifies the Dutch legislation on euthanasia and explains the cultural context in which it originated. Second, it looks at the argument of the slippery slope. A logical and an empirical version are distinguished, and the latter, though philosophically less interesting, proves to be most relevant in the discussion on euthanasia. Thirdly, it addresses the question whether Dutch experiences in the process of legalizing euthanasia justify the fear for a slippery slope. The conclusion is: Dutch experiences justify some caution. Despite the fact that we live in a global village, and despite the fact that values and norms are widely exchanged within the Western culture, some differences have in the past decades become larger instead of smaller. The discussions on euthanasia and assisted suicide are an example. In this paper, I intend to contribute to the discussion from an inside perspective, i.e., as a participant in a political culture in which active euthanasia is considered more or less accepted, having worked in medical ethics in a clinical setting for most of my career, and being part of a family of practicing physicians and nurses. The paper will concentrate upon one of the arguments used in the current euthanasia debate worldwide: the contention that any form of legalization of voluntary euthanasia will inevitably go from bad to worse, from euthanasia in the case of terminal diseases to assisted suicide under much broader conditions,1 to more requests, to misuse, to nonvoluntary or even involuntary euthanasia and, eventually, to an erosion of the roots of our public morale. I will concentrate on developments in Holland.2 It should be noted from the onset, however, that other countries, which have not or not yet legalized euthanasia, may be worse off than the Netherlands.3 In this paper, I will first clarify the Dutch legislation on euthanasia and comment on the cultural context from which it stems. Second, I will look at the argument of the slippery slope: What does it mean to use the argument? What function does it have in ethics? Thirdly, I will combine the two and look whether Dutch experiences since the legalization process of euthanasia give ground to the fear for a slippery slope.