TY - JOUR

T1 - How to conceive the dignity of the dead?

T2 - A dispositional account

AU - Münch, Nikolai

AU - Müller-Salo, Johannes

AU - Schwarz, Clara Sophie

N1 - Funding Information: Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

PY - 2024/1

Y1 - 2024/1

N2 - In dealing with human corpses, notions of dignity play a decisive role, especially within legal texts that regulate a corpse’s handling. However, it is quite unclear how the claim “Treat human corpses with dignity!” should be understood and justified. Drawing upon examples and problems from forensic medicine, this paper explores three possible lines of interpreting such demands: (a) positions that closely link the dignity of the human corpse to the dignity of the former living persons and (b) accounts that derive the dignity of the dead from consequentialist considerations. We argue that both lines heavily rely on contestable metaphysical claims and therefore propose an alternative account for the dignity of the dead. Our proposal (c) focuses on action-guiding attitudes and the symbolic value of the dead. Such a conception allows for a variety of morally appropriate groundings of individual attitudes. It avoids metaphysically troublesome premises and, at the same time, allows to classify certain actions and manners of acting as clearly inappropriate and blameworthy.

AB - In dealing with human corpses, notions of dignity play a decisive role, especially within legal texts that regulate a corpse’s handling. However, it is quite unclear how the claim “Treat human corpses with dignity!” should be understood and justified. Drawing upon examples and problems from forensic medicine, this paper explores three possible lines of interpreting such demands: (a) positions that closely link the dignity of the human corpse to the dignity of the former living persons and (b) accounts that derive the dignity of the dead from consequentialist considerations. We argue that both lines heavily rely on contestable metaphysical claims and therefore propose an alternative account for the dignity of the dead. Our proposal (c) focuses on action-guiding attitudes and the symbolic value of the dead. Such a conception allows for a variety of morally appropriate groundings of individual attitudes. It avoids metaphysically troublesome premises and, at the same time, allows to classify certain actions and manners of acting as clearly inappropriate and blameworthy.

KW - Corpse

KW - Dignity

KW - Moral attitudes

KW - Posthumous harm

KW - Symbolic value

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85152023154&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1007/s00414-023-02991-6

DO - 10.1007/s00414-023-02991-6

M3 - Article

C2 - 37022465

AN - SCOPUS:85152023154

VL - 138

SP - 177

EP - 186

JO - International Journal of Legal Medicine

JF - International Journal of Legal Medicine

SN - 0937-9827

ER -