Kevin's thoughts on ethics.

Over recent years there has been a stark loss of faith in the Enlightenment idea of knowledge with a capital K. Those who believe in humanity's capacity to grasp objective reality are dismissed as arrogant and elitist. The more modest proposition that all knowledge is particular and and contingent is now rarely challenged. Partisans of identity politics reject the supposedly universal body of knowledge as a mask for hegemonic interests. History is decried as a Socially constructed grand narrative. In place of the universal, we see the profileration of many 'knowledges'. many 'histories' At the same time insights gained from experience and emotion are often privileged over supposedly absolute truths.

Are there any ideals intellectuals should not examine? Some areas of knowledge are deemed so problematic, we rein in investigation and stifle debate. In the case of anthropology, a whole discipline is tarnished with colonial oppression, and its practitioners struggle to find ethically acceptable methods. In Science, the field of genetics has been subject to unprecedented  external scrutiny. Ethical regulations and ethics committees rather than the demands of the field of study now determine the degree and conduct of research, for example in therapeutic cloning. Media concerns and public opinion are cited to justify limits on what can be acceptably pursued. How can ideas develop if they are hemmed in by ethical concern, interest groups lobbying and public opinion? What effect does this climate have on intellectual life in general?