Executive Director of the Centre for Ethics and Law, Copenhagen, and Director of the Department of Philosophy of Education at the Danish University of Education, Copenhagen. President of Federation Internationale des Societes de Philosophie.
Member of l'Academie Internationale de Philosophie des Sciences and l'Institut International de Philosophie, Paris.

Achievements
Major Works: Theorie de l'engagement, Paris,1973, Das Unersetzlische, Berlin, 1992. Levinas, une introduction philosophique, Paris, 1997. Kemp and Rendtorff (Ed.): Basic Ethical principle in Europeans Bioethics and Biolaw, vol. I & II.
Report to the European Commission of the BIOMED-II Project, Copenhagen, Denmark and Barcelona, Spain 2000.
Last book in Danish in print: Verdensborgeren som pø dagoigisk ideal (The Citizen of the World as Ideal of Education).

Staff
Cand.theol. Lisbeth Witthoefft Nielsen
Has a master degree in Theology from the University of Copenhagen (2001). Doctoral Student at the Danish University of Education (since 2001). Lisbeth has worked closely on bioethics and the moral foundation of the precautionary principle as well as the principle of sustainable development in relation to the non-human area. Furthermore, her research focuses on the problems of communication on ethical issues between scientists within different disciplines as well as on public perceptions of nature and naturalness in relation to modern biotechnology. In relation to these studies, Lisbeth has worked closely with the educational aspects concerning ethical issues related to the scientific development within modern biotechnology.
Publications:
Kemp, Lunde & Witthê fft Nielsen: ’Genetic Engineering and Ethics. National Law’. (Summary published in English August 2002: Gene Technology and Ethics in the Plant and Foods area “ Towards an International Convention)
www.biotik.dk
’The Foundation of Bioethics “ Western Ethical Thinking and the Question of a Common Bioethics’. A Master thesis.

Resources useful for the project
Centre for Ethics and Law (www.ethiclaw.dk) has carried out research on bioethics since 1993 on a cross-cutting and international basis involving researcher from biology, agriculture, philosophy, sociology, theology, law, documentation etc.. The Centre is attached to the Danish University of Education. The Centre has made a major contribution to the 5th Framework Programme (BIOMED II, 1994-98) on Basic Ethical Principles and shown its ability to manage international research activities. Since 1997 the Centre has collaborated with the Danish Ministry of Trade and Industry on bioethical principles and evaluative frameworks for new biotechnologies. The Centre has recently been responsible for an International Conference on Future Food and Bioethics, Copenhagen, October 23-25, 2002, hosted by the Danish Government.

Special assignments
The Centre for Ethics and Law group will contribute in mapping moral philosophical and ethical issues raised within science dealing with fusion of human and non-human material. The research will be twofold: A) focusing on concrete experiment-case in order to map the central ethical issues raised in praxis, B) mapping perceptions of the non-human and its position in a moral philosophical context. Based on the results from A and B the research aims at outlining possible methods to deal with the challenge of communication between scientists, government/politicians and the public when it comes to the question of how to regulate this particular type of biotechnology with reference to the precautionary principle and the principle of sustainable development.