Between Bioethics and Literature: Representations of (post-) human identities in Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake and The Year of The Flood

Literature can contribute to bioethical debate in several ways: by enabling us to see cases as embedded in specific human contexts, by enhancing our sensitivity to the narratives of others, and by developing a broader outlook to human identity. Both literature and bioethics are interested in the future of humanity and call attention to the dangers of uncontrolled scientific progress, looking for a balance between the excesses of technophobia on the one hand and technophilia on the other. In a context in which scientists face increasingly difficult ethical choices, novels such as Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood can help us understand what it means to be human, which after all is the ultimate goal of all scientific as well as humanistic endeavors.