Van Rensselaer Potter
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Van Rensselaer Potter II (12 November, 1911 – September 6, 2001) was an American
biochemist Biochemists are scientists who are trained in biochemistry. They study chemical processes and chemical transformations in living organisms. Biochemists study DNA, proteins and Cell (biology), cell parts. The word "biochemist" is a portmanteau of ...
, oncologist, and bioethicist. Born in northeast
South Dakota South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state, state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Dakota people, Dakota Sioux ...
, Potter was professor of
oncology Oncology is a branch of medicine that deals with the study, treatment, diagnosis, and prevention of cancer. A medical professional who practices oncology is an ''oncologist''. The name's Etymology, etymological origin is the Greek word ὄγ ...
at the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research at the
University of Wisconsin–Madison The University of Wisconsin–Madison (University of Wisconsin, Wisconsin, UW, UW–Madison, or simply Madison) is a public land-grant research university in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. It was founded in 1848 when Wisconsin achieved st ...
for more than five decades. Potter is known for coining the widely used term ''
bioethics Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice, interested in ethical issues related to health (primarily focused on the human, but also increasingly includes animal ethics), including those emerging from advances in biology, me ...
'' in 1970, however, German theologian Fritz Jahr had previously coined the term in the 1920s. Peter Whitehouse describes Potter's formulation of bioethics as a "wise integration of biology and values", which arose from his work as a cancer researcher and from the influence of faculty member
Aldo Leopold Aldo Leopold (January 11, 1887 – April 21, 1948) was an American writer, Philosophy, philosopher, Natural history, naturalist, scientist, Ecology, ecologist, forester, Conservation biology, conservationist, and environmentalist. He was a profes ...
at the University of Wisconsin. Bioethics is linked to
environmental ethics In environmental philosophy, environmental ethics is an established field of practical philosophy "which reconstructs the essential types of argumentation that can be made for protecting natural entities and the sustainable use of natural resourc ...
and is separate from biomedical ethics. Because of this confusion (and appropriation of the term in medicine), Potter chose to use the term '' global bioethics'' in 1988. He was an elected member of the
National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...
, The president of the American Society of Cell Biology in 1965, and the president of the
American Association for Cancer Research The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) is the world's oldest and largest professional association related to cancer research. Based in Philadelphia, the AACR focuses on all aspects of cancer research, including Basic research, basic, ...
in 1974.


Awards

* Bristol-Myers Squibb Awards (1981) * Pfizer Award in Enzyme Chemistry (1947) * List of Ten Outstanding Young Americans (1945)


Publications


Popular

* ''Bioethics: Bridge to the Future'' (Prentice-Hall, 1971) * ''Global Bioethics: Building on the Leopold Legacy'' (Michigan State Univ Pr 1988)


See also

* Geotherapy


References


Further reading

* Lower, G. (2001)
Van Rensselaer Potter—Ad memoriam
''Global Bioethics'', 14(4), 31–32. Retrieved May 15, 2021. * Whitehouse, P. J. (2002)
Van Rensselaer Potter: An Intellectual Memoir
''Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics'', 11(4), 331–334. Retrieved May 15, 2021. 1911 births 2001 deaths 20th-century American biochemists People from South Dakota Global ethics American cancer researchers {{US-biochemist-stub