       A Philosophical Methodology for Sociology in and of Bioethics Nathan Emmerich nathan.emmerich@gmail.com 1. Since its early days bioethics has included works of social science. Historically these have been a small part of the discipline although more recently a focus on social scientific 1 methods and research in bioethics has become visible. 2 This has lead some bioethicists to discuss the contributions social science can make to bioethics, 3 to develop theoretical perspectives 4 and to calls for bioethical research programs and expertise to explicitly include knowledge of the empirical disciplines. 5 Whether or not these research programs can, ought or should be multi- or interdisciplinary has been debated, although certainly not settled. 6 In any event, empirical methods in bioethics are clearly here to stay. 7 Whilst social science in general has adopted cultural and epistemological relativism as methodology this same social science has seen ethical relativism, even methodological ethical relativism, as troubling, particularly in the discipline of bioethics. 8   1 Throughout this paper I predominantly use the term social science. As will no doubt be clear to the reader I am largely concerned with ‘qualitative’, ‘interpretive’ or ‘hermeneutic’ social science which can be found in many of the disciplines considered social science. Those considered in this paper are predominantly anthropology, sociology and psychology. In order to not to be continually differentiating between these disciplines or making clear a lack of differentiation in the context of my arguments I use the term social science. 2 P. Borry, P. Schotsmans, and K. Dierickx, “The birth of the empirical turn in bioethics.,” Bioethics 19, no. 1 (2005): 49-71. 3 E. Haimes, “What can the Social Sciences Contribute to the Study of Ethics? Theoretical, Empirical and Substantive Considerations,” Bioethics 16, no. 2 (2002): 89-113. 4 A. M. Hedgecoe, “Critical Bioethics: Beyond the Social Science Critique of Applied Ethics,” Bioethics 18, no. 2 (2004): 120-143; B. Molewijk et al., “Empirical data and moral theory. A plea for integrated empirical ethics,” Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 7, no. 1 (2004): 55-69. 5 R. A. Pearlman, S. H. Miles, and R. M. Arnold, “Contributions of empirical research to medical ethics,” Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 14, no. 3 (1993): 197-210; P Borry, P Schotsmans, and K Dierickx, “Bioethics and its Methodology: The Rise of Empirical Contributions.,” in New Pathways for European Bioethics. (Intersentia, 2008). 6 L. van der Scheer and G. Widdershoven, “Integrated empirical ethics: Loss of normativity?,” Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 7, no. 1 (2004): 71-79; M. Levitt, “Complementarity rather than integration,” Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 7, no. 1 (2004): 81-83; L. van der Scheer and G. Widdershoven, “A response to Levitt and Molewijk,” Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 7, no. 1 (2004): 89-91. 7 J Sugarman and D Sulmasy, Methods in Medical Ethics (Georgetown University Press, 2001); L Jacoby and L Siminoff, Empirical Methods for Bioethics: A Primer, 1st ed. (JAI Press, 2007). 8 E Hatch, Culture and Morality: Relativity of Values in Anthropology (Columbia University Press, 1983); A Kleinman, Writing at the Margin: Discourse Between Anthropology and Medicine (University of California Press, 1995). p.63.