Is bioethics Circe, the enchantress of medicine?

Background: Recent development in the biomedical fields have led to conside rable moral perplexity, about the rights and duties of health professionals , patients and research subjects. Since about 1970 bioethics have become in volved in an ongoing discussion of the complex ethical issues raised by the se developments. Objective: To review the precise relationship between Niet zsche's ontology and an eventual bioethics. Method: The author intends to g ive a picture of how ontological factors have influenced the beginnings of bioethics. Results: Ethics for Nietzsche symbolizes Circe, the enchantress in Homer's Odyssey. Nietzsche's task is to proclaim the emptiness (devaluat ion) of all traditional values, thus soliciting a rejection of them. But bi oethics must not be content with merely replacing the old values by new one s, v.g. by filling the place left by the supreme values. Conclusions: Despi te the efforts to overcome technicity, bioethics remains locked in the subj ect-ism of which technicity is but a consequence. Nietzsche's special insig ht is to perceive that the interpretation of beings currentby prevalent is valueless, for it is an interpretation that has returned to values that are precisely without an value at all.