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Prof. dr. Etienne Vermeersch
May 2, 1934 - January 18, 2019

Etienne Vermeersch was Professor of Philosophy and Bioethics at the University of Ghent, Belgium, which he formerly served as vice rector. 
He became a renowned Belgian Moral philosopher as a founding father of the abortion and euthanasia laws in Belgium. 
He served five years as a Jesuit (1953-1958). From 1959 he started his studies Philosophy while finishing his last two years Classical Philology at the University Ghent. He broke with his faith after his first year Philosophy and became an atheist and naturalist. During the 1990s Etienne Vermeersch became a huge influential Intellectual in Flanders, and as the chairman of the Belgian National Advisory Committee on Bioethics the leading Bioethicist in Belgium, years before euthanasia was legalized in 2002.
He was also one of the leading skeptics in The Low Countries.