shosty, my apologies. I will get back to your earlier post soon, I've been a bit busy as of late. Thank you for your efforts to raise the level of discourse, even though we disagree on the topic at hand, I thoroughly appreciate a well-reasoned argument.
No problem. I've been really busy too. I've been enjoying reading your posts. You have a knack for cutting through the nonsense in a clear headed way.
Derideo_Te, it is not necessary to attempt to define legislatively what a future of value looks like for different regions and circumstances. You don't understand the argument. All that is necessary is to show that a future is a moral category sufficient to explain why killing adults is ordinarily wrong and that a fetus has a "future like ours" (i.e adults). Again, go back the the argument and stick with me for a second here... if we can explain why it is ordinarily wrong to kill an adult solely on the basis that it deprives them of their future (not that there may not be others reasons it is wrong to kill), then we have a legitimate moral category. And if we have a moral category (in this case "futures like ours") it follows that, 1) "futures like ours" have value (this goes hand in hand with saying a future is a "moral category") 2) being a moral category it can be applied to other situations So if we apply this moral category to fetuses who have "futures like ours", then we have a solid argument that it is prima facie wrong to kill a fetus. You are very caught up in seeing the issue of abortion through the lens of the fetus and adult as a moral category. I suggest you remain open to seeing the question of the morality of abortion through another lens.
Morality belongs in a different forum. This one is about abortion. But if you insist I will ask you the following questions relating to "morality". If you had a time travel machine would you go back in time and abort the fetuses of Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot? You already know that their "future value" is to cause untold deaths and needless suffering to tens of millions of people, many of whom were innocent children. If yes then doesn't that negate your "future value" argument and if no, then where is the "morality" in knowingly imposing so much pain and suffering on others? Explain the "morality" of forcing a women to give birth knowing that the child will be unwanted and probably end up as a criminal. Explain the "morality" of imposing the acts of that criminal on other innocent people. Medical science has the capacity to determine that a fetus is malformed and will live a life of endless pain and suffering. Explain the "morality" of imposing that pain and suffering on a human being when you would put down an animal that was in the same state of pain and suffering on the grounds of it being the "humane" thing to do. Explain why your own subjective "morality" must be imposed on others who don't share your particular brand of "morality". What makes your "morality" better than someone else's? Since all attempts at legislating "morality" have turned out to be wrong where does your "morality" stand when it comes to the death penalty. A conservative republican governor suspended the death penalty in his own state because DNA evidence was showing that there were too many people on death row who were innocent of the crimes for which they had been given the death sentence. If your "morality" makes it "wrong" to kill an adult, even when it comes to the state imposing the death penalty, then shouldn't the death penalty be abolished nationwide under your pretext that it robs them of their "future value" even if that is just time spent behind bars until they die of natural causes?
di·ver·sion dəˈvərZHən,dīˈvərZHən/ noun noun: diversion 1. an instance of turning something aside from its course. eg: In other words, (*)(*)(*)(*) the argument, (*)(*)(*)(*) your thread, I want to bloviate about how immoral "morality"(according to me) is.
This forum is related to anything having to do with abortion, including the ethics of abortion. Certainly, assuming the view I've put forward for debate here is correct and is the only reason killing is wrong (which I never claimed), then the scenarios you describe would allow for aborting the fetuses of Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot. As I just alluded to, if there are other reasons killing may be wrong besides the future-like-ours argument, then those would need to be considered as well. Other cases you didn't mention would be those who suffer brain trauma and are in a persistent vegetative state. So the principle would be, where there is solid evidence that no future even exists or, as in your hypothetical, we could know the future of those like Hitler, then you have a solid argument for ending a life of an adult or fetus. The difference here is you are making a huge assumption, unlike your hypothetical above, where time travel is possible. Well, here you bring up another case where, based on the argument I am putting forward, one could make a case that abortion is an ethical choice. Again, this assumes that the future-like-ours argument is the only applicable moral principle. What makes a morality "better" than another are the arguments on which it is based. You do realize that ethics is a branch of philosophy, right? Your argument assumes that no objective moral principles exist and that morality is entirely subjective. This isn't even something you believe since this statement of yours assumes it is objectively wrong to impose morality on another. It's similar to someone claiming "there is no absolute truth", which is itself an absolute truth statement and so is inherently self contradictory. If governments cannot legislate morality, then the logical conclusion would be advocating anarchism. At the very minimum, protecting "rights" is legislating morality. The morality of the death penalty is another case entirely because we are talking about punishment for serious crimes. Remember, the argument says it is "ordinarily wrong" to take away a future of value. A similar case is killing in war time. So other moral principles would need to be taken into account when considering the morality of the death penalty. But certainly the future -like-ours argument would play a key role in this as taking away someone's future is a tremendously sobering and serious thing to do.
Let's consider two fictional women: Anna never wanted to have any children. She becomes a beloved aunt, but stays true to her word and practices abstinence throughout her whole life. Berta had an abortion in her late teens because she didn't want to raise a child as a single mother with no financial stability. Later on in life, she raises two kids, while running her own small business together with her husband. While Berta was involved in the killing of her own fetus, she has granted life, love and a bright future to two children. Anna, on the other hand, never bothered to have any children and therefore decided against granting them a future. If our moral compass puts great emphasis on giving our fellow human beings a future, Berta was wrong when she had her abortion, but made up for it by having two kids later on. In the grand scheme of things, Anna's abstinence deprived more children of their future than Berta's actions. This kind of argument is not seen often, because in most cases, we focus on the act of killing instead of the end result. Intent matters. We distinguish between a cold-blooded act of murder and an unfortunate accident. Most of us would never blame Anna for giving no consideration to the wishes and dreams of the child she never had. Berta, however, made a conscious decision to end a life. The "future like ours" argument in the opening post specifically talks about killing, but if we accept it, how should we treat this slightly modified version? 1. It is ordinarily wrong to kill an adult because it deprives that adult of a future of value. 2. Abstinence also deprives an egg of a future that is equally as valuable as an adult's future. 3. Therefore, it is ordinarily equally as wrong to abstain from fertilizing an egg as it is to kill an adult. I am the first to admit that this sounds outlandish, but still, it's so similar to the original argument. I agree that the future of a fetus and an adult are essentially equivalent, but also think that a significant part of what makes murder wrong doesn't lie in the aftermath of the act of killing someone, but in the time before the murder. This may sound strange at first, but let me explain what I mean with a personal story. I lost my mom during my teenage years to lung cancer. At the time of diagnosis, the prognosis was bad. She had maybe one more year to live even with surgery and chemotherapy. Once the initial shock wore off, she was less concerned about her own future than ours. In the limited time she had left, she did whatever she could to prepare for our lives without her. In the end, I mourned because I had lost someone who, without any doubt, deeply cared about me. Looking back, what gave her death significance, wasn't the loss of a possible future, but her whole life before that very moment. Without a past, she would have not only been a stranger to all those close to her, but also to herself.
First let me say that I think Marquis's account of why killing is wrong is persuasive as it relates to persons, where I disagree is in the application of FOV to entities that are not persons. (I will leave aside what constitutes the nature of personhood as a topic for another day). 1) My concern about ontology here follows Singer's concern about contiguity. At some point, Marquis has to be able to claim that there is a connection between a singular individual and its FOV. However, what twinning problematizes is idea that such a linear connection can be had easily. Twinning demonstrates that there is no specific FOV that can be traced back to a single individual (say prior to the 5th day) because twinning , but if there is no specific future at this time, how can Marquis claim continuity say conception to some FOV? It seems that at the very least, he would have to move his timetable for particularity (single individual) past the date of when twinning can potentially occur (one need not undergo twinning). But if this is the case then what criteria establishes a FOV later on? It's the failure to account for specific continuity that causes the problem here, therefore considerations of causal explanations for twinning, or predictions about when it would occur would not solve this particular problem. Additionally, it would not be that the embryo has no ontological identity, but rather that it has potentially multiple ones that poses the problem. To put it another way, if we say that an individual begins at conception, then what are we to say about twinning? That one individual becomes 2 or 4 or 8 individuals? One self-same person divided into 8 parts? No, this would fail the test of identity (any difference between things = different things). So, that means that prior to the age of twinning there is no specific individual that has a specific future like ours (indeed Marquis himself suggests that FOV comes into play after the "age of twinning." But now there is another complication: since we can initiate twinning, it would seem (if denying a FOV is immoral) that we are responsible if we prevent another 2, 4 or 8 lives (by failing to initiate twinning) to come into being, since to do would be to deny these individuals a future like ours. 2) I agree that a person's future is valuable. And so to deny a person a FOV would be prima facie wrong. It appears that our disagreement stems from what constitutes a person that has a FOV. The fact that there are various environments and/or resources necessary for the embryo or fetus to develop in order to survive seems to me to be important - my discussion in point 2 was to highlight this contingency in order to set up point 3, which I think is the most serious problem for Marquis’s position. 3) It seems to me that the cloning objection is fatal (as a reductio ad absurdum). There doesn’t seem to be a philosophically significant difference, given Marquis’s account, between a skin cell and an embryo or fetus. A skin cloned skin cell, if placed in an environment with the necessary resources, would become a person, hence that skin cell has a FOV. If it is prima facie wrong to prevent a someone from actualizing their future, this would seem to apply to issues of commission and omission equally (i.e. one would be morally culpable by preventing a future from occurring by killing as well as by preventing that future from occurring by not giving aid). The skin cell nucleus contains all of the genetic material to become a person (this difference separates this critique from the sperm/egg spatiality objection that many level against Marquis)– the only thing the cloned skin cell lacks is the proper environment/resources – hence it does have a FOV. By preventing this cell from being placed in that environment, I have effectively denied someone a FOV. Or to put it another way, if I intentionally kill a skin cell that could be cloned, I would be effectively denying this cell a FOV. But of course this is absurd, hence, something is wrong with Marquis’s position.
It seems we are close in our opinions on this. If i am understanding you correctly, you are understanding the argument to say that a person's future is valuable only in relation to how much the possessor of this future values it. Is that correct? Because what I am saying is that there is value attached to people's future that is objective as well, evidenced by the suicide hotlines. We clearly see value in other's futures when they, in moments of despair, cannot see it. I also gave Beethoven as an example, who ultimately managed to see the value in his future in his despair and kept himself from killing himself. Had he not seen value in his future and killed himself, the tremendous value his future has brought to us, brought to him in the past, and continues to bring today, would not have happened. But I think saying simply that "Abortion ordinarily deprives the fetus of a future value" instead of "Abortion also deprives the fetus of a future that is equally as valuable as an adult's future" ignores the parallel between the two. I don't think any person can say authoritatively that x person's future is more valuable than y person's future or should presume to speak for another regarding their future except in extreme circumstances, such as a vegetative state. So we are best to regard all human futures as equally as valuable.
Thank you for your post and your respectful tone. Actually, your point has been brought up by those who disagree with Marquis' argument saying that if Marquis is correct, then it follows that not only abstinence must be wrong but contraception and the failure to clone cells, etc. The problem with your conclusion - comparing killing an adult to abstinence - is in the later case there is no identifiable determinate being possessing a future. There is a potential determinate being (the egg), but a potential determinate being cannot posses anything, such as a future of value. Abstinence isn't about any specific life whereas killing an adult is. Abortion is about a particular life, a determinate being, who has a "future like ours". And I am very sorry for your loss. I'm sure you have a perspective on this issue others do not have. Thank you for your post.
The suicide hotlines evidence that there are people who value the lives of other people, not that value exists independent of any mind, which is what it would mean for value to be objective. I would not say that people are only valued by themselves. Most people are valued by themselves and by others, but, for any person picked at random from the world, it is more likely that that person is valued by that person than that that person is valued by someone else. In the case of an argument against abortion, we're starting off with reason to believe that the people in question may indeed not be valued by anyone else given that their own mothers are contemplating killing them. They may be valued by others in the future, but the future is even less certain than the present. A) "Abortion ordinarily deprives the fetus of future value" B) "Abortion also deprives the fetus of a future that is equally as valuable as an adult's future" Statement B says a lot more than statement A, for sure, but statement A is much more likely to be true. That's how arguments tend to be; the more one tries to prove, the less tenable it will be. In this case, I think you should trade away some reach for a more plausible second premise. If you disregard all the false accusations of fallacious reasoning in this thread, what are you left with? It's mostly objections to the second premise, right? I'm guessing, actually, but I know you're getting some. When you say something is equal to something else, you're making a quantifiable statement as precise as any other quantifiable claim, such as "my estimation of the value of peanut butter is equal to 68.987126354897% of your estimation of the value of peanut butter". In principle, we could find out if it's true if we knew everything. I wouldn't try to defend a claim like that. Changing it to A wouldn't even be giving up that much. A doesn't preclude B, B could still be true, you just wouldn't be saying it's necessarily the case, and you don't need it to say that. It only needs to show that the reason you shouldn't kill the adult is also true of the fetus.
