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Princeton Prof Advocates Euthanizing Handicapped Babies
An earlier idea of Singer's, that a human life is not necessarily more valuable than an animal's, led (at least in part) to the founding of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals [PETA] and the Animal Liberation Front.
We're running this here -- after some serious soul-searching -- because Singer raises thorny ethical questions that make people think in new ways even when they don't agree with him, and if there's one thing Slashdot readers are good at, it's coming up with unique reactions to controversial ideas that cause most people to shut down their critical thinking abilities and issue emotional, knee-jerk responses.
The floor is now open. Please try to treat this as an important ethical discussion, not as flamebait. It's a serious -- if frightening -- subject, and the debate now being carried on about it in academic circles will no doubt affect the way we treat our fellow humans and other life forms, both organic and cybernetic, in the 21st century and beyond.
People protesting over an Professor of higher learning? What has this country come to?
I don't necessarily agree with his position on euthanization. That doesn't mean that I have to protest him personally.
Further more, to pressure the school to not offer him tenure is inapproptiate at best. Steve Forbes, et. all, neet to relize that there is a commitment that needs to be made. You can't choose to fund higher learning, and then tell the free-thinkers what to believe.
People who throw away pre-concieved notions and think outside of the box are the most important people to support... Lest free speech, and philisophical development come to a screeching halt.
I've always felt very strongly that a human isn't necessariy a person. I've read that full-grown mature dogs operate at the same level of intelligence as a three month old baby. You could get off relatively unharmed for killing the dog, but killing a three month old baby would surely get you a long prison sentence.
;)
People regard the _potential_ for intelligence with perhaps a little too highly. I feel that while there can't be drawn a specific line in the sane, once someone shows that they are self-aware
they are a person. And no sooner. For example, if
a baby was born as a vegetable and was kept alive
in that state for 30 years, I wouldn't consider
that a person, just a human body.
With that in mind, I really don't feel that harming a non-sentient human is the same thing as
harming a mature person. I also, for the same
reasons, beleive strongly in the right of a mother
to decide to abort a child at any stage of
pregnancy.
But that said, I'm very aware that my opinions don't translate well into the real world, and they aren't exactly popular, so I guess we're stuck with what we've already got
What did you eat today? http://www.atetoday.com/
Thomas Swift was being sarcastic, sadly enough, our esteemed bio"ethics" professor is not. The fact of the matter is that there are some things that just seem wrong to us. Without any use of logic, it just seems wrong that retarded children should not have the chance to live simply because they are severely disabled. In cases such as this, the basic instict we have is often correct. However, I'll admit, that there may be a logical point behind Singer's argument.
It is hard to watch someone die. Often we say that it is kinder to pull the plug than watch the suffering. Now I am an agnostic who does not find anything inherently wrong with physician-assisted suicide. However, I think there is a clear difference. One person has had a chance to lead a full life while the other has not. Whatever that life may be, isn't it true that there is at least some moral imperative to giving a child the best life possible.
What if this is all that there is? If there is no heaven or hell or afterlife? Then is it fair to the child to kill it and deprive it of everything. Existence is precious, we should treasure it for ourselves and for others. Pain tells us that we are alive. While it may be hard to watch, until a child can choose for his or herself whether or not to end his/her existence, we have an obligation to preserve that obligation.
Sorry Mr. Singer, but you are wrong.
14 digits of Pi are all we need.
Everyone who has not read his book should just stop commenting. What he suggests is not to better help others, it is that the hapiness if the couple creates a child that is not disabled outweighs the wrong of killing a child. Read it then come back, the man is sick but I wouldn't advocate killing him and firmly believe he has a right to his beliefs even though I vehemtly disagree with him. I have know many parapelegics, asmahtics, and people with other disabilities that were happy with their life. Every one deserves a chance to live.
That said. I recently had to hlep amke a decision to stop life support for my grandmother, it was the hardest decision I ever made. The professor refers to in his book a hemophiliac child, not one with no arms or no legs.
Alright now. Usually I'm rather reactionary, opting to respond to comments posted by others rather than taking any real intiative (except perhaps to do a line by line rip of an article or post a silly joke no one laughs at anyway). This is going to be.. a little different.
What hubris it is for humans to even dare suggest that they are indeed exempt from natural selection. Do you think that out in the wild parents (read: animals) allow their offspring to go on living if it is clear that they can not fend for themselves? Clearly not. Only the strong survive. This is the natural way of things. The only thing that separates humans from the natural world is their disgusting way of thinking.
This man is a genius. To think people condemn him for having a view that conflicts with their own. Personally, I'd switch my choice of university in order to be in one of his classes. It's nice to have an instructor who actually has intelligent thoughts.
I'm not so sure about the "human consciousness" issue, having no clear recollection of my first year or two of life. But hey, whatever. I will agree that it's not always "wrong" to kill a person. I'd like to question morality itself, however.. Which brings me to:
How true. Think of how many insects and other critters you step on every day, squashing the life out of them. What makes you think you're so much better? Because you can "think"? Because you can "feel"? News flash: animals can feel pain too. Ever seen a kid kick a dog? See how it whimpers? Ever seen a dog get depressed? See how sad it looks? No creature is "more deserving" of life than any other, though some are simply better built to survive it.
Also, thinking about all the vegans and vegetarians out there. They don't want to eat animals (ok, that comment was broad-sweeping.. I'll admit right now that that is not the rationale for all of them.. for those that it is, that is who the following is concerned with, alright?). Well.. guess what? Plants are alive too! Just because they can't run off, they aren't "deserving" of life? Because they can't scream, you assume they can't feel? By that line of reasoning, a mute amputee would not be deserving of life either. Think about it. (also think about how sick vegans and such get because it's so hard to maintain a healthy diet without eating any kind of animal product)
Oh please! This man is talking about the ending of suffering, not the complete opposite: torturing an entire people and putting them to death. The Jews weren't "unfit" to live.. Hitler was simply a sick, very sick, man. By the way.. he also isn't advocating making euthanasia (do you people even know what that means??) mandatory, simply that parents have that option. As in nature. Again I ask: what makes you think you're above the natural order?
Clearly an enlightened mind. So long as I can draw breath, I'll talk about whatever the fuck I want. You want to restrict my freedom of speech? You'll have to kill me first. Most people may not be willing to step up to the plate to defend their freedom anymore, but I'll be damned if I'm not. He obviously missed Singer's entire point.
Personally, if I were the disabled child, I'm not sure I'd want to know that my parents said that. Well, unless I was really that miserable. I don't know. I say I'm not sure because, well, I'm not disabled (subject to controversy with regards to my mental capacity, I'm sure). =P
Obviously because that would make sense. The fact that they are protesting proves that they don't make sense.
Wow.. someone actually taking the time to become more informed. More people should get a clue from this and do the same.
As I said, I don't think we're talking about mandatory stuff here. Purely an option. And it should certainly only be used in extreme circumstances. Anyone who thinks you need to be euthanised because of a minor defect is clearly nuts. Only those disabilities which inhibit a person's ability to actually live life and survive in the world should be considered. And no, it's not about saving money, you loons. Gah. Not everyone thinks about your precious fucking money! Get off it!
This I find odd. ;) However, I'm not going to disagree with the man personally because he has chosen this way of life, nor does it cause me to discredit the main point he has come under fire for simply because I disagree with him here. I never said there was anything wrong with not eating meat, just that it seems silly to me. If people don't want to eat (or wear) animals, that's fine. But plants are living things too.. And you have to eat something .. Of course, all of that is premature. I'd like to know why he doesn't eat meat/wear leather. ;)
Clearly this man is the root of all evil..? Ha!
This really saddens me. Perhaps one day the U.S. really will be about learning and free thought again, rather than ignorance and submission.
I'm going to wager on the "not thinking" theory. People really should open up their minds and actually think about things. A lack of questioning.. is decidedly unhealthy. Just think how horrible your life would be if you never questioned anything and simply accepted everything the way it was. No, seriously, close your eyes and just try to imagine..
Pretty fucking scary if you ask me.
Well, I'm all for it. I'm also for anything that brings us closer to recognizing that we are indeed a part of the natural world rather than its ultimate masters. Humans always try to manipulate the other creatures on this earth, and think themselves to be above all else. Humans as a whole have the right to decide the fate of entire species, trimming their numbers as "appropriate" (coyotes and wolves are evil.. kill the fuckers! no one cares about animal species until they are already on the brink of extinction.. and then it's too late.. humans don't have clue 1 about how to balance the natural order because it's far to complex to predict or even assess properly), yet parents can't even have the right to decide if their child is healthy enough to survive in the world?
Throw off the shackles of conventional "thought", and actually ponder these weighty issues before making a snap judgement. The world will be better off for it.
Also note the difference between "fit to survive" and "deserving of life". All things are deserving of life, whether you think so or not. However, not all things were built to survive. Sad to many of us? Yes. A fact of nature? Yes. Morality is wholly in your mind. There is nothing natural about it. Do you think nature is guided by some greater morality? No. It's something completely different, something most people clearly do not even understand, although they damn well should .
~ Kish
The Beginner wrote that our basic instinct tells us that killing a retarded child is not correct.
;-)
However,
1. The basic instinct in fact does tell a mother to abandon her child if it proves not to be able to survive on its own. This holds true for most primitive tribes that have been studied so far (refer to Eibl-Eibesfeldt or the like).
2. It is one of the great achievments of civilisation that we don't kill when our instinct tells us to (when we catch our partner in bed with another person, when we encounter a tresspasser...). It's good to know what your basic instincts tell you to do - but you should control them and think civilized before acting!!!
As posted previously, it comes down to drawing the line between "fit to live" and "unfit to live".
Maybe you are too frightened to draw the line...
Maybe people who do just try to play god (although - has anybody seen him around lately?
MOooOD
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
On the contrary, you can attack the conclusions even if the premises are right IF the conclusions leads to morally questionable results or, more importantly, if the logical model that permits such premises is not sound. Singer thinks that consciousness doesn't begin until a month or more after full-term birth. How did he come to that conclusion? What's consciousness to begin with? We are tying consciousness with life, and at the same time position consciousness above life itself. And based on what? What is the scientific basis for such thinking? A 5 year old child is not aware of the consequences of education? Should it not matter whether he/she gets an education, then? A handicapped 3 year old child will definitedly not be aware of the difficulties that lie ahead. He/she will be conscious that he/she exists, all right, but he/she will not know what the full implications of his/her handicaps are. Would that make this child less unconcious and then more suitable for euthanazing?
Singer's premises will be valid (or wrong) if and only if we clearly and unquestionably know:
1) what consciousness is in the first place,
2) whether there are degrees of consciousness or there are just absolute consciousness or unconsciousness,
3) that we know for sure a newborn is unconscious, and that such fact stop us from treating a newborn and a 1 year old as equals,
3) that human life can be quantify and qualify in terms consciousness, and MORE IMPORTANTLY,
4) the fact that the possibility, however narrow, that a supossed unconscious (and therefore non-sentient) handicapped baby would have prefered to go on living is of no consequence and irrelevant compared to the benefits and whatever moral reasons one would have to kill him/her.
Singer is drawing conclusions using some form of logic which soundness is not that clear, at least to me. There are more thinks to take into account, more questions that remain unanswered or even stated! How can we then make such a leap? Prove me what consciousness is and how it quantify and qualify life. Show me that the benefits of killing a handicapped newborn outweights whatever future choice this baby would have made.
Luis Espinal.
http://www.cs.fiu.edu
The comparison to Hitler is more apt that you apparently think. Yes, he killed the Jews, whom he thought inferior. However, the sick, the weak, those with congenital diseases, the alcoholic, the mentally or physically infirm, these were all separated, prevented from reproducing (under the various German Health Acts), and were planned to be killed.
As you point out, Singer isn't saying to make this mandatory. However, unless people disagree with him, his views could easily be adopted by the majority and become mandatory. Secondly, due to the statistical and biological fact of "regression to the mean," eugenics is unlikely to work with massive coercion, and its proponents would realize that. Finally, I simply find it strange that a bunch of supposed geeks, who often seem to take offense at the idea of parents controlling the lives of teenaged children, find nothing wrong with parents having complete control over their children's life and death.
I also wonder how, if "morality is wholly in your mind" and "there is nothing natural about it," why Hitler was evil? Certainly the Jews couldn't resist his power; weren't they being selected against in a social sense? Why do you seem to claim it's a good thing to give to Oxfam; shouldn't natural selection weed out those who can't fight to survive when food is scarce?
This is a horrific idea. I have a cousin who, when born, had a cerebral palsy-like condition due to his mother being clinically dead for several minutes during birth and the ensuing lack of ocygen to his brain for that time. For the first several years of his life, no one knew what exactly this would mean for him, since he had obvious motor coordination problems and appeared to have some sort of mental retardation.
He's now in his mid-20's, holds a B.S in Accounting (from a real university, not a mail-it-in type), lifts weights, serves as a deacon in his congregation, and is a useful, productive member of society, not to mention a hell of a guy (he was the best man in my wedding). He's not Stephen Hawking, in either direction, but I'd venture to guess that there are a lot more folks like him than like Hawking. And by this prof's lights, he should have been killed before finishing his first month.
We are not the same as animals. Humans have inherent value. If the word "humanity" has so little meaning for someone, then I for one am ashamed to have them as part of my species.
"You can never have too many elephants on your team."
By bestowing a life long burden on the taxpayers to support a child that should have been naturally un-selected, we
are in essence creating a life where there should never have been one.
Basically what you say is that children should be killed because they cost the taxpayer money. This is probably the
most disgusting attitude a human being can have. You should be ashamed of yourself. I can't even come up with a
good term to describe you. You disgust me.
So maybe you and all other likeminded folks should adopt all these defective and unwanted babies, and raise and feed them till their deaths entirely at your own expense.
Maybe one day, you can even let one of them marry your own daughter, without any concern for any of their disabilities and shortfallings, since they're just as good as anyone else to you, and produce you some wonderful grandchildren, for whom you shall also pick up the tab if necessary.
This all reminds me of an incident that took place around here not too long ago. A woman tried to stage an accidental fall of her Downs syndrome-afflicted baby daughter by dropping her off a 45-meter-high suspension bridge. The baby somehow miraculously survived. Apparently, the mother had attempted to put her up for adoption three times in the past, unsuccessfully. Now, where the bloody hell were the folks like you to pick up for her and adopt this child and avert a tragedy like this from ever occuring in the first place???
However bright we may be, it is not for us to decide. Consider: every civilization that has successfully evolved has done so with strong restrictions against infanticide. That alone should prove the dangers. If a society could gain a competititve advantage by killing defective children, why has this practice never taken hold? The answer is simply that it does not confer any net advantage to a society.
Even if some babies would be "better off dead," any society that allowed such things would suffer other maladies. The bright white line between life and death is one of those absolute values that people must have in order to work together and prosper. Allowing infanticide blurs that line, coarsens people, and reduces their trust of each other.
This man, unfortunately, has tenure at Princeton, so there's little use in demanding that he leave his field (they can't fire him and it's doubtful that he will resign). But to promote infanticide for selfish reasons: that's the mark of a mind that should be watched very carefully.
Who the hell does this man think he is that he can decide who is human and who is not? Let's take, for instance, Stephen Hawking. He wasn't born with Lou Gherig's disease, but let's say that he was found to be susceptible to it at birth. Furthermore, let's say his parents euthanized him because he would eventually "cramp their style" or someone else's. Think of what the world would have lost.
While we're at it, what about Ray Charles or Stevie Wonder, two men who became talented musicians, even though both were blind?
This man has no right whatsoever to decide that handicapped children have no potential. Every human does, even those with severe cases of brain damage in one form or another. To snuff out that potential, particularly when it's involuntary, to decrease the parents' "suffering" isn't simply inhumane; I think this one qualifies as inhuman.
While we're at it, I think it calls upon us to define what is human. to start, let's say that a two-year-old is human. Why? Because I don't think anyone will argue that it isn't, so we have a convenient baseline for comparison. Is a newborn human? Genetically, it certainly is. Morphologically, it's as human as a two-year-old (who, I remind you, is still not fully-developed).
An infant carries on all of the same biological processes as a two-year-old (meaning all of the biological processes of an adult except those involved in reproduction; but since this isn't counted against a two-year-old's humanity then it's not fair to count it against an infant's). Granted, the average two-year-old is toilet-trained, but I don't think anyone here is going to say that toilet-training makes someone human.
Its brain, while still maturing, has the capacity to learn, even if the child hasn't learned how to vocalize yet. Since people who are born mute for one reason or another are considered human, it's not fair to count the inability to speak against an infant.
It can't survive on its own, but neither can a two-year-old (or most animals at a comparable stage of development) so that cannot be counted against it either. If you want to take the "parasite approach" then I must remind you that parasites are still considered alive, and that there are many full-grown adults who are just as parasitic yet still couunted as human.
Does it have consciousness? I'd love to see how he proposes to test that question(assuming he's ever tried; I've found that many philosophers tend to go on convenient assumptions and leave the testing to others). Just when is this "magic moment" that the brain develops consciousness? I'm in the camp that believes the brain is pre-wired for consciousness, and has it as soon as it develops to the point where it could possibly posess it (which is probably, to be honest, still in the fetal stages; I don't claim to know exactly when).
Oh, and let's get to the "suffering" bit, while we're at it. Who, exactly, suffers? I do quite a lot of work with Down's Syndrome children (my uncle had one of the more severe cases on record, in case you're wondering how I got started in this). The children don't seem to be suffering; they make the best of the situation. And the parents... well, the parents of the children are frankly among the happiest people I've ever seen; they aren't suffering either. Yes, it's an extra burden; I never argued that it wasn't. But it's pure selfishness to reject a child because of something which will mean an extra burden for yourself.
There are risks involved in having a child. When you decide to have a child, you accept those risks. To remove the risk... that's a grey area at best; it reduces burdens, but at what cost? Perhaps a disrespect for human life? I see something of that in this professor.
But enough of this rant. I don't agree with this guy. I'll respect his right to say it, but I don't believe it should be from the professorial position he currently enjoys. There's nothing that can be done about it, of course (he has tenure, after all). And as long as he teaches this as only one philosophy out of many, that's one thing. But if this man starts indoctrinating his students, that's quite another.
"Women should be made continuously pregnant because otherwise a Stephen Hawkin might miss being conceived."
That's the logical extension of the argument.
Female Prison Rape in NY
Seeing as I can't moderate you, I'll reply instead.
He was not talking about autistic children, he was talking about a person of 17 with the mental age of 1, who will remain that way for the rest of their life. Autistic is quite different.
You are relating this sort of thinking to Hitler, yes? Hitler and his ideas are almost incomparable (I say almost). Whilst he wanted everyone of a certain race or races killed (genecide) here we are talking specifically about killing children who are severely handicapped (euthanasia). Whilst genecide is almost (again, I say almost) globally accepted as wrong, euthanasia is still a hotly debatable issue.
Now for my personal opinions on this (or are they my personal -feelings- on this? Perhaps there should be clearer destinction).
1)I think that this sort of action should be legal, but HIGHLY HIGHLY controlled. Allowed only in the most severest of severe cases.
2)I believe also that there should be distinction between physically handicapped, and mentally handicapped. Severely mentally handicapped children we have little to no hope for, in helping them to lead a normal life. We cannot replace their brain, they will always be handicapped and ALWAYS require supervision, support, assistance, etc. Whilst severely physically handicapped people can eventually benefit from advanced technologies that allow them to move around, communicate, etc. And physically handicapped people at least have the one organ functioning which we have the least ability to replace or correct - the brain.
Still, it's a complex issue, with no easy cut and dry answers.
el bobo
1. Who could and who should decide when to end a childs life?
IMHO: The parents - if they can afford to pay the bills from the hospitalization et all. If they cannot, I don't think they should have a choice.
Like my father always said to me "I brought you into this world, I can take you out".
2. Might this actually happen someday, will we start 'giving involuntary euthanesia' to children who might become criminals or something else 'undesired' (aka killing them)?
Anything is possible. I don't see it going that far, but I do see us eventually NOT treating infants that are born with problems that would cost over $10k to fix. It sounds sick, I know - but if you think about the initial cost, and you think about the family's costs over the (possible future) life of the child, it is *enourmous*. I know a family that was, and still is very much bankrupt from such a child. The child unfortunately never did improve.
Then again, my step son is a-ok after having been born premature. Because his father was in the military, taxpayers paid for his treatment - the bills would have been astronomical in the private sector. He was on oxygen for many days - in the hospital for about 6 weeks - the doctors ended up giving him a 90% chance of braindamage. He's fine now - but would *I* have insisted that the doc's let him go as is? Yes.
Just let them grow up, they'll probably be okay.
Define probably - is that probably if someone shells out a million or so for treatment for those first few months? What if it's not treatable, and it's a lifetime problem?
There is no probably. Babies are born screwed
up all the time - it's just that you never hear about them in the media - and society ignores it for the most part. You will hear about the women who was impregnated and is going to have 12 kids and the couple cannot afford it and someone's taking a collection for them and companies are donating cars and a house etc to them.
After all, they can always ask for assisted suicide later.
What if they can't talk? What if they can't hardly communicate at all?
There are no guarantees here. There never will be. Its like playing the lottery - the only difference is that as time passes the chances of medical technology helping to improve the situation increase dramatically. And the thing is - if you lose - and your child is severly disabled - who's going to take care of that child after you're gone?
http://slashdot.org/~tf23/journal
People have a lot of different attitudes about this. The Right-To-Life position is that it begins at the union of gametes (which I've heard parodied as "Life begins at erection"), and some even take issue with interfering with the gametes getting together. To the Warren Court, life which could be protected by the power of the state without reservation began at viability.
Singer starts with the premise that life qua human being is tied to conscious existence. In this he is not alone: The entire USA and the courts have no problem with proclaiming a body that's still metabolizing just fine, but can never be conscious again due to brain death, to be legally dead. Singer thinks that consciousness doesn't begin until a month or more after full-term birth and draws conclusions from this. You have no business attacking his conclusions unless you can find something wrong with his premises.
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
You're not the editor.. you wanna be an editor, dump a shitload of time and money into creating a new "News for Nerds" site..
Slashdot is pretty much about anything that's interesting and not just the latest AMD K-999 6.5-tittyflop, cryogenically-cooled, uranium-based Intel-compatible microprocessors..
I'm a nerd.. a bioengineer. This story interests me. It matters to me.. my wife and I are trying to have kids.
The real irony here is that our present knee-jerk response to infanticide is unique to our time. In the past, when our standard of living was lower, children weren't recognized as humans -- read any anthropology text if you don't believe me; just learn _some_ history. Until a child had grown to 8 or 10 years old, (and thus passed through the most dangerous part of life, disease-wise) he or she was not given a 'real' name, they weren't really considered members of the family, and they weren't buried with the family. Specifics vary from culture to culture, but the concept is true everywhere there's a high infant mortality rate. Just a few decades ago, India still gave names to children when they had passed their first 7-8 years. France didn't have a word for infant until the middle of the 19th century. Even here in America, until the 1950's, stillborn babies below a certain weight didn't need records -- they just threw the corpse out.
But I digress. My only point here is that the morals of our time are not the only morals, nor have they always been as they are now. Think about it.
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
..for that oversight. Please insert the word "many" right before "vegans". In a post this long, however, I'm bound to make mistakes like these. *sigh*
Even if I were to agree with you, which I don't, having never been a plant, I can safely we say "we don't know anything for sure about what it's like to be a plant". People who haven't been raped can't even understand what it's like to be a rape victim. They can say they do, but do they truly understand ? I think not. Therefore, it seems a little.. well. It seems untoward to assume one can assume what it's like to be a plant. Humans don't even fully understand how the human brain functions.
Besides which, to me, most ethical concerns are largely religious concerns. Most religious seem to agree on the notion that humans have souls. Is there proof to back this up? No. Even if it were true, is there proof that other life forms don't have souls? No. Perhaps plants have souls and their souls allow them to feel? No way to know for sure. We're not plants.
However.. as I stated more clearly farther down in the article, I could care less one way or the other if someone is vegan. It's their choice. To me, neither choice is any more "ethical" than the other.
~ Kish
You know, I wouldn't worry about Dr. Singer so much if he was a lone crackpot. The trouble is (as is shown already on this Slashdot discussion) that so many people are willing to go along with this nonsense. Pope John Paul II is right to warn that we have a "Culture of Death", where our answer to problems is to simply kill. [No, I am not Catholic; however, I believe JPII is absolutely correct about this.]
This is exactly what the pro-life movement has been warning about for decades now. I can date my conversion to a pro-life viewpoint pretty exactly; it was when, as part of a "bio-ethics" class, I was exposed to the viewpoints of Joseph Fletcher, Peter Singer's predecessor in such positions as the alleged morality of infanticide. I hadn't really thought about abortion very much, but I concluded that, if there was such a consensus about the fact that there really isn't any ethical difference between a fetus and a baby, that there is no magic moral pixie dust that confers personhood and humanity by a trip out of the uterus (something Singer and Fletcher would agree with), then either we arrive at a viewpoint where, if human life is sacred at all, we must treat life in the womb as sacred, or else humans are simply animals that may be killed when they are too much trouble, and there is no logical reason not to kill unwanted children, or unhappy and unwanted old people, or anyone that enough of us feel are inconvenient.
The only reason that Singer stands out is that he boldly embraces and proclaims this logical conclusion, rather than stopping short of it. So the man is not a hypocrite. I don't consider this much of a virtue. I'd rather have a person who is hypocritical and inconsistant in refusing to follow a bad premise through to clearly evil ends, than someone who in the name of "boldness" or "consistancy" or "integrity" follows through a bad premise to consistantly evil ends.
(Side note -- I'm bothered by the subtle and not-so-subtle ad hominem attacks going on here. It seems as if, according to Dr. Shapiro, Roblimo, and the majority of Slashdotters, that by definition anyone who holds to the traditional Christian position that it's simply wrong to kill children, or anyone else, because they are "defective" by some standard is "unthinking", whereas anyone who's willing to entertain Dr. Singer's philosophy is by definition an intellectual. This is nothing more than name-calling.)
At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, I would like to know how this differs in any essential way from Nazi philosophy. The Nazis declared that ceratin people were defective, and therefore that killing them was not an immoral act, since they weren't really "human" or "people" anyway. Singer is saying the same thing, he's simply replaced "Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, and anyone who doesn't get along well with the Third Reich" with "children of any race who don't measure up phyically and mentally, or whose life might cause their parents too much suffering."
I propose a simple alternative philosophy. It's not new, but neither is Singer's. It is this: that human life is sacred. It is sacred because it is a gift of God, and we are made in His image. It is a gift, and therefore we have it by simply being born into this world. As a gift, we do not earn it by being smart enough, or fit enough, or pain-free enough. We simply have it, and to deny this is to deny legitimate human freedom and dignity.
This is, in some ways, a bit like the "partial birth abortion" debate. Third trimester abortions are NOT done in this country unless there is a severe risk to the life of the mother, or the infant is not viable (ie is going to be born without a large portion of its brain). It does, however, make a nice strawman for those who are against abortion. And I *do* think that in the case of a VERY severe handicap, in some cases it is kinder to let the child die. It's easier on the child, it's easier on the parents, and it's easier on society as a whole.
BUT
Which brings me to my next point: There are "severe disabilities" that are NOT apparent at birth. How old can the child become and still have the parents allowed to kill him, or at least to "let him die"? One year old? Five? Thirteen? Seventeen?
Last but not least, I am bisexual. My housemate is gay. If a "gay gene" is ever found, those who consider us "undesirable" might engage in selective abortion or infanticide. This gives me the chills on a very irrational, personal level. Likewise, I know that in ancient Scandanavia and in modern China, babies are killed or left to die for the "defect" of being female. Since I'm female, this does not sit well with me at all. "But those abuses won't happen!" How do you know that?
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
Singer has been advocating this for years, it's hardly breaking news. (See his book Practical Ethics, for example.)
If Stephen Hawking was euthanized as a child (granted he wasn't born with his illness... not in it's worst stages) the scientific community would not have the insight into the universe that his genius has given us.
Luckily he was born relatively normal.
Parents should consider long and hard if the only reason they are going to euthanize a child is because they feel that the child may be physically maladjusted for our society. There is no reason to assume that the child, were it "normal", would even want to live in today's norms, maybe it would want to be a recluse....
basically the parents are deciding if THEY want to deal with the burden of raising a child who will not coincide peacefully with our society.
In this case, if doctors were to be able to figure out a fetus' social opinions or orientation, would the parents have the right to euthanize the child if he were not to become what they desired, or if he were to become a recluse?
Why is the ability to take care of oneself equated with the ability to make a contribution to society? I don't see a connection at all. The obvious counterexample is Stephen Hawking- clearly he cannot take care of himself due to gross and costly physical disability. Now, would you care to make his contribution to society for him so we can put 'im down? Go on, knock yourself out- you can do it! :P
My own take on the difference between infanticide/culling and abortion is this- abortion is a woman saying "Whoa! I DID NOT WISH to do this. At all. I never made a decision to bring a life into the world and I'm not prepared/equipped to cope with that, no matter what the baby would be like. Stop!" I also feel, if you're going to do that, best do it as early as possible.
I don't think 'intelligent' culling of the human herd is a reasonable plan. It is a severely stupid and shortsighted plan, because few people advocating it believe in any sort of higher authority that can pass judgement on what's worthwhile and what's not. The inevitable result of this lack of judgement would be babies destroyed because they would have missing fingers, babies destroyed because they were female (but a better story would be made up), babies destroyed once someone figures out how to predict that the baby would probably be a computer geek, etc etc. These decisions would not be _made_ by educated, wise people. They'd be made by just random people, some of whom will be unreasonable. The result would be a great deal of abuse of the system.
Which does bring up a burning question. Anencephalic infants cannot survive; many die before birth, and the rest are all dead within weeks. This is all due to failure of the skull and brain to form correctly; there is no cure.
Some women carrying anencephalic fetuses have tried to donate their organs. This has not happened yet, because hospitals refuse to take the organs before clinical death (the heart stops), and by the time the heart fails the organs have been damaged by lack of oxygen and cannot be transplanted. Meanwhile, other babies die for lack of hearts, livers and kidneys.
Should we:
- Define life as "natural circulation" and allow the current situation to continue?
- Define life as "presence of a living cerebral cortex" and allow parents to donate their anencephalic babies' organs immediately at birth?
- Define life as "conscious existence" a la Singer, decide that massive surgical intervention to save malformed newborns is too expensive for society to bear, and allow the parents of babies with biliary atresia (a fatal malformation of the liver) a choice between euthanasia or natural death? (Most babies with this problem die, due to lack of donor livers or rejection of transplants.)
- Other?
Sometimes there just aren't any easy choices.--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Whan my wife was pregnant with our son (second child), her waters broke at just shy of 26 weeks and he was expected to be delivered shortly. My wife and I were discussing that if he did arrive early, should we allow him to die on his own if that was the way it was going to be (ie, minimal intervention) so that he wouldn't later in life suffer from any disabilities caused by his premature birth. Fortunatly, he held in there (with only bed rest, steroids (for his lungs, just in case) and lots of antibiotics (to prevent infection from the torn sack)) and wasn't born until 4 days before his due date (the sack closed up again). Mind you, he came out backwards, with a knot in his cord (which broke as the doctor was trying to extricate the placenta), and was rather blue (due to the knot), but only needed 6 hours of O2. He's been basicly fine since; if he suffered any brain damage, I'ld hate to see what he would have been like without it. He's a real terror @ 4 :), real geek material.
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
That's why we need AC posting.
The problem is that most people are in the grip of an irrational, non-utilitarian way of thinking that ignores the horrible consequences of inaction. I know that we have very strong intuitions against killing babies - I have them myself - but a previous poster was spot on in saying that the moral distinction between babies and foetuses is very shaky. In some cases, permitting a baby to live that would suffer horribly, cause others to suffer horribly, and not contribute anything to the world to make up for that suffering, is a monstrous decision. Yet those advocating infanticide are seen as the monsters. No, we are only being compassionate. It's monstrous to put people through so much suffering for no good purpose.
It's the fallacy of "the default option cannot be immoral, because it is the default" (the default option being letting the baby live). It's akin to saying "it cannot be immoral to eat meat, because that is the default option in our culture". The latter is not a rational argument for the former. If a billion people say a false thing, it is still false.
I wish someone would explain why infanticide is always morally worse than ANY amount of suffering.
Female Prison Rape in NY
Communism is the belief that we could eliminate poverty, hunger, warfare, and many other "bad things" if people worked together for the good of all.
I don't believe in communism, mostly because people suck. I don't exclude myself from that belief, either. I _know_ that if I lived in a communist society, I wouldn't get out of bed in the morning to go to work; I have trouble enough when my having a bed depends on getting out of bed.
But I get away from my point. Communism is NOT bad. Its the idea that a society can be beneficial for all involved. It doesn't work, but that doesn't make the IDEA a bad thing. Maybe someday, people will aspire to be greater than we are currently, and it WILL work. Maybe it will STILL be a bad thing.
The fact is, that the people in power in the USSR, (and historically, in China) have followed a policy that I would fight against with all my being; namely the belief that "IDEAS CAN BE DANGEROUS"
If you're not following me by this point, go, read "1984" by Orwell, and then come back.
There is a quote, and I'm sorry to say that I don't remember who said it, but it goes something along the lines of: "I would give my life to defend the rights of a man to shout at the top of his lungs that which I would spend my life arguing against." The original was more clear, and if anyone knows the exact quote, please share it.
I don't believe that anyone in power during the Red Scare actually was afraid of communism. It was merely a political tool; a way of getting the people worked up into a frenzy; mob rule which gave them almost unlimited power.
The symetry of the whole scheme, in retrospect, is that which the people feared so much, was EXACTLY the cause to which they were assisting!
My points are: Communism is not a bad thing. Ideas are a great thing. If hope is the best thing, _THINKING_ is not far behind it. Ideas lead to thinking, therefore censorship prohibits thinking. QED
>>>>>>>>>> Kvort
-Don't mind me, I'm personality-deficient and mentally-impaired.
I know a couple of people who were born with partial limbs due to thalidomide (sp?). When the big thalidomide scare was in progress, parents with "malformed" foetuses were often advised to have them aborted (by doctors). They were told that the children would have no quality of life and it was kinder to kill them at that stage.
Well, the two peeps I know are now in their 20s and very happy and successful.
Friends who have worked with the handicapped tell me that despite being restricted by communication abilities or learning difficulties, most people seem very happy.
It is too easy to think to ourselves, "Gosh, if I lost the use of my eyes I would rather die than go on like that."
A fair question does arise as to how reasonable it is to transpose those feelings onto someone else.
On the other hand, anyone who has seen/heard One by Metallica may well be able to understand this professor's attitude to the matter.
I think that the main difficulty in legislating for euthanasia is in control...what will count as severely disabled?...who should decide?...Are the parents' feelings of difficulty in coping with the child overriding the rights of the child who, with appropriate assistance, may well be very happy in life?
I'm not pro-life but do feel that there are serious questions that are difficult to cope with as regards the law.
In the Republic of Ireland, abortion is illegal. However, if a judge permits it, a pregnant woman may travel to another country for an abortion.
If the US were to introduce pro-euthansia legislation, how would it cope with parents from other countries bringing their children over to have them euthanised?
Many, many questions all round.
Up until not too long ago, people _could_ "euthanize" babies right after they were born (or during birth). Even healthy ones. It was called partial birth abortion. I know some places have banned this, but I'm not even sure that all states in the US have done so, much less the state of the world. Some (but not all) abortion-rights people supported the mother's right to do this. I think it would be interesting to see where they come down on this issue, too.
Would he be received differently, if he advocated early amniocentisis and other tests to determine disability, and then abortion of those babies?
Please note, I have tried to leave my views on abortion out of the above paragraph, they are not relevant to my point here.
My point is that the man's job is to incite debate on bioethical issues, at least in the class he teaches. This is the most important duty of academics, and universities in general. We go to school to expand our horizons, to learn things that might never be useful in a specific sense, except that they teach us to think critically. If I was just going to school to learn programming and networking, I would be done now, but I have 2 more good years of it, and I look forward to having a teacher as colorful as this gentleman. I doubt I will, because OSU is a public school, and more subject to the whims of popular opinion, and that is a shame. Disagree with the man if you wish (I do), but he would be lax in his job if he did not say what he believed. I will be severely disappointed if Princeton bows to public pressure and censures or fires the man.
Communication is only possible between equals
All those that are proponents of a Pro-Life, no euthansia, movements should especially take a look at this post.
This professor proposes that we kill our defective offspring to ease their suffering. Has the audience ever heard of infanticide? This is a naturally occuring side-effect of those suffering from post-pardum depression. They view their children as defective, and therefore attempt to eliminate them.
This fits right into the 'survial of the fittest' theory. Parents sub-consiously wish to produce the strongest offspring (physically and mentally).
This is noted in Darwin's work. Why should we resist the natural processes of life? The pro-life and religious right would say that to terminate the pregnancy, or let the child die, might deprive the human race of the next Einstein or Hawking. I will tell you this: There will be no anasyphallic genuis, there will be no quadriplegic who can be self-reliant.
So I ask you all this question:
Could you, in good conscience, knowingly bring a severly disabled child into this world? And if so, would you not feel the least bit guilty?
By bestowing a life long burden on the taxpayers to support a child that should have been naturally un-selected, we are in essence creating a life where there should never have been one.
That's the way to tell 'em: Put up or shut up.
--Threed
...somebody has to take the other side so I'll sacrifice myself (for the greater good of the discussion).
;). So I'll be the first to admit I haven't the slightest personal insight in this issue. But hey, that's why it's in a disscussion. So if you think I'm moraly corrupt please feel free to enlightenment me and other /.'ers with your insight.
I would say there could be very good arguments in support of this concept. Children born severly disabled are very likely to either die very young after much suffering or require extensive and expensive care though the entirety of thier lives. The most severly disabled will not be able to contribute to society and instead become dead weights consuming resources that could be put to other use. The most severly disabled will most likely encounter a great deal of suffering; not just physical, but mental as well. So, in all practicality exactly what purpose does letting the severly dissbled live serve.
Now the theological aspects of this are a whole different and very complex argument and I'm not going to delve into that, but other than those reasons based on religion or morality (typically derived from religion) there are no reasons not to do this.
Now, before you fire your flame thrower let me just say, I'm not disabled (other than slight shortsightedness). Neither am I a parent (as far as I know
Also, I never said I personaly adgree with this, I'm only saying that it makes logical sense and seems practical.
-E29
P.S. I'm really glad such an interesting and contravesal topic got post (even if it wasn't really news for nerds). It is a great mental exercise and should allow us to step away from our petty computer issue and discuss a really meaningfull issue. I hope that we will all leave this thread somewhat enlightened.
Well, we don't have any choice in the life thing. It is, as another Slashdoter put, a 100% fatal STD. So who would deny that a life of suffering is preferable? One of the few things I value is my mind- if I had Alzheimers, I would be VERY disappointed in anyone who stood in the way of me taking my own life. Everyone says "It's your life. Do what you will." UNTIL it comes to ending it. Excuse me people, but since I got out and figured out what death was, it's been MY decision to keep waking up, and I would very much like it to be my decision to STOP waking up. This is a basic right that I think many, many people are being denied.
If a disability is acquired later in life, then it should be the choice of that person to end his/her life if that person so desires. I don't see the state or some pro-life idiot paying my medical bills, so if I reproduce, and that reproduction is severely flawed and would be better off dead, then so be it. If the state or anyone else wants to pay my bills and medical insurance, THEN I will seriously consider what they have to say when they get all huffy about the "sanctity of life". If they do not have a part in it, then they do not have a right to interfere in it- it's a simple equation that is older than our present "civilization". And something the uptights cannot understand, for some reason. Figure that one out, and cold fusion isn't far behind.
Here are a few of my thoughts on the subject. Some of them may be contradictory (in case the fact doesn't come through in these musings, btw, I disagree with him).
1. Citing individual cases as reasons why it's a bad idea is usually, well, a bad idea. For every Stephen Hawking there is probably someone made radical contributions to humanity which would not have happened had they devoted their time to maintaining their disabled child. A similar argument, which I've seen on several occasions, is the guy who would have died in a car crash had he been wearing a seatbelt.
2. As a species on this planet, we're genetically encoded to react against anything that endangers the next generation (and I don't mean the borg). This is why all those ridiculous "for the children" pleas are so effective. And no matter what your feelings on the subject, you'll have to agree that this is no longer necessary for the perpetuation of the human race.
3. Ethical is, of course, in the eye of the beholder. Eugenics of the sort espoused by Singer, in a fascistic darwinian sort of way, contribute to the future viability of the species. However, see point two.
4. Points two and three above refer only to the continuation of the species, and ignore what could happen should indiviual human life become devalued through practices such as abortion, euthanasia and infanticide. This isn't my view, but it's one I'm willing to listen to with an open mind.
5. All laws and ethical systems are for the good of most members of society. This tyrrany of democracy inevitably has adverse consequences for the minority. Attitudes to those minorities decide whether this is viewed as a good or bad thing.
6. I'm an athiest, but that doesn't mean I can't steal the good bits from various holy books for my own philosophy. As far as I'm concerned, all philosophies that don't involve killing everyone else boil down to 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'.
It's not that we on Slashdot are largely ad hominem; we just happen to (largely) argue that accepting views and beliefs because someone tells you that "This is how it is" is at the very least unthinking. I can tell a five year old advanced physics theory until he can recite to me every word that I tell him; does that mean that he understands what he's saying? Not at all. I for one have no particular disrespect for members of organized religion, but I do question the various methods that the religious members use to propogate themselves.
In case you haven't noticed, I'd say a pretty good amount of the Slashdot community is Atheist or Agnostic, as far as religion goes. Does that make us smarter? Does it mean we'll end up in Hell? Who knows.... but this debate was originally meant to argue whether or not this is an ethically correct option. (At least, that's how I had thought of it...) About that, here's my opinion...
We all are born, as someone earlier stated, with one option guaranteed: we're going to die at some point in our lives. Whether that's God's decision or not is a matter of belief/opinion; but the main thing is that we do die. Humans don't have any more right to life than animals do; and we happily slaughter cows and various other farmland animals so that we ourselves might eat food and perpetuate ourselves on this planet, and perhaps in the future other planets as well.
However, if we DO have a chance to live, it's my personal belief that we should make the most of what we can. But, and this is also (still) my opinion, if we have no chance of enjoying life, should we live? Why should we live, if there is nothing that we can produce for the benefit of humanity or ourselves? In today's culture and world, more and more people seem to care less about humanity than they do themselves. For the most part, this is understandable- because Humanity as we know it is not in any great imminent danger, and the next thing that we should look to (according to a certain Hierarchy of life) is enjoyment. Once hunger, thirst, shelter, safety, and peace have been achieved, people look to entertainment. But what do all of these things have in common? QUALITY OF LIFE. If a reasonable quality of life is unattainable for any individual, should they abandon life? I think that this is the real question.
Furthermore, if one's quality of life (the infant's) is in such a poor condition that it worsens the quality of life for others (the infant's parents) in several ways (money that they can't afford to spend on decent healthy food; money they can't spend on time to get away, and relax, which is also important to quality of life; money they can't spend on helping others) then is it unreasonable and unethical to halt the one's life? If bringing the infant's life to a close is a way of improving the quality of life for others, is it unethical and wrong?
As noted, this topic is sensitive and people's views are going to offend each other. This is where it's very important that we remember that different thoughts are to be encouraged even when the actions they contemplate may be reprehensible to us. Exposing some values that lead people to end up on the different sides of this issue may be helpful.
Some people deeply believe that is wrong for a full adult in irremediable acute pain to decide to end their own life.
Others may be deeply empathetic with the pain they imagine in a seriously handicapped child, and think it mercy to kill the child instead.
Another group will think that this kind of euthansia will benefit society, and rather coldly decide it is a good idea for that reason.
I find all three views expressed above at least uncomfortable. I don't wish to assign a value of "true" to any one. I think you have to look at each individual case, weigh the options carefully, and make a hard decision, knowing you could be wrong. What I am sure of, personally, is that I don't want the government mandating the "one true" practice. I think the choice needs to be made at a much more local level -- between the family concerned, and their doctor, with legal advice. My pro-choice bias undoubtedly shows here, and I realize this will be no less controversial than abortion.
Note we've already had to deal with this problem in the form of acephalic babies. IIRC, It's been decided that they are braindead, and their life support may be legally terminated currently.
So it may be that the question isn't whether it is ever acceptable, but rather under which circumstances, and for what reasons. Decision where there is no obvious right or wrong should be made at the family level, with government supplying reasonable guidelines for that choice.
At issue here is not simply Singer's complete disregard for the value of human life (which should be enough in itself, and should greatly concern everyone here), but also the fact that Princeton still (in claim if not in fact) is a Presbyterian institution, and Singer's views are anathema with the stated goals and values of Princeton and the Presbyterian reformed theology worldview it ostensibly represents.
It is completely right and appropriate to protest Singer and his appointment, and Princeton should be ostracized as an aberration because of Singer's hideous views. Furthermore, it is *completely* appropriate to fund "higher learning" and place bounds on what is consistent with the values of the institution. Under your logic, the *only* thing that can be taught is that there are no values at all (no objective truth, or as Dostoevsky put it, "If God does not exist, then all things are permissable"), which of course points out the implicit logical fallacy: It cannot be objectively true that there is no objective truth.
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
An important question is what good is the life of a terminally demented child. Say, we are talking about infants who have no hope of recovery (with current standards of medicine), and will probably remain dysfunctional for the rest of their lives. These infants cannot think -- we can demonstrate that they do not think by means of any number of tests for neural activity. The question to ask is whether such a life is worth anything to the fuzzy cloud of Humanity. The child certainly would not mind if he were (painlessly) removed -- he would barely know that he was being killed. The parents certainly, in spite of their terrible sorrow, might not want to be burdened by a child that denies them all the pleasures of parenthood. Is the child any better than any other anthropomorphic living dead, for example a brain-dead accident victim? We do not seem to mind the fact that many brain-dead people are unplugged all the time; should we really have a different standard for brain-dead babies?
Of course this classification of "mentally-useless" is a dangerous one. I understand fully well the implications of a mis-classification, even one caused by a lacking in our current state of knowledge.
I am sorry, however, I cannot easily dismiss Singer's viewpoints as entirely invalid.
(Notice that few of us have any ethical problems with purging brain-dead programs like Microsoft's operating systems...)
A few comments, more on-topic:
One person has had a chance to lead a full life while the other has not
I'm not sure we're actually discussing cases where "the chance to lead a full life" is the issue.
Pain tells us that we are alive
I'm reminded of Joseph Heller's views on this from Catch-22 (transcribed from memory, may be wrong)
My personal view is that the real mistake here is to try to make general moral rules about these things. I personally feel revulsion at this sentiment; but I wouldn't necessarily presume to tell parents facing this problem what their choice should be. On the other hand, I don't want to say that "anything goes"; there should be some moral statements which are actually true. I guess that a lot would depend on the motives -- I would not like to see disabled children become the victims of infanticide because they were "inconvenient", but would mind less if euthanasia were carried out because the parents simply couldn't cope. There is a distinction there.
Of course, perhaps the answer is that there is no right thing to do when such an unfortunate child is born. Perhaps either decision is very badly morally wrong. I'm not aware of any obligation on the universe to always provide us with a "right thing to do" -- perhaps genuine "moral tragedies" can exist.
Thank heavens that the immediate question -- that of academic freedom -- is much more clear cut. I refer all present to Mill's On Liberty, which says all that needs to be said on this.
jsm
I don't think that the above is really flamebait, and I regretfully suggest that any and all negative moderation points will be needed for the real hardcore unpleasantness that I suspect this topic will launch.
jsm
I am amazed at the number of people here who seem to think that moral decisions are influenced by economic or other concerns. Allow me to ilustrate:
/. is also revealed in another way - the numerous attempts to detract from Singer's ridiculous proposition through arguments such as, "what about Hawking?" While I have great respect for the contributions of this theorist (so far as I am able to understand his thinking), his contributions to society (and many would argue his contributions are minor) are entirely irrelevant.
My killing you would be wrong. (I think we are all in agreement here.)
My killing you would be just as wrong if I were paid $10 million for the act. (Some would claim this is worse, since I am now guilty of covetous greed as well as murder.)
The act would *still* be just as wrong if it netted the entire wealth of the planet, to be used solely for the purpose of helping others and eliminating human suffering worldwide. (Any disagreement on this point is an implicit agreement that "the end justifies the means", and ultimately nullifies any claim of the existence of right and wrong.)
The "unclear on the concept" problem prevalent here at
From the only logically consistent moral point of view, Hawking has no more or less worth than you, I, a German Jew, a Sudanese Christian, or even a deformed infant. (I would argue, counter to Singer, that all of the above have sustantially more worth than, say, a cat or a porpoise.) If you do not believe this, then I respectfully request that you reevaluate your value system, at least to the point that you admit you are a bigot and do not hold all men to be created equal, for that is the only logical conclusion that can be reached.
Slashdot is a funny place: despite all the "expertise" in computers and logic, a logical, well-thought-out argument is quite hard to find, but wooly thinking abounds, especially if wrapped in the latest trendiness.
THINK, people!
Finally, has it occured to none of the morallly challenged here that because of the gravity of the issues at debate, it might be best to fall on the "safe" side, and grant life the benfit of the doubt? Surely those who are not entirely sure (and I think if they are honest, most of Singer's supporters fall into this camp) should realize that life and death decisions are final, and if there is even the slightest chance they are wrong, the only morally correct thing to do is to support the position that grants and affirms life, for there is no reprieve from death.
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
Which do we value more? Humans or potential humans? This is a major component of why both this and abortion are contravertial.
Society has invested a lot of resources into making a typical 20 year old. At this point in their life, they have passed through primary and possibly secondary school systems, costing taxpayers money, and using up time of people qualified and willing to educate them.
The theory behind the continuation of society is that society invests the time and energy into helping an individual develop, after which this person repays this debt through productivity and taxes. At this point in history, this exchange is creating a net surplus of resources - people get to retire when they get old, standards of living go up, etc. Resources ARE distributed unevenly, but that's a different issue.
Having kids is gambling. You invest time, love, and money, and maybe they fall ill and die, and maybe they win a noble prize, and maybe they become a mass-murderer. You can influence the odds, but you can't control the outcome.
The question our Ivy league friend raises is how this equation changes as the weights shift - what if there's only a 1% chance this child will reach maturity? What if there's a 1% chance that this child will ever be able to communicate with others in any way? What if there's only a 30% chance that this child will ever be a 'normal' member of society?
This child quite likely WILL take up more of the caregivers' resources. Is the child worth it if [s]he is unlikely to ever be develop a mental or emotional capacity beyond that of a goldfish? a poodle? an 8-year old?
At what point does the potential for a human to survive/succeed become small enough that the burden to actualized humans outweighs it?
-- end of post (I hope you weren't expecting me to try and answer any of these questions) --
Trees can't go dancing
So do them a big favor
Pretend dancing stinks!
While I'm not exactly a barrister on retainer for a nether power...
I *do* have to disagree with you here; frequently, the ends *do* justify the means. In fact, this is commonly recognized, if not often admitted, in society. The character of intent is a admissible and admirable purpose in society.
For instance, even you would probably agree that teaching somebody basic electronics and chemistry, with the intent of training them to construct explosive devices for use in killing civillians for the sole purpose of extortion, would generally
be considered wrong. Training, however, the same person with basic electronics, chemistry, biology and more, however, is a commonly accepted practice in high schools. The difference is intent.
For all you know, it may be perfectly ethical for somebody to kill me. After all, what do you know of my capabilities or intent? While I may, truly, be what I claim to be -- a mildly eccentric graduate student -- verifying that might be non trivial, and even with that information there is no evidence that, say, I am not evil incarnate. Were I to pose a dire threat to society, perhaps trading threatening skills or information as currency among those who violently oppose it, then another principle takes over: that of self-defense. Here, we have a recognition of means.
Killing me without reason would, most likely, be wrong on most moral compasses; doing so on the basis that I *may* be evil, the same. However, if I were to lash out against society via bomb or bullet, it would be as justified to stop me through incarceration or worse as it would be unjustifiable to randomly incarcerate the innocent; or would you rather that the many sacrifice *their* rights and lives, upholding one principle so that one may throw down the rest?
If you wish to make moral judgements, then to ignore the ends is willful blindness.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Would your opinion change if this were limited to disorders that were known to either be fatal within a short period of time (i.e. not Huntington's, for instance), or those that lacked either the capacity for thought or to express it?
If you're focusing on viability and output, there are diseases which render infants essentially will not procreate at all due to longevity issues, or permanent dependence on 24/7 life support, and from a gene pool point of view don't matter.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
I have relatives to whom this happened-
they had 2 out of their 4 children born severly
retarted. Of course, there was no way to kill the
child (it was not known beforehand that the
child was damaged) and anyway they didn't believe
in abortion. I have since watched the two parents
slowly be destroyed by their kids (and I only
visit them once a year or so) and have watched the
normal kids get really fucked up. Of course,
everyone in the family goes on about how affectionate
the retarted kids are, and sure, they are, but
they are also horrors. I don't really want to go
into details but I'm sure you can imagine. More
to the point, they have little intelligence to speak
of. One kid, who is now 17, can't count, can't
read, can't reason or perform basic functions. She
is functionally a 1 year old or worse, and to
boot she has a 17 year old's strength and she
is often very angry at the world, for obvious
reasons.
Now all things being equal, is it better for her
had she been killed at birth? Maybe, maybe not. But
all things aren't equal. She exacts a huge toll
on everyone around her. And also, don't forget
that there was a normal kid who was not born, as
a result of her consuming a certain amount of
family resources. Instead of a year of the trama
of killing an infant, her parents have suffered
nearly two decades of horror, and will continue to
do so forever.
As an aside, the parents are still avid
christians. It never ceases to amaze me
that people will continue to worship a god
who fucks them. (of course, I am an atheist, so
I think their misfortune is just bad luck)
At any rate, I hope this becomes legal, since I know
I'd kill any of my kids who were retarted. It won't,
of course, since the US is filled with weak-minded
xtians. So, I guess I'll be stuck doing weekly
amniocentheses (mispelled) with a hand
on the ripcord.
I hate to tell you guys this, but many parents are already practicing infanticide to get rid of 'unwanted' (e.g. unaffordable, handicapped, and/or illegitimate) children.
An infant cannot defend itself against an adult. All you have to do is press its mouth against a pillow or blanket and it will die of hypoxia in minutes. And then the coroner rules "SIDS" (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) to get the parents off the hook.
How do I know this? Well, I'd rather not say. But believe me when I say that this is a common occurrence. All Singer is doing is trying to get society at large to stop being hypocritical and admit that this stuff happens. Parents assume the role of God and Grim Reaper over their child for the first 1-2 years of the child's life. To pretend otherwise, is to be ignorant or a hypocrite.
One thing to note -- if memory serves, the National Socialists did not _expand_ their objectives throughout their rule, so much as follow an agenda that already had been largely outlined in "Mein Kampf".
I might be wrong about this, but my suspicion is that while the specific, detailed plans may not have been formed, Hitler and company had intended to eliminate or enslave pretty much everybody non-Aryan from the get-go. They'd planned almost everything else...
The difference here, is that Singer and supporters are most likely not planning genocide, and thus the comparisons are slightly specious.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
And that's her take on it. From where she is she still thinks that life isn't bad, but she doesn't feel that getting to where she is through the trials and pain was worth it.
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
> Who gets to decide the official measure of a
> "defect"? Heart problems? Deformed limbs?
> Nearsighted eyes?
IMHO this is quite clear. A severely handicaped child is one that can't live without continuous high-effort medical aid, and even then has a severely reduced live expectation. A hundret years ago, the worst of those childs (after they died) where shown (conserved) in curiousity cabinets as "monsters". Today, we can keep them alive for years.
It's not a matter of evolution* - these poor creatures can't breed anyway. I think it's more a matter of luxury - can you afford it to keep someone alive? Normal childs can be kept alive by giving them to eat and drink, a worm place to sleep, and intellectual challange and social contact to learn.
And since resources are limited, you really should think about the luxury to keep a severely handicapped child alive some years for a million dollars. You could probably spent the money better by donating a $5/child vaczine to the third world and save hundrets, if not thousands of lives.
There are a lot of serious questions with high-tech medicine. Is it ok to lengthen one's live by painful 6 weeks for $100k, which is a typical statistic for some sort of cancer operations, or is that just a lot of money wasted and even denying a death in peace? Or is it ok to give them poison (or illegal drugs) instead so that they can die without pain?
This isn't just about money, it's also about live quality. You can't ask non-concious people, but sometimes, you can ask concious. I once worked in a hospital (instead of military service), and we had a 86 year old woman, who had a very serious disease - she was operated every second day for over a month, and to our all surprise, she actually survived that. Some months later, still bound to bed (with little hope to recover much more), she asked us why we didn't let her die. Sometimes, suffering is worse than death.
*) ordinary, cheap medicine matters to evolution. It keeps people healthy and attractive who aren't really that strong.
"If you want it done right, you have to do it yourself"
We just need to *discourage* the unfit from reproducing. As it is today, we give enormous benefits, discounts and payouts to people to *do* have children. We ENCOURAGE it.
It would be nice to have a society where people would be smart enough to think about the greater good in their family planning choices. If I had some horrible genetic defect that would cause all of my offspring to have a 50 IQ, I would either not reproduce or I would (via genetic engineering) fix that defect.
Peter Singer starts from a premise (utilitarianism) I do not agree with, works his logic flawlessly, and comes to conclusions that make me shiver. Yet he is doing all of us a service. He unflinchingly deals with issues that we all think about, but seldom speak about. In our silence we often toy with the same ideas he expounds, but fear to speak them.
Sometimes we come close to practicing them. Everyday, grieving parents and doctors agree that a baby is so deformed that they should not take heroic measures to save it. This is only a short step away from euthanasia. What of an encephalitic baby (one that is born without a brain?). Would it be a sin to kill such a baby? Why?
Peter Singer forces us to confront the issues that modern medicine is throwing into our lap. For that we should be grateful.