-Does the abortion debate only hang on the issue of fetal person-hood?
The 'future like ours' argument could be construed as either they will be people or they are already people because they have the futures of people. Also a bit of a bad question because an issue can always be brought up.
My position on morality would actually ignore the thing itself. Since fetuses are not part of society the same way humans or animals are they need not be dealt with with any special moral considerations.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Q&A Question 1
-Where is the line between person-hood and being an animal, are there important qualities that overlap?
Ultimately the root of the the question of weather or not it is moral to kill/harm animals. It's already quite obvious that it is wrong to kill or harm a human, with certain exceptions of course.
I think the relevant difference is that they do not automatically invoke the same amount of empathy within us, the way we get from another human being. This may be a cultural convention. It may have been that in the past humans had no empathy fostered in them by their milieux and where more capable of harming and killing each other. The most relevant overlap is more metaphysical. The overlap is that they have the capacity to feel pain and, intuitively, I think that certain animals have 'consciousness' or some continuous experience of living comparable to human's.
The basis for my own argument for animal ethics is both that animals do have certain capacities that would seem to put them on a similar level of moral consideration as humans. Secondly, we would want to enforce the ethical treatment of animals because their mistreatment could inspire a lack of empathy and lead the animal abuser to be more comfortable with abusing humans.
Ultimately the root of the the question of weather or not it is moral to kill/harm animals. It's already quite obvious that it is wrong to kill or harm a human, with certain exceptions of course.
I think the relevant difference is that they do not automatically invoke the same amount of empathy within us, the way we get from another human being. This may be a cultural convention. It may have been that in the past humans had no empathy fostered in them by their milieux and where more capable of harming and killing each other. The most relevant overlap is more metaphysical. The overlap is that they have the capacity to feel pain and, intuitively, I think that certain animals have 'consciousness' or some continuous experience of living comparable to human's.
The basis for my own argument for animal ethics is both that animals do have certain capacities that would seem to put them on a similar level of moral consideration as humans. Secondly, we would want to enforce the ethical treatment of animals because their mistreatment could inspire a lack of empathy and lead the animal abuser to be more comfortable with abusing humans.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Singer
I will come out and say it, I think singer is right. His argument seems to me to be completely cogent and entirely reasonable. That being said, I do not think that his proposal will, in the long run, eliminate poverty and starvation.
I find the structural issues that cause wide spread poverty and starvation to be more immoral than the things themselves. That the world's economy marginalizes, and except in the case of exploitable resources, excludes the third world from the advances of man, because those third world populations are irrelevant to the world economy, to be morally unacceptable. This relies on a fragile ethical position, which is that it is the general movement of humanity, in its many abstract and ultimately meaningless endeavors, that lends meaning to the individual. If an individual or community is excluded from the greater movements of humanity that creates a void of meaning and relevance.
I find the structural issues that cause wide spread poverty and starvation to be more immoral than the things themselves. That the world's economy marginalizes, and except in the case of exploitable resources, excludes the third world from the advances of man, because those third world populations are irrelevant to the world economy, to be morally unacceptable. This relies on a fragile ethical position, which is that it is the general movement of humanity, in its many abstract and ultimately meaningless endeavors, that lends meaning to the individual. If an individual or community is excluded from the greater movements of humanity that creates a void of meaning and relevance.
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