Suffering and Moral Status

2021 ◽  
pp. 23-39
Author(s):  
Jeff McMahan
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Potential Victim ◽  
Adult Human ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Psychological Capacities ◽  
Moral Constraint

It is a common claim in debates about abortion and the killing of animals that individuals, such as foetuses and non-human animals, that have psychological capacities significantly lower than those of adult human persons also have a moral status lower than that of persons. And those who defend this claim typically assume that it implies that the moral constraint against killing a foetus or animal is, if other things are equal, weaker than the constraint against killing a person. Many of these same people also claim, however, that the difference in moral status makes no difference to the strength of the constraint against causing suffering. They argue that the reason not to cause suffering to an individual who neither deserves nor is liable to be caused to suffer is equally strong whatever the nature or moral status of the potential victim is. There is, however, a type of individual whose psychological capacities and moral status are such that it is plausible to believe that the reason not to cause them to suffer is weaker than the reason not to cause equivalent suffering to a person. Most non-human animals are psychologically intermediate between these low-status individuals and persons. This raises the question, which is explored in this chapter, whether most animals have an intermediate moral status that makes their suffering matter more than that of the low-status individuals but less than that of persons.

Literalism and Moral Status

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carrie Figdor
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Moral Boundaries ◽  
Psychological Capacities

Chapter 9 presents the idea that Literalism undermines current social and moral boundaries for moral status. Possession of psychological capacities, moral standing, and respectful treatment are a standard package deal. So either many more beings enjoy moral status than we now think, or the relative superiority of human moral status over other beings is diminished. It introduces the role of psychological ascriptions in drawing social and moral boundaries by examining dehumanization and anthropomorphism. It argues that in the short term Literalism does not motivate us to do more than make minor adjustments to current moral boundaries. We can distinguish the kinds of psychological capacities that matter for moral status from the kinds that best divide nature at its joints. In the long run, however, Literalism prompts us to reconsider the anthropocentric standards that govern current moral boundaries.

Pieces of Mind

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carrie Figdor
Keyword(s):  
Mathematical Models ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Entire Range ◽  
Fruit Flies ◽  
Literal Interpretation ◽  
Psychological Capacities

Many people accept that chimpanzees, dolphins, and some other animals can think and feel. But these cases are just the tip of a growing iceberg. If biologists are right, fruit flies and plants make decisions, worms and honeybees can be trained, bacteria communicate linguistically, and neurons have preferences. Just how far does cognition go? This book is the first to critically consider this question from the perspective of the entire range of new ascriptions of psychological capacities throughout biology. It is also the first to consider the role of mathematical models and other quantitative forms of evidence in prompting and supporting the new ascriptions. It defends a default literal interpretation of psychological terms across biological domains. It also considers the implications of the literal view for efforts to explain the mind’s place in nature and for traditional ways of distinguishing the superior moral status of humans relative to other living beings.

Orphans and the relational significance of birth: a response to Singh

2020 ◽  
pp. medethics-2020-106827
Author(s):  
Christopher A Bobier
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Parent Child Relationship ◽  
Child Relationship ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Parent Child

Prabhpal Singh has defended a relational account of the difference in moral status between fetuses and newborns. Newborns stand in the parent-child relation while fetuses do not, and standing in the parent-child relationship brings with it higher moral status for newborns. Orphans pose a problem for this account because they do not stand in a parent-child relationship. I argue that Singh has not satisfactorily responded to the problem.

scholarly journals Defending the distinction between pregnancy and parenthood

2020 ◽  
pp. medethics-2020-106216 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prabhpal Singh
Keyword(s):  
Pregnant Women ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Parent Child Relationship ◽  
Child Relationship ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Parent Child

In this paper, I respond to the criticisms towards my account of the difference in moral status between fetuses and newborns. I show my critics have not adequately argued for their view that pregnant women participate in a parent–child relationship. While an important counterexample is raised against my account, this counterexample had already been dealt with in my original paper. Because the criticisms against my account lack argumentative support, they do not pose a problem for my account. I conclude the raised criticisms do not amount to a stron philosophical case against my account.

Fetuses, newborns, & parental responsibility

2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 188-193 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prabhpal Singh
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Newborn Baby ◽  
Parental Responsibility ◽  
Moral Dimension ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Parent Child

I defend a relational account of difference in the moral status between fetuses and newborns. The difference in moral status between a fetus and a newborn is that the newborn baby is the proper object of ‘parental responsibility’ whereas the fetus is not. ‘Parental responsibilities’ are a moral dimension of a ‘parent-child relation’, a relation which newborn babies stand in, but fetuses do not. I defend this relational account by analysing the concepts of ‘parent’ and ‘child’, and conclude that the difference in the moral status between fetuses and newborns means one may claim abortion is morally permissible while also claiming infanticide is not morally permissible, without inconsistency between the two claims.

scholarly journals Parental responsibilities and moral status

2020 ◽  
pp. medethics-2020-106173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce Philip Blackshaw ◽  
Daniel Rodger
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Moral Worth ◽  
Radical Change ◽  
Moral Dimension ◽  
Moral Value ◽  
Gestational Period ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Rule Out ◽  
Parent Child

Prabhpal Singh has recently defended a relational account of the difference in moral status between fetuses and newborns as a way of explaining why abortion is permissible and infanticide is not. He claims that only a newborn can stand in a parent–child relation, not a fetus, and this relation has a moral dimension that bestows moral value. We challenge Singh’s reasoning, arguing that the case he presents is unconvincing. We suggest that the parent–child relation is better understood as an extension of an existing relationship formed during the gestational period. The change in this relation at birth is not sufficient to justify the radical change in moral status required to rule out infanticide while accepting the permissibility of abortion. Given that the moral status of orphans is also problematic under Singh’s account, we conclude that Singh has not shown that a newborn has greater moral worth than a fetus.

Bioethical Challenges of Human Genome Editing Technologies in Embryos

2021 ◽  
pp. 70-82
Author(s):  
◽  
Olga V. Popova ◽  
Pavel D. Tishchenko ◽  
Sergey Yu. Shevchenko ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Genome Editing ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Technological Transformation ◽  
Ethical Problems ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
Ethics Of Responsibility ◽  
The World ◽  
Biomedical Technologies ◽  
The Difference

Bioethical challenges associated with the development of human e mbryo genome editing technologies are being investigated. The role of bioethics as a fo­rum for discussing the interdisciplinary anthropological and ethical problems generated by the progress of biomedical technologies is noted. The basis of con­tradictions and discussions around the acceptability of the technologies under consideration is the value ambivalence associated with the difference between the artificial and the natural. Almost any innovation in the field of biology and medicine, and here genome editing technologies are no exception, since its in­ception has been at the epicenter of a sharp ideological confrontation between supporters of the progressive technological transformation of the world and their opponents from the camp of environmentally concerned people of bio-conserva­tive values. Progressive ideas are refined through ideas the life instrumenta­lization. Bio-conservative ideas are substantiated by the principle of natality H. Arendt, which is used by J. Habermas in criticizing neo-eugenic projects and supported by G. Jonas in the concept of ecological imperative. The problem of the moral status of embryos, the specific advantages and disadvantages of con­servative and liberal positions are analyzed, and a retroactive model of the moral status of embryos is proposed, which represents a specific social construction. The project of normative monitoring of the consequences of using human em­bryo genome editing technologies Sh. Yasanoff is discussed. Its connection with the ideas of ethics of responsibility of H. Jonas is established.

scholarly journals The Reception of the Non-Human Living Beings in Philosophical and Practical Approaches

2020 ◽  
pp. 18
Author(s):  
Željko Kaluđerović
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Animal Ethics ◽  
Applied Ethics ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Difference

In this paper, the author explores the reception of the non-human living beings in modern philosophical and practical approaches. The analysis is aimed at examining both the views of the representatives of classical anthropocentrism, as well as the theses of the representatives of various non-anthropocentric teachings. Anthropocentrism is, in short, a worldview that is based on Aristotle's vision of man as a special being among other natural beings. Advocates of the questioning of the dominant anthropocentric perspective of the cosmos, on the other hand, are trying to establish the new relation by relativizing of the difference between humans and non-human living beings, by attributing specifically human qualities and categories, such as dignity, moral status and rights, as well as feelings, memories, communication, consciousness and thinking to non-human living beings. Non-anthropocentrists, consequently, believe that it is necessary to relax the usual strict hierarchy among beings in nature, that is, the discrediting of animals in relation to man, and that within the applied ethics, alias bioethics, it is possible, even necessary, to establish the "animal ethics".

Cognitive Enhancement

2020 ◽  
pp. 33-48
Author(s):  
Neil Levy
Keyword(s):  
Moral Status ◽  
Cognitive Enhancement ◽  
Foreseeable Future ◽  
Parity Principle ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Psychological Capacities ◽  
What Matters

According to the parity principle, the means whereby an agent intervenes in his or her mind, or the minds of others, is irrelevant when it comes to assessing the moral status of the intervention: what matters is how the intervention affects the agent. This chapter sets out the case for the parity principle, before defending it from recent objections due to Christoph Bublitz and Reinhard Merkel. Bublitz and Merkel argue that direct interventions bypass agents’ psychological capacities and therefore produce states over which agents have less control and which are less reflective of who they genuinely are. I argue that indirect interventions that are processed psychologically may be no less destructive of control or of the degree to which the resulting states are reflective of the agent and, further, that direct interventions may be morally unproblematic. Given that right now and for the foreseeable future indirect interventions threaten our autonomy far more often and far more deeply than direct, the distinction between direct and indirect interventions doesn’t even provide a useful heuristic for assessing when an intervention into the mind/brain is problematic.

scholarly journals Morphological study of variations in shape of coronoid process of adult human mandible

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 116-118
Author(s):  
Nimisha Madhu ◽  
Chandra Kiran ◽  
Rajendra Prasad ◽  
Praveen Kumar ◽  
Ramanuj Singh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cross Sectional Study ◽  
Coronoid Process ◽  
Sectional Study ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Morphological Variations ◽  
Medical College ◽  
Adult Human ◽  
Present Cross Sectional Study ◽  
Different Populations ◽  
The Difference

Many researchers have studied the morphology of coronoid process and have found varying shapes but such a study is lacking in this area.The present study was conducted to identify different morphological variations in shape of coronoid process of adult human mandible. The present cross-sectional study was conducted in the department of Anatomy at a Medical College of Bihar upon 46 dry adult human mandibles i.e. 92 coronoid processes. The morphological forms of coronoid process were noted.57.6% of coronoid processes were triangular in shape, 28.3% were rounded and 14.1% were hook shaped. The difference between male and female mandibles was found to be statistically significant (p=0.004).The proper knowledge on the morphological shapes of coronoid process is useful for maxillofacial surgeons as well as to be used as an anthropological marker to assess different populations and races.

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