Procreation and Intellectual Disability
This chapter probes the implications of Kantian ethics concerning procreative decisions that involve offspring with intellectual disability. The chapter argues that selecting against embryos or early fetuses that would develop intellectual disabilities does not typically fail to respect persons’ dignity, according to one partial reconstruction of Kant’s Formula of Humanity. The chapter then disputes Paul Hurley and Rivka Weinberg’s contention that in some “nonidentity” cases involving offspring with disability parents treat their child merely as a means and thereby wrong her. David Wasserman claims inspiration from the Formula of Humanity in developing a necessary condition for morally permissible procreation. The chapter urges rejecting this condition for embracing it sometimes implausibly implies that in producing a child with intellectual disability, parents contravene the spirit of the Formula of Humanity.