The argument from potential: a reappraisal

Several criticisms of the argument from potential are reported. It is noted that such criticisms are inspired by two similarly wrong interpretations of potentiality, one confusing it with possibility and another with probability. A brief analysis of the original Aristotelian context in which the concept emerged shows that potentiality cannot be thought of as indicating the provision of some empirical facts in the future, but must rather be referred to the inherent ontological structure of the being in question. It is then argued that such an Aristotelian concept can be useful to express the dynamic structure of the person, as it must be understood according to contemporary phenomenological personalism. In the light of this philosophical tradition, the embryo can be vieewed as a being already possessing the human nature and actively developing its potential for personhood: it also follows that human nature must not be understood as a static and predetermined essence, but rather as the principle of becoming and movement toward further achievements.     

The argument from intrinsic value: a critique

In his recent book Abortion and Unborn Human Life , Patrick Lee develops an argument for foetal personhood based on intrinsic value. Lee argues that since the foetus is identical with the rational, self-conscious being who will exist a few years later, and since this rational, self-conscious being indisputably is intrinsically valuable, therefore the foetus must already be intrinsically valuable; for nothing can come to be at one time but become intrinsically valuable at another. I show that this argument fails on two counts. First, the crucial premise that a thing's intrinsic value must derive from its essential properties is question-begging and devoid of support. Second, that premise is inconsistent with the pro-life position.     

The parenthood argument

Don Marquis is well known for his future like ours theory (FLO), according to which the killing beings like us is seriously morally wrong because it deprives us of a future we can value. According to Marquis, human fetuses possess a future they can come to value, and thus according to FLO have a right to life. Recently Mark Brown has argued that even if FLO shows fetuses have a right to life, it fails to show that fetuses have a right to use their mother's body, evoking Judith Jarvis Thomson's famous violinist case. In the wake of Brown's conclusion, Marquis presents a new argument—the parenthood argument (PA)—which he believes shows that abortion is seriously morally wrong. Here I argue that the PA fails to show abortion is seriously morally wrong for the same reasons FLO fails to show abortion is seriously morally wrong.     

The pro-life argument from substantial identity and the pro-choice argument from asymmetric value: a reply to Patrick Lee

Lee claims that foetuses and adult humans are phases of the same identical substance, and thus have the same moral status because: first, foetuses and adults are the same physical organism, and second, the development from foetus to adult is quantitative and thus not a change of substance. Versus the first argument, I contend that the fact that foetuses and adults are the same physical organism implies only that they are the same thing but not the same substance, much as living adults and their corpses are the same thing (same body) but not the same substance. Against Lee's second argument, I contend that Lee confuses the nature of a process with the nature of its result. A process of quantitative change can produce a change in substance. Lee also fails to show that foetuses are rational and thus have all the essential properties of adults, as required for them to be the same substance. Against the pro-choice argument from asymmetric value (that only the fact that a human has become conscious of its life and begun to count on its continuing can explain human life's asymmetric moral value, i.e. that it is vastly worse to kill a human than not to produce one), Lee claims that foetus's lives are asymmetrically valuable to them before consciousness. This leads to counterintuitive outcomes, and it confuses the goodness of life (a symmetric value that cannot account for why it is worse to kill a human than not produce one) with asymmetric value.     

The pro-life argument from substantial identity: a defence

This article defends the following argument: what makes you and I valuable so that it is wrong to kill us now is what we are (essentially). But we are essentially physical organisms, who, embryology reveals, came to be at conception/fertilisation. I reply to the objection to this argument (as found in Dean Stretton, Judith Thomson, and Jeffrey Reiman), which holds that we came to be at one time, but became valuable as a subject of rights only some time later, in virtue of an acquired characteristic. I argue against this position that the difference between a basic, natural capacity and some degree of development of such a capacity is a mere difference in degree, that this position logically implies the denial of equal personal dignity, and that the selection of the required degree of development of a capacity is necessarily arbitrary.     

The handicap principle and the argument of subversion from within

This paper examines the very disparate positions that various actors have taken towards the argument of subversion from within (a classical argument against the evolution of altruism by group selection) in a set of related debates on group selection, altruism and the handicap principle. Using this set of debates as a case study, this paper argues that different applications of epistemic values were one of the factors behind the disagreements between John Maynard Smith and Amotz Zahavi over a number of important evolutionary issues. The paper also argues that these different applications were connected to important epistemological differences related in part (but not solely) to their disciplinary background. Apart from conflicting evolutionary views concerning the theoretical feasibility of the handicap effect, these antagonists both differed in the confidence they ascribed to mathematical modeling and over the hereditary basis for altruistic behavior.     

Paternalism and the argument from illiteracy

Throughout this essay, I will consider an argument frequently used to justify paternalistic behavior toward a specific class of persons: illiterate people. The argument states that illiterate people are uneducated, lack information and understanding, and are thus unable to make decisions. Therefore, it is argued, paternalism in their case is justified. The conclusion is that illiterate persons cannot be autonomous. The justification for this view is based on an a priori attitude: since it is impossible to communicate, physicians should decide which kind of treatment the illiterate patient should receive. This argument is frequently used even though its proponents may not be aware of its implications. Given the importance and uncritical acceptance this argument has in Argentina, and also in other Latin American countries, I think it is relevant to analyze carefully what it means. I propose a thorough analysis of this argument, of its implications and an evaluation of whether it is acceptable.     

The deprivation argument against abortion

The most plausible pro-life argument claims that abortion is seriously wrong because it deprives the foetus of something valuable. This paper examines two recent versions of this argument. Don Marquis's version takes the valuable thing to be a 'future like ours', a future containing valuable experiences and activities. Jim Stone's version takes the valuable thing to be a future containing conscious goods, which it is the foetus's biological nature to make itself have. I give three grounds for rejecting these arguments. First, they lead to unacceptable inequalities in the wrongness of killing. Second, they lead to counterintuitive results in a range of imaginary cases. Third, they ignore the role of psychological connectedness in determining the magnitude or seriousness of deprivation-based harms: because the foetus is only weakly psychologically connected to its own future, it cannot be seriously harmed by being deprived of that future.     

The argument from biogenesis: Probabilities against a natural origin of life

No evidence exists that the accidental origin of life is too improbable to have occurred naturally, but there are numerous attempts to argue so. Dizzying statistics are cited to show that a god had to be responsible. This paper identifies the Argument from Biogenesis, then explains why all these arguments so far fail, and what would actually have to be done to make such an argument succeed. Describes seven general types of error, with examples. Includes a table of forty-seven statistics used by over twenty authors to date.     

The exploitation argument against commercial surrogacy

This paper discusses the exploitation argument against commercial surrogacy: the claim that commercial surrogacy is morally objectionable because it is exploitative. The following questions are addressed. First, what exactly does the exploitation argument amount to? Second, is commercial surrogacy in fact exploitative? Third, if it were exploitative, would this provide a sufficient reason to prohibit (or otherwise legislatively discourage) it? The focus throughout is on the exploitation of paid surrogates, although it is noted that other parties (e.g. ‘commissioning parents’) may also be the victims of exploitation. It is argued that there are good reasons for believing that commercial surrogacy is often exploitative. However, even if we accept this, the exploitation argument for prohibiting (or otherwise legislatively discouraging) commercial surrogacy remains quite weak. One reason for this is that prohibition may well ‘backfire’ and lead to potential surrogates having to do other things that are more exploitative and/or more harmful than paid surrogacy. It is concluded therefore that those who oppose exploitation should (rather than attempting to stop particular practices like commercial surrogacy) concentrate on: (a) improving the conditions under which paid surrogates ‘work’; and (b) changing the background conditions (in particular, the unequal distribution of power and wealth) which generate exploitative relationships.     

The simplest formal argument for fitness optimization

The Formal Darwinism Project aims to provide a formal argument linking population genetics to fitness optimization, which of necessity includes defining fitness. This bridges the gulf between those biologists who assume that natural selection leads to something close to fitness optimization and those biologists who believe on theoretical grounds that there is no sense of fitness that can usefully be said to be optimized. The current paper’s main objective is to provide a careful mathematical introduction to the project, and it also reflects on the project’s scope and limitations. The central argument is the proof of close ties between the mathematics of motion, as embodied in the Price equation, and the mathematics of optimization, as represented by optimization programmes. To make these links, a general and abstract model linking genotype, phenotype and number of successful gametes is assumed. The project has begun with simple dynamic models and simple linking models, and its progress will involve more realistic versions of them. The versions given here are fully mathematically rigorous, but elementary enough to serve as an introduction.     

The Great Stench or the fool's argument.

The eight weeks of the "Great Stench" in London in June-July 1858 had a lasting effect on the city. Today's embankments were planned then, and the huge oval brick sewers of London were designed and constructed as a direct result of the stench. The event occurred before the bacteriological era, when fear of cholera caused by a miasma gripped the city. This article, through quotations from The Times, Punch, and the medical press, traces the various reactions to the stink and explores the reasons why there wasn't more of a public reaction to the plague threat.     

The impairment argument for the immorality of abortion revisited

Eric Vogelstein has defended Don Marquis' ‘future-like-ours' argument for the immorality of abortion against what is known as the Identity Objection, which contends that for a fetus to have a future like ours, it must be numerically identical to an entity like us that possesses valuable experiences some time in the future. On psychological accounts of personal identity, there is no identity relationship between the fetus and the entity with valuable experiences that it will become. Vogelstein maintains that a non-sentient fetus nonetheless has a future like ours because it is numerically identical with a future organism that has a mind that bears valuable experiences. Skott Brill, drawing on Jeff McMahan's embodied mind account, denies that human organisms directly have experiences, claiming that they only have experiences derivatively by virtue of their thinking part, and the loss of a future like ours is not transferred to the organism. I show that on McMahan's account, a strong case can be made for the organism having experiences directly, and the subject having these experiences derivatively. This negates Brill's reasoning, although it does imply that non-sentient fetuses do not have a future like ours in quite the same way as we do. I conclude that this is not problematic for Marquis' argument.