"In the area of thinking about morality, the abortion question underlines for me the insight that moral decisions are inevitably situational (which does not mean relativist)."
I suppose we should start with term clarifications. An intrinsically immoral act is one that is not situational, and can /never/ be justified. Procured abortion is offered as an instance. Why would the dispute over abortion lead one to conclude "moral decisions are situational"? I just don't follow this -- I tried to reverse-engineer the reasoning. It seems to go like this. We disagree about X. Therefore, X is situational. It just doesn't follow. From the /fact/ of disagreement, what follows? If I am misstating your argument, please lay it out. What leads one to conclude "therefore moral decisions are inevitably situational". Inevitably situational? That sounds pretty absolute! On Jul 4, 7:55 am, frantheman <[email protected]> wrote: > The abortion "hand grenade" has been fizzing around on the "What is > Evil?" thread for a while now - I think Alan W. threw it in > originally, so let's cordon it off in its own thread, shall we? At the > same time, I'll try to put it into a wider context here, in the hope > that it might even exemplarily give rise to a wider discussion. > Reluctantly - because I am a man and I feel that we men should take a > very subordinate role in this discussion, as we don't get pregnant > and - literally - don't get left holding the baby. > > In an ideal world, abortion would hardly be necessary. Young people > would be universally and adequately educated in sexual issues before > reaching puberty, reliable means of contraception would be universally > easily available, sexual violence (i.e. rape) would be non-existent, > young people reaching fertility would develop in an environment where > they could discover, experiment with, learn to deal with, cherish and > enjoy their sexuality in the knowledge of the possible consequences > and take responsible reproductive decisions in this context. Children > would be born into a society which really cherished them and provided > for circumstances in which they could develop and thrive as human > beings, and their mothers (and fathers) would receive all the support > neccessary to provide a loving and secure environment for their > children. > > We do not live in such a world. Daily, thousands of women discover > that they are pregnant, although they have not wished to be so and do > not - for many different reasons - feel that they can take on the > responsibility of caring for a child. Some carry through with the > preganancy and do a magnificent job of rearing the unplanned child. > Some carry through with the pregnancy and make a complete mess of > rearing the child, damaging its life and their own enormously in the > process. Some terminate the pregnancy. > > This is never an easy decision and none of the women I know who have > terminated pregnancies have taken it lightly. They all pay a high > price for it, for a few, a price with which they have great problems > dealing, even years later. The last things any woman faced with this > fateful decision needs (whichever way the decision goes) are attitudes > of condemnation, legal barriers, people who claim to know better > taking over their lives, etc. And emotionally loaded slogans like > "baby murder" are completely inappropriate - as are attacks on those > who choose to aid them, should they decide to terminate the pregnancy. > > Legally prohibiting abortion solves nothing. I can cite as a > particularly apt example my own homeland, Ireland. Abortion is illegal > in Ireland - the country is, in the view of those who support this > position, "pro-life." All it means is that many women with sufficient > social competence and financial means who have an unwanted pregnancy > travel to the UK and obtain an abortion there (the estimates are > thousands yearly). Those without these advantages - as a rule, the > ones least equipped to provide an adequate environment for a new > member of the human race - carry the pregnancy to term with the > frequent result that conditions of social misery are continued for > another generation. The holier-than-thou hypocrisy of this situation > has always sickened me (even during the period when I was a member of > a Catholic religious order in Ireland many years ago). > > In the area of thinking about morality, the abortion question > underlines for me the insight that moral decisions are inevitably > situational (which does not mean relativist). Moral decisions are > always made in a particular complex context, by individual people. The > role of societies and laws in such situations is to help and support > people to make responsible decisions. Commandments, fiats and > anathemas don't help. The most we can ever perhaps hope to achieve are > moral norms, i.e. guidelines which state that, in general, one > direction of decision is usually morally preferable to another - > without giving absolute guidance for any particular situation. > > I realise that this position is not acceptable for those who purport > to be able to derive particular moral absolutes from natural law - > even more so for those who appeal to divine law. But I find attempts > to follow this way to be extremely questionable and often unacceptably > arrogant. It takes a hell of a lot of chutzpah to be so confident > about the infallibility of every step of one's own process of > reasoning, especially in such complex processes as the derivation of > particular moral principles. But then, as I've stated here more than > once, I find the Kantian approach to morality much more helpful. > > Francis --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups ""Minds Eye"" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/Minds-Eye?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
