The moral issues of killing

[Hagi]

The difference in an adult and child isn't just in potential but also in capability. An adult can reasonably be expected to take care of himself/herself, a child can not. Thus if given the choice one should save the child, it should not be expected to save itself.

The situation I'm penning is one where the child and the adult are equals in all but accumulated lifetime though.

Imagine being strapped to a mechanism with a gun that will go off in ten seconds no matter what you do. The gun can be set to aim at a baby strapped down in front of you, or an adult strapped down next to it. The gun can only be moved between these to positions. Who receives the bullet?

The adult. No matter how you frame it the child is inherently less capable and thus more deserving of protection. Even if there's absolutely no chance of survival the adult is still more capable of coming to terms with his impending demise than the child, more capable of fully understanding and accepting the consequences etc.

The difference in a child and a fetus is in being sentient.

I'm sure you agree that a fetus at the end of the ninth month of pregnancy is as sentient as a newborn child, while a week-old lump of stem-cells is not sentient at all.
At what point during the pregnancy is sentience gained?
I think looking at sentience in this black and white way is a gross oversimplification. Sentience isn't binary, it's a spectrum; there's no magical point at which a fetus becomes sentient.

The way I see it, a fetus becomes a person/a mind the moment the first neuron fires. However, it is a very primitive being which I'd have no qualms about killing, if it wasn't for this whole issue with potential.
As time passes and both potential and complexity of mind increases, more and more justification will be needed for me to take the step to kill it.

I partly disagree. Sentience is certainly a spectrum. But I don't think a single neuron falls inside of it. A single neuron is not sentient and is not a mind. It's not capable of sensing anything. Neurons don't equal sentience, the interaction between and in large groups of them is what forms sentience. Without that there's no sentience.

The difference should be established through scientific research, at what point is there sufficient interaction between neurons to form a sentience? I can't tell you the exact answer but we I believe we should form our laws on what research there is available.

 

[Jonluw]

Turns out a majority of people pick the older child, which is interesting. It sounds horrible, I guess, but the explanation we got in class is that there are some evolutionary explanations, i.e. due to historical infant mortality rates and what not, the choice is between a child who has survived and a younger child who still may not, and also the older child represents more resources spent as a parent. That sort of stuff.

This is pretty much analogous to my comparison of the value of a newborn to that of a fetus, I figure.
Nice to see that actual research backs it up.

So, OP... from what I was taught, no. You are not biologically wired to value newborns over other life. You are biologically wired to be more protective of newborns than like, middle aged strangers. And that doesn't require any sort of logic.

It's interesting to hear that we biologically value small children above newborns, but that doesn't really change my problem.
Yes, I am aware that I am biologically wired to value infants over middle-aged strangers, but the very thought that spurred this thread was that I cannot accept my evolutionarily produced emotions as a basis for my system of morals.
Ethics should be based on logic, not emotion, which is why I'm doubting the whole "valuing newborns" aspect of my moral code in the first place.

 

[Lieju]

If you go by 'potential', should you also consider sperm cells and eggs worthy of the same protection? They have the potential to start life, after all..

The way I see it, a fetus is a mind which is developing; has something like an 80%(wild guess) chance of at some point becoming sapient, while genital cells are biological components capable of producing a mind.

Killing sperm is no more wrong than "breaking" amino acids.
Killing a fetus is killing a mind, albeit a very primitve one, but importantly a mind that will develop into a more complex one if given time.

A big problem in the discussions about abortion tends to be that they become these kinds of yes/no debates. When a zygote and a 9-month fetus aren't the same. The possibility for the pregnancy to just naturally terminate is pretty high in the beginning, and it's very possible for a woman to get pregnant and lose it and never know because it happened in the early stages.

The problem here is then to define the 'mind', and at what point of the pregnancy it is formed.

 

[Hagi]

The difference in a child and a fetus is in being sentient and sapient. A child is and a fetus is not.

Actually, this may not be true...

I'm loathe to pull up dictionary definitions, but wikipedia says of "sapience": "Sapience is often defined as wisdom, or the ability of an organism or entity to act with appropriate judgment, a mental faculty which is a component of intelligence or alternatively may be considered an additional faculty, apart from intelligence, with its own properties"

and of "sentience": "Sentience is the ability to feel, perceive, or be conscious, or to have subjective experiences." And later, under the heading of animal rights: "In the philosophy of animal rights, sentience implies the ability to experience pleasure and pain."

Working from these, neither infants nor fetuses are sapient. Newborns do not develop the ability to make judgments for some time after birth. Depending on one's interpretation of sentience, one could again conclude that neither infants nor fetuses are sentient. Or, if one takes the broader interpretation of sentience used by animal rights activists, both fetuses and infants are sentient because both are capable of feeling pain.

But then, so is any creature with a nervous system. Hell, some vegetables are reported to act in response to damage, so depending on how broadly one interprets things one could conclude that chopping a carrot is as immoral as killing babies.

I would say newborns and even fetuses in late term are both sentient and sapient (in my earlier post fetus was intended to refer to those that can be legally aborted, apologies for any confusion on that part).

They may not act with much judgement but they do act with some judgement. They're capable of calling out for help in appropriate situations for example, undoubtedly with many mistakes made and not much thought involved but they do judge situations and act appropriately. It's not complex, it's not precise, it's not very thoughtful but it is judgement in my opinion.

But definitions like this are naturally very complex and open to change and debate. I can't provide you with precise specifics because I simply lack the knowledge to provide those, but I do believe in the general idea that there's a certain quality of sentience, sapience or however you want to call it that's possessed by newborns and even fetuses nearing the end of their development but not by fetuses before a certain stage in development or embryos. Where that certain stage is exactly I don't know and I'm fully supportive of more research into it and changing laws in accordance, but I do believe it exists.

 

[Jonluw]

The adult. No matter how you frame it the child is inherently less capable and thus more deserving of protection. Even if there's absolutely no chance of survival the adult is still more capable of coming to terms with his impending demise than the child, more capable of fully understanding and accepting the consequences etc.

But the child wouldn't even be aware it would be about to die.
The adult might experience quite a bit of emotional pain and turmoil for the ten seconds the gun points at him.
The child will merely cry because it is strapped down. It doesn't have the capacity to understand anything of what's happening. I don't see why that's a reason to let it live.

The difference in a child and a fetus is in being sentient.

I'm sure you agree that a fetus at the end of the ninth month of pregnancy is as sentient as a newborn child, while a week-old lump of stem-cells is not sentient at all.
At what point during the pregnancy is sentience gained?
I think looking at sentience in this black and white way is a gross oversimplification. Sentience isn't binary, it's a spectrum; there's no magical point at which a fetus becomes sentient.

The way I see it, a fetus becomes a person/a mind the moment the first neuron fires. However, it is a very primitive being which I'd have no qualms about killing, if it wasn't for this whole issue with potential.
As time passes and both potential and complexity of mind increases, more and more justification will be needed for me to take the step to kill it.

I partly disagree. Sentience is certainly a spectrum. But I don't think a single neuron falls inside of it.

I certainly wouldn't call a single neuron sentient, but the way I see it; when the first synapse fires there is communication going on between cells.
This is what I define as a mind: a society of single-celled organisms working as a unit and communicating with eachother for the common benefit. And in that sense, the very first pair of neurons is the beginning of this mind. The formation of it.
I wouldn't need much justification for erasing it from existence, partly because it's neither sentient nor sapient, but I still consider it a mind.
It is at this point I consider the "me" to start existing, so to speak.

I'm saying I value minds above life, sentient minds above non-sentient minds, and sapient minds over those. Afte all, I eat dead sentient creatures all the time, so sentience isn't something that I consider the crucial criteria for me to not kill something.

The difference should be established through scientific research, at what point is there sufficient interaction between neurons to form a sentience? I can't tell you the exact answer but we I believe we should form our laws on what research there is available.

I don't think 'sentience' is such a clear-cut concept that it is possible to establish a point at which a cluster of nerves becomes sentient though.
That is, unless we consider sentience to be simply the ability to sense the world around you.

 

[Jonluw]

If you go by 'potential', should you also consider sperm cells and eggs worthy of the same protection? They have the potential to start life, after all..

The way I see it, a fetus is a mind which is developing; has something like an 80%(wild guess) chance of at some point becoming sapient, while genital cells are biological components capable of producing a mind.

Killing sperm is no more wrong than "breaking" amino acids.
Killing a fetus is killing a mind, albeit a very primitve one, but importantly a mind that will develop into a more complex one if given time.

A big problem in the discussions about abortion tends to be that they become these kinds of yes/no debates. When a zygote and a 9-month fetus aren't the same. The possibility for the pregnancy to just naturally terminate is pretty high in the beginning, and it's very possible for a woman to get pregnant and lose it and never know because it happened in the early stages.

The problem here is then to define the 'mind', and at what point of the pregnancy it is formed.

This is what I define as a mind: a society of single-celled organisms working as a unit and communicating with eachother for the common benefit. And in that sense, the very first pair of neurons is the beginning of this mind. The formation of it.

Communication being the crucial aspect here. Synapses firing, in my opinion, are a mind no matter how you look at it.

 

[Hagi]

But the child wouldn't even be aware it would be about to die.
The adult might experience quite a bit of emotional pain and turmoil for the ten seconds the gun points at him.
The child will merely cry because it is strapped down. It doesn't have the capacity to understand anything of what's happening. I don't see why that's a reason to let it live.

I think that's exactly the reason to let it live. The child doesn't even understand it's situation, I consider that immensely unfair. The adult might very well experience the most horrendous ten seconds in human history, but that does not take away the capability I believe inherent in maturity (and adults can reasonably be expected to be mature in my opinion) to understand, accept and come to terms with the situation. The less capable an individual the more deserving I believe them to be of protection (although that's certainly not the only factor). Given only the knowledge that one is an adult and the other a child all I know is that one of them can reasonably be expected to be less capable and thus more deserving of my protection.

I certainly wouldn't call a single neuron sentient, but the way I see it; when the first synapse fires there is communication going on between cells.
This is what I define as a mind: a society of single-celled organisms working as a unit and communicating with eachother for the common benefit. And in that sense, the very first pair of neurons is the beginning of this mind. The formation of it.
I wouldn't need much justification for erasing it from existence, partly because it's neither sentient nor sapient, but I still consider it a mind.
It is at this point I consider the "me" to start existing, so to speak.

I'm saying I value minds above life, sentient minds above non-sentient minds, and sapient minds over those. Afte all, I eat dead sentient creatures all the time, so sentience isn't something that I consider the crucial criteria for me to not kill something.

I'm not trying to claim sentience is a crucial criteria on it's own. But in combination with all the other factors present in a human fetus (being the same species, having the potential of being an individual with all the same rights as me etc.) it becomes a crucial one.

Given that it's a human fetus with all the attributes inherent to that I believe that the impossibly difficult define but still existing property of consciousness, sentience and sapience is what makes the difference between a moral and amoral abortion. I don't know when exactly that property develops, I don't know what exactly it is, but I do believe we should approximate it to the best of our ability through research and base our laws on that.

I don't think 'sentience' is such a clear-cut concept that it is possible to establish a point at which a cluster of nerves becomes sentient though.
That is, unless we consider sentience to be simply the ability to sense the world around you.

It's not a clear-cut concept. It's most likely impossible to define accurately. But that goes for almost all morality, there's always doubts and uncertainties. That doesn't mean we shouldn't act to the best of our knowledge and try to approximate it as best as we're able.

I don't know at which point a cluster of nerves becomes sentient. I'm don't think we'll ever know the exact point. I think it's impossible to know the exact point. But I don't believe that prevents us from approximating it, from saying "I don't know exactly where sentience begins but I do know it's not there at X weeks and it's definitely there after Y weeks". Might even be wrong, but we should keep on researching these matters and come as close as possible whilst understanding how abstract the subject matter we're dealing with is. All we can do is act to the best of our ability and judgement.

 

[Hagi]

Going by that broad of a definition, newly hatched chicks are sapient as well. Hell, human infants have an abnormally large head-to-body proportion compared to other mammals. That means human infants are born much less developed than many other mammals in order to fit through the birth canal. So arguably, a newborn horse is more sapient than a newborn human- a newborn human infant is incapable of visually recognizing people, of making choices, or even of moving of it's own accord. All it can do is instinctively cry when it's unhappy and suckle when something is in it's mouth. Meanwhile a newborn horse can stand within hours of being birthed, and that means it can choose when it wants to nurse by walking to or from its mother. If we say sapience determines what should live or die, it's more immoral to kill a newborn horse than it is to kill a newborn infant. We probably don't want to go down that road.

Well... yeah... Animals can display sapience as well. It's pretty clear especially when studying species like Chimpanzees and Bonobos.

I don't think that's the only quality we should be looking at though. It's definitely an important one, but there's potential for example as well. The potential of a newborn human child is much more than that of a horse. There's also the simple fact that a human child is infinitely more like we are ourselves than a horse and thus to be treated as we would like to be treated ourselves.

But given the situation of this thread, where almost all these other factors are equal since we're not looking between species I do believe it comes down to sentience and sapience.

This is exactly what the problem with such definitions is- at some stage they depend upon our feelings, not facts. That's why they cannot ever be used as a method for determining the legality of abortion.

What other method is there? We have to have some legality, even anarchy is a legality of it's own. We have to base it off something. A line has to be drawn somewhere, even if it's nowhere.

We should determine the legality of abortion to the best of our abilities and considering the immense complexity of human life and the even more complex situation of the morality surrounding it that won't be based on anything that can unanimously be agreed upon as fact for a long while yet.

If you have some other criteria for abortion that depends entirely on what can scientifically be regarded as a dependable fact then I'll be most eager to hear it. But lacking that vague definitions like this are all we have and thus should be used as best as we're able.

 

[Lieju]

Communication being the crucial aspect here. Synapses firing, in my opinion, are a mind no matter how you look at it.

So, even something like flatworms have a 'mind', according to your definition, and so killing them (and a lot of them are parasitic and can infect humans)is as bad as killing a human?

 

[Jonluw]

Communication being the crucial aspect here. Synapses firing, in my opinion, are a mind no matter how you look at it.

So, even something like flatworms have a 'mind', according to your definition, and so killing them (and a lot of them are parasitic and can infect humans)is as bad as killing a human?

If you assume all minds are equal, yes.

However, I don't consider flatworm-minds particularly significant in any way.

I think I value minds by how good they are at forming abstract thoughts.

 

[Frungy]

The one logical reason I've arrived on is potential.

I think you've arrived at one reason, but my advice is to always be cautious when you attempt to reduce any equation to a single factor, because A=B is rarely true unless A is B. Or to put it more simply, I would be happier if you took "The" out of the line I quoted, because it isn't the only reason. Hagi demonstrates the error in your logic.

The difference in an adult and child isn't just in potential but also in capability. An adult can reasonably be expected to take care of himself/herself, a child can not. Thus if given the choice one should save the child, it should not be expected to save itself.

This is the basis for "Women and children first." out of dangerous situations, the presumption (arguably incorrect in the case of modern women, but probably quite true in the case of women of the time who were burdened with corsets and dresses that made movement difficult) being that they were more vulnerable and less able to help themselves.

Children are unable to defend themselves as effectively against aggression, not yet equipped with knowledge that may save their lives in a disaster (for example not knowing to get down on the ground in a fire where it is easier to see and breathe), etc. Thus children are more deserving of protection.

Where one ends up with a conflict of this principle is in the issue of abortion. The fetus is incredibly vulnerable, however it is fundamentally in a parasitic relationship with its host, the mother. The mother's health may suffer, either physically or mentally, and she is likewise incapable of defending herself except by aborting the child. In this situation you have two entities with equal vulnerability, and so the situation becomes balanced. A doctor may be able to assess the physical risk to the mother, but only the mother is aware of other exingencies of the situation, such as her mental health, her ability to care for the child later, her willingness to explore other options such as adoption, etc. As such it becomes the choice of the only person with full information, namely the prospective mother. For any other person to interfere is an abuse of power. The father should have no say, neither should the government, religious organisations, etc, or they will be interfering in the protection of at least one person who is in a very vulnerable position. In effect any interference becomes bullying.

Does this make sense to you now?

 

[Jonluw]

I think that's exactly the reason to let it live. The child doesn't even understand it's situation, I consider that immensely unfair. The adult might very well experience the most horrendous ten seconds in human history, but that does not take away the capability I believe inherent in maturity (and adults can reasonably be expected to be mature in my opinion) to understand, accept and come to terms with the situation. The less capable an individual the more deserving I believe them to be of protection (although that's certainly not the only factor). Given only the knowledge that one is an adult and the other a child all I know is that one of them can reasonably be expected to be less capable and thus more deserving of my protection.

I guess what I don't understand is why you believe capability has anything to do with how deserving someone is of being rescued when this capability does not factor into them being able to escape their fate.
The way I see it, how capable someone is only matters to my decision on whether to save them or not if their capability somehow provides some sort of probability that they will get out of it on their own. Otherwise, in my mind, capability means nothing to or fro'.

I certainly wouldn't call a single neuron sentient, but the way I see it; when the first synapse fires there is communication going on between cells.
This is what I define as a mind: a society of single-celled organisms working as a unit and communicating with eachother for the common benefit. And in that sense, the very first pair of neurons is the beginning of this mind. The formation of it.
I wouldn't need much justification for erasing it from existence, partly because it's neither sentient nor sapient, but I still consider it a mind.
It is at this point I consider the "me" to start existing, so to speak.

I'm saying I value minds above life, sentient minds above non-sentient minds, and sapient minds over those. Afte all, I eat dead sentient creatures all the time, so sentience isn't something that I consider the crucial criteria for me to not kill something.

I'm not trying to claim sentience is a crucial criteria on it's own. But in combination with all the other factors present in a human fetus (being the same species, having the potential of being an individual with all the same rights as me etc.) it becomes a crucial one.

So could we put it like this:
You do not wish to cause harm to a mind of your own species with potential to become a greater mind.
Before the point where the mind is sentient, terminating the mind's existence doesn't really cause it any displeasure and doesn't remove anything particularly meaningful from our species at all, so it isn't particularly bad to kill it?

I don't think 'sentience' is such a clear-cut concept that it is possible to establish a point at which a cluster of nerves becomes sentient though.
That is, unless we consider sentience to be simply the ability to sense the world around you.

It's not a clear-cut concept. It's most likely impossible to define accurately. But that goes for almost all morality, there's always doubts and uncertainties. That doesn't mean we shouldn't act to the best of our knowledge and try to approximate it as best as we're able.

I don't know at which point a cluster of nerves becomes sentient. I'm don't think we'll ever know the exact point. I think it's impossible to know the exact point. But I don't believe that prevents us from approximating it, from saying "I don't know exactly where sentience begins but I do know it's not there at X weeks and it's definitely there after Y weeks". Might even be wrong, but we should keep on researching these matters and come as close as possible whilst understanding how abstract the subject matter we're dealing with is. All we can do is act to the best of our ability and judgement.

You know, I've been thinking, and it seems to me that sentience simply can be reduced to "a mind's ability to pick up information from its surroundings", i.e., "having senses" and sapience is simply a measure of how good you are at problem solving and logical reasoning.
While sentient vs. non-sentient seems a distinction that's possible to make, sapient vs. non-sapient I don't think makes any sense at all since the purpose of a brain in the first place is to analyze, and control its body accordingly, i.e., I'd say sapience might be an inherent quality in all minds, simply to differing degrees.
'Sapient' to me, means simply "what a mind is".
The way we use the word 'sapient' commonly though, strikes me as actually meaning "has a decent amount of sapience". Considering that there is no offical definition of what "a decent amount" of sapience is, that means something being defined as sapient or not is simply up to the observer's definition of how much a decent amount is.

 

[Hagi]

Sounds like solid reasoning to me.

Although I personally consider it a certainty that, given modern technologies, the capabilities of men and women are equal.

But it's an incredibly complex matter so might easily be I'm missing something or am mistaken somewhere. But I feel we can shake hands on this one.

 

[Frission]

Morality isn't always logical. We're not robots after all.

Yet, I see alot of people going *BEEP* *BOOP* THAT DOES NOT COMPUTE.

 

[Hagi]

I'm not sure I agree. If a child is born severely brain damaged for example, they may have very little potential.

Well, that's additional information on which the decision should be changed accordingly. But given the average human child and the average horse foal I think the human infant's potential is much greater.

This is also a very dangerous road to go down. Extending this logic, it's more moral of me to kill a child that doesn't resemble me (different race, different gender, different culture, different nationality, different class) than one that does. And I'm sure we don't want to get into that.

I'm referring to mental resemblance. I don't believe there to be any essential difference between the minds of races, genders, cultures, nationalities or classes. I believe there's an essential humanity that all of us possess which allows us to empathize and reason with each other. It's this humanity that matters, which horses don't possess. Doesn't make horses worthless, they're still living beings like us and thus do deserve to be treated decently but they're not human.

I agree, a line has to be drawn. So rather than defining who should live by squishy emotive boundaries, we should define it by something fairly concrete and objective.

A fetus that is within it's mother cannot survive independent of the mother. Therefore it is not alive, it is simply part of the mother's body. A fetus that has left the mother's body and is living independently outside of it has been "born" and is alive.

I don't think I agree, I think there's a point at which a fetus can not yet survive independently outside it's mother's body but does possess sufficient mental faculties to make it immoral to abort.

I'm not sure how to back it up though with anything fairly concrete and objective though beyond it being measurable that there's brain activity similar to that found in newborn babies.

I do appreciate your line of thought though, it's an interesting way of looking at the issue. Just can't find myself agreeing, but I'd say it's something that should definitely be taken into account when making laws on the issue.

 

[Jonluw]

Where one ends up with a conflict of this principle is in the issue of abortion. The fetus is incredibly vulnerable, however it is fundamentally in a parasitic relationship with its host, the mother. The mother's health may suffer, either physically or mentally, and she is likewise incapable of defending herself except by aborting the child. In this situation you have two entities with equal vulnerability, and so the situation becomes balanced. A doctor may be able to assess the physical risk to the mother, but only the mother is aware of other exingencies of the situation, such as her mental health, her ability to care for the child later, her willingness to explore other options such as adoption, etc. As such it becomes the choice of the only person with full information, namely the prospective mother. For any other person to interfere is an abuse of power. The father should have no say, neither should the government, religious organisations, etc, or they will be interfering in the protection of at least one person who is in a very vulnerable position. In effect any interference becomes bullying.

The problem doesn't lie in justifying abortion legally and stuff like that though. It's an issue with my personal ethics.

Fundamentally, I'm okay with killing fetuses in the early stages no matter how little justification is given for it.
This particular segment of my moral code didn't function with my "potential"-argument for saving babies, which meant I had to add another factor into my calculating of the morality of killing, namely "brain complexity" (or rather, mind complexity).
Their capabilities, as I explained to Hagi, don't really factor into the ethics of it to me.

 

[Frungy]

Fundamentally, I'm okay with killing fetuses in the early stages no matter how little justification is given for it. This particular segment of my moral code didn't function with my "potential"-argument for saving babies, which meant I had to add another factor into my calculating of the morality of killing, namely "brain complexity" (or rather, mind complexity).
Their capabilities, as I explained to Hagi, don't really factor into the ethics of it to me.

And evidently you didn't get my point, which is that unless you're the one who's actually deciding on the abortion, i.e. the pregnant female, then your opinion doesn't matter a damn, nor do you have any right to express any opinion on the matter without becoming a bully trying to inflict your moral framework on someone who is in a very vulnerable position.

Do you see the point now? Your moral code is irrelevant because you are not in possession of anything more than a vast and indefensible set of generalisations about abortion, and abortion is an incredibly personal choice. People who make generalisations about others go by names like "racists" and "paternalistic".

 

[Lieju]

Communication being the crucial aspect here. Synapses firing, in my opinion, are a mind no matter how you look at it.

So, even something like flatworms have a 'mind', according to your definition, and so killing them (and a lot of them are parasitic and can infect humans)is as bad as killing a human?

If you assume all minds are equal, yes.

However, I don't consider flatworm-minds particularly significant in any way.

I think I value minds by how good they are at forming abstract thoughts.

But the question was, what rights fetuses should have. According to your logic, they have a 'mind', and that definition of a 'mind' you gave applies to flatworms too.

But now you're bringing in how good the mind is forming abstract thoughts.