Law & Society Blog

9 Responses to “Weapons of Mass Democracy Rediscovered in the US (About Time!)”  

1. 1 Ben Samuel Nelson Nov 10th, 2006 at 9:29 pm

   Here here.

   Also a repeal of the Bankruptcy bill is called for, if at all possible.

2. 2 Pensans Nov 18th, 2006 at 1:36 am

   Yes, believing that scientific research should be limited by mere moral considerations is “insane.” Just like believing in measured rhetoric . . .

3. 3 Hanno Kaiser Nov 18th, 2006 at 9:10 am

   And what, Pensans, are those “mere moral considerations?” On what moral grounds would you propose to defend a ban on embryonic stem cell research? My point, quite plainly, is that there are no acceptable justifications for banning a practice that harms no one and is among the most promising avenues for alleviating human suffering.

4. 4 Pensans Nov 18th, 2006 at 2:17 pm

   Oh, you see, I did misunderstand your point. But, I think it might not be wholly my fault if I missed your “quite plain[]” point.

   Calling something “insane” usually expresses more than an on-the-whole disagreement with others, but rather indicates a belief that something is a symptom of a baseless irrationality comparable to that created by mental disorder.

   And, you have recently expressed quite a bit of such hostile animus towards religious belief. You have characterized common religious beliefs as “delusional”, “nonsense plain and simple,” “scary [and/or] weird” and have expressed your “refusal to take seriously” those who believe in inerrant religious revelation.

   Accordingly, I thought you might be suggesting that the well-known objections of the Christian right to such research were not merely wrong but a sign of some delulsional, nonsensical, frighteningly strange “pro-cancer” mental problem.

   But since that is not the case . . .

   Even those who favor stem-cell research have recognized that there are some moral objections that should be taken seriously.

   For example, writing in the New England Journal of Medicine, Profs. Sandel and McHugh (of Harvard and Johns Hopkins respectively) acknowledged two considerations that should be taken seriously in judging the morality of such research (although they disagreed with them on the whole):

   (1) They acknowledged that dignitary concerns surrounding human life limited the proper uses of human embryos in research; that given the potential of human life, an embryo could not be regarded as a mere thing and used in any way, but concluded that human embryos were not entitled to sufficient respect (because of insufficient development) to justify protecting them from destruction for important medical ends.

   (2) They acknowledge the danger that allowing experimentation on human embryos will open the door to other dehumanizing practices like farming babies for medical spare parts, but conclude that there are less costly ways of avoiding this danger besides a ban on embryonic research, e.g. regulating it to avoid use of embryos older than a small number of days.

   http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/351/3/207

   P.S. You requested references to some books explaining in rational terms the grounds for Christian doctrines of textual revelation — of the two I recommended, I think that Swinburne’s is much the better for your purposes.

5. 5 Hanno Kaiser Nov 19th, 2006 at 2:19 pm

   I fail to see the argument against embryonic stem cell research. Yes, the concept of human dignity ought to be taken seriously, whether we justify it on deontological or rule-consequentialist grounds. Either way, we end up with overwhelming arguments for embryonic stem cell research, because, for example, (i) actual humans are much more clearly entitled to respect than “potential” humans; (ii) the fact that a slope may be slippery doesn’t mean that we have to stay off of it entirely, it just means that we have to pay close attention to where we’re going. Using embryonic stem cells (which would be destroyed as IVF leftovers anyway) for medical research is, if anything, at the very edge of the slope. Thus, it is an easy case. It’s morally permissible and should be legal. Similarly, killing babies for harvesting organs is also an easy case. It’s clearly immoral and illegal. So I’m asking again, what are the rational arguments for maintaining a ban on embryonic stem cell research? If no rational arguments exist, which I believe to be the case, then opposing embryonic stem cell research is, indeed, “a symptom of a baseless irrationality comparable to that created by mental disorder.”

6. 6 Pensans Nov 20th, 2006 at 1:36 am

   “Overwhelming” arguments? Even Sandel and McHugh – who oppose a ban – think the contrary arguments are serious and legitimate. Calling Christians “insane” for accepting arguments that experts concede are legitimate makes you sound crazed: a wide-eyed Euclid who thinks he can prove by deduction where the line of human rights divides worthless human potentiality from valuable human life.

   You assume an embryo is not human; the biological fact is that an embryo is the earliest in the continuous series of developmental stages of human being. Like a developing young child, if provided a suitable environment and nutrition, an embryo will develop by a self-directed process through other physical stages – fetal, infant, toddler, child, adolescence, adult and senescence. Like a developing child, an embryo lacks many of the attributes of adult human beings. But it is not insane to judge that human life begins at an early stage, before all mature attributes of human being are attained, or even at the earliest stage of physical life, when the fewest are attained.

   But the Sandel-McHugh argument is more troubling for you. They contend that human embryos are entitled to respect even though they are mere potentialities. Thus, they argue that it would be immoral to kill embryos to develop mere cosmetics. But if human potentiality is enough to create a duty of respect, then your contention that embryos are potentialities proves nothing. You must additionally overwhelm us with evidence that the goals of embryo destroying research are sufficiently lofty and attainable that they justify the indignity to human potentiality. Unlike you, I see how reasonable people might disagree reasonably about such a value judgment. Perhaps, I value human potentiality more than you do, or I judge the chance that research will be fruitless too great. Such disagreements are not evidence of pro-cancer insanity.

   As to the slippery slope: if Christians trusted the secularist elites who are so enthusiastic about funding these projects to “pay close attention” to where stem-cell research was going, they might feel more secure about getting on the slope with them. But reckless name-calling does not suggest that they will administer such programs cautiously.

   There are far too many stem-cell fundamentalists who assert that this is a clear issue of rational categories calling for bold action – rather than the morally ambiguous area that it clearly is, calling for cautious restraint. Your insistence, for example, that those who disagree with you are “insane” does not help develop the kind of trust that would enable religious and non-religious to walk out together on the slope.

7. 7 Matt Wood Nov 28th, 2006 at 1:52 pm

   I’d like to make a few observations about this discussion:

   I. Reason and imagination are not separate.

   Pensans’s argument for injecting a moral duty into stem cell research seems to rest on a conception of “human potential” residing in the embryo itself (or, rather, in its “nature”). Clearly though, this conception is not rooted in any empirically observable characteristic of the individual embryo. It is, rather, a reification (and projection into the external world) of an expectation derived from inductive reasoning.

   As a point of departure, there is nothing intrinsic to an embryo per se that seems to justify the attachment of a duty of care. In other words, were an embryo to remain suspended indefinitely in its current form without developing any further, it’s hard to envision a duty of care any greater than that which attaches to the millions of skin cells that flake from our bodies daily. Furthermore, around half of all embryos are spontaneously aborted by the mother’s body, many without her ever being aware of her pregnancy. A significant number of these embryos may possess inherent defects that prevent them from maturing into more developed fetuses. These embryos would therefore seem to lack “human potential”, and hence should be exempt from a duty of care. Absent this duty (and assuming these embryos could be identified ex ante), stem cell research on these particular embryos appears to entail no moral costs. It therefore seems reasonable to conclude that any perception of “human potential” in an embryo is the product of human imagination and the expectations it enables.

   But Hanno’s stance is subject to these same observations. His vision of a world endowed with the medical benefits of productive stem cell research is by no means guaranteed, and may involve costs that are hidden to him. He looks to the current state of the science and perceives a “therapeutic potential”, not unlike the “human potential” that Pensans perceives in an embryo. This is imagination, not fact.

   There’s a saying I’ve heard in the context of estate planning but that’s applicable here as well: “A mediocre mind on the spot is better than the most brilliant strategist 50 years in advance.” The world, including our own social structures, is a complex system not entirely understood by human beings, and conservatism serves a useful discourse function roughly analagous to brakes. The burden of proof is on those advocating change and probably should be, the law of unintended consequences being undisputed. [Think of the French revolutionaries and the ensuing Reign of Terror, or of the thwarted but noble aspirations of Communism.] Pragmatism serves a useful and complementary function by enabling alternative visions of the future. But both rest for their efficacy on human imagination.

   Because the perceptions of Pensans and Hanno are not empirical facts but rather products of human imagination, the only route to consensus is through open dialogue. Each individual’s imagination is conditioned and delimited by individual experience in a path dependent away, and discourse can produce a convergence of these paths into consensus, which enables the consensual coordination of action (an imperative harnessed and enshrined by democratic institutions).

   There is a very human tendency to ignore the irreducibly imaginative nature of views we find self-evident. Thus, because my sympathies lie with Hanno’s views, I’m often guilty of taking the success of stem cell research (at acceptable social cost) for granted. Those who perceive moral duties to embryos probably likewise find Pensans contentions “obvious” and are therefore predisposed to recognize the speculative nature of Hanno’s arguments. But on reflection, both positions dissolve into mind-stuff, into imagination, and require discursive defense (ideally dialectic) as to their reasonableness.

8. 8 Pensans Dec 16th, 2006 at 2:06 am

   Sliding down the slippery slope:

   http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6171083.stm

9. 9 Hanno Kaiser Dec 17th, 2006 at 10:31 am

   A few remarks in reply to Matt’s and Pensans comments:

   (1) It is prudent to act based on the best available scientific evidence. On that basis, we have no reason to question the scientific and medical promise of stem cell research. We know that embryonic stem cells are pluripotent and, given the right stimuli, can be made to develop into each of the about 200 cell types that the human body contains. This is a uniquely useful property for medical research. I don’t see how this line of argument is speculative and dissolves into “mind stuff” and imagination.

   (2) Not that this is necessary for my argument, but the embryonic stem cells that I am talking about are harvested from blastocytes that are slated for destruction. Why not put those leftover cells to good use?

   (3) And what about the link to the “Ukraine babies in stem cell probe” article that Pensans points us to? First, killing newborns doesn’t get you embryonic stem cells. So whatever slippery slope Pensans is concerned about, it is not the one that I am talking about. Second, by the same logic, shouldn’t we also outlaw, say, organ transplants because of the potential (and the reality!) for abuse?

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