哲學

哲學功課: Don Marquis’s view on the Morality of Abortion

Leave a comment

In Don Marquis’ paper “An Argument that Abortion is Wrong”, he argues abortion is morally wrong for the same reason as murder. His argument is different from the standard pro-life argument that stress that the fetus is both human and alive, therefore the fetus has right to life. By using a different approach, Don Marquis’ argument avoids the controversial in the debate of whether fetus is qualified as a human whom process the right to life.

Marquis starts his argument with asking why killing an adult human is wrong. (p.130) Killing is wrong because killing deprives the victim of a future value. The killing victim suffers the misfortune of a premature death which consists of the loss to the victim of the future goods of the consciousness. In general, killing is wrong because it deprives the victim of a future like ours (FLO).

Marquis then further explains the FLO theory is a sufficient reason for killing is wrong. First he argues the nature of misfortune in terminal disease is the loss of FLO, which also the same for premature death. He also argues murder is the worst crime because it deprives the victim all of his future, not merely part of it. Then he argues the FLO theory does not the pit-falls of traditional pro-life arguments. The FLO theory is compatible with euthanasia because those who seek euthanasia have no future. The FLO theory has no implication to animal rights, since animal life is not a life like ours. Therefore why killing is wrong can be explained using the FLO theory alone. At last he applies the FLO theory to abortion. Killing fetuses deprive the FLO of the fetuses, therefore abortion is immoral. (p.133)

The FLO theory seems to provide a sound argument on why abortion is immoral. However under strict scrutiny, the FLO theory actually contradicts to Marquis’ own view on abortion (p.84) [1]. In the beginning of his essay, Marquis stated abortion is not immoral under rare instances. “Such cases include abortion after rape and abortion during the first fourteen days after conception when there is an argument that the fetus is not definitely an individual.” (p.126). If the morality of abortion is judged by the FLO theory alone, there should be no exceptional cases for fetuses from rapes and fetuses under fourteen days old. The fetuses from rapes have the same FLO as other fetuses, so their abortion should also be immoral. In the case of the first two weeks post conception, twinning is possible; abortion may cause the loss of FLO for two individuals instead of one. Killing those fetuses deprives their FLO(s); therefore abortion is also wrong in these cases.

Marquis did not explain the criteria to make abortion moral for the rare cases in his paper. It is obvious that using FLO theory cannot grant him the morality of abortion in the rare cases he stated.s In order to defense his view, he may attempt to use traditional moral theories, such as Unitarianism, Categorical Imperatives or Social Contract Theory, to overrule the FLO theory in the rare cases. Regardless of which moral theory he chooses to defense the exceptions, once he introduces a moral theory other than the FLO theory into his argument, he opens the flood gate allow us to re-evaluate the morality for the not so rare cases. Is kill fetuses from rape ok because the mother does not want the baby? Why not extend the fourteen days limit to the 3rd trimester? If there are fundamental moral principles that can overrule the FLO theory, according to the Occam’s razor, why can’t we simply use the fundamental moral principle and get rid of the FLO theory?

Until Marquis come up with satisfying explanation for morality of abortion in the rare cases or he can explain away the future good of those fetuses. He must either withhold the application of FLO theory to abortion for not contradicting himself or he must revise his view to accept abortion is wrong even in those rare cases.

[1] P.84 In addition, Marquis mentions as exceptions cases of rapes, when the fetus is anencephalic (partially or completely lacking a brain), and when the abortion is performed during the first fourteen days after conception. Given the number of these exceptions he allows himself at the outset, it tempting to say that Marquis is really a moderate rather than strictly pro-life, but because his emphasis is on the claim that abortion is seriously wrong, I will put him in the pro-life camp.

Daily Scribble

(fluff)Friends on Facebook

3 Comments

I finally create a fluff in Facebook of my own. The idea of fluff is not new, Tamagochi pioneered the market of virtual pet. Linking up your virtual pet with virtual the pets of your friends over the internet is also not new, Sony had made the now defunct Post Pet in the Web 1.0 era. On the surface, fluff offers nothing new. You have cute cartoon animals, you can buy various virtual food or habitant with virtual money. You can earn virtual money either by petting your friend’s pet or place bets in virtual pets races. It is just a plain old boring virtual pet.

I have quite a number of friends is obsess about petting and feeding the virtual pets.  I try to understand why fluff is so popular and many people are addicted to this simple 2D virtual pet. Cute graphics definitely helps, girls love cute things and then pressure their boyfriends to play along. Piggy-back on Facebook is also a major factor. Many people logon to Facebook quite often, so playing fluff and recruiting new members is very convenient. Fluff catches their eye-ball and it is only a mouse click away.

I think the most important factor is the racing system. To be exact, it is not the race itself, but the speed attribute of the fluff. You can increase this number by feeding your flutt. In order to do so, you have to pet your friend’s flutt to earn virtual money to buy food.  Your friends will pet your flutt in return and hence complete a never-ending pet, feed and race cycle.  If there  exists some sort of score, it is just human nature wanting to get a higher score. When the score goes up, it will give the mind a sense of satisfaction, even the score really doesn’t mean anything. This mentality applies to fluff players, applies to online RPG gamers who pursuit high level and stronger weapons.  To some extend it also apply to those who accumulate wealth but never spend a dime.

Daily Scribble

Toastmaster education series

Leave a comment

I am elected the VP of education of the Toastmaster club at work.  The role of VP education is to help the club member become a better speaker.  Although I am half way through the advance speaker bronze program, I don’t think I can make particularly good speeches comparing to the native speakers.  I am not very convincing to teach others how to deliver a good speech.  Anyways, if I am just comparing to myself, I can see the progress I have made over time.

One of the responsibilities of VP education is to give presentations to the club members on how to give better speech or make the club better.  The Toastmaster has lots of resources to help my role.  The education series manuals are prepared speeches with slides ready to use.  Today, I just inherit a box full of education materials from the previous club president.  I volunteer myself to give the first education session, hoping that it will inspire other executive to step in for later sessions.  I quickly went through the stuffs and picked a manual for next month’s education session.  Maybe I couldn’t do everything right that is outlined in the manual when I am giving a speech.  I strongly believe in the best way to learn is to teach.  By giving a presentation, the points will engrave deeper into my mind and help me become a better speaker subconsciously.

Daily Scribble

iPhone hack

3 Comments

A 17 years old kid hacked the iPhone, making phone call using networks other than AT&T is already old news. There is also an alternative hack fooling the iPhone using a turbo SIM that pretends to be a AT&T SIM card. I have quite some friends at work who bought the iPhone readily tried the hacks and eagerly showing off their fully functional iPhone.  As an engineer, I am genuiely interested in the technical details of hacks, but I am more interest in responding to an comment from a friend who condemns the hacks.

She is complaining all the hacking deprive the profit of AT&T and hacking in general cause the lack of investment in R&D because company cannot turn a profit. I have to disagree with her argument. AT&T is making a wrong and stupid business decision for locking up the iPhone.  It is our consumer right to tinker with whatever product we purchase by making it a better product that suits us better. If the company put in anti-user features that alienate the customers by making the product hard to use, we have every right to remove those unwanted features ourselves.  The invisible hand will punish those who act against the force of the free market.  The only way to make a profit is by giving the consumers what they want, not stupidly going against the consumers’ will.

In terms of business ethics, the consumers should only be responsible to pay for whatever they wish to buy. It is unjust to exploit the consumers by bundling sub-standard product with a high demand product.  The consumer should be given the option of not buying things they don’t need or wanted.  Everyone knows AT&T has the worse cellular network in US. If AT&T wants to gain more market share, it should provide a better service, instead of holding iPhone users as hostages.

宗教

基督教思想史第一部 – 第二章﹕基督論問題

3 Comments

基督論的問題是三一爭議的延繼﹐雖然三位一體解決了東西教會分裂的問題﹐但沒有回答原先要解決的問題。若果聖子與聖父同質不同位格﹐那聖子耶穌到底是什麼呢﹖耶穌如何可以是神﹐亦同時間也是人呢﹖對於這個問題﹐當時的意見主要分為兩大陣營﹐一說法是聖父收養耶穌﹐而另一說法則是聖父化身成為耶穌。尼西信經中聖父聖子同聖同體﹐可以按不同詮譯得出這兩個不同的答案。於是早期教會再一次掀起新的爭議﹐代表雙方陣營分便是亞歷山大教會和得到羅馬教會支持的Antioch教會。

亞歷山大教會認為只有耶穌的神性完全吞食人性﹐人類的救贖才有可能實現﹐這稱為基督一性論(Monophysitism)﹐當時也很多知識較低的平信徒支持這個說法。Antioch教會則持相反意見﹐認為應該從歷史性去認識耶穌﹐保留耶穌人性的一面﹐並得到羅馬教會的支持。耶穌人神二性卻引申一些問題﹐人神二性必須有一個開始﹐而這個開始就在瑪利亞的子宮裏﹐ 於是推論出瑪利亞是神母親這個理所當然的結論。同樣耶穌為世人受難是史實﹐但神不可受到任何苦難﹐於是推論出只有耶穌的人性受苦的結論。由於耶穌的人神二性有把瑪利亞升格為女神的危險﹐而當時只有異教徒有對女神的崇拜﹐加上大部份信徒不能接受耶穌是人﹐於是亞歷山大教會與Antioch教會爭持不下。要到公元四五一年﹐教會召開Chalcedon會議才解決這個紛歧。

在Chalcedon會議中﹐教宗Leo I頒報一系列的內容帶有悖論性的教義﹐確定耶穌擁有完全的人性和完全的神性。決議的內容富有詩意文學色彩﹐對於澄清哲學上的爭議沒有多大幫助﹐反而產生不同版本詮譯的問題。東方教會對這個決議十分失望﹐在中東和埃及等地死硬支持基督一性論的教會與西方教會決裂﹐種下了日後當地人民變節改信奉回教的伏線。羅馬皇帝為阻止東西教會分裂﹐他採用了Leontius of Byzantium的拆衷解決辨法﹐在人性和神性上加上質(hypostatis)。耶穌擁有一質二性﹐分別有兩個自由意志﹐解決了人性神性同時存在的問題。

聖子的爭論暫時解決了﹐ 接下來論到應如何理解聖父的問題。在這個問題上倒沒有太大的爭論﹐自Dionysius在公元五百年提出有關神的論述以來﹐東西教會一直源用至今。他把新柏拉圖主義與基督教結合﹐將希臘神話中的諸神符號化﹐不以歷史性的方法去解讀﹐讓真理透過古希臘的智慧表達出來。他認為有兩認識神的方法﹐先把正面的意義歸納為神的屬性﹐再從反面否定人類的言語足夠去完全理解神。他的神學觀充滿階級性﹐從最高處的神往下走﹐一級級到最低層的罪人﹐而人類的救贖就是由下而上的旅程。他的神學亦同時帶有神秘色彩﹐教會的所有事物也是指向神的象徵﹐對日後東正教和拜占庭文化有很大的影響。

同時期還有兩位重要的神學家。Tertullian除了發明三位一體的方程式外﹐他還有幾項重要的神學思想。其中一項是原罪的教義﹐並把原罪與性扯上關係﹐間接促成教會千多年來的保守性觀念。另一項是天主教的聖靈實體化的觀念﹐聖靈可以通過聖事注入聖體和聖水內﹐再由人的口中進入靈魂內。另一個神學家Cyprian同樣也幾項重要的神學思想﹐成為中世紀天主教神學的雛型。第一項是異端教會和分裂教會領洗是否有效的問題﹐領洗的效力並非決定於施洗的人﹐而是客觀地從聖靈而來。第二項是宣稱教會之內沒有教恩﹐將教會從聖人組成的團體﹐轉變為發放教恩的機構。第三項是正統教會的宗徒承傳性﹐與合一的普世教會﹐聖彼得的教宗地位。第四項神職人員的獻祭功用﹐後來發展成為天主教的彌撒。

田立克在書中指出﹐在公元五世紀時的早期教會的神學﹐比較接近現今天主教的神學。基督教常說他們回歸早期教會的信仰﹐很顯是與事實不乎的說法。在這個時期的東西教會﹐已經出現信仰重點上的分歧。東方教會著重生死真假對錯的問題﹐西方教會則著重罪和救贖的問題。東方教會著重耶穌的榮耀﹐西方教會則著重耶穌的謙卑。西方教會著重人與神之間的規律﹐而這個如何解釋這個規律成為羅馬教宗權威的來源。