H
Ham1
Guest
This is essentially the question that I have asked Ribo not once but twice on this thread. He has yet to supply an answer. In order for his theory to hold up, he needs to explain at what point a person develops intrinsic value. Is it 30 days before birth, 30 days after, 2 years after? At what point does an individual’s value cease to be determined by a parent and begins to be determined by the very existence of the individual himself. And does an individual’s intrinsic value go from no value to full value or is it a progression from one to the other.What about the preference values of others besides the Parents? Grandpapa and Grandmama or me or Joe down the street? They all may have a preference value for life for that poor kid in the womb. Why is their value overridden by the mother’s value? Why does she have special rights just because she’s carrying the kid?
Does power come into play here? Mom has power over the fetus because she has the kid in her that’s why she gets to kill the kid? Does this belief system come down to naked power defining whose preference value gets chosen?
Stalin made a preference value choice that a lotta people needed to be killed. Why is his preference value more or less worthy than others?
Who defines value? Those with voice (power). So abortion is a natural focal point for this philosophy for none are so powerless than the unborn.
I think even if I did not have faith, I would still have to be Christian just for the attractiveness and utilitarian value of it’s belief system. Utilitarian in that it combines as another poster stated the whole person, the aesthetic and emtional and spiritual, while also giving meaning to discounted experiences such as suffering by most other philosophies and religions.
This is the part of philosophy where utilitarianism fails both logically and empirically.