What first to consider when evaluating ethical arguments…

I firmly believe that ethical arguments are progressive in a certain sense. The word “progressive” is ambiguous because it presupposes a context-based understanding of it. I will clarify what I mean by that designation. We want to say that we have moved forward in a progressive sense because, amongst other things, we:

• have a more open approach than before (we are not as exclusive when considering pressing concerns);
• we are not quick to pretend that there are generic resolutions;
• we are evaluating each dilemma/problem/argument within a group setting;
• we have a global perspective and therefore have more viewpoints to consider.

All of these facets of progress point to a more collective grasp of ethical concerns, which in my mind demands that we need to be careful that we do not move too quickly. There are arguably many ways to treat each concern carefully, but I intend to first focus on the clarification of conceptual understandings of ethical problems. I should also mention that there is a tendency to conflate the conceptual with the doctrinal in the context of bioethics because of the applied nature of this field. The conceptual/doctrinal distinction is exhaustively examine by Quine in the first few pages of his Epistemology Naturalized. However the doctrinal will be deferred for another analysis because it leads to a digression from this short introduction.

The conceptual underpinnings of a bioethical/ethical analysis should be carefully scrutinized so that we can be clear about a few things. First it will allow us to identify the scope of the project under analysis. When, for example, we allude to the recent “locked-in-syndrome” case, the ethical concern -at least as how I came to understand it- was already clearly publicized. The patient (anon-intended) was seeking assistance with his decision to end his life. Because of his condition, he could not carry out this wish on his own. This required, what we refer to as, assisted suicide. The replies to this recent development have been less than clear, in terms of the conceptual domain. Some have suggested that the issue concerns “rights” and based upon our ‘global constitutions’ this patient should be permitted to decide not to eat; to not be force-fed. This response is, in my mind, a clear misunderstanding of the relationship between “rights” and “ethical considerations”. Others have suggested that on the basis of self-determinism (autonomy), the patient should have the freedom to decide for them self how they want to live or die .  Others still, are pushing the conflation of active and passive euthanasia in order to argue that, just as physicians are permitted to increase sedatives under the false pretense of alleviating pain, so should this patient be allowed to end his life on similar terms.

All of these positions speak to a particular understanding of rights, self-determinism and euthanasia, and if we do not clarify our conceptions we run the risk of misconstruing the ethical lens. We need to be more careful when we make public statements about certain ethical concerns because we run the risk of setting a wrong precedent. We also run the risk of creating a value-statement that could eventually permeate itself into society, alienating certain people who do not share the ethical viewpoints. If, for example, this individual has judged for themselves (and they are seemingly competent to do so)  that they would like to end their life, this should not entail a situation where we become too quick to push for legal, ethical, moral and academic alterations  to conceptions that have not been properly construed.

I have included a link to a discussion between Chomsky and Buckley concerning Buckley’s misuse of “disinterested”. Chomsky provides a clear example of the conceptual mistake Buckley makes in trying reconcile “disinterested causes for war” in particular circumstances and the paradoxical result of “dis-interested” referring to the unintended referent.