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That we were a culture that had it within our power to stop aging and age-related death, and chose to bury our heads in the sand and suffer and die instead. Ign

That we were a culture that had it within our power to stop aging and age-related death, and chose to bury our heads in the sand and suffer and die instead. Ignorant suicidal barbarians, they'll call us. http://www.fightaging.org/archives/2008/09/the-scientific-debate-that-will-determine-how-long-we-all-live.php http://www.fightaging.org/archives/2008/09/the-scientific-de...

carbocation 16y ago
We don't blame the past for not discovering penicillin until the 19th-20th Century (there is debate on the exact date). The future won't blame us for not discovering {as-yet-undiscovered amazing thing} yet, either.
- ivank 16y ago
  Many of these amazing things are around in embryonic form, but few people choose to invest any money or time in them. The future can certainly blame us for that.
- NickPollard 16y ago
  I (and many others) blame close-mindedness for holding back Scientific Progress and the fruits of the Enlightenment. Would Penicillin have been discovered earlier if people hadn't been so keen to label as 'heresy' what was just new, potentially valid hypotheses about the universe?
  - carbocation 16y ago
    I can agree in part. We must hold people accountable for their beliefs, actions, and attitudes across time and place. On the other hand, I do not think that we should underestimate the degree to which serendipity influences the scientific endeavor.
CWuestefeld 16y ago
...implying that we'll discover a moral necessity to provide health care to others. This is of a category with the OP's comments about the elderly. Pretty much all the other comments I've seen reference negative liberty, meaning that it regards our freedom from something, e.g., freedom from censorship. However, you're talking about positive liberty, which is a fundamentally different thing: it posits that society owes us something. The arguments for negative liberty are generally easier to make because they only force people to leave you alone. The argument for positive liberty are much more difficult, because they force an obligation upon everyone. This suffers from slippery-slope problems, and clearly breaks down at the margins. Since healthcare (to take your example) requires the expenditure of resources, we must first determine to what level we are obligated (which is completely arbitrary, as far as I can see). And when resources are limited, it requires that we forsake that moral obligation (in other words, it may place us into a situation for which all possible actions are immoral).
- badkungfu 16y ago
  It all comes down to phrasing doesn't it? Maybe the future will phrase the problem differently than we do. * Freedom from being beaten by one's husband vs the right to feel secure in one's own home. * Freedom from slavery vs the right to live and work according to your own dictates. * Freedom from censorship vs the right to say whatever you want. * Freedom from bankruptcy or death when illness strikes vs the right to realistically affordable health care. This will sound snarkier than I intend, but there was a time when some Southern farmers thought that freedom for black people was a problem "at the margins" as it required increased expenditure to maintain their farms. It caused a breakdown in the entire economic model of the South- how does that impact the moral calculus as we look back?
  - CWuestefeld 16y ago
    It all comes down to phrasing doesn't it? No, the two cases are fundamentally different. On the one hand we guarantee each person the right to voice his own beliefs, peaceably assemble, and worship (or not) as his conscience dictates. This empowers each person, but is completely neutral for others: I can listen or ignore the speech of others as I like. On the other hand are the positive liberties such as healthcare. These do much more than allow a person to do as they will without hurting others. Quite the opposite: they explicitly place a responsibility on me to provide for the care of others. In the case of negative liberties such as free speech, I can go off in the woods to type out my magnum opus, and be well within moral grounds. But in the presence of positive liberties, my choice to distance myself is morally wrong, as I'd be shirking my duty to help provide. Your comparison to slavery in the American south simply doesn't work. In their case, the abolition of slavery damaged the plantation owners, but that was a morally just outcome. But in the current case, what happens when the budget for healthcare is exhausted? At some point there must come an instance where we say "we just don't have the resources to heal you". Also, because the resources to provide healthcare are necessarily finite, someone must draw a line determining how much healthcare is due each person. I'm not comfortable with a moral code where right and wrong is determined by an arbitrary line (which is what is going to happen: if the bill exceeds $X per quality-adjusted year of life, then it will be denied). I note that this doesn't in itself mean that it ought not to be done, but it makes the argument from morality much more difficult. I'm not comfortable with a moral code

carbocation 16y ago

We don't blame the past for not discovering penicillin until the 19th-20th Century (there is debate on the exact date). The future won't blame us for not discovering {as-yet-undiscovered amazing thing} yet, either.

ivank 16y ago
Many of these amazing things are around in embryonic form, but few people choose to invest any money or time in them. The future can certainly blame us for that.
NickPollard 16y ago
I (and many others) blame close-mindedness for holding back Scientific Progress and the fruits of the Enlightenment. Would Penicillin have been discovered earlier if people hadn't been so keen to label as 'heresy' what was just new, potentially valid hypotheses about the universe?
- carbocation 16y ago
  I can agree in part. We must hold people accountable for their beliefs, actions, and attitudes across time and place. On the other hand, I do not think that we should underestimate the degree to which serendipity influences the scientific endeavor.

CWuestefeld 16y ago

...implying that we'll discover a moral necessity to provide health care to others. This is of a category with the OP's comments about the elderly. Pretty much all the other comments I've seen reference negative liberty, meaning that it regards our freedom from something, e.g., freedom from censorship. However, you're talking about positive liberty, which is a fundamentally different thing: it posits that society owes us something. The arguments for negative liberty are generally easier to make because they only force people to leave you alone. The argument for positive liberty are much more difficult, because they force an obligation upon everyone. This suffers from slippery-slope problems, and clearly breaks down at the margins. Since healthcare (to take your example) requires the expenditure of resources, we must first determine to what level we are obligated (which is completely arbitrary, as far as I can see). And when resources are limited, it requires that we forsake that moral obligation (in other words, it may place us into a situation for which all possible actions are immoral).

badkungfu 16y ago
It all comes down to phrasing doesn't it? Maybe the future will phrase the problem differently than we do. * Freedom from being beaten by one's husband vs the right to feel secure in one's own home. * Freedom from slavery vs the right to live and work according to your own dictates. * Freedom from censorship vs the right to say whatever you want. * Freedom from bankruptcy or death when illness strikes vs the right to realistically affordable health care. This will sound snarkier than I intend, but there was a time when some Southern farmers thought that freedom for black people was a problem "at the margins" as it required increased expenditure to maintain their farms. It caused a breakdown in the entire economic model of the South- how does that impact the moral calculus as we look back?
- CWuestefeld 16y ago
  It all comes down to phrasing doesn't it? No, the two cases are fundamentally different. On the one hand we guarantee each person the right to voice his own beliefs, peaceably assemble, and worship (or not) as his conscience dictates. This empowers each person, but is completely neutral for others: I can listen or ignore the speech of others as I like. On the other hand are the positive liberties such as healthcare. These do much more than allow a person to do as they will without hurting others. Quite the opposite: they explicitly place a responsibility on me to provide for the care of others. In the case of negative liberties such as free speech, I can go off in the woods to type out my magnum opus, and be well within moral grounds. But in the presence of positive liberties, my choice to distance myself is morally wrong, as I'd be shirking my duty to help provide. Your comparison to slavery in the American south simply doesn't work. In their case, the abolition of slavery damaged the plantation owners, but that was a morally just outcome. But in the current case, what happens when the budget for healthcare is exhausted? At some point there must come an instance where we say "we just don't have the resources to heal you". Also, because the resources to provide healthcare are necessarily finite, someone must draw a line determining how much healthcare is due each person. I'm not comfortable with a moral code where right and wrong is determined by an arbitrary line (which is what is going to happen: if the bill exceeds $X per quality-adjusted year of life, then it will be denied). I note that this doesn't in itself mean that it ought not to be done, but it makes the argument from morality much more difficult. I'm not comfortable with a moral code